One thing became clear to him that night, they could not afford two
rooms. They must get along with one, and with the dollar and a half one
at that. The steam-radiator had proved a farce, anyway--there was never
any steam, and they had had to use gas-heaters. And now, what things
Corydon could not get into his room, she would have to send back to her
parents. The cost of the other room was the price of a book-review, and
that sometimes meant a whole day of his precious time.
He talked it over with his wife, and she agreed with him. And so they
underwent the humiliation of telling their landlady, and they obtained
permission to keep Corydon’s trunk in the hall, as there was no place
for it in the tiny room. Such things as would not go upon the little
dressing-stand, or hang behind the door, they put into boxes and shoved
under the bed. And now, when midnight came, Thyrsis would go out for a
walk while Corydon went to bed; and then he would come in and make his
own bed upon the floor, with a quilt which the landlady had given them,
and a pair of blankets they had borrowed from home, and his overcoat and
some of Corydon’s skirts when it was cold. Sometimes it would be very
cold, and then he would have to sleep in his clothing; for there was no
room save directly under the window, and they would not sleep with the
window down. In the morning Corydon would turn her face to the wall
while Thyrsis washed and dressed; and then he would go out and walk,
while she took her turn.
And so he parted with the last shred of his isolation. He had to do all
his work now with his wife in the room with him. And though she would
sit as still as a mouse for hours, still he could not think as before;
also, when she was worn out at night, he had to stop work and let
her sleep. Under such circumstances it was small wonder that he was
sometimes nervous and irritable; and, of course, there could be nothing
hid between them, and when he was out of sorts, Corydon would be plunged
into a bottomless pit of melancholy.
Then the strain and worry, and the night and day toil, began to have
effects upon their health. Thyrsis had a strong constitution, but now he
began to have headaches, and sometimes, if he worked on doggedly, they
grew severe. He blamed this upon their heater; he knew little about
hygiene, but he had studied physics, and he knew that a gas-heater
devitalized the air. They had tried living in the room without heat, but
in mid-winter they could not stand it. So on moderate days they would
sit with the window up and their overcoats on; and when it was too cold
for this, they would burn the heater for an hour or so, and when they
began to feel the effects of the poisons, they would go out and walk for
a while and let the room air.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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