p at all. How different, indeed? From
what Cowperwood had said in Chicago she had fancied that when they took
up their formal abode in New York he would make an attempt to
straighten out his life somewhat, to modify the number of his
indifferent amours and to present an illusion of solidarity and unity.
Yet, now that they had actually arrived, she noticed that he was more
concerned with his heightened political and financial complications in
Illinois and with his art-collection than he was with what might happen
to be going on in the new home or what could be made to happen there.
As in the days of old, she was constantly puzzled by his persistent
evenings out and his sudden appearances and disappearances. Yet,
determine as she might, rage secretly or openly as she would, she could
not cure herself of the infection of Cowperwood, the lure that
surrounded and substantiated a mind and spirit far greater than any
other she had ever known. Neither honor, virtue, consistent charity,
nor sympathy was there, but only a gay, foamy, unterrified sufficiency
and a creative, constructive sense of beauty that, like sunlit spray,
glowing with all the irradiative glories of the morning, danced and
fled, spun driftwise over a heavy sea of circumstance. Life, however
dark and somber, could never apparently cloud his soul. Brooding and
idling in the wonder palace of his construction, Aileen could see what
he was like. The silver fountain in the court of orchids, the
peach-like glow of the pink marble chamber, with its birds and flowers,
the serried brilliance of his amazing art-collections were all like
him, were really the color of his soul. To think that after all she
was not the one to bind him to subjection, to hold him by golden yet
steely threads of fancy to the hem of her garment! To think that he
should no longer walk, a slave of his desire, behind the chariot of her
spiritual and physical superiority. Yet she could not give up.

By this time Cowperwood had managed through infinite tact and a stoic
disregard of his own aches and pains to re-establish at least a
temporary working arrangement with the Carter household. To Mrs.
Carter he was still a Heaven-sent son of light. Actually in a mournful
way she pleaded for Cowperwood, vouching for his disinterestedness and
long-standing generosity. Berenice, on the other hand, was swept
between her craving for a great state for herself--luxury, power--and
her desire to conform t