Jennie was thrown back on what Bob had repeated so often: "You’re the other half of me; I’m the other half of you." Whether it came through some impulse of affinity, or whether it was the chance of conscientiously living together, Jennie wasn’t sure; but it began to seem as if in the mere fact of marriage there was a naturally unifying principle. To go against it was, in a measure, to go against the forces of the universe; and though she had only been nominally married to Bob, she was preparing to go against it. Had she been a rebel at heart, it would have been easier; but she was docile, loving, eager to be loved, with nothing more daring in her soul than the wish to live at peace with the world she saw round her. Bob’s letters were disturbing, too. In the way of a happy future, he took everything for granted. He reasoned as if, now that they had gone through a certain form together and signed it with a parson’s name, she had no more liberty of will than a woman in a harem. Little as she was rebellious, she rebelled against that, preferring an element of chance in her love to a love in which there was no choice. Bob wrote as if her love was of no importance, as if he could love enough for two—did, in fact, love enough for two—so that the whole need of loving was taken off her hands. I feel, as if my love was the air and you were a plant to grow in it. It’s the sunshine to which your leaves and blossoms will only have to turn. "That’s all very well for him," she said, falling back with a grimace on the language Gussie brought home with her from vaudeville shows, "but I ain’t no blooming plant." Hubert’s love, she thought at other times, was like a rare and precious cordial, of which a few drops carefully doled out ran like fire through the veins. Bob’s was a rushing torrent which, without saying with your leave or by your leave, carried you away. She preferred the cordial, of which you could take up the glass and put it down according as you wanted less or more; but, on the other hand, when there was a flood which, without asking your permission, poured all over you, what were you to do? She knew what she meant to do; but it was the difficulty of doing it and facing that terrific tide which made her stand aghast. If Bob would only let her alone....