Our house of life

Here's another little portion of The Rosemary Tree by Elizabeth Goudge, that I liked a lot. I had all sorts of personal things in mind to write around it, but maybe I will just leave it here and readers can absorb it as they please. Mary has just discovered there is some unknown darkness in Michael's past, and this is the exchange that follows.

"I believe asking questions is fatal to—to—any sort of happy relationship. I try not to ask them even in my mind. I don’t mean that I don’t wonder about people and try to understand them, I do, but I never——". She paused, blushing hotly. She was sounding conceited and trite.

“We have a right to our own experience,” said Michael. “it’s part of our house of life. You don’t go into other people’s houses unless they invite you in.”

“No,” said Mary in a small voice. It struck her suddenly that that was an invitation that had never come her way. In the large turbulent family to which she belonged intimacy had been only of the physical sort. Their bodies had tumbled over each other in a constricted space, but the harassed parents had shown little of themselves to the children and invited no confidence in return. To have that sort of door opened to you by someone you loved, to go in, and thereafter for the same house of life to shelter two souls. Did that ever happen? Or was it like the contact she longed for, a happiness achieved so rarely that she could scarcely hope for it? If it could happen, as the fruit of much patience and selflessness, then it might be one of the best things life had to offer.”

“But no one can be expected to build a friendship in a vacuum,” said Michael, smiling. “There must be a few facts to make some sort of scaffolding.” He paused and she could feel by the unease in her own body how difficult it was for him to go on. Then he plunged jerkily and curtly into it ...