The dentist might or might not possess
them, it was all one with Trina. She loved him because she had given
herself to him freely, unreservedly; had merged her individuality into
his; she was his, she belonged to him forever and forever. Nothing that
he could do (so she told herself), nothing that she herself could do,
could change her in this respect. McTeague might cease to love her,
might leave her, might even die; it would be all the same, SHE WAS HIS.
But it had not been so at first. During those long, rainy days of the
fall, days when Trina was left alone for hours, at that time when the
excitement and novelty of the honeymoon were dying down, when the new
household was settling into its grooves, she passed through many an hour
of misgiving, of doubt, and even of actual regret.
Never would she forget one Sunday afternoon in particular. She had been
married but three weeks. After dinner she and little Miss Baker had gone
for a bit of a walk to take advantage of an hour's sunshine and to look
at some wonderful geraniums in a florist's window on Sutter Street. They
had been caught in a shower, and on returning to the flat the little
dressmaker had insisted on fetching Trina up to her tiny room and
brewing her a cup of strong tea, "to take the chill off.
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