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In her autobiography, A Backward Glance, she celebrates the passion shared with her husband for travel and dogs. But she never mentions Teddy Wharton’s bouts of depression or the fact that her own romantic life had moved outside the marriage before she finally divorced him after 28 years. He knelt by the bed and bent over her, draining their last moment to itslees; and in the silence there passed between them the word which madeall clear. It was this moment of love, this fleeting victory over themselves, whichhad kept them from atrophy and extinction; which, in her, had reached outto him in every struggle against the influence of her surroundings, andin him, had kept alive the faith that now drew him penitent andreconciled to her side. He put it from him with sudden loathing, and setting his lips, addressedhimself resolutely to what remained of his task. After all, that taskwould be easier to perform, now that his personal stake in it wasannulled.
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The poor little working-girl who had found strength to gather up thefragments of her life, and build herself a shelter with them, seemed toLily to have reached the central truth of existence. It was a meagreenough life, on the grim edge of poverty, with scant margin forpossibilities of sickness or mischance, but it had the frail audaciouspermanence of a bird’s nest built on the edge of a cliff—a mere wisp ofleaves and straw, yet so put together that the lives entrusted to it mayhang safely over the abyss. Lily, instead of answering, rose with a smile and held out her arms; andthe mother, understanding the gesture, laid her child in them. Lily’s eyes did not falter, but a look of wonder, of puzzledself-interrogation, formed itself slowly in their depths. In the light ofhis question, she had paused to ask herself if her decision had reallybeen taken when she entered the room.
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It would be difficult to follow her there, andstill more difficult, should he do so, to contrive the opportunity for aprivate word; and he had almost decided on the unsatisfactory alternativeof writing, when the ceaseless diorama of the square suddenly unrolledbefore him the figures of Lord Hubert and Mrs. Bry. Her heart was beating all over her body—in her throat,her limbs, her helpless useless hands. Her eyes travelled despairinglyabout the room—they lit on the bell, and she remembered that help was incall. It was enough that the servants knew her tobe in the house with Trenor—there must be nothing to excite conjecturein her way of leaving it.
Also by Edith Wharton
He wrote briefly that an importantcase called him to Albany, whence he would be unable to return till theevening, and asked Lily to let him know at what hour on the following dayshe would see him. Suddenly she raised her eyes with the beseeching earnestness of a child.“You never speak to me—you think hard things of me,” she murmured. She felt that the moment was tremendous, and remembered suddenly thatMrs. Peniston’s black brocade, with the cut jet fringe, would have beenhers at the end of the season. Do you mean to tell methat, with Lily’s looks and advantages, she could find no better use forher time than to waste it on a fat stupid man almost old enough to be herfather?
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He turned and looked about him, sternly compelling himself to regain hisconsciousness of outward things. The shabby chest of drawers was spread with a lace cover, and setout with a few gold-topped boxes and bottles, a rose-colouredpin-cushion, a glass tray strewn with tortoise-shell hair-pins—he shrankfrom the poignant intimacy of these trifles, and from the blank surfaceof the toilet-mirror above them. He had dropped on his knees beside the bed, but a touch from Gertyaroused him. He stood up, and as their eyes met he was struck by theextraordinary light in his cousin’s face. He stood looking down onthe sleeping face which seemed to lie like a delicate impalpable maskover the living lineaments he had known.
Brief Biography of Edith Wharton
These people whom she had ridiculedand yet envied were glad to make a place for her in the charmed circleabout which all her desires revolved. They were not as brutal andself-engrossed as she had fancied—or rather, since it would no longer benecessary to flatter and humour them, that side of their nature becameless conspicuous. Society is a revolving body which is apt to be judgedaccording to its place in each man’s heaven; and at present it wasturning its illuminated face to Lily. The next three days demonstrated to her own complete satisfaction MissBart’s ability to manage her affairs without extraneous aid. Mrs. Peniston was Mr. Bart’s widowed sister, and if she was by no meansthe richest of the family group, its other members nevertheless aboundedin reasons why she was clearly destined by Providence to assume thecharge of Lily. In the first place she was alone, and it would becharming for her to have a young companion.
Not wishing to be the means of effecting this enlargement, Lily quicklytransferred her glance to Trenor, to whom the expression of her gratitudeseemed not to have brought the complete gratification she had meant it togive. She had found it reassuringly easy to keep Trenor in a good humour. Tolisten to his stories, to receive his confidences and laugh at his jokes,seemed for the moment all that was required of her, and the complacencywith which her hostess regarded these attentions freed them of the leasthint of ambiguity. Mrs. Trenor evidently assumed that Lily’s growingintimacy with her husband was simply an indirect way of returning her ownkindness.
In the meantime, after eating at his cousin Gerty Farish’s, Selden goes to Carry Fisher’s to look for Lily. When he hears that she has already left, he decides to go for a walk. Ned Van Alstyne accompanies him and, when the two men approach the Trenors’ house, they see Lily walk out and leave Gus behind. Believing that Lily is having an affair with Gus, Selden abruptly leaves, angry and hurt.
One day, Mrs. Haffen, the cleaning woman at the Benedick, where Selden lives, comes to Lily’s house with a packet of love letters that she believes Lily has written to Selden. However, when Lily examines the letters, she recognizes Bertha Dorset’s handwriting and decides to buy the letters to protect Selden’s reputation. Although Lily initially plans on destroying them right away, she remembers Bertha’s cruel behavior toward her and decides to keep the letters instead. The knowledge of these letters makes Lily feel like she has power over Bertha, and allows Lily to renew her friendship with her.
Despite the efforts of both Carry and Farish, Lily rapidly descends through the social strata of New York City's high society. She obtains a job as personal secretary of Mrs. Hatch, a disreputable woman who very nearly succeeds in marrying a wealthy young man in Lily's former social circle. It is during this occupation she is introduced to the use of chloral hydrate, sold in drugstores, as a remedy for malaise. She resigns her position after Hatch blames her for the failure of her engagement. Lily then finds a job in a milliner's shop; unaccustomed to the rigors of working-class manual labor, her rate of production is low, and the quality of her workmanship is poor, exacerbated by her increased use of the drug. She is fired at the end of the New York social season, when the demand for fashionable hats has diminished.
Gerty learned that whatever sympathyher friend’s case might have excited a few months since had beenimperilled, if not lost, by her association with Mrs. Hatch. Once again,Lily had withdrawn from an ambiguous situation in time to save herself-respect, but too late for public vindication. It wasa relief to those who had hung back from her to find themselves thusjustified, and they were inclined to insist a little on her connectionwith the Hatch case in order to show that they had been right. When Lily woke on the morning after her translation to the EmporiumHotel, her first feeling was one of purely physical satisfaction. Theforce of contrast gave an added keenness to the luxury of lying once morein a soft-pillowed bed, and looking across a spacious sunlit room at abreakfast-table set invitingly near the fire. As became persons of their rising consequence, the Gormers were engagedin building a country-house on Long Island; and it was a part of MissBart’s duty to attend her hostess on frequent visits of inspection to thenew estate.
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