"You know how I hate that sort of show," he answered. "I've always avoided social functions. They don't interest me." "Very well," she said. "Then I must decline the invitation." He swung round on her quickly and caught her up in his arms and held her tightly, muttering against her lips, and punctuating the words with kisses. "Decline it... yes... I can't let the world--any one--come between you and me. Why should you want interests apart from your home? Your home is here, little one, in the depths of my heart." She felt his heart thumping against his chest, beating hard and fast as the heart of some one labouring under great excitement; she heard his breath escaping in quick deep gasps, and saw the passionate ardour which burned in his eyes; and she gave way, yielding her will to his stronger will, reluctantly, but with a growing sense of the futility of striving against him any longer. He silenced her protests with kisses, holding her head against his shoulder and keeping his lips on hers. Book 3--CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE. For a time Hallam kept the social world at arm's length, and continued to monopolise his wife, and to persuade himself that she needed nothing beyond his love to make life perfect for her, as it was for him. But Esme's more active temperament was not satisfied with the exclusion of every outside influence; and she chafed frequently at the monotony of her life, its gradually narrowing limits. Hallam was a bookworm: he spent much of his time in reading. When he was among his books she longed to go out and amuse herself in the ordinary way as she had done before her marriage; but if she went without consulting him he worried at her absence; when she mentioned that she was going he always laid aside his reading and accompanied her. There were times when this amused her; there were other times when she felt merely exasperated. It became very clear to her that she would be obliged to make some stand or she would cease to have any life of her own at all. She decided to take up tennis again; and joined the public courts on the advice of a woman with whom she was becoming intimately friendly, and who, despite Hallam's lack of response, continued to call and to bring her husband with her on occasions.