But perhaps the most amazing circumstance in this peculiar episode was the speed with which Elizabeth once more evacuated the old familiar Hindenburg Line, and reoccupied the most advanced positions of Sexual Freedom. But, of course, she did so with a difference. Though she wouldn’t admit it even to herself, and though George tried not to see it, in her case the Triumphal Scheme had broken down badly under its first stern test. Directly that test had come, she had fallen back in panic on the old cut-and-dried solution; she hadn’t had the courage to go through with it. In a way one could excuse her by saying that the interior trouble had temporarily deranged her brain, that she wasn’t really responsible for her actions. But that’s only a quibble—the fact remains that she did fly in a panic to social safety and the registrar. And then the legal tie introduced a subtle difference in their relation. You may say, of course, that it needn’t, that since they continued to live in exactly the same way and to profess exactly the same attitude towards each other and “freedom,” it made no difference whether they were legally married or not. But it did. And it does. You can see that perfectly well if you watch people. Somehow the mere fact of marriage introduces the sense of possession, and hence jealousy. Lovers, of course, may be and frequently are just as possessive and quite as jealous. But there is a difference. As a rule lovers are not first occupants, so to speak; and they are generally willing to grant each other more liberty and to “forgive.” But you will see married people who have become totally indifferent to each other, rise in a fury of possessiveness and jealousy when they happen to find out that the wife or husband, as the case may be, is in love with some one else. This, indeed may be only another aspect of that peculiar vindictiveness bred by marriage. And another curious modification of their relationship arose. When Elizabeth reoccupied the Sexual Freedom line, without knowing it she did so for herself alone, and not for George. If George liked to accept the subsequent Elizabeth-Reggie affair, in accordance with the provisions of the Triumphal Scheme, all well and good; that was his lookout. But when it came to Elizabeth’s accepting the Fanny-George affair in the same spirit, that was a very different matter. Elizabeth now felt somehow responsible for George, and feeling responsible translated itself into keeping possession of....