"THE VOYAGE OUT (1915)\n\n\nby Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)\n\n\n\nChapter I\n\n\nAs the streets that lead from the Strand to the Embankment are very\nnarrow, it is better not to walk down them arm-in-arm. If you persist,\nlawyers' clerks will have to make flying leaps into the mud; young lady\ntypists will have to fidget behind you. In the streets of London where\nbeauty goes unregarded, eccentricity must pay the penalty, and it is\nbetter not to be very tall, to wear a long blue cloak, or to beat the\nair with your left hand.\n\nOne afternoon in the beginning of October when the traffic was becoming\nbrisk a tall man strode along the edge of the pavement with a lady on\nhis arm. Angry glances struck upon their backs. The small, agitated\nfigures--for in comparison with this couple most people looked\nsmall--decorated with fountain pens, and burdened with despatch-boxes,\nhad appointments to keep, and drew a weekly salary, so that there\nwas some reason for the unfriendly stare which was bestowed upon Mr.\nAmbrose's height and upon Mrs. Ambrose's cloak. But some enchantment had\nput both man and woman beyond the reach of malice and unpopularity. In\nhis guess one might guess from the moving lips that it was thought; and\nin hers from the eyes fixed stonily straight in front of her at a level\nabove the eyes of most that it was sorrow. It was only by scorning all\nshe met that she kept herself from tears, and the friction of people\nbrushing past her was evidently painful. After watching the traffic on\nthe Embankment for a minute or two with a stoical gaze she twitched her\nhusband's sleeve, and they crossed between the swift discharge of motor\ncars. When they were safe on the further side, she gently withdrew her\narm from his, allowing her mouth at the same time to relax, to tremble;\nthen tears rolled down, and leaning her elbows on the balustrade, she\nshielded her face from the curious. Mr. Ambrose attempted consolation;\nhe patted her shoulder; but she showed no signs of admitting him, and\nfeeling it awkward to stand beside a grief that was greater than his, he\ncrossed his arms behind him, and took a turn along the pavement.\n\nThe embankment juts out in angles here and there, like pulpits; instead\nof preachers, however, small boys occupy them, dangling string, dropping\npebbles, or launching wads of paper for a cruise. With their sharp eye\nfor eccentricity, they were inclined to think Mr. Ambrose awful; but\nthe quickest witted cried \"Bluebeard!\" as he passed. In case they should\nproceed to tease his wife, Mr. Ambrose flourished his stick at them,\nupon which they decided that he was grotesque merely, and four instead\nof one cried \"Bluebeard!\" in chorus.\n\nAlthough Mrs. Ambrose stood quite still, much longer than is natural,\nthe little boys let her be. Some one is always looking into the river\nnear Waterloo Bridge; a couple will stand there talking for half an hour\non a fine afternoon; most people, walking for pleasure, contemplate for\nthree minutes; when, having compared the occasion with other occasions,\nor made some sentence, they pass on. Sometimes the flats and churches\nand hotels of Westminster are like the outlines of Constantinople in a\nmist; sometimes the river is an opulent purple, sometimes mud-coloured,\nsometimes sparkling blue like the sea. It is always worth while to look\ndown and see what is happening. But this lady looked neither up nor\ndown; the only thing she had seen, since she stood there, was a circular\niridescent patch slowly floating past with a straw in the middle of it.\nThe straw and the patch swam again and again behind the tremulous medium\nof a great welling tear, and the tear rose and fell and dropped into the\nriver. Then there struck close upon her ears--\n\n     Lars Porsena of Clusium\n     By the nine Gods he swore--\n\nand then more faintly, as if the speaker had passed her on his walk--\n\n     That the Great House of Tarquin\n     Should suffer wrong no more.\n\nYes, she knew she must go back to all that, but at present she must\nweep. Screening her face she sobbed more steadily than she had yet done,\nher shoulders rising and falling with great regularity. It was this\nfigure that her husband saw when, having reached the polished Sphinx,\nhaving entangled himself with a man selling picture postcards, he\nturned; the stanza instantly stopped. He came up to her, laid his hand\non her shoulder, and said, \"Dearest.\" His voice was supplicating. But\nshe shut her face away from him, as much as to say, \"You can't possibly\nunderstand.\"\n\nAs he did not leave her, however, she had to wipe her eyes, and to raise\nthem to the level of the factory chimneys on the other bank. She saw\nalso the arches of Waterloo Bridge and the carts moving across them,\nlike the line of animals in a shooting gallery. They were seen blankly,\nbut to see anything was of course to end her weeping and begin to walk.\n\n\"I would rather walk,\" she said, her husband having hailed a cab already\noccupied by two city men.\n\nThe fixity of her mood was broken by the action of walking. The shooting\nmotor cars, more like spiders in the moon than terrestrial objects, the\nthundering drays, the jingling hansoms, and little black broughams,\nmade her think of the world she lived in. Somewhere up there above the\npinnacles where the smoke rose in a pointed hill, her children were\nnow asking for her, and getting a soothing reply. As for the mass of\nstreets, squares, and public buildings which parted them, she only felt\nat this moment how little London had done to make her love it, although\nthirty of her forty years had been spent in a street. She knew how\nto read the people who were passing her; there were the rich who were\nrunning to and from each others' houses at this hour; there were the\nbigoted workers driving in a straight line to their offices; there were\nthe poor who were unhappy and rightly malignant. Already, though there\nwas sunlight in the haze, tattered old men and women were nodding off\nto sleep upon the seats. When one gave up seeing the beauty that clothed\nthings, this was the skeleton beneath.\n\nA fine rain now made her still more dismal; vans with the odd names\nof those engaged in odd industries--Sprules, Manufacturer of Saw-dust;\nGrabb, to whom no piece of waste paper comes amiss--fell flat as a bad\njoke; bold lovers, sheltered behind one cloak, seemed to her sordid,\npast their passion; the flower women, a contented company, whose talk\nis always worth hearing, were sodden hags; the red, yellow, and blue\nflowers, whose heads were pressed together, would not blaze. Moreover,\nher husband walking with a quick rhythmic stride, jerking his free hand\noccasionally, was either a Viking or a stricken Nelson; the sea-gulls\nhad changed his note.\n\n\"Ridley, shall we drive? Shall we drive, Ridley?\"\n\nMrs. Ambrose had to speak sharply; by this time he was far away.\n\nThe cab, by trotting steadily along the same road, soon withdrew them\nfrom the West End, and plunged them into London. It appeared that this\nwas a great manufacturing place, where the people were engaged in\nmaking things, as though the West End, with its electric lamps, its vast\nplate-glass windows all shining yellow, its carefully-finished houses,\nand tiny live figures trotting on the pavement, or bowled along on\nwheels in the road, was the finished work. It appeared to her a very\nsmall bit of work for such an enormous factory to have made. For some\nreason it appeared to her as a small golden tassel on the edge of a vast\nblack cloak.\n\nObserving that they passed no other hansom cab, but only vans and\nwaggons, and that not one of the thousand men and women she saw was\neither a gentleman or a lady, Mrs. Ambrose understood that after all\nit is the ordinary thing to be poor, and that London is the city of\ninnumerable poor people. Startled by this discovery and seeing herself\npacing a circle all the days of her life round Picadilly Circus she was\ngreatly relieved to pass a building put up by the London County Council\nfor Night Schools.\n\n\"Lord, how gloomy it is!\" her husband groaned. \"Poor creatures!\"\n\nWhat with the misery for her children, the poor, and the rain, her mind\nwas like a wound exposed to dry in the air.\n\nAt this point the cab stopped, for it was in danger of being crushed\nlike an egg-shell. The wide Embankment which had had room for\ncannonballs and squadrons, had now shrunk to a cobbled lane steaming\nwith smells of malt and oil and blocked by waggons. While her husband\nread the placards pasted on the brick announcing the hours at which\ncertain ships would sail for Scotland, Mrs. Ambrose did her best to find\ninformation. From a world exclusively occupied in feeding waggons with\nsacks, half obliterated too in a fine yellow fog, they got neither help\nnor attention. It seemed a miracle when an old man approached, guessed\ntheir condition, and proposed to row them out to their ship in the\nlittle boat which he kept moored at the bottom of a flight of steps.\nWith some hesitation they trusted themselves to him, took their places,\nand were soon waving up and down upon the water, London having shrunk\nto two lines of buildings on either side of them, square buildings and\noblong buildings placed in rows like a child's avenue of bricks.\n\nThe river, which had a certain amount of troubled yellow light in it,\nran with great force; bulky barges floated down swiftly escorted by\ntugs; police boats shot past everything; the wind went with the current.\nThe open rowing-boat in which they sat bobbed and curtseyed across the\nline of traffic. In mid-stream the old man stayed his hands upon the\noars, and as the water rushed past them, remarked that once he had taken\nmany passengers across, where now he took scarcely any. He seemed to\nrecall an age when his boat, moored among rushes, carried delicate feet\nacross to lawns at Rotherhithe.\n\n\"They want bridges now,\" he said, indicating the monstrous outline of\nthe Tower Bridge. Mournfully Helen regarded him, who was putting water\nbetween her and her children. Mournfully she gazed at the ship they were\napproaching; anchored in the middle of the stream they could dimly read\nher name--_Euphrosyne_.\n\nVery dimly in the falling dusk they could see the lines of the rigging,\nthe masts and the dark flag which the breeze blew out squarely behind.\n\nAs the little boat sidled up to the steamer, and the old man shipped\nhis oars, he remarked once more pointing above, that ships all the\nworld over flew that flag the day they sailed. In the minds of both the\npassengers the blue flag appeared a sinister token, and this the moment\nfor presentiments, but nevertheless they rose, gathered their things\ntogether, and climbed on deck.\n\nDown in the saloon of her father's ship, Miss Rachel Vinrace, aged\ntwenty-four, stood waiting her uncle and aunt nervously. To begin with,\nthough nearly related, she scarcely remembered them; to go on with, they\nwere elderly people, and finally, as her father's daughter she must be\nin some sort prepared to entertain them. She looked forward to seeing\nthem as civilised people generally look forward to the first sight of\ncivilised people, as though they were of the nature of an approaching\nphysical discomfort--a tight shoe or a draughty window. She was already\nunnaturally braced to receive them. As she occupied herself in laying\nforks severely straight by the side of knives, she heard a man's voice\nsaying gloomily:\n\n\"On a dark night one would fall down these stairs head foremost,\" to\nwhich a woman's voice added, \"And be killed.\"\n\nAs she spoke the last words the woman stood in the doorway. Tall,\nlarge-eyed, draped in purple shawls, Mrs. Ambrose was romantic and\nbeautiful; not perhaps sympathetic, for her eyes looked straight and\nconsidered what they saw. Her face was much warmer than a Greek face;\non the other hand it was much bolder than the face of the usual pretty\nEnglishwoman.\n\n\"Oh, Rachel, how d'you do,\" she said, shaking hands.\n\n\"How are you, dear,\" said Mr. Ambrose, inclining his forehead to be\nkissed. His niece instinctively liked his thin angular body, and the big\nhead with its sweeping features, and the acute, innocent eyes.\n\n\"Tell Mr. Pepper,\" Rachel bade the servant. Husband and wife then sat\ndown on one side of the table, with their niece opposite to them.\n\n\"My father told me to begin,\" she explained. \"He is very busy with the\nmen. . . . You know Mr. Pepper?\"\n\nA little man who was bent as some trees are by a gale on one side of\nthem had slipped in. Nodding to Mr. Ambrose, he shook hands with Helen.\n\n\"Draughts,\" he said, erecting the collar of his coat.\n\n\"You are still rheumatic?\" asked Helen. Her voice was low and seductive,\nthough she spoke absently enough, the sight of town and river being\nstill present to her mind.\n\n\"Once rheumatic, always rheumatic, I fear,\" he replied. \"To some extent\nit depends on the weather, though not so much as people are apt to\nthink.\"\n\n\"One does not die of it, at any rate,\" said Helen.\n\n\"As a general rule--no,\" said Mr. Pepper.\n\n\"Soup, Uncle Ridley?\" asked Rachel.\n\n\"Thank you, dear,\" he said, and, as he held his plate out, sighed\naudibly, \"Ah! she's not like her mother.\" Helen was just too late in\nthumping her tumbler on the table to prevent Rachel from hearing, and\nfrom blushing scarlet with embarrassment.\n\n\"The way servants treat flowers!\" she said hastily. She drew a green\nvase with a crinkled lip towards her, and began pulling out the tight\nlittle chrysanthemums, which she laid on the table-cloth, arranging them\nfastidiously side by side.\n\nThere was a pause.\n\n\"You knew Jenkinson, didn't you, Ambrose?\" asked Mr. Pepper across the\ntable.\n\n\"Jenkinson of Peterhouse?\"\n\n\"He's dead,\" said Mr. Pepper.\n\n\"Ah, dear!--I knew him--ages ago,\" said Ridley. \"He was the hero of the\npunt accident, you remember? A queer card. Married a young woman out of\na tobacconist's, and lived in the Fens--never heard what became of him.\"\n\n\"Drink--drugs,\" said Mr. Pepper with sinister conciseness. \"He left a\ncommentary. Hopeless muddle, I'm told.\"\n\n\"The man had really great abilities,\" said Ridley.\n\n\"His introduction to Jellaby holds its own still,\" went on Mr. Pepper,\n\"which is surprising, seeing how text-books change.\"\n\n\"There was a theory about the planets, wasn't there?\" asked Ridley.\n\n\"A screw loose somewhere, no doubt of it,\" said Mr. Pepper, shaking his\nhead.\n\nNow a tremor ran through the table, and a light outside swerved. At the\nsame time an electric bell rang sharply again and again.\n\n\"We're off,\" said Ridley.\n\nA slight but perceptible wave seemed to roll beneath the floor; then it\nsank; then another came, more perceptible. Lights slid right across the\nuncurtained window. The ship gave a loud melancholy moan.\n\n\"We're off!\" said Mr. Pepper. Other ships, as sad as she, answered\nher outside on the river. The chuckling and hissing of water could be\nplainly heard, and the ship heaved so that the steward bringing plates\nhad to balance himself as he drew the curtain. There was a pause.\n\n\"Jenkinson of Cats--d'you still keep up with him?\" asked Ambrose.\n\n\"As much as one ever does,\" said Mr. Pepper. \"We meet annually. This\nyear he has had the misfortune to lose his wife, which made it painful,\nof course.\"\n\n\"Very painful,\" Ridley agreed.\n\n\"There's an unmarried daughter who keeps house for him, I believe, but\nit's never the same, not at his age.\"\n\nBoth gentlemen nodded sagely as they carved their apples.\n\n\"There was a book, wasn't there?\" Ridley enquired.\n\n\"There _was_ a book, but there never _will_ be a book,\" said Mr. Pepper\nwith such fierceness that both ladies looked up at him.\n\n\"There never will be a book, because some one else has written it for\nhim,\" said Mr. Pepper with considerable acidity. \"That's what comes of\nputting things off, and collecting fossils, and sticking Norman arches\non one's pigsties.\"\n\n\"I confess I sympathise,\" said Ridley with a melancholy sigh. \"I have a\nweakness for people who can't begin.\"\n\n\". . . The accumulations of a lifetime wasted,\" continued Mr. pepper.\n\"He had accumulations enough to fill a barn.\"\n\n\"It's a vice that some of us escape,\" said Ridley. \"Our friend Miles has\nanother work out to-day.\"\n\nMr. Pepper gave an acid little laugh. \"According to my calculations,\" he\nsaid, \"he has produced two volumes and a half annually, which,\nallowing for time spent in the cradle and so forth, shows a commendable\nindustry.\"\n\n\"Yes, the old Master's saying of him has been pretty well realised,\"\nsaid Ridley.\n\n\"A way they had,\" said Mr. Pepper. \"You know the Bruce collection?--not\nfor publication, of course.\"\n\n\"I should suppose not,\" said Ridley significantly. \"For a Divine he\nwas--remarkably free.\"\n\n\"The Pump in Neville's Row, for example?\" enquired Mr. Pepper.\n\n\"Precisely,\" said Ambrose.\n\nEach of the ladies, being after the fashion of their sex, highly trained\nin promoting men's talk without listening to it, could think--about the\neducation of children, about the use of fog sirens in an opera--without\nbetraying herself. Only it struck Helen that Rachel was perhaps too\nstill for a hostess, and that she might have done something with her\nhands.\n\n\"Perhaps--?\" she said at length, upon which they rose and left, vaguely\nto the surprise of the gentlemen, who had either thought them attentive\nor had forgotten their presence.\n\n\"Ah, one could tell strange stories of the old days,\" they heard Ridley\nsay, as he sank into his chair again. Glancing back, at the doorway,\nthey saw Mr. Pepper as though he had suddenly loosened his clothes, and\nhad become a vivacious and malicious old ape.\n\nWinding veils round their heads, the women walked on deck. They were\nnow moving steadily down the river, passing the dark shapes of ships\nat anchor, and London was a swarm of lights with a pale yellow canopy\ndrooping above it. There were the lights of the great theatres, the\nlights of the long streets, lights that indicated huge squares of\ndomestic comfort, lights that hung high in air. No darkness would\never settle upon those lamps, as no darkness had settled upon them for\nhundreds of years. It seemed dreadful that the town should blaze\nfor ever in the same spot; dreadful at least to people going away to\nadventure upon the sea, and beholding it as a circumscribed mound,\neternally burnt, eternally scarred. From the deck of the ship the great\ncity appeared a crouched and cowardly figure, a sedentary miser.\n\nLeaning over the rail, side by side, Helen said, \"Won't you be cold?\"\nRachel replied, \"No. . . . How beautiful!\" she added a moment later.\nVery little was visible--a few masts, a shadow of land here, a line of\nbrilliant windows there. They tried to make head against the wind.\n\n\"It blows--it blows!\" gasped Rachel, the words rammed down her throat.\nStruggling by her side, Helen was suddenly overcome by the spirit of\nmovement, and pushed along with her skirts wrapping themselves round\nher knees, and both arms to her hair. But slowly the intoxication of\nmovement died down, and the wind became rough and chilly. They looked\nthrough a chink in the blind and saw that long cigars were being smoked\nin the dining-room; they saw Mr. Ambrose throw himself violently against\nthe back of his chair, while Mr. Pepper crinkled his cheeks as though\nthey had been cut in wood. The ghost of a roar of laughter came out to\nthem, and was drowned at once in the wind. In the dry yellow-lighted\nroom Mr. Pepper and Mr. Ambrose were oblivious of all tumult; they were\nin Cambridge, and it was probably about the year 1875.\n\n\"They're old friends,\" said Helen, smiling at the sight. \"Now, is there\na room for us to sit in?\"\n\nRachel opened a door.\n\n\"It's more like a landing than a room,\" she said. Indeed it had nothing\nof the shut stationary character of a room on shore. A table was rooted\nin the middle, and seats were stuck to the sides. Happily the tropical\nsuns had bleached the tapestries to a faded blue-green colour, and the\nmirror with its frame of shells, the work of the steward's love, when\nthe time hung heavy in the southern seas, was quaint rather than\nugly. Twisted shells with red lips like unicorn's horns ornamented\nthe mantelpiece, which was draped by a pall of purple plush from which\ndepended a certain number of balls. Two windows opened on to the deck,\nand the light beating through them when the ship was roasted on the\nAmazons had turned the prints on the opposite wall to a faint yellow\ncolour, so that \"The Coliseum\" was scarcely to be distinguished from\nQueen Alexandra playing with her Spaniels. A pair of wicker arm-chairs\nby the fireside invited one to warm one's hands at a grate full of gilt\nshavings; a great lamp swung above the table--the kind of lamp which\nmakes the light of civilisation across dark fields to one walking in the\ncountry.\n\n\"It's odd that every one should be an old friend of Mr. Pepper's,\"\nRachel started nervously, for the situation was difficult, the room\ncold, and Helen curiously silent.\n\n\"I suppose you take him for granted?\" said her aunt.\n\n\"He's like this,\" said Rachel, lighting on a fossilised fish in a basin,\nand displaying it.\n\n\"I expect you're too severe,\" Helen remarked.\n\nRachel immediately tried to qualify what she had said against her\nbelief.\n\n\"I don't really know him,\" she said, and took refuge in facts, believing\nthat elderly people really like them better than feelings. She produced\nwhat she knew of William Pepper. She told Helen that he always called on\nSundays when they were at home; he knew about a great many things--about\nmathematics, history, Greek, zoology, economics, and the Icelandic\nSagas. He had turned Persian poetry into English prose, and English\nprose into Greek iambics; he was an authority upon coins; and--one other\nthing--oh yes, she thought it was vehicular traffic.\n\nHe was here either to get things out of the sea, or to write upon the\nprobable course of Odysseus, for Greek after all was his hobby.\n\n\"I've got all his pamphlets,\" she said. \"Little pamphlets. Little yellow\nbooks.\" It did not appear that she had read them.\n\n\"Has he ever been in love?\" asked Helen, who had chosen a seat.\n\nThis was unexpectedly to the point.\n\n\"His heart's a piece of old shoe leather,\" Rachel declared, dropping the\nfish. But when questioned she had to own that she had never asked him.\n\n\"I shall ask him,\" said Helen.\n\n\"The last time I saw you, you were buying a piano,\" she continued. \"Do\nyou remember--the piano, the room in the attic, and the great plants\nwith the prickles?\"\n\n\"Yes, and my aunts said the piano would come through the floor, but at\ntheir age one wouldn't mind being killed in the night?\" she enquired.\n\n\"I heard from Aunt Bessie not long ago,\" Helen stated. \"She is afraid\nthat you will spoil your arms if you insist upon so much practising.\"\n\n\"The muscles of the forearm--and then one won't marry?\"\n\n\"She didn't put it quite like that,\" replied Mrs. Ambrose.\n\n\"Oh, no--of course she wouldn't,\" said Rachel with a sigh.\n\nHelen looked at her. Her face was weak rather than decided, saved from\ninsipidity by the large enquiring eyes; denied beauty, now that she was\nsheltered indoors, by the lack of colour and definite outline. Moreover,\na hesitation in speaking, or rather a tendency to use the wrong words,\nmade her seem more than normally incompetent for her years. Mrs.\nAmbrose, who had been speaking much at random, now reflected that she\ncertainly did not look forward to the intimacy of three or four weeks\non board ship which was threatened. Women of her own age usually boring\nher, she supposed that girls would be worse. She glanced at Rachel\nagain. Yes! how clear it was that she would be vacillating, emotional,\nand when you said something to her it would make no more lasting\nimpression than the stroke of a stick upon water. There was nothing\nto take hold of in girls--nothing hard, permanent, satisfactory. Did\nWilloughby say three weeks, or did he say four? She tried to remember.\n\nAt this point, however, the door opened and a tall burly man entered\nthe room, came forward and shook Helen's hand with an emotional kind of\nheartiness, Willoughby himself, Rachel's father, Helen's brother-in-law.\nAs a great deal of flesh would have been needed to make a fat man of\nhim, his frame being so large, he was not fat; his face was a large\nframework too, looking, by the smallness of the features and the glow\nin the hollow of the cheek, more fitted to withstand assaults of the\nweather than to express sentiments and emotions, or to respond to them\nin others.\n\n\"It is a great pleasure that you have come,\" he said, \"for both of us.\"\n\nRachel murmured in obedience to her father's glance.\n\n\"We'll do our best to make you comfortable. And Ridley. We think it\nan honour to have charge of him. Pepper'll have some one to contradict\nhim--which I daren't do. You find this child grown, don't you? A young\nwoman, eh?\"\n\nStill holding Helen's hand he drew his arm round Rachel's shoulder, thus\nmaking them come uncomfortably close, but Helen forbore to look.\n\n\"You think she does us credit?\" he asked.\n\n\"Oh yes,\" said Helen.\n\n\"Because we expect great things of her,\" he continued, squeezing his\ndaughter's arm and releasing her. \"But about you now.\" They sat down\nside by side on the little sofa. \"Did you leave the children well?\nThey'll be ready for school, I suppose. Do they take after you or\nAmbrose? They've got good heads on their shoulders, I'll be bound?\"\n\nAt this Helen immediately brightened more than she had yet done, and\nexplained that her son was six and her daughter ten. Everybody said that\nher boy was like her and her girl like Ridley. As for brains, they were\nquick brats, she thought, and modestly she ventured on a little story\nabout her son,--how left alone for a minute he had taken the pat of\nbutter in his fingers, run across the room with it, and put it on\nthe fire--merely for the fun of the thing, a feeling which she could\nunderstand.\n\n\"And you had to show the young rascal that these tricks wouldn't do,\neh?\"\n\n\"A child of six? I don't think they matter.\"\n\n\"I'm an old-fashioned father.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, Willoughby; Rachel knows better.\"\n\nMuch as Willoughby would doubtless have liked his daughter to praise\nhim she did not; her eyes were unreflecting as water, her fingers still\ntoying with the fossilised fish, her mind absent. The elder people went\non to speak of arrangements that could be made for Ridley's comfort--a\ntable placed where he couldn't help looking at the sea, far from\nboilers, at the same time sheltered from the view of people passing.\nUnless he made this a holiday, when his books were all packed, he\nwould have no holiday whatever; for out at Santa Marina Helen knew, by\nexperience, that he would work all day; his boxes, she said, were packed\nwith books.\n\n\"Leave it to me--leave it to me!\" said Willoughby, obviously intending\nto do much more than she asked of him. But Ridley and Mr. Pepper were\nheard fumbling at the door.\n\n\"How are you, Vinrace?\" said Ridley, extending a limp hand as he came\nin, as though the meeting were melancholy to both, but on the whole more\nso to him.\n\nWilloughby preserved his heartiness, tempered by respect. For the moment\nnothing was said.\n\n\"We looked in and saw you laughing,\" Helen remarked. \"Mr. Pepper had\njust told a very good story.\"\n\n\"Pish. None of the stories were good,\" said her husband peevishly.\n\n\"Still a severe judge, Ridley?\" enquired Mr. Vinrace.\n\n\"We bored you so that you left,\" said Ridley, speaking directly to his\nwife.\n\nAs this was quite true Helen did not attempt to deny it, and her next\nremark, \"But didn't they improve after we'd gone?\" was unfortunate, for\nher husband answered with a droop of his shoulders, \"If possible they\ngot worse.\"\n\nThe situation was now one of considerable discomfort for every one\nconcerned, as was proved by a long interval of constraint and silence.\nMr. Pepper, indeed, created a diversion of a kind by leaping on to his\nseat, both feet tucked under him, with the action of a spinster who\ndetects a mouse, as the draught struck at his ankles. Drawn up there,\nsucking at his cigar, with his arms encircling his knees, he looked\nlike the image of Buddha, and from this elevation began a discourse,\naddressed to nobody, for nobody had called for it, upon the unplumbed\ndepths of ocean. He professed himself surprised to learn that although\nMr. Vinrace possessed ten ships, regularly plying between London and\nBuenos Aires, not one of them was bidden to investigate the great white\nmonsters of the lower waters.\n\n\"No, no,\" laughed Willoughby, \"the monsters of the earth are too many\nfor me!\"\n\nRachel was heard to sigh, \"Poor little goats!\"\n\n\"If it weren't for the goats there'd be no music, my dear; music depends\nupon goats,\" said her father rather sharply, and Mr. Pepper went on to\ndescribe the white, hairless, blind monsters lying curled on the ridges\nof sand at the bottom of the sea, which would explode if you brought\nthem to the surface, their sides bursting asunder and scattering\nentrails to the winds when released from pressure, with considerable\ndetail and with such show of knowledge, that Ridley was disgusted, and\nbegged him to stop.\n\nFrom all this Helen drew her own conclusions, which were gloomy enough.\nPepper was a bore; Rachel was an unlicked girl, no doubt prolific of\nconfidences, the very first of which would be: \"You see, I don't get on\nwith my father.\" Willoughby, as usual, loved his business and built his\nEmpire, and between them all she would be considerably bored. Being a\nwoman of action, however, she rose, and said that for her part she was\ngoing to bed. At the door she glanced back instinctively at Rachel,\nexpecting that as two of the same sex they would leave the room\ntogether. Rachel rose, looked vaguely into Helen's face, and remarked\nwith her slight stammer, \"I'm going out to t-t-triumph in the wind.\"\n\nMrs. Ambrose's worst suspicions were confirmed; she went down the\npassage lurching from side to side, and fending off the wall now\nwith her right arm, now with her left; at each lurch she exclaimed\nemphatically, \"Damn!\"\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter II\n\n\nUncomfortable as the night, with its rocking movement, and salt smells,\nmay have been, and in one case undoubtedly was, for Mr. Pepper had\ninsufficient clothes upon his bed, the breakfast next morning wore a\nkind of beauty. The voyage had begun, and had begun happily with a soft\nblue sky, and a calm sea. The sense of untapped resources, things to say\nas yet unsaid, made the hour significant, so that in future years the\nentire journey perhaps would be represented by this one scene, with the\nsound of sirens hooting in the river the night before, somehow mixing\nin.\n\nThe table was cheerful with apples and bread and eggs. Helen handed\nWilloughby the butter, and as she did so cast her eye on him and\nreflected, \"And she married you, and she was happy, I suppose.\"\n\nShe went off on a familiar train of thought, leading on to all kinds\nof well-known reflections, from the old wonder, why Theresa had married\nWilloughby?\n\n\"Of course, one sees all that,\" she thought, meaning that one sees that\nhe is big and burly, and has a great booming voice, and a fist and a\nwill of his own; \"but--\" here she slipped into a fine analysis of him\nwhich is best represented by one word, \"sentimental,\" by which she meant\nthat he was never simple and honest about his feelings. For example, he\nseldom spoke of the dead, but kept anniversaries with singular pomp.\nShe suspected him of nameless atrocities with regard to his daughter, as\nindeed she had always suspected him of bullying his wife. Naturally she\nfell to comparing her own fortunes with the fortunes of her friend, for\nWilloughby's wife had been perhaps the one woman Helen called friend,\nand this comparison often made the staple of their talk. Ridley was a\nscholar, and Willoughby was a man of business. Ridley was bringing out\nthe third volume of Pindar when Willoughby was launching his first ship.\nThey built a new factory the very year the commentary on Aristotle--was\nit?--appeared at the University Press. \"And Rachel,\" she looked at\nher, meaning, no doubt, to decide the argument, which was otherwise too\nevenly balanced, by declaring that Rachel was not comparable to her\nown children. \"She really might be six years old,\" was all she said,\nhowever, this judgment referring to the smooth unmarked outline of the\ngirl's face, and not condemning her otherwise, for if Rachel were ever\nto think, feel, laugh, or express herself, instead of dropping milk\nfrom a height as though to see what kind of drops it made, she might be\ninteresting though never exactly pretty. She was like her mother, as the\nimage in a pool on a still summer's day is like the vivid flushed face\nthat hangs over it.\n\nMeanwhile Helen herself was under examination, though not from either of\nher victims. Mr. Pepper considered her; and his meditations, carried\non while he cut his toast into bars and neatly buttered them, took him\nthrough a considerable stretch of autobiography. One of his penetrating\nglances assured him that he was right last night in judging that Helen\nwas beautiful. Blandly he passed her the jam. She was talking nonsense,\nbut not worse nonsense than people usually do talk at breakfast, the\ncerebral circulation, as he knew to his cost, being apt to give trouble\nat that hour. He went on saying \"No\" to her, on principle, for he never\nyielded to a woman on account of her sex. And here, dropping his eyes\nto his plate, he became autobiographical. He had not married himself for\nthe sufficient reason that he had never met a woman who commanded his\nrespect. Condemned to pass the susceptible years of youth in a railway\nstation in Bombay, he had seen only coloured women, military women,\nofficial women; and his ideal was a woman who could read Greek, if not\nPersian, was irreproachably fair in the face, and able to understand the\nsmall things he let fall while undressing. As it was he had contracted\nhabits of which he was not in the least ashamed. Certain odd minutes\nevery day went to learning things by heart; he never took a ticket\nwithout noting the number; he devoted January to Petronius, February to\nCatullus, March to the Etruscan vases perhaps; anyhow he had done good\nwork in India, and there was nothing to regret in his life except the\nfundamental defects which no wise man regrets, when the present is still\nhis. So concluding he looked up suddenly and smiled. Rachel caught his\neye.\n\n\"And now you've chewed something thirty-seven times, I suppose?\" she\nthought, but said politely aloud, \"Are your legs troubling you to-day,\nMr. Pepper?\"\n\n\"My shoulder blades?\" he asked, shifting them painfully. \"Beauty has no\neffect upon uric acid that I'm aware of,\" he sighed, contemplating the\nround pane opposite, through which the sky and sea showed blue. At the\nsame time he took a little parchment volume from his pocket and laid it\non the table. As it was clear that he invited comment, Helen asked him\nthe name of it. She got the name; but she got also a disquisition upon\nthe proper method of making roads. Beginning with the Greeks, who\nhad, he said, many difficulties to contend with, he continued with the\nRomans, passed to England and the right method, which speedily became\nthe wrong method, and wound up with such a fury of denunciation\ndirected against the road-makers of the present day in general, and the\nroad-makers of Richmond Park in particular, where Mr. Pepper had the\nhabit of cycling every morning before breakfast, that the spoons fairly\njingled against the coffee cups, and the insides of at least four rolls\nmounted in a heap beside Mr. Pepper's plate.\n\n\"Pebbles!\" he concluded, viciously dropping another bread pellet upon\nthe heap. \"The roads of England are mended with pebbles! 'With the first\nheavy rainfall,' I've told 'em, 'your road will be a swamp.' Again and\nagain my words have proved true. But d'you suppose they listen to me\nwhen I tell 'em so, when I point out the consequences, the consequences\nto the public purse, when I recommend 'em to read Coryphaeus? No, Mrs.\nAmbrose, you will form no just opinion of the stupidity of mankind until\nyou have sat upon a Borough Council!\" The little man fixed her with a\nglance of ferocious energy.\n\n\"I have had servants,\" said Mrs. Ambrose, concentrating her gaze. \"At\nthis moment I have a nurse. She's a good woman as they go, but she's\ndetermined to make my children pray. So far, owing to great care on\nmy part, they think of God as a kind of walrus; but now that my back's\nturned--Ridley,\" she demanded, swinging round upon her husband, \"what\nshall we do if we find them saying the Lord's Prayer when we get home\nagain?\"\n\nRidley made the sound which is represented by \"Tush.\" But Willoughby,\nwhose discomfort as he listened was manifested by a slight movement\nrocking of his body, said awkwardly, \"Oh, surely, Helen, a little\nreligion hurts nobody.\"\n\n\"I would rather my children told lies,\" she replied, and while\nWilloughby was reflecting that his sister-in-law was even more eccentric\nthan he remembered, pushed her chair back and swept upstairs. In a\nsecond they heard her calling back, \"Oh, look! We're out at sea!\"\n\nThey followed her on to the deck. All the smoke and the houses had\ndisappeared, and the ship was out in a wide space of sea very fresh and\nclear though pale in the early light. They had left London sitting on\nits mud. A very thin line of shadow tapered on the horizon, scarcely\nthick enough to stand the burden of Paris, which nevertheless rested\nupon it. They were free of roads, free of mankind, and the same\nexhilaration at their freedom ran through them all. The ship was making\nher way steadily through small waves which slapped her and then fizzled\nlike effervescing water, leaving a little border of bubbles and foam on\neither side. The colourless October sky above was thinly clouded as if\nby the trail of wood-fire smoke, and the air was wonderfully salt and\nbrisk. Indeed it was too cold to stand still. Mrs. Ambrose drew her arm\nwithin her husband's, and as they moved off it could be seen from the\nway in which her sloping cheek turned up to his that she had something\nprivate to communicate. They went a few paces and Rachel saw them kiss.\n\nDown she looked into the depth of the sea. While it was slightly\ndisturbed on the surface by the passage of the _Euphrosyne_, beneath it\nwas green and dim, and it grew dimmer and dimmer until the sand at the\nbottom was only a pale blur. One could scarcely see the black ribs of\nwrecked ships, or the spiral towers made by the burrowings of great\neels, or the smooth green-sided monsters who came by flickering this way\nand that.\n\n--\"And, Rachel, if any one wants me, I'm busy till one,\" said her\nfather, enforcing his words as he often did, when he spoke to his\ndaughter, by a smart blow upon the shoulder.\n\n\"Until one,\" he repeated. \"And you'll find yourself some employment, eh?\nScales, French, a little German, eh? There's Mr. Pepper who knows more\nabout separable verbs than any man in Europe, eh?\" and he went off\nlaughing. Rachel laughed, too, as indeed she had laughed ever since she\ncould remember, without thinking it funny, but because she admired her\nfather.\n\nBut just as she was turning with a view perhaps to finding some\nemployment, she was intercepted by a woman who was so broad and so thick\nthat to be intercepted by her was inevitable. The discreet tentative way\nin which she moved, together with her sober black dress, showed that\nshe belonged to the lower orders; nevertheless she took up a rock-like\nposition, looking about her to see that no gentry were near before she\ndelivered her message, which had reference to the state of the sheets,\nand was of the utmost gravity.\n\n\"How ever we're to get through this voyage, Miss Rachel, I really can't\ntell,\" she began with a shake of her head. \"There's only just sheets\nenough to go round, and the master's has a rotten place you could\nput your fingers through. And the counterpanes. Did you notice the\ncounterpanes? I thought to myself a poor person would have been ashamed\nof them. The one I gave Mr. Pepper was hardly fit to cover a dog. . . .\nNo, Miss Rachel, they could _not_ be mended; they're only fit for dust\nsheets. Why, if one sewed one's finger to the bone, one would have one's\nwork undone the next time they went to the laundry.\"\n\nHer voice in its indignation wavered as if tears were near.\n\nThere was nothing for it but to descend and inspect a large pile of\nlinen heaped upon a table. Mrs. Chailey handled the sheets as if she\nknew each by name, character, and constitution. Some had yellow stains,\nothers had places where the threads made long ladders; but to the\nordinary eye they looked much as sheets usually do look, very chill,\nwhite, cold, and irreproachably clean.\n\nSuddenly Mrs. Chailey, turning from the subject of sheets, dismissing\nthem entirely, clenched her fists on the top of them, and proclaimed,\n\"And you couldn't ask a living creature to sit where I sit!\"\n\nMrs. Chailey was expected to sit in a cabin which was large enough,\nbut too near the boilers, so that after five minutes she could hear her\nheart \"go,\" she complained, putting her hand above it, which was a state\nof things that Mrs. Vinrace, Rachel's mother, would never have dreamt\nof inflicting--Mrs. Vinrace, who knew every sheet in her house, and\nexpected of every one the best they could do, but no more.\n\nIt was the easiest thing in the world to grant another room, and the\nproblem of sheets simultaneously and miraculously solved itself, the\nspots and ladders not being past cure after all, but--\n\n\"Lies! Lies! Lies!\" exclaimed the mistress indignantly, as she ran up on\nto the deck. \"What's the use of telling me lies?\"\n\nIn her anger that a woman of fifty should behave like a child and come\ncringing to a girl because she wanted to sit where she had not leave to\nsit, she did not think of the particular case, and, unpacking her music,\nsoon forgot all about the old woman and her sheets.\n\nMrs. Chailey folded her sheets, but her expression testified to flatness\nwithin. The world no longer cared about her, and a ship was not a home.\nWhen the lamps were lit yesterday, and the sailors went tumbling above\nher head, she had cried; she would cry this evening; she would cry\nto-morrow. It was not home. Meanwhile she arranged her ornaments in the\nroom which she had won too easily. They were strange ornaments to\nbring on a sea voyage--china pugs, tea-sets in miniature, cups stamped\nfloridly with the arms of the city of Bristol, hair-pin boxes crusted\nwith shamrock, antelopes' heads in coloured plaster, together with a\nmultitude of tiny photographs, representing downright workmen in their\nSunday best, and women holding white babies. But there was one portrait\nin a gilt frame, for which a nail was needed, and before she sought it\nMrs. Chailey put on her spectacles and read what was written on a slip\nof paper at the back:\n\n\"This picture of her mistress is given to Emma Chailey by Willoughby\nVinrace in gratitude for thirty years of devoted service.\"\n\nTears obliterated the words and the head of the nail.\n\n\"So long as I can do something for your family,\" she was saying, as she\nhammered at it, when a voice called melodiously in the passage:\n\n\"Mrs. Chailey! Mrs. Chailey!\"\n\nChailey instantly tidied her dress, composed her face, and opened the\ndoor.\n\n\"I'm in a fix,\" said Mrs. Ambrose, who was flushed and out of breath.\n\"You know what gentlemen are. The chairs too high--the tables too\nlow--there's six inches between the floor and the door. What I want's\na hammer, an old quilt, and have you such a thing as a kitchen table?\nAnyhow, between us\"--she now flung open the door of her husband's\nsitting room, and revealed Ridley pacing up and down, his forehead all\nwrinkled, and the collar of his coat turned up.\n\n\"It's as though they'd taken pains to torment me!\" he cried, stopping\ndead. \"Did I come on this voyage in order to catch rheumatism and\npneumonia? Really one might have credited Vinrace with more sense.\nMy dear,\" Helen was on her knees under a table, \"you are only making\nyourself untidy, and we had much better recognise the fact that we are\ncondemned to six weeks of unspeakable misery. To come at all was the\nheight of folly, but now that we are here I suppose that I can face\nit like a man. My diseases of course will be increased--I feel already\nworse than I did yesterday, but we've only ourselves to thank, and the\nchildren happily--\"\n\n\"Move! Move! Move!\" cried Helen, chasing him from corner to corner with\na chair as though he were an errant hen. \"Out of the way, Ridley, and in\nhalf an hour you'll find it ready.\"\n\nShe turned him out of the room, and they could hear him groaning and\nswearing as he went along the passage.\n\n\"I daresay he isn't very strong,\" said Mrs. Chailey, looking at Mrs.\nAmbrose compassionately, as she helped to shift and carry.\n\n\"It's books,\" sighed Helen, lifting an armful of sad volumes from the\nfloor to the shelf. \"Greek from morning to night. If ever Miss Rachel\nmarries, Chailey, pray that she may marry a man who doesn't know his\nABC.\"\n\nThe preliminary discomforts and harshnesses, which generally make the\nfirst days of a sea voyage so cheerless and trying to the temper, being\nsomehow lived through, the succeeding days passed pleasantly enough.\nOctober was well advanced, but steadily burning with a warmth that made\nthe early months of the summer appear very young and capricious. Great\ntracts of the earth lay now beneath the autumn sun, and the whole of\nEngland, from the bald moors to the Cornish rocks, was lit up from dawn\nto sunset, and showed in stretches of yellow, green, and purple. Under\nthat illumination even the roofs of the great towns glittered. In\nthousands of small gardens, millions of dark-red flowers were blooming,\nuntil the old ladies who had tended them so carefully came down the\npaths with their scissors, snipped through their juicy stalks, and laid\nthem upon cold stone ledges in the village church. Innumerable parties\nof picnickers coming home at sunset cried, \"Was there ever such a day\nas this?\" \"It's you,\" the young men whispered; \"Oh, it's you,\" the young\nwomen replied. All old people and many sick people were drawn, were it\nonly for a foot or two, into the open air, and prognosticated pleasant\nthings about the course of the world. As for the confidences and\nexpressions of love that were heard not only in cornfields but in\nlamplit rooms, where the windows opened on the garden, and men with\ncigars kissed women with grey hairs, they were not to be counted. Some\nsaid that the sky was an emblem of the life to come. Long-tailed birds\nclattered and screamed, and crossed from wood to wood, with golden eyes\nin their plumage.\n\nBut while all this went on by land, very few people thought about the\nsea. They took it for granted that the sea was calm; and there was no\nneed, as there is in many houses when the creeper taps on the bedroom\nwindows, for the couples to murmur before they kiss, \"Think of the ships\nto-night,\" or \"Thank Heaven, I'm not the man in the lighthouse!\" For all\nthey imagined, the ships when they vanished on the sky-line dissolved,\nlike snow in water. The grown-up view, indeed, was not much clearer than\nthe view of the little creatures in bathing drawers who were trotting\nin to the foam all along the coasts of England, and scooping up buckets\nfull of water. They saw white sails or tufts of smoke pass across the\nhorizon, and if you had said that these were waterspouts, or the petals\nof white sea flowers, they would have agreed.\n\nThe people in ships, however, took an equally singular view of England.\nNot only did it appear to them to be an island, and a very small island,\nbut it was a shrinking island in which people were imprisoned. One\nfigured them first swarming about like aimless ants, and almost pressing\neach other over the edge; and then, as the ship withdrew, one figured\nthem making a vain clamour, which, being unheard, either ceased, or rose\ninto a brawl. Finally, when the ship was out of sight of land, it became\nplain that the people of England were completely mute. The disease\nattacked other parts of the earth; Europe shrank, Asia shrank, Africa\nand America shrank, until it seemed doubtful whether the ship would ever\nrun against any of those wrinkled little rocks again. But, on the other\nhand, an immense dignity had descended upon her; she was an inhabitant\nof the great world, which has so few inhabitants, travelling all day\nacross an empty universe, with veils drawn before her and behind. She\nwas more lonely than the caravan crossing the desert; she was infinitely\nmore mysterious, moving by her own power and sustained by her own\nresources. The sea might give her death or some unexampled joy, and none\nwould know of it. She was a bride going forth to her husband, a virgin\nunknown of men; in her vigor and purity she might be likened to all\nbeautiful things, for as a ship she had a life of her own.\n\nIndeed if they had not been blessed in their weather, one blue day being\nbowled up after another, smooth, round, and flawless. Mrs. Ambrose would\nhave found it very dull. As it was, she had her embroidery frame set\nup on deck, with a little table by her side on which lay open a black\nvolume of philosophy. She chose a thread from the vari-coloured tangle\nthat lay in her lap, and sewed red into the bark of a tree, or yellow\ninto the river torrent. She was working at a great design of a tropical\nriver running through a tropical forest, where spotted deer would\neventually browse upon masses of fruit, bananas, oranges, and giant\npomegranates, while a troop of naked natives whirled darts into the air.\nBetween the stitches she looked to one side and read a sentence about\nthe Reality of Matter, or the Nature of Good. Round her men in blue\njerseys knelt and scrubbed the boards, or leant over the rails and\nwhistled, and not far off Mr. Pepper sat cutting up roots with a\npenknife. The rest were occupied in other parts of the ship: Ridley at\nhis Greek--he had never found quarters more to his liking; Willoughby at\nhis documents, for he used a voyage to work of arrears of business; and\nRachel--Helen, between her sentences of philosophy, wondered sometimes\nwhat Rachel _did_ do with herself? She meant vaguely to go and see. They\nhad scarcely spoken two words to each other since that first evening;\nthey were polite when they met, but there had been no confidence of any\nkind. Rachel seemed to get on very well with her father--much better,\nHelen thought, than she ought to--and was as ready to let Helen alone as\nHelen was to let her alone.\n\nAt that moment Rachel was sitting in her room doing absolutely nothing.\nWhen the ship was full this apartment bore some magnificent title and\nwas the resort of elderly sea-sick ladies who left the deck to their\nyoungsters. By virtue of the piano, and a mess of books on the floor,\nRachel considered it her room, and there she would sit for hours playing\nvery difficult music, reading a little German, or a little English when\nthe mood took her, and doing--as at this moment--absolutely nothing.\n\nThe way she had been educated, joined to a fine natural indolence, was\nof course partly the reason of it, for she had been educated as the\nmajority of well-to-do girls in the last part of the nineteenth century\nwere educated. Kindly doctors and gentle old professors had taught her\nthe rudiments of about ten different branches of knowledge, but they\nwould as soon have forced her to go through one piece of drudgery\nthoroughly as they would have told her that her hands were dirty. The\none hour or the two hours weekly passed very pleasantly, partly owing\nto the other pupils, partly to the fact that the window looked upon\nthe back of a shop, where figures appeared against the red windows in\nwinter, partly to the accidents that are bound to happen when more than\ntwo people are in the same room together. But there was no subject in\nthe world which she knew accurately. Her mind was in the state of an\nintelligent man's in the beginning of the reign of Queen Elizabeth;\nshe would believe practically anything she was told, invent reasons for\nanything she said. The shape of the earth, the history of the world,\nhow trains worked, or money was invested, what laws were in force, which\npeople wanted what, and why they wanted it, the most elementary idea of\na system in modern life--none of this had been imparted to her by any of\nher professors or mistresses. But this system of education had one great\nadvantage. It did not teach anything, but it put no obstacle in the way\nof any real talent that the pupil might chance to have. Rachel, being\nmusical, was allowed to learn nothing but music; she became a fanatic\nabout music. All the energies that might have gone into languages,\nscience, or literature, that might have made her friends, or shown her\nthe world, poured straight into music. Finding her teachers inadequate,\nshe had practically taught herself. At the age of twenty-four she knew\nas much about music as most people do when they are thirty; and could\nplay as well as nature allowed her to, which, as became daily more\nobvious, was a really generous allowance. If this one definite gift\nwas surrounded by dreams and ideas of the most extravagant and foolish\ndescription, no one was any the wiser.\n\nHer education being thus ordinary, her circumstances were no more out of\nthe common. She was an only child and had never been bullied and laughed\nat by brothers and sisters. Her mother having died when she was eleven,\ntwo aunts, the sisters of her father, brought her up, and they lived\nfor the sake of the air in a comfortable house in Richmond. She was\nof course brought up with excessive care, which as a child was for her\nhealth; as a girl and a young woman was for what it seems almost crude\nto call her morals. Until quite lately she had been completely ignorant\nthat for women such things existed. She groped for knowledge in old\nbooks, and found it in repulsive chunks, but she did not naturally care\nfor books and thus never troubled her head about the censorship which\nwas exercised first by her aunts, later by her father. Friends might\nhave told her things, but she had few of her own age,--Richmond being\nan awkward place to reach,--and, as it happened, the only girl she knew\nwell was a religious zealot, who in the fervour of intimacy talked about\nGod, and the best ways of taking up one's cross, a topic only fitfully\ninteresting to one whose mind reached other stages at other times.\n\nBut lying in her chair, with one hand behind her head, the other\ngrasping the knob on the arm, she was clearly following her thoughts\nintently. Her education left her abundant time for thinking. Her eyes\nwere fixed so steadily upon a ball on the rail of the ship that she\nwould have been startled and annoyed if anything had chanced to obscure\nit for a second. She had begun her meditations with a shout of laughter,\ncaused by the following translation from _Tristan_:\n\n     In shrinking trepidation\n       His shame he seems to hide\n     While to the king his relation\n       He brings the corpse-like Bride.\n     Seems it so senseless what I say?\n\nShe cried that it did, and threw down the book. Next she had picked up\n_Cowper's_ _Letters_, the classic prescribed by her father which had\nbored her, so that one sentence chancing to say something about the\nsmell of broom in his garden, she had thereupon seen the little hall at\nRichmond laden with flowers on the day of her mother's funeral, smelling\nso strong that now any flower-scent brought back the sickly horrible\nsensation; and so from one scene she passed, half-hearing, half-seeing,\nto another. She saw her Aunt Lucy arranging flowers in the drawing-room.\n\n\"Aunt Lucy,\" she volunteered, \"I don't like the smell of broom; it\nreminds me of funerals.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, Rachel,\" Aunt Lucy replied; \"don't say such foolish things,\ndear. I always think it a particularly cheerful plant.\"\n\nLying in the hot sun her mind was fixed upon the characters of her\naunts, their views, and the way they lived. Indeed this was a subject\nthat lasted her hundreds of morning walks round Richmond Park, and\nblotted out the trees and the people and the deer. Why did they do the\nthings they did, and what did they feel, and what was it all about?\nAgain she heard Aunt Lucy talking to Aunt Eleanor. She had been that\nmorning to take up the character of a servant, \"And, of course, at\nhalf-past ten in the morning one expects to find the housemaid brushing\nthe stairs.\" How odd! How unspeakably odd! But she could not explain to\nherself why suddenly as her aunt spoke the whole system in which they\nlived had appeared before her eyes as something quite unfamiliar and\ninexplicable, and themselves as chairs or umbrellas dropped about\nhere and there without any reason. She could only say with her slight\nstammer, \"Are you f-f-fond of Aunt Eleanor, Aunt Lucy?\" to which her\naunt replied, with her nervous hen-like twitter of a laugh, \"My dear\nchild, what questions you do ask!\"\n\n\"How fond? Very fond!\" Rachel pursued.\n\n\"I can't say I've ever thought 'how,'\" said Miss Vinrace. \"If one cares\none doesn't think 'how,' Rachel,\" which was aimed at the niece who had\nnever yet \"come\" to her aunts as cordially as they wished.\n\n\"But you know I care for you, don't you, dear, because you're your\nmother's daughter, if for no other reason, and there _are_ plenty of\nother reasons\"--and she leant over and kissed her with some emotion, and\nthe argument was spilt irretrievably about the place like a bucket of\nmilk.\n\nBy these means Rachel reached that stage in thinking, if thinking it can\nbe called, when the eyes are intent upon a ball or a knob and the lips\ncease to move. Her efforts to come to an understanding had only hurt\nher aunt's feelings, and the conclusion must be that it is better not\nto try. To feel anything strongly was to create an abyss between oneself\nand others who feel strongly perhaps but differently. It was far better\nto play the piano and forget all the rest. The conclusion was very\nwelcome. Let these odd men and women--her aunts, the Hunts, Ridley,\nHelen, Mr. Pepper, and the rest--be symbols,--featureless but dignified,\nsymbols of age, of youth, of motherhood, of learning, and beautiful\noften as people upon the stage are beautiful. It appeared that nobody\never said a thing they meant, or ever talked of a feeling they felt, but\nthat was what music was for. Reality dwelling in what one saw and felt,\nbut did not talk about, one could accept a system in which things went\nround and round quite satisfactorily to other people, without often\ntroubling to think about it, except as something superficially strange.\nAbsorbed by her music she accepted her lot very complacently, blazing\ninto indignation perhaps once a fortnight, and subsiding as she subsided\nnow. Inextricably mixed in dreamy confusion, her mind seemed to enter\ninto communion, to be delightfully expanded and combined with the spirit\nof the whitish boards on deck, with the spirit of the sea, with the\nspirit of Beethoven Op. 112, even with the spirit of poor William Cowper\nthere at Olney. Like a ball of thistledown it kissed the sea, rose,\nkissed it again, and thus rising and kissing passed finally out of\nsight. The rising and falling of the ball of thistledown was represented\nby the sudden droop forward of her own head, and when it passed out of\nsight she was asleep.\n\nTen minutes later Mrs. Ambrose opened the door and looked at her. It did\nnot surprise her to find that this was the way in which Rachel passed\nher mornings. She glanced round the room at the piano, at the books,\nat the general mess. In the first place she considered Rachel\naesthetically; lying unprotected she looked somehow like a victim\ndropped from the claws of a bird of prey, but considered as a woman,\na young woman of twenty-four, the sight gave rise to reflections. Mrs.\nAmbrose stood thinking for at least two minutes. She then smiled, turned\nnoiselessly away and went, lest the sleeper should waken, and there\nshould be the awkwardness of speech between them.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter III\n\n\nEarly next morning there was a sound as of chains being drawn roughly\noverhead; the steady heart of the _Euphrosyne_ slowly ceased to beat;\nand Helen, poking her nose above deck, saw a stationary castle upon a\nstationary hill. They had dropped anchor in the mouth of the Tagus, and\ninstead of cleaving new waves perpetually, the same waves kept returning\nand washing against the sides of the ship.\n\nAs soon as breakfast was done, Willoughby disappeared over the vessel's\nside, carrying a brown leather case, shouting over his shoulder that\nevery one was to mind and behave themselves, for he would be kept in\nLisbon doing business until five o'clock that afternoon.\n\nAt about that hour he reappeared, carrying his case, professing himself\ntired, bothered, hungry, thirsty, cold, and in immediate need of his\ntea. Rubbing his hands, he told them the adventures of the day: how he\nhad come upon poor old Jackson combing his moustache before the glass\nin the office, little expecting his descent, had put him through such\na morning's work as seldom came his way; then treated him to a lunch of\nchampagne and ortolans; paid a call upon Mrs. Jackson, who was fatter\nthan ever, poor woman, but asked kindly after Rachel--and O Lord, little\nJackson had confessed to a confounded piece of weakness--well, well, no\nharm was done, he supposed, but what was the use of his giving orders if\nthey were promptly disobeyed? He had said distinctly that he would take\nno passengers on this trip. Here he began searching in his pockets and\neventually discovered a card, which he planked down on the table before\nRachel. On it she read, \"Mr. and Mrs. Richard Dalloway, 23 Browne\nStreet, Mayfair.\"\n\n\"Mr. Richard Dalloway,\" continued Vinrace, \"seems to be a gentleman who\nthinks that because he was once a member of Parliament, and his wife's\nthe daughter of a peer, they can have what they like for the asking.\nThey got round poor little Jackson anyhow. Said they must have\npassages--produced a letter from Lord Glenaway, asking me as a personal\nfavour--overruled any objections Jackson made (I don't believe they came\nto much), and so there's nothing for it but to submit, I suppose.\"\n\nBut it was evident that for some reason or other Willoughby was quite\npleased to submit, although he made a show of growling.\n\nThe truth was that Mr. and Mrs. Dalloway had found themselves stranded\nin Lisbon. They had been travelling on the Continent for some weeks,\nchiefly with a view to broadening Mr. Dalloway's mind. Unable for a\nseason, by one of the accidents of political life, to serve his country\nin Parliament, Mr. Dalloway was doing the best he could to serve it\nout of Parliament. For that purpose the Latin countries did very well,\nalthough the East, of course, would have done better.\n\n\"Expect to hear of me next in Petersburg or Teheran,\" he had said,\nturning to wave farewell from the steps of the Travellers'. But a\ndisease had broken out in the East, there was cholera in Russia, and\nhe was heard of, not so romantically, in Lisbon. They had been through\nFrance; he had stopped at manufacturing centres where, producing letters\nof introduction, he had been shown over works, and noted facts in a\npocket-book. In Spain he and Mrs. Dalloway had mounted mules, for they\nwished to understand how the peasants live. Are they ripe for rebellion,\nfor example? Mrs. Dalloway had then insisted upon a day or two at Madrid\nwith the pictures. Finally they arrived in Lisbon and spent six days\nwhich, in a journal privately issued afterwards, they described as of\n\"unique interest.\" Richard had audiences with ministers, and foretold\na crisis at no distant date, \"the foundations of government being\nincurably corrupt. Yet how blame, etc.\"; while Clarissa inspected the\nroyal stables, and took several snapshots showing men now exiled and\nwindows now broken. Among other things she photographed Fielding's\ngrave, and let loose a small bird which some ruffian had trapped,\n\"because one hates to think of anything in a cage where English people\nlie buried,\" the diary stated. Their tour was thoroughly unconventional,\nand followed no meditated plan. The foreign correspondents of the\n_Times_ decided their route as much as anything else. Mr. Dalloway\nwished to look at certain guns, and was of opinion that the African\ncoast is far more unsettled than people at home were inclined to\nbelieve. For these reasons they wanted a slow inquisitive kind of ship,\ncomfortable, for they were bad sailors, but not extravagant, which would\nstop for a day or two at this port and at that, taking in coal while\nthe Dalloways saw things for themselves. Meanwhile they found themselves\nstranded in Lisbon, unable for the moment to lay hands upon the precise\nvessel they wanted. They heard of the _Euphrosyne_, but heard also that\nshe was primarily a cargo boat, and only took passengers by special\narrangement, her business being to carry dry goods to the Amazons, and\nrubber home again. \"By special arrangement,\" however, were words of high\nencouragement to them, for they came of a class where almost everything\nwas specially arranged, or could be if necessary. On this occasion all\nthat Richard did was to write a note to Lord Glenaway, the head of the\nline which bears his title; to call on poor old Jackson; to represent to\nhim how Mrs. Dalloway was so-and-so, and he had been something or other\nelse, and what they wanted was such and such a thing. It was done. They\nparted with compliments and pleasure on both sides, and here, a\nweek later, came the boat rowing up to the ship in the dusk with the\nDalloways on board of it; in three minutes they were standing together\non the deck of the _Euphrosyne_. Their arrival, of course, created some\nstir, and it was seen by several pairs of eyes that Mrs. Dalloway was\na tall slight woman, her body wrapped in furs, her head in veils, while\nMr. Dalloway appeared to be a middle-sized man of sturdy build, dressed\nlike a sportsman on an autumnal moor. Many solid leather bags of a\nrich brown hue soon surrounded them, in addition to which Mr. Dalloway\ncarried a despatch box, and his wife a dressing-case suggestive of a\ndiamond necklace and bottles with silver tops.\n\n\"It's so like Whistler!\" she exclaimed, with a wave towards the shore,\nas she shook Rachel by the hand, and Rachel had only time to look at the\ngrey hills on one side of her before Willoughby introduced Mrs. Chailey,\nwho took the lady to her cabin.\n\nMomentary though it seemed, nevertheless the interruption was upsetting;\nevery one was more or less put out by it, from Mr. Grice, the steward,\nto Ridley himself. A few minutes later Rachel passed the smoking-room,\nand found Helen moving arm-chairs. She was absorbed in her arrangements,\nand on seeing Rachel remarked confidentially:\n\n\"If one can give men a room to themselves where they will sit, it's all\nto the good. Arm-chairs are _the_ important things--\" She began wheeling\nthem about. \"Now, does it still look like a bar at a railway station?\"\n\nShe whipped a plush cover off a table. The appearance of the place was\nmarvellously improved.\n\nAgain, the arrival of the strangers made it obvious to Rachel, as the\nhour of dinner approached, that she must change her dress; and the\nringing of the great bell found her sitting on the edge of her berth in\nsuch a position that the little glass above the washstand reflected\nher head and shoulders. In the glass she wore an expression of tense\nmelancholy, for she had come to the depressing conclusion, since the\narrival of the Dalloways, that her face was not the face she wanted, and\nin all probability never would be.\n\nHowever, punctuality had been impressed on her, and whatever face she\nhad, she must go in to dinner.\n\nThese few minutes had been used by Willoughby in sketching to the\nDalloways the people they were to meet, and checking them upon his\nfingers.\n\n\"There's my brother-in-law, Ambrose, the scholar (I daresay you've heard\nhis name), his wife, my old friend Pepper, a very quiet fellow, but\nknows everything, I'm told. And that's all. We're a very small party.\nI'm dropping them on the coast.\"\n\nMrs. Dalloway, with her head a little on one side, did her best to\nrecollect Ambrose--was it a surname?--but failed. She was made slightly\nuneasy by what she had heard. She knew that scholars married any\none--girls they met in farms on reading parties; or little suburban\nwomen who said disagreeably, \"Of course I know it's my husband you want;\nnot _me_.\"\n\nBut Helen came in at that point, and Mrs. Dalloway saw with relief\nthat though slightly eccentric in appearance, she was not untidy, held\nherself well, and her voice had restraint in it, which she held to be\nthe sign of a lady. Mr. Pepper had not troubled to change his neat ugly\nsuit.\n\n\"But after all,\" Clarissa thought to herself as she followed Vinrace in\nto dinner, \"_every_ _one's_ interesting really.\"\n\nWhen seated at the table she had some need of that assurance, chiefly\nbecause of Ridley, who came in late, looked decidedly unkempt, and took\nto his soup in profound gloom.\n\nAn imperceptible signal passed between husband and wife, meaning that\nthey grasped the situation and would stand by each other loyally. With\nscarcely a pause Mrs. Dalloway turned to Willoughby and began:\n\n\"What I find so tiresome about the sea is that there are no flowers in\nit. Imagine fields of hollyhocks and violets in mid-ocean! How divine!\"\n\n\"But somewhat dangerous to navigation,\" boomed Richard, in the bass,\nlike the bassoon to the flourish of his wife's violin. \"Why, weeds\ncan be bad enough, can't they, Vinrace? I remember crossing in the\n_Mauretania_ once, and saying to the Captain--Richards--did you know\nhim?--'Now tell me what perils you really dread most for your ship,\nCaptain Richards?' expecting him to say icebergs, or derelicts, or fog,\nor something of that sort. Not a bit of it. I've always remembered his\nanswer. '_Sedgius_ _aquatici_,' he said, which I take to be a kind of\nduck-weed.\"\n\nMr. Pepper looked up sharply, and was about to put a question when\nWilloughby continued:\n\n\"They've an awful time of it--those captains! Three thousand souls on\nboard!\"\n\n\"Yes, indeed,\" said Clarissa. She turned to Helen with an air of\nprofundity. \"I'm convinced people are wrong when they say it's work that\nwears one; it's responsibility. That's why one pays one's cook more than\none's housemaid, I suppose.\"\n\n\"According to that, one ought to pay one's nurse double; but one\ndoesn't,\" said Helen.\n\n\"No; but think what a joy to have to do with babies, instead of\nsaucepans!\" said Mrs. Dalloway, looking with more interest at Helen, a\nprobable mother.\n\n\"I'd much rather be a cook than a nurse,\" said Helen. \"Nothing would\ninduce me to take charge of children.\"\n\n\"Mothers always exaggerate,\" said Ridley. \"A well-bred child is no\nresponsibility. I've travelled all over Europe with mine. You just wrap\n'em up warm and put 'em in the rack.\"\n\nHelen laughed at that. Mrs. Dalloway exclaimed, looking at Ridley:\n\n\"How like a father! My husband's just the same. And then one talks of\nthe equality of the sexes!\"\n\n\"Does one?\" said Mr. Pepper.\n\n\"Oh, some do!\" cried Clarissa. \"My husband had to pass an irate lady\nevery afternoon last session who said nothing else, I imagine.\"\n\n\"She sat outside the house; it was very awkward,\" said Dalloway. \"At\nlast I plucked up courage and said to her, 'My good creature, you're\nonly in the way where you are. You're hindering me, and you're doing no\ngood to yourself.'\"\n\n\"And then she caught him by the coat, and would have scratched his eyes\nout--\" Mrs. Dalloway put in.\n\n\"Pooh--that's been exaggerated,\" said Richard. \"No, I pity them, I\nconfess. The discomfort of sitting on those steps must be awful.\"\n\n\"Serve them right,\" said Willoughby curtly.\n\n\"Oh, I'm entirely with you there,\" said Dalloway. \"Nobody can condemn\nthe utter folly and futility of such behaviour more than I do; and as\nfor the whole agitation, well! may I be in my grave before a woman has\nthe right to vote in England! That's all I say.\"\n\nThe solemnity of her husband's assertion made Clarissa grave.\n\n\"It's unthinkable,\" she said. \"Don't tell me you're a suffragist?\" she\nturned to Ridley.\n\n\"I don't care a fig one way or t'other,\" said Ambrose. \"If any creature\nis so deluded as to think that a vote does him or her any good, let him\nhave it. He'll soon learn better.\"\n\n\"You're not a politician, I see,\" she smiled.\n\n\"Goodness, no,\" said Ridley.\n\n\"I'm afraid your husband won't approve of me,\" said Dalloway aside, to\nMrs. Ambrose. She suddenly recollected that he had been in Parliament.\n\n\"Don't you ever find it rather dull?\" she asked, not knowing exactly\nwhat to say.\n\nRichard spread his hands before him, as if inscriptions were to be read\nin the palms of them.\n\n\"If you ask me whether I ever find it rather dull,\" he said, \"I am bound\nto say yes; on the other hand, if you ask me what career do you consider\non the whole, taking the good with the bad, the most enjoyable and\nenviable, not to speak of its more serious side, of all careers, for a\nman, I am bound to say, 'The Politician's.'\"\n\n\"The Bar or politics, I agree,\" said Willoughby. \"You get more run for\nyour money.\"\n\n\"All one's faculties have their play,\" said Richard. \"I may be treading\non dangerous ground; but what I feel about poets and artists in general\nis this: on your own lines, you can't be beaten--granted; but off your\nown lines--puff--one has to make allowances. Now, I shouldn't like to\nthink that any one had to make allowances for me.\"\n\n\"I don't quite agree, Richard,\" said Mrs. Dalloway. \"Think of Shelley. I\nfeel that there's almost everything one wants in 'Adonais.'\"\n\n\"Read 'Adonais' by all means,\" Richard conceded. \"But whenever I hear\nof Shelley I repeat to myself the words of Matthew Arnold, 'What a set!\nWhat a set!'\"\n\nThis roused Ridley's attention. \"Matthew Arnold? A detestable prig!\" he\nsnapped.\n\n\"A prig--granted,\" said Richard; \"but, I think a man of the world.\nThat's where my point comes in. We politicians doubtless seem to you\"\n(he grasped somehow that Helen was the representative of the arts)\n\"a gross commonplace set of people; but we see both sides; we may be\nclumsy, but we do our best to get a grasp of things. Now your artists\n_find_ things in a mess, shrug their shoulders, turn aside to their\nvisions--which I grant may be very beautiful--and _leave_ things in a\nmess. Now that seems to me evading one's responsibilities. Besides, we\naren't all born with the artistic faculty.\"\n\n\"It's dreadful,\" said Mrs. Dalloway, who, while her husband spoke, had\nbeen thinking. \"When I'm with artists I feel so intensely the delights\nof shutting oneself up in a little world of one's own, with pictures and\nmusic and everything beautiful, and then I go out into the streets and\nthe first child I meet with its poor, hungry, dirty little face makes me\nturn round and say, 'No, I _can't_ shut myself up--I _won't_ live in a\nworld of my own. I should like to stop all the painting and writing and\nmusic until this kind of thing exists no longer.' Don't you feel,\" she\nwound up, addressing Helen, \"that life's a perpetual conflict?\" Helen\nconsidered for a moment. \"No,\" she said. \"I don't think I do.\"\n\nThere was a pause, which was decidedly uncomfortable. Mrs. Dalloway then\ngave a little shiver, and asked whether she might have her fur cloak\nbrought to her. As she adjusted the soft brown fur about her neck a\nfresh topic struck her.\n\n\"I own,\" she said, \"that I shall never forget the _Antigone_. I saw it\nat Cambridge years ago, and it's haunted me ever since. Don't you think\nit's quite the most modern thing you ever saw?\" she asked Ridley. \"It\nseemed to me I'd known twenty Clytemnestras. Old Lady Ditchling for one.\nI don't know a word of Greek, but I could listen to it for ever--\"\n\nHere Mr. Pepper struck up:\n\n    πολλἀ τἀ δεινά, κοὐδἑν ἀν-\n    θρώπου δεινότερον πέλει.\n    τοῦτο καί πολιοῦ πέραν\n    πόντου χειμερίῳ νότῳ\n    χωρεῖ, περιβρυχίοισι\n    περῶν ὑπ´ οῐδμασι\n\nMrs. Dalloway looked at him with compressed lips.\n\n\"I'd give ten years of my life to know Greek,\" she said, when he had\ndone.\n\n\"I could teach you the alphabet in half an hour,\" said Ridley, \"and\nyou'd read Homer in a month. I should think it an honour to instruct\nyou.\"\n\nHelen, engaged with Mr. Dalloway and the habit, now fallen into\ndecline, of quoting Greek in the House of Commons, noted, in the great\ncommonplace book that lies open beside us as we talk, the fact that all\nmen, even men like Ridley, really prefer women to be fashionable.\n\nClarissa exclaimed that she could think of nothing more delightful. For\nan instant she saw herself in her drawing-room in Browne Street with a\nPlato open on her knees--Plato in the original Greek. She could not help\nbelieving that a real scholar, if specially interested, could slip Greek\ninto her head with scarcely any trouble.\n\nRidley engaged her to come to-morrow.\n\n\"If only your ship is going to treat us kindly!\" she exclaimed,\ndrawing Willoughby into play. For the sake of guests, and these were\ndistinguished, Willoughby was ready with a bow of his head to vouch for\nthe good behaviour even of the waves.\n\n\"I'm dreadfully bad; and my husband's not very good,\" sighed Clarissa.\n\n\"I am never sick,\" Richard explained. \"At least, I have only been\nactually sick once,\" he corrected himself. \"That was crossing the\nChannel. But a choppy sea, I confess, or still worse, a swell, makes me\ndistinctly uncomfortable. The great thing is never to miss a meal. You\nlook at the food, and you say, 'I can't'; you take a mouthful, and\nLord knows how you're going to swallow it; but persevere, and you often\nsettle the attack for good. My wife's a coward.\"\n\nThey were pushing back their chairs. The ladies were hesitating at the\ndoorway.\n\n\"I'd better show the way,\" said Helen, advancing.\n\nRachel followed. She had taken no part in the talk; no one had spoken\nto her; but she had listened to every word that was said. She had looked\nfrom Mrs. Dalloway to Mr. Dalloway, and from Mr. Dalloway back again.\nClarissa, indeed, was a fascinating spectacle. She wore a white dress\nand a long glittering necklace. What with her clothes, and her arch\ndelicate face, which showed exquisitely pink beneath hair turning grey,\nshe was astonishingly like an eighteenth-century masterpiece--a Reynolds\nor a Romney. She made Helen and the others look coarse and slovenly\nbeside her. Sitting lightly upright she seemed to be dealing with the\nworld as she chose; the enormous solid globe spun round this way and\nthat beneath her fingers. And her husband! Mr. Dalloway rolling that\nrich deliberate voice was even more impressive. He seemed to come from\nthe humming oily centre of the machine where the polished rods are\nsliding, and the pistons thumping; he grasped things so firmly but so\nloosely; he made the others appear like old maids cheapening remnants.\nRachel followed in the wake of the matrons, as if in a trance; a curious\nscent of violets came back from Mrs. Dalloway, mingling with the soft\nrustling of her skirts, and the tinkling of her chains. As she followed,\nRachel thought with supreme self-abasement, taking in the whole course\nof her life and the lives of all her friends, \"She said we lived in a\nworld of our own. It's true. We're perfectly absurd.\"\n\n\"We sit in here,\" said Helen, opening the door of the saloon.\n\n\"You play?\" said Mrs. Dalloway to Mrs. Ambrose, taking up the score of\n_Tristan_ which lay on the table.\n\n\"My niece does,\" said Helen, laying her hand on Rachel's shoulder.\n\n\"Oh, how I envy you!\" Clarissa addressed Rachel for the first time.\n\"D'you remember this? Isn't it divine?\" She played a bar or two with\nringed fingers upon the page.\n\n\"And then Tristan goes like this, and Isolde--oh!--it's all too\nthrilling! Have you been to Bayreuth?\"\n\n\"No, I haven't,\" said Rachel. `\"Then that's still to come. I shall never\nforget my first _Parsifal_--a grilling August day, and those fat old\nGerman women, come in their stuffy high frocks, and then the dark\ntheatre, and the music beginning, and one couldn't help sobbing. A kind\nman went and fetched me water, I remember; and I could only cry on\nhis shoulder! It caught me here\" (she touched her throat). \"It's like\nnothing else in the world! But where's your piano?\" \"It's in another\nroom,\" Rachel explained.\n\n\"But you will play to us?\" Clarissa entreated. \"I can't imagine anything\nnicer than to sit out in the moonlight and listen to music--only that\nsounds too like a schoolgirl! You know,\" she said, turning to Helen, \"I\ndon't think music's altogether good for people--I'm afraid not.\"\n\n\"Too great a strain?\" asked Helen.\n\n\"Too emotional, somehow,\" said Clarissa. \"One notices it at once when a\nboy or girl takes up music as a profession. Sir William Broadley told me\njust the same thing. Don't you hate the kind of attitudes people go into\nover Wagner--like this--\" She cast her eyes to the ceiling, clasped her\nhands, and assumed a look of intensity. \"It really doesn't mean that\nthey appreciate him; in fact, I always think it's the other way round.\nThe people who really care about an art are always the least affected.\nD'you know Henry Philips, the painter?\" she asked.\n\n\"I have seen him,\" said Helen.\n\n\"To look at, one might think he was a successful stockbroker, and not\none of the greatest painters of the age. That's what I like.\"\n\n\"There are a great many successful stockbrokers, if you like looking at\nthem,\" said Helen.\n\nRachel wished vehemently that her aunt would not be so perverse.\n\n\"When you see a musician with long hair, don't you know instinctively\nthat he's bad?\" Clarissa asked, turning to Rachel. \"Watts and\nJoachim--they looked just like you and me.\"\n\n\"And how much nicer they'd have looked with curls!\" said Helen. \"The\nquestion is, are you going to aim at beauty or are you not?\"\n\n\"Cleanliness!\" said Clarissa, \"I do want a man to look clean!\"\n\n\"By cleanliness you really mean well-cut clothes,\" said Helen.\n\n\"There's something one knows a gentleman by,\" said Clarissa, \"but one\ncan't say what it is.\"\n\n\"Take my husband now, does he look like a gentleman?\"\n\nThe question seemed to Clarissa in extraordinarily bad taste. \"One of\nthe things that can't be said,\" she would have put it. She could find no\nanswer, but a laugh.\n\n\"Well, anyhow,\" she said, turning to Rachel, \"I shall insist upon your\nplaying to me to-morrow.\"\n\nThere was that in her manner that made Rachel love her.\n\nMrs. Dalloway hid a tiny yawn, a mere dilation of the nostrils.\n\n\"D'you know,\" she said, \"I'm extraordinarily sleepy. It's the sea air. I\nthink I shall escape.\"\n\nA man's voice, which she took to be that of Mr. Pepper, strident in\ndiscussion, and advancing upon the saloon, gave her the alarm.\n\n\"Good-night--good-night!\" she said. \"Oh, I know my way--do pray for\ncalm! Good-night!\"\n\nHer yawn must have been the image of a yawn. Instead of letting her\nmouth droop, dropping all her clothes in a bunch as though they depended\non one string, and stretching her limbs to the utmost end of her berth,\nshe merely changed her dress for a dressing-gown, with innumerable\nfrills, and wrapping her feet in a rug, sat down with a writing-pad on\nher knee. Already this cramped little cabin was the dressing room of\na lady of quality. There were bottles containing liquids; there were\ntrays, boxes, brushes, pins. Evidently not an inch of her person lacked\nits proper instrument. The scent which had intoxicated Rachel pervaded\nthe air. Thus established, Mrs. Dalloway began to write. A pen in her\nhands became a thing one caressed paper with, and she might have been\nstroking and tickling a kitten as she wrote:\n\n\nPicture us, my dear, afloat in the very oddest ship you can imagine.\nIt's not the ship, so much as the people. One does come across queer\nsorts as one travels. I must say I find it hugely amusing. There's the\nmanager of the line--called Vinrace--a nice big Englishman, doesn't say\nmuch--you know the sort. As for the rest--they might have come trailing\nout of an old number of _Punch_. They're like people playing croquet\nin the 'sixties. How long they've all been shut up in this ship I don't\nknow--years and years I should say--but one feels as though one had\nboarded a little separate world, and they'd never been on shore, or\ndone ordinary things in their lives. It's what I've always said about\nliterary people--they're far the hardest of any to get on with. The\nworst of it is, these people--a man and his wife and a niece--might have\nbeen, one feels, just like everybody else, if they hadn't got swallowed\nup by Oxford or Cambridge or some such place, and been made cranks of.\nThe man's really delightful (if he'd cut his nails), and the woman has\nquite a fine face, only she dresses, of course, in a potato sack, and\nwears her hair like a Liberty shopgirl's. They talk about art, and think\nus such poops for dressing in the evening. However, I can't help that;\nI'd rather die than come in to dinner without changing--wouldn't you? It\nmatters ever so much more than the soup. (It's odd how things like that\n_do_ matter so much more than what's generally supposed to matter.\nI'd rather have my head cut off than wear flannel next the skin.) Then\nthere's a nice shy girl--poor thing--I wish one could rake her out\nbefore it's too late. She has quite nice eyes and hair, only, of course,\nshe'll get funny too. We ought to start a society for broadening the\nminds of the young--much more useful than missionaries, Hester! Oh, I'd\nforgotten there's a dreadful little thing called Pepper. He's just like\nhis name. He's indescribably insignificant, and rather queer in\nhis temper, poor dear. It's like sitting down to dinner with an\nill-conditioned fox-terrier, only one can't comb him out, and sprinkle\nhim with powder, as one would one's dog. It's a pity, sometimes, one\ncan't treat people like dogs! The great comfort is that we're away from\nnewspapers, so that Richard will have a real holiday this time. Spain\nwasn't a holiday. . . .\n\n\n\"You coward!\" said Richard, almost filling the room with his sturdy\nfigure.\n\n\"I did my duty at dinner!\" cried Clarissa.\n\n\"You've let yourself in for the Greek alphabet, anyhow.\"\n\n\"Oh, my dear! Who _is_ Ambrose?\"\n\n\"I gather that he was a Cambridge don; lives in London now, and edits\nclassics.\"\n\n\"Did you ever see such a set of cranks? The woman asked me if I thought\nher husband looked like a gentleman!\"\n\n\"It was hard to keep the ball rolling at dinner, certainly,\" said\nRichard. \"Why is it that the women, in that class, are so much queerer\nthan the men?\"\n\n\"They're not half bad-looking, really--only--they're so odd!\"\n\nThey both laughed, thinking of the same things, so that there was no\nneed to compare their impressions.\n\n\"I see I shall have quite a lot to say to Vinrace,\" said Richard. \"He\nknows Sutton and all that set. He can tell me a good deal about the\nconditions of ship-building in the North.\"\n\n\"Oh, I'm glad. The men always _are_ so much better than the women.\"\n\n\"One always has something to say to a man certainly,\" said Richard.\n\"But I've no doubt you'll chatter away fast enough about the babies,\nClarice.\"\n\n\"Has she got children? She doesn't look like it somehow.\"\n\n\"Two. A boy and girl.\"\n\nA pang of envy shot through Mrs. Dalloway's heart.\n\n\"We _must_ have a son, Dick,\" she said.\n\n\"Good Lord, what opportunities there are now for young men!\" said\nDalloway, for his talk had set him thinking. \"I don't suppose there's\nbeen so good an opening since the days of Pitt.\"\n\n\"And it's yours!\" said Clarissa.\n\n\"To be a leader of men,\" Richard soliloquised. \"It's a fine career. My\nGod--what a career!\"\n\nThe chest slowly curved beneath his waistcoat.\n\n\"D'you know, Dick, I can't help thinking of England,\" said his wife\nmeditatively, leaning her head against his chest. \"Being on this ship\nseems to make it so much more vivid--what it really means to be English.\nOne thinks of all we've done, and our navies, and the people in India\nand Africa, and how we've gone on century after century, sending out\nboys from little country villages--and of men like you, Dick, and it\nmakes one feel as if one couldn't bear _not_ to be English! Think of\nthe light burning over the House, Dick! When I stood on deck just now I\nseemed to see it. It's what one means by London.\"\n\n\"It's the continuity,\" said Richard sententiously. A vision of English\nhistory, King following King, Prime Minister Prime Minister, and Law Law\nhad come over him while his wife spoke. He ran his mind along the line\nof conservative policy, which went steadily from Lord Salisbury to\nAlfred, and gradually enclosed, as though it were a lasso that opened\nand caught things, enormous chunks of the habitable globe.\n\n\"It's taken a long time, but we've pretty nearly done it,\" he said; \"it\nremains to consolidate.\"\n\n\"And these people don't see it!\" Clarissa exclaimed.\n\n\"It takes all sorts to make a world,\" said her husband. \"There would\nnever be a government if there weren't an opposition.\"\n\n\"Dick, you're better than I am,\" said Clarissa. \"You see round, where I\nonly see _there_.\" She pressed a point on the back of his hand.\n\n\"That's my business, as I tried to explain at dinner.\"\n\n\"What I like about you, Dick,\" she continued, \"is that you're always the\nsame, and I'm a creature of moods.\"\n\n\"You're a pretty creature, anyhow,\" he said, gazing at her with deeper\neyes.\n\n\"You think so, do you? Then kiss me.\"\n\nHe kissed her passionately, so that her half-written letter slid to the\nground. Picking it up, he read it without asking leave.\n\n\"Where's your pen?\" he said; and added in his little masculine hand:\n\nR.D. _loquitur_: Clarice has omitted to tell you that she looked\nexceedingly pretty at dinner, and made a conquest by which she has bound\nherself to learn the Greek alphabet. I will take this occasion of adding\nthat we are both enjoying ourselves in these outlandish parts, and only\nwish for the presence of our friends (yourself and John, to wit) to make\nthe trip perfectly enjoyable as it promises to be instructive. . . .\n\nVoices were heard at the end of the corridor. Mrs. Ambrose was speaking\nlow; William Pepper was remarking in his definite and rather acid voice,\n\"That is the type of lady with whom I find myself distinctly out of\nsympathy. She--\"\n\nBut neither Richard nor Clarissa profited by the verdict, for directly\nit seemed likely that they would overhear, Richard crackled a sheet of\npaper.\n\n\"I often wonder,\" Clarissa mused in bed, over the little white volume of\nPascal which went with her everywhere, \"whether it is really good for\na woman to live with a man who is morally her superior, as Richard is\nmine. It makes one so dependent. I suppose I feel for him what my mother\nand women of her generation felt for Christ. It just shows that one\ncan't do without _something_.\" She then fell into a sleep, which was as\nusual extremely sound and refreshing, but visited by fantastic dreams\nof great Greek letters stalking round the room, when she woke up and\nlaughed to herself, remembering where she was and that the Greek letters\nwere real people, lying asleep not many yards away. Then, thinking\nof the black sea outside tossing beneath the moon, she shuddered, and\nthought of her husband and the others as companions on the voyage.\nThe dreams were not confined to her indeed, but went from one brain\nto another. They all dreamt of each other that night, as was natural,\nconsidering how thin the partitions were between them, and how strangely\nthey had been lifted off the earth to sit next each other in mid-ocean,\nand see every detail of each other's faces, and hear whatever they\nchanced to say.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter IV\n\n\nNext morning Clarissa was up before anyone else. She dressed, and was\nout on deck, breathing the fresh air of a calm morning, and, making the\ncircuit of the ship for the second time, she ran straight into the lean\nperson of Mr. Grice, the steward. She apologised, and at the same time\nasked him to enlighten her: what were those shiny brass stands for, half\nglass on the top? She had been wondering, and could not guess. When he\nhad done explaining, she cried enthusiastically:\n\n\"I do think that to be a sailor must be the finest thing in the world!\"\n\n\"And what d'you know about it?\" said Mr. Grice, kindling in a strange\nmanner. \"Pardon me. What does any man or woman brought up in England\nknow about the sea? They profess to know; but they don't.\"\n\nThe bitterness with which he spoke was ominous of what was to come.\nHe led her off to his own quarters, and, sitting on the edge of a\nbrass-bound table, looking uncommonly like a sea-gull, with her white\ntapering body and thin alert face, Mrs. Dalloway had to listen to the\ntirade of a fanatical man. Did she realise, to begin with, what a very\nsmall part of the world the land was? How peaceful, how beautiful, how\nbenignant in comparison the sea? The deep waters could sustain Europe\nunaided if every earthly animal died of the plague to-morrow. Mr. Grice\nrecalled dreadful sights which he had seen in the richest city of the\nworld--men and women standing in line hour after hour to receive a mug\nof greasy soup. \"And I thought of the good flesh down here waiting\nand asking to be caught. I'm not exactly a Protestant, and I'm not\na Catholic, but I could almost pray for the days of popery to come\nagain--because of the fasts.\"\n\nAs he talked he kept opening drawers and moving little glass jars. Here\nwere the treasures which the great ocean had bestowed upon him--pale\nfish in greenish liquids, blobs of jelly with streaming tresses, fish\nwith lights in their heads, they lived so deep.\n\n\"They have swum about among bones,\" Clarissa sighed.\n\n\"You're thinking of Shakespeare,\" said Mr. Grice, and taking down a copy\nfrom a shelf well lined with books, recited in an emphatic nasal voice:\n\n\"Full fathom five thy father lies,\n\n\"A grand fellow, Shakespeare,\" he said, replacing the volume.\n\nClarissa was so glad to hear him say so.\n\n\"Which is your favourite play? I wonder if it's the same as mine?\"\n\n\"_Henry the Fifth_,\" said Mr. Grice.\n\n\"Joy!\" cried Clarissa. \"It is!\"\n\n_Hamlet_ was what you might call too introspective for Mr. Grice, the\nsonnets too passionate; Henry the Fifth was to him the model of an\nEnglish gentleman. But his favourite reading was Huxley, Herbert\nSpencer, and Henry George; while Emerson and Thomas Hardy he read for\nrelaxation. He was giving Mrs. Dalloway his views upon the present state\nof England when the breakfast bell rung so imperiously that she had to\ntear herself away, promising to come back and be shown his sea-weeds.\n\nThe party, which had seemed so odd to her the night before, was already\ngathered round the table, still under the influence of sleep, and\ntherefore uncommunicative, but her entrance sent a little flutter like a\nbreath of air through them all.\n\n\"I've had the most interesting talk of my life!\" she exclaimed, taking\nher seat beside Willoughby. \"D'you realise that one of your men is a\nphilosopher and a poet?\"\n\n\"A very interesting fellow--that's what I always say,\" said Willoughby,\ndistinguishing Mr. Grice. \"Though Rachel finds him a bore.\"\n\n\"He's a bore when he talks about currents,\" said Rachel. Her eyes were\nfull of sleep, but Mrs. Dalloway still seemed to her wonderful.\n\n\"I've never met a bore yet!\" said Clarissa.\n\n\"And I should say the world was full of them!\" exclaimed Helen. But her\nbeauty, which was radiant in the morning light, took the contrariness\nfrom her words.\n\n\"I agree that it's the worst one can possibly say of any one,\" said\nClarissa. \"How much rather one would be a murderer than a bore!\" she\nadded, with her usual air of saying something profound. \"One can fancy\nliking a murderer. It's the same with dogs. Some dogs are awful bores,\npoor dears.\"\n\nIt happened that Richard was sitting next to Rachel. She was curiously\nconscious of his presence and appearance--his well-cut clothes, his\ncrackling shirt-front, his cuffs with blue rings round them, and the\nsquare-tipped, very clean fingers with the red stone on the little\nfinger of the left hand.\n\n\"We had a dog who was a bore and knew it,\" he said, addressing her in\ncool, easy tones. \"He was a Skye terrier, one of those long chaps, with\nlittle feet poking out from their hair like--like caterpillars--no, like\nsofas I should say. Well, we had another dog at the same time, a black\nbrisk animal--a Schipperke, I think, you call them. You can't imagine\na greater contrast. The Skye so slow and deliberate, looking up at\nyou like some old gentleman in the club, as much as to say, 'You don't\nreally mean it, do you?' and the Schipperke as quick as a knife. I liked\nthe Skye best, I must confess. There was something pathetic about him.\"\n\nThe story seemed to have no climax.\n\n\"What happened to him?\" Rachel asked.\n\n\"That's a very sad story,\" said Richard, lowering his voice and peeling\nan apple. \"He followed my wife in the car one day and got run over by a\nbrute of a cyclist.\"\n\n\"Was he killed?\" asked Rachel.\n\nBut Clarissa at her end of the table had overheard.\n\n\"Don't talk of it!\" she cried. \"It's a thing I can't bear to think of to\nthis day.\"\n\nSurely the tears stood in her eyes?\n\n\"That's the painful thing about pets,\" said Mr. Dalloway; \"they die. The\nfirst sorrow I can remember was for the death of a dormouse. I regret to\nsay that I sat upon it. Still, that didn't make one any the less sorry.\nHere lies the duck that Samuel Johnson sat on, eh? I was big for my\nage.\"\n\n\"Then we had canaries,\" he continued, \"a pair of ring-doves, a lemur,\nand at one time a martin.\"\n\n\"Did you live in the country?\" Rachel asked him.\n\n\"We lived in the country for six months of the year. When I say 'we' I\nmean four sisters, a brother, and myself. There's nothing like coming of\na large family. Sisters particularly are delightful.\"\n\n\"Dick, you were horribly spoilt!\" cried Clarissa across the table.\n\n\"No, no. Appreciated,\" said Richard.\n\nRachel had other questions on the tip of her tongue; or rather one\nenormous question, which she did not in the least know how to put into\nwords. The talk appeared too airy to admit of it.\n\n\"Please tell me--everything.\" That was what she wanted to say. He had\ndrawn apart one little chink and showed astonishing treasures. It seemed\nto her incredible that a man like that should be willing to talk to her.\nHe had sisters and pets, and once lived in the country. She stirred her\ntea round and round; the bubbles which swam and clustered in the cup\nseemed to her like the union of their minds.\n\nThe talk meanwhile raced past her, and when Richard suddenly stated in a\njocular tone of voice, \"I'm sure Miss Vinrace, now, has secret leanings\ntowards Catholicism,\" she had no idea what to answer, and Helen could\nnot help laughing at the start she gave.\n\nHowever, breakfast was over and Mrs. Dalloway was rising. \"I always\nthink religion's like collecting beetles,\" she said, summing up the\ndiscussion as she went up the stairs with Helen. \"One person has a\npassion for black beetles; another hasn't; it's no good arguing about\nit. What's _your_ black beetle now?\"\n\n\"I suppose it's my children,\" said Helen.\n\n\"Ah--that's different,\" Clarissa breathed. \"Do tell me. You have a boy,\nhaven't you? Isn't it detestable, leaving them?\"\n\nIt was as though a blue shadow had fallen across a pool. Their eyes\nbecame deeper, and their voices more cordial. Instead of joining them\nas they began to pace the deck, Rachel was indignant with the prosperous\nmatrons, who made her feel outside their world and motherless, and\nturning back, she left them abruptly. She slammed the door of her room,\nand pulled out her music. It was all old music--Bach and Beethoven,\nMozart and Purcell--the pages yellow, the engraving rough to the finger.\nIn three minutes she was deep in a very difficult, very classical fugue\nin A, and over her face came a queer remote impersonal expression of\ncomplete absorption and anxious satisfaction. Now she stumbled; now she\nfaltered and had to play the same bar twice over; but an invisible\nline seemed to string the notes together, from which rose a shape,\na building. She was so far absorbed in this work, for it was really\ndifficult to find how all these sounds should stand together, and drew\nupon the whole of her faculties, that she never heard a knock at the\ndoor. It was burst impulsively open, and Mrs. Dalloway stood in the room\nleaving the door open, so that a strip of the white deck and of the blue\nsea appeared through the opening. The shape of the Bach fugue crashed to\nthe ground.\n\n\"Don't let me interrupt,\" Clarissa implored. \"I heard you playing, and I\ncouldn't resist. I adore Bach!\"\n\nRachel flushed and fumbled her fingers in her lap. She stood up\nawkwardly.\n\n\"It's too difficult,\" she said.\n\n\"But you were playing quite splendidly! I ought to have stayed outside.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Rachel.\n\nShe slid _Cowper's_ _Letters_ and _Wuthering_ _Heights_ out of the\narm-chair, so that Clarissa was invited to sit there.\n\n\"What a dear little room!\" she said, looking round. \"Oh, _Cowper's\nLetters_! I've never read them. Are they nice?\"\n\n\"Rather dull,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"He wrote awfully well, didn't he?\" said Clarissa; \"--if one likes\nthat kind of thing--finished his sentences and all that. _Wuthering_\n_Heights_! Ah--that's more in my line. I really couldn't exist without\nthe Brontes! Don't you love them? Still, on the whole, I'd rather live\nwithout them than without Jane Austen.\"\n\nLightly and at random though she spoke, her manner conveyed an\nextraordinary degree of sympathy and desire to befriend.\n\n\"Jane Austen? I don't like Jane Austen,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"You monster!\" Clarissa exclaimed. \"I can only just forgive you. Tell me\nwhy?\"\n\n\"She's so--so--well, so like a tight plait,\" Rachel floundered. \"Ah--I\nsee what you mean. But I don't agree. And you won't when you're older.\nAt your age I only liked Shelley. I can remember sobbing over him in the\ngarden.\n\n     He has outsoared the shadow of our night,\n     Envy and calumny and hate and pain-- you remember?\n\n     Can touch him not and torture not again\n     From the contagion of the world's slow stain.\n\nHow divine!--and yet what nonsense!\" She looked lightly round the room.\n\"I always think it's _living_, not dying, that counts. I really respect\nsome snuffy old stockbroker who's gone on adding up column after column\nall his days, and trotting back to his villa at Brixton with some old\npug dog he worships, and a dreary little wife sitting at the end of the\ntable, and going off to Margate for a fortnight--I assure you I know\nheaps like that--well, they seem to me _really_ nobler than poets whom\nevery one worships, just because they're geniuses and die young. But I\ndon't expect _you_ to agree with me!\"\n\nShe pressed Rachel's shoulder.\n\n\"Um-m-m--\" she went on quoting--\n\nUnrest which men miscall delight--\n\n\"When you're my age you'll see that the world is _crammed_ with\ndelightful things. I think young people make such a mistake about\nthat--not letting themselves be happy. I sometimes think that happiness\nis the only thing that counts. I don't know you well enough to say, but\nI should guess you might be a little inclined to--when one's young and\nattractive--I'm going to say it!--_every_thing's at one's feet.\" She\nglanced round as much as to say, \"not only a few stuffy books and Bach.\"\n\n\"I long to ask questions,\" she continued. \"You interest me so much. If\nI'm impertinent, you must just box my ears.\"\n\n\"And I--I want to ask questions,\" said Rachel with such earnestness that\nMrs. Dalloway had to check her smile.\n\n\"D'you mind if we walk?\" she said. \"The air's so delicious.\"\n\nShe snuffed it like a racehorse as they shut the door and stood on deck.\n\n\"Isn't it good to be alive?\" she exclaimed, and drew Rachel's arm within\nhers.\n\n\"Look, look! How exquisite!\"\n\nThe shores of Portugal were beginning to lose their substance; but\nthe land was still the land, though at a great distance. They could\ndistinguish the little towns that were sprinkled in the folds of the\nhills, and the smoke rising faintly. The towns appeared to be very small\nin comparison with the great purple mountains behind them.\n\n\"Honestly, though,\" said Clarissa, having looked, \"I don't like views.\nThey're too inhuman.\" They walked on.\n\n\"How odd it is!\" she continued impulsively. \"This time yesterday we'd\nnever met. I was packing in a stuffy little room in the hotel. We know\nabsolutely nothing about each other--and yet--I feel as if I _did_ know\nyou!\"\n\n\"You have children--your husband was in Parliament?\"\n\n\"You've never been to school, and you live--?\"\n\n\"With my aunts at Richmond.\"\n\n\"Richmond?\"\n\n\"You see, my aunts like the Park. They like the quiet.\"\n\n\"And you don't! I understand!\" Clarissa laughed.\n\n\"I like walking in the Park alone; but not--with the dogs,\" she\nfinished.\n\n\"No; and some people _are_ dogs; aren't they?\" said Clarissa, as if she\nhad guessed a secret. \"But not every one--oh no, not every one.\"\n\n\"Not every one,\" said Rachel, and stopped.\n\n\"I can quite imagine you walking alone,\" said Clarissa: \"and\nthinking--in a little world of your own. But how you will enjoy it--some\nday!\"\n\n\"I shall enjoy walking with a man--is that what you mean?\" said Rachel,\nregarding Mrs. Dalloway with her large enquiring eyes.\n\n\"I wasn't thinking of a man particularly,\" said Clarissa. \"But you\nwill.\"\n\n\"No. I shall never marry,\" Rachel determined.\n\n\"I shouldn't be so sure of that,\" said Clarissa. Her sidelong glance\ntold Rachel that she found her attractive although she was inexplicably\namused.\n\n\"Why do people marry?\" Rachel asked.\n\n\"That's what you're going to find out,\" Clarissa laughed.\n\nRachel followed her eyes and found that they rested for a second, on the\nrobust figure of Richard Dalloway, who was engaged in striking a match\non the sole of his boot; while Willoughby expounded something, which\nseemed to be of great interest to them both.\n\n\"There's nothing like it,\" she concluded. \"Do tell me about the\nAmbroses. Or am I asking too many questions?\"\n\n\"I find you easy to talk to,\" said Rachel.\n\nThe short sketch of the Ambroses was, however, somewhat perfunctory, and\ncontained little but the fact that Mr. Ambrose was her uncle.\n\n\"Your mother's brother?\"\n\nWhen a name has dropped out of use, the lightest touch upon it tells.\nMrs. Dalloway went on:\n\n\"Are you like your mother?\"\n\n\"No; she was different,\" said Rachel.\n\nShe was overcome by an intense desire to tell Mrs. Dalloway things she\nhad never told any one--things she had not realised herself until this\nmoment.\n\n\"I am lonely,\" she began. \"I want--\" She did not know what she wanted,\nso that she could not finish the sentence; but her lip quivered.\n\nBut it seemed that Mrs. Dalloway was able to understand without words.\n\n\"I know,\" she said, actually putting one arm round Rachel's shoulder.\n\"When I was your age I wanted too. No one understood until I met\nRichard. He gave me all I wanted. He's man and woman as well.\" Her eyes\nrested upon Mr. Dalloway, leaning upon the rail, still talking. \"Don't\nthink I say that because I'm his wife--I see his faults more clearly\nthan I see any one else's. What one wants in the person one lives with\nis that they should keep one at one's best. I often wonder what I've\ndone to be so happy!\" she exclaimed, and a tear slid down her cheek. She\nwiped it away, squeezed Rachel's hand, and exclaimed:\n\n\"How good life is!\" At that moment, standing out in the fresh breeze,\nwith the sun upon the waves, and Mrs. Dalloway's hand upon her arm, it\nseemed indeed as if life which had been unnamed before was infinitely\nwonderful, and too good to be true.\n\nHere Helen passed them, and seeing Rachel arm-in-arm with a comparative\nstranger, looking excited, was amused, but at the same time slightly\nirritated. But they were immediately joined by Richard, who had enjoyed\na very interesting talk with Willoughby and was in a sociable mood.\n\n\"Observe my Panama,\" he said, touching the brim of his hat. \"Are you\naware, Miss Vinrace, how much can be done to induce fine weather by\nappropriate headdress? I have determined that it is a hot summer day; I\nwarn you that nothing you can say will shake me. Therefore I am going\nto sit down. I advise you to follow my example.\" Three chairs in a row\ninvited them to be seated.\n\nLeaning back, Richard surveyed the waves.\n\n\"That's a very pretty blue,\" he said. \"But there's a little too much of\nit. Variety is essential to a view. Thus, if you have hills you ought\nto have a river; if a river, hills. The best view in the world in my\nopinion is that from Boars Hill on a fine day--it must be a fine day,\nmark you--A rug?--Oh, thank you, my dear . . . in that case you have\nalso the advantage of associations--the Past.\"\n\n\"D'you want to talk, Dick, or shall I read aloud?\"\n\nClarissa had fetched a book with the rugs.\n\n\"_Persuasion_,\" announced Richard, examining the volume.\n\n\"That's for Miss Vinrace,\" said Clarissa. \"She can't bear our beloved\nJane.\"\n\n\"That--if I may say so--is because you have not read her,\" said Richard.\n\"She is incomparably the greatest female writer we possess.\"\n\n\"She is the greatest,\" he continued, \"and for this reason: she does not\nattempt to write like a man. Every other woman does; on that account, I\ndon't read 'em.\"\n\n\"Produce your instances, Miss Vinrace,\" he went on, joining his\nfinger-tips. \"I'm ready to be converted.\"\n\nHe waited, while Rachel vainly tried to vindicate her sex from the\nslight he put upon it.\n\n\"I'm afraid he's right,\" said Clarissa. \"He generally is--the wretch!\"\n\n\"I brought _Persuasion_,\" she went on, \"because I thought it was a\nlittle less threadbare than the others--though, Dick, it's no good\n_your_ pretending to know Jane by heart, considering that she always\nsends you to sleep!\"\n\n\"After the labours of legislation, I deserve sleep,\" said Richard.\n\n\"You're not to think about those guns,\" said Clarissa, seeing that his\neye, passing over the waves, still sought the land meditatively, \"or\nabout navies, or empires, or anything.\" So saying she opened the book\nand began to read:\n\n\"'Sir Walter Elliott, of Kellynch Hall, in Somersetshire, was a man\nwho, for his own amusement, never took up any book but the\n_Baronetage_'--don't you know Sir Walter?--'There he found occupation\nfor an idle hour, and consolation in a distressed one.' She does write\nwell, doesn't she? 'There--'\" She read on in a light humorous voice. She\nwas determined that Sir Walter should take her husband's mind off the\nguns of Britain, and divert him in an exquisite, quaint, sprightly, and\nslightly ridiculous world. After a time it appeared that the sun was\nsinking in that world, and the points becoming softer. Rachel looked\nup to see what caused the change. Richard's eyelids were closing and\nopening; opening and closing. A loud nasal breath announced that he no\nlonger considered appearances, that he was sound asleep.\n\n\"Triumph!\" Clarissa whispered at the end of a sentence. Suddenly she\nraised her hand in protest. A sailor hesitated; she gave the book to\nRachel, and stepped lightly to take the message--\"Mr. Grice wished\nto know if it was convenient,\" etc. She followed him. Ridley, who had\nprowled unheeded, started forward, stopped, and, with a gesture of\ndisgust, strode off to his study. The sleeping politician was left in\nRachel's charge. She read a sentence, and took a look at him. In sleep\nhe looked like a coat hanging at the end of a bed; there were all the\nwrinkles, and the sleeves and trousers kept their shape though no longer\nfilled out by legs and arms. You can then best judge the age and state\nof the coat. She looked him all over until it seemed to her that he must\nprotest.\n\nHe was a man of forty perhaps; and here there were lines round his eyes,\nand there curious clefts in his cheeks. Slightly battered he appeared,\nbut dogged and in the prime of life.\n\n\"Sisters and a dormouse and some canaries,\" Rachel murmured, never\ntaking her eyes off him. \"I wonder, I wonder\" she ceased, her chin upon\nher hand, still looking at him. A bell chimed behind them, and Richard\nraised his head. Then he opened his eyes which wore for a second the\nqueer look of a shortsighted person's whose spectacles are lost. It\ntook him a moment to recover from the impropriety of having snored, and\npossibly grunted, before a young lady. To wake and find oneself left\nalone with one was also slightly disconcerting.\n\n\"I suppose I've been dozing,\" he said. \"What's happened to everyone?\nClarissa?\"\n\n\"Mrs. Dalloway has gone to look at Mr. Grice's fish,\" Rachel replied.\n\n\"I might have guessed,\" said Richard. \"It's a common occurrence. And how\nhave you improved the shining hour? Have you become a convert?\"\n\n\"I don't think I've read a line,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"That's what I always find. There are too many things to look at. I find\nnature very stimulating myself. My best ideas have come to me out of\ndoors.\"\n\n\"When you were walking?\"\n\n\"Walking--riding--yachting--I suppose the most momentous conversations\nof my life took place while perambulating the great court at Trinity.\nI was at both universities. It was a fad of my father's. He thought it\nbroadening to the mind. I think I agree with him. I can remember--what\nan age ago it seems!--settling the basis of a future state with the\npresent Secretary for India. We thought ourselves very wise. I'm not\nsure we weren't. We were happy, Miss Vinrace, and we were young--gifts\nwhich make for wisdom.\"\n\n\"Have you done what you said you'd do?\" she asked.\n\n\"A searching question! I answer--Yes and No. If on the one hand I have\nnot accomplished what I set out to accomplish--which of us does!--on the\nother I can fairly say this: I have not lowered my ideal.\"\n\nHe looked resolutely at a sea-gull, as though his ideal flew on the\nwings of the bird.\n\n\"But,\" said Rachel, \"what _is_ your ideal?\"\n\n\"There you ask too much, Miss Vinrace,\" said Richard playfully.\n\nShe could only say that she wanted to know, and Richard was sufficiently\namused to answer.\n\n\"Well, how shall I reply? In one word--Unity. Unity of aim, of dominion,\nof progress. The dispersion of the best ideas over the greatest area.\"\n\n\"The English?\"\n\n\"I grant that the English seem, on the whole, whiter than most men,\ntheir records cleaner. But, good Lord, don't run away with the idea that\nI don't see the drawbacks--horrors--unmentionable things done in our\nvery midst! I'm under no illusions. Few people, I suppose, have\nfewer illusions than I have. Have you ever been in a factory, Miss\nVinrace!--No, I suppose not--I may say I hope not.\"\n\nAs for Rachel, she had scarcely walked through a poor street, and always\nunder the escort of father, maid, or aunts.\n\n\"I was going to say that if you'd ever seen the kind of thing that's\ngoing on round you, you'd understand what it is that makes me and men\nlike me politicians. You asked me a moment ago whether I'd done what I\nset out to do. Well, when I consider my life, there is one fact I\nadmit that I'm proud of; owing to me some thousands of girls in\nLancashire--and many thousands to come after them--can spend an hour\nevery day in the open air which their mothers had to spend over their\nlooms. I'm prouder of that, I own, than I should be of writing Keats and\nShelley into the bargain!\"\n\nIt became painful to Rachel to be one of those who write Keats and\nShelley. She liked Richard Dalloway, and warmed as he warmed. He seemed\nto mean what he said.\n\n\"I know nothing!\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"It's far better that you should know nothing,\" he said paternally, \"and\nyou wrong yourself, I'm sure. You play very nicely, I'm told, and I've\nno doubt you've read heaps of learned books.\"\n\nElderly banter would no longer check her.\n\n\"You talk of unity,\" she said. \"You ought to make me understand.\"\n\n\"I never allow my wife to talk politics,\" he said seriously. \"For this\nreason. It is impossible for human beings, constituted as they are, both\nto fight and to have ideals. If I have preserved mine, as I am thankful\nto say that in great measure I have, it is due to the fact that I have\nbeen able to come home to my wife in the evening and to find that she\nhas spent her day in calling, music, play with the children, domestic\nduties--what you will; her illusions have not been destroyed. She gives\nme courage to go on. The strain of public life is very great,\" he added.\n\nThis made him appear a battered martyr, parting every day with some of\nthe finest gold, in the service of mankind.\n\n\"I can't think,\" Rachel exclaimed, \"how any one does it!\"\n\n\"Explain, Miss Vinrace,\" said Richard. \"This is a matter I want to clear\nup.\"\n\nHis kindness was genuine, and she determined to take the chance he gave\nher, although to talk to a man of such worth and authority made her\nheart beat.\n\n\"It seems to me like this,\" she began, doing her best first to recollect\nand then to expose her shivering private visions.\n\n\"There's an old widow in her room, somewhere, let us suppose in the\nsuburbs of Leeds.\"\n\nRichard bent his head to show that he accepted the widow.\n\n\"In London you're spending your life, talking, writing things, getting\nbills through, missing what seems natural. The result of it all is that\nshe goes to her cupboard and finds a little more tea, a few lumps of\nsugar, or a little less tea and a newspaper. Widows all over the country\nI admit do this. Still, there's the mind of the widow--the affections;\nthose you leave untouched. But you waste you own.\"\n\n\"If the widow goes to her cupboard and finds it bare,\" Richard answered,\n\"her spiritual outlook we may admit will be affected. If I may pick\nholes in your philosophy, Miss Vinrace, which has its merits, I would\npoint out that a human being is not a set of compartments, but an\norganism. Imagination, Miss Vinrace; use your imagination; that's where\nyou young Liberals fail. Conceive the world as a whole. Now for your\nsecond point; when you assert that in trying to set the house in\norder for the benefit of the young generation I am wasting my higher\ncapabilities, I totally disagree with you. I can conceive no more\nexalted aim--to be the citizen of the Empire. Look at it in this way,\nMiss Vinrace; conceive the state as a complicated machine; we citizens\nare parts of that machine; some fulfil more important duties; others\n(perhaps I am one of them) serve only to connect some obscure parts of\nthe mechanism, concealed from the public eye. Yet if the meanest screw\nfails in its task, the proper working of the whole is imperilled.\"\n\nIt was impossible to combine the image of a lean black widow, gazing out\nof her window, and longing for some one to talk to, with the image of a\nvast machine, such as one sees at South Kensington, thumping, thumping,\nthumping. The attempt at communication had been a failure.\n\n\"We don't seem to understand each other,\" she said.\n\n\"Shall I say something that will make you very angry?\" he replied.\n\n\"It won't,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"Well, then; no woman has what I may call the political instinct. You\nhave very great virtues; I am the first, I hope, to admit that; but I\nhave never met a woman who even saw what is meant by statesmanship. I am\ngoing to make you still more angry. I hope that I never shall meet such\na woman. Now, Miss Vinrace, are we enemies for life?\"\n\nVanity, irritation, and a thrusting desire to be understood, urged her\nto make another attempt.\n\n\"Under the streets, in the sewers, in the wires, in the telephones,\nthere is something alive; is that what you mean? In things like\ndust-carts, and men mending roads? You feel that all the time when you\nwalk about London, and when you turn on a tap and the water comes?\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said Richard. \"I understand you to mean that the whole of\nmodern society is based upon cooperative effort. If only more people\nwould realise that, Miss Vinrace, there would be fewer of your old\nwidows in solitary lodgings!\"\n\nRachel considered.\n\n\"Are you a Liberal or are you a Conservative?\" she asked.\n\n\"I call myself a Conservative for convenience sake,\" said Richard,\nsmiling. \"But there is more in common between the two parties than\npeople generally allow.\"\n\nThere was a pause, which did not come on Rachel's side from any lack of\nthings to say; as usual she could not say them, and was further confused\nby the fact that the time for talking probably ran short. She was\nhaunted by absurd jumbled ideas--how, if one went back far enough,\neverything perhaps was intelligible; everything was in common; for the\nmammoths who pastured in the fields of Richmond High Street had turned\ninto paving stones and boxes full of ribbon, and her aunts.\n\n\"Did you say you lived in the country when you were a child?\" she asked.\n\nCrude as her manners seemed to him, Richard was flattered. There could\nbe no doubt that her interest was genuine.\n\n\"I did,\" he smiled.\n\n\"And what happened?\" she asked. \"Or do I ask too many questions?\"\n\n\"I'm flattered, I assure you. But--let me see--what happened? Well,\nriding, lessons, sisters. There was an enchanted rubbish heap, I\nremember, where all kinds of queer things happened. Odd, what things\nimpress children! I can remember the look of the place to this day.\nIt's a fallacy to think that children are happy. They're not; they're\nunhappy. I've never suffered so much as I did when I was a child.\"\n\n\"Why?\" she asked.\n\n\"I didn't get on well with my father,\" said Richard shortly. \"He was\na very able man, but hard. Well--it makes one determined not to sin in\nthat way oneself. Children never forget injustice. They forgive heaps of\nthings grown-up people mind; but that sin is the unpardonable sin. Mind\nyou--I daresay I was a difficult child to manage; but when I think what\nI was ready to give! No, I was more sinned against than sinning. And\nthen I went to school, where I did very fairly well; and and then, as\nI say, my father sent me to both universities. . . . D'you know, Miss\nVinrace, you've made me think? How little, after all, one can tell\nanybody about one's life! Here I sit; there you sit; both, I doubt not,\nchock-full of the most interesting experiences, ideas, emotions; yet how\ncommunicate? I've told you what every second person you meet might tell\nyou.\"\n\n\"I don't think so,\" she said. \"It's the way of saying things, isn't it,\nnot the things?\"\n\n\"True,\" said Richard. \"Perfectly true.\" He paused. \"When I look back\nover my life--I'm forty-two--what are the great facts that stand out?\nWhat were the revelations, if I may call them so? The misery of the poor\nand--\" (he hesitated and pitched over) \"love!\"\n\nUpon that word he lowered his voice; it was a word that seemed to unveil\nthe skies for Rachel.\n\n\"It's an odd thing to say to a young lady,\" he continued. \"But have you\nany idea what--what I mean by that? No, of course not. I don't use the\nword in a conventional sense. I use it as young men use it. Girls are\nkept very ignorant, aren't they? Perhaps it's wise--perhaps--You _don't_\nknow?\"\n\nHe spoke as if he had lost consciousness of what he was saying.\n\n\"No; I don't,\" she said, scarcely speaking above her breath.\n\n\"Warships, Dick! Over there! Look!\" Clarissa, released from Mr. Grice,\nappreciative of all his seaweeds, skimmed towards them, gesticulating.\n\nShe had sighted two sinister grey vessels, low in the water, and bald\nas bone, one closely following the other with the look of eyeless beasts\nseeking their prey. Consciousness returned to Richard instantly.\n\n\"By George!\" he exclaimed, and stood shielding his eyes.\n\n\"Ours, Dick?\" said Clarissa.\n\n\"The Mediterranean Fleet,\" he answered.\n\n\"The _Euphrosyne_ was slowly dipping her flag. Richard raised his hat.\nConvulsively Clarissa squeezed Rachel's hand.\n\n\"Aren't you glad to be English!\" she said.\n\nThe warships drew past, casting a curious effect of discipline and\nsadness upon the waters, and it was not until they were again invisible\nthat people spoke to each other naturally. At lunch the talk was all\nof valour and death, and the magnificent qualities of British admirals.\nClarissa quoted one poet, Willoughby quoted another. Life on board a\nman-of-war was splendid, so they agreed, and sailors, whenever one met\nthem, were quite especially nice and simple.\n\nThis being so, no one liked it when Helen remarked that it seemed to her\nas wrong to keep sailors as to keep a Zoo, and that as for dying on a\nbattle-field, surely it was time we ceased to praise courage--\"or to\nwrite bad poetry about it,\" snarled Pepper.\n\nBut Helen was really wondering why Rachel, sitting silent, looked so\nqueer and flushed.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter V\n\n\nShe was not able to follow up her observations, however, or to come to\nany conclusion, for by one of those accidents which are liable to happen\nat sea, the whole course of their lives was now put out of order.\n\nEven at tea the floor rose beneath their feet and pitched too low again,\nand at dinner the ship seemed to groan and strain as though a lash\nwere descending. She who had been a broad-backed dray-horse, upon whose\nhind-quarters pierrots might waltz, became a colt in a field. The plates\nslanted away from the knives, and Mrs. Dalloway's face blanched for\na second as she helped herself and saw the potatoes roll this way and\nthat. Willoughby, of course, extolled the virtues of his ship,\nand quoted what had been said of her by experts and distinguished\npassengers, for he loved his own possessions. Still, dinner was uneasy,\nand directly the ladies were alone Clarissa owned that she would be\nbetter off in bed, and went, smiling bravely.\n\nNext morning the storm was on them, and no politeness could ignore it.\nMrs. Dalloway stayed in her room. Richard faced three meals, eating\nvaliantly at each; but at the third, certain glazed asparagus swimming\nin oil finally conquered him.\n\n\"That beats me,\" he said, and withdrew.\n\n\"Now we are alone once more,\" remarked William Pepper, looking round the\ntable; but no one was ready to engage him in talk, and the meal ended in\nsilence.\n\nOn the following day they met--but as flying leaves meet in the air.\nSick they were not; but the wind propelled them hastily into rooms,\nviolently downstairs. They passed each other gasping on deck; they\nshouted across tables. They wore fur coats; and Helen was never seen\nwithout a bandanna on her head. For comfort they retreated to their\ncabins, where with tightly wedged feet they let the ship bounce and\ntumble. Their sensations were the sensations of potatoes in a sack on a\ngalloping horse. The world outside was merely a violent grey tumult.\nFor two days they had a perfect rest from their old emotions. Rachel had\njust enough consciousness to suppose herself a donkey on the summit of a\nmoor in a hail-storm, with its coat blown into furrows; then she became\na wizened tree, perpetually driven back by the salt Atlantic gale.\n\nHelen, on the other hand, staggered to Mrs. Dalloway's door, knocked,\ncould not be heard for the slamming of doors and the battering of wind,\nand entered.\n\nThere were basins, of course. Mrs. Dalloway lay half-raised on a pillow,\nand did not open her eyes. Then she murmured, \"Oh, Dick, is that you?\"\n\nHelen shouted--for she was thrown against the washstand--\"How are you?\"\n\nClarissa opened one eye. It gave her an incredibly dissipated\nappearance. \"Awful!\" she gasped. Her lips were white inside.\n\nPlanting her feet wide, Helen contrived to pour champagne into a tumbler\nwith a tooth-brush in it.\n\n\"Champagne,\" she said.\n\n\"There's a tooth-brush in it,\" murmured Clarissa, and smiled; it might\nhave been the contortion of one weeping. She drank.\n\n\"Disgusting,\" she whispered, indicating the basins. Relics of humour\nstill played over her face like moonshine.\n\n\"Want more?\" Helen shouted. Speech was again beyond Clarissa's reach.\nThe wind laid the ship shivering on her side. Pale agonies crossed Mrs.\nDalloway in waves. When the curtains flapped, grey lights puffed across\nher. Between the spasms of the storm, Helen made the curtain fast, shook\nthe pillows, stretched the bed-clothes, and smoothed the hot nostrils\nand forehead with cold scent.\n\n\"You _are_ good!\" Clarissa gasped. \"Horrid mess!\"\n\nShe was trying to apologise for white underclothes fallen and scattered\non the floor. For one second she opened a single eye, and saw that the\nroom was tidy.\n\n\"That's nice,\" she gasped.\n\nHelen left her; far, far away she knew that she felt a kind of liking\nfor Mrs. Dalloway. She could not help respecting her spirit and\nher desire, even in the throes of sickness, for a tidy bedroom. Her\npetticoats, however, rose above her knees.\n\nQuite suddenly the storm relaxed its grasp. It happened at tea; the\nexpected paroxysm of the blast gave out just as it reached its climax\nand dwindled away, and the ship instead of taking the usual plunge\nwent steadily. The monotonous order of plunging and rising, roaring and\nrelaxing, was interfered with, and every one at table looked up and\nfelt something loosen within them. The strain was slackened and human\nfeelings began to peep again, as they do when daylight shows at the end\nof a tunnel.\n\n\"Try a turn with me,\" Ridley called across to Rachel.\n\n\"Foolish!\" cried Helen, but they went stumbling up the ladder. Choked\nby the wind their spirits rose with a rush, for on the skirts of all the\ngrey tumult was a misty spot of gold. Instantly the world dropped into\nshape; they were no longer atoms flying in the void, but people riding\na triumphant ship on the back of the sea. Wind and space were banished;\nthe world floated like an apple in a tub, and the mind of man, which had\nbeen unmoored also, once more attached itself to the old beliefs.\n\nHaving scrambled twice round the ship and received many sound cuffs from\nthe wind, they saw a sailor's face positively shine golden. They looked,\nand beheld a complete yellow circle of sun; next minute it was traversed\nby sailing stands of cloud, and then completely hidden. By breakfast\nthe next morning, however, the sky was swept clean, the waves, although\nsteep, were blue, and after their view of the strange under-world,\ninhabited by phantoms, people began to live among tea-pots and loaves of\nbread with greater zest than ever.\n\nRichard and Clarissa, however, still remained on the borderland. She did\nnot attempt to sit up; her husband stood on his feet, contemplated his\nwaistcoat and trousers, shook his head, and then lay down again. The\ninside of his brain was still rising and falling like the sea on the\nstage. At four o'clock he woke from sleep and saw the sunlight make a\nvivid angle across the red plush curtains and the grey tweed trousers.\nThe ordinary world outside slid into his mind, and by the time he was\ndressed he was an English gentleman again.\n\nHe stood beside his wife. She pulled him down to her by the lapel of his\ncoat, kissed him, and held him fast for a minute.\n\n\"Go and get a breath of air, Dick,\" she said. \"You look quite washed\nout. . . . How nice you smell! . . . And be polite to that woman. She\nwas so kind to me.\"\n\nThereupon Mrs. Dalloway turned to the cool side of her pillow, terribly\nflattened but still invincible.\n\nRichard found Helen talking to her brother-in-law, over two dishes of\nyellow cake and smooth bread and butter.\n\n\"You look very ill!\" she exclaimed on seeing him. \"Come and have some\ntea.\"\n\nHe remarked that the hands that moved about the cups were beautiful.\n\n\"I hear you've been very good to my wife,\" he said. \"She's had an awful\ntime of it. You came in and fed her with champagne. Were you among the\nsaved yourself?\"\n\n\"I? Oh, I haven't been sick for twenty years--sea-sick, I mean.\"\n\n\"There are three stages of convalescence, I always say,\" broke in the\nhearty voice of Willoughby. \"The milk stage, the bread-and-butter stage,\nand the roast-beef stage. I should say you were at the bread-and-butter\nstage.\" He handed him the plate.\n\n\"Now, I should advise a hearty tea, then a brisk walk on deck; and by\ndinner-time you'll be clamouring for beef, eh?\" He went off laughing,\nexcusing himself on the score of business.\n\n\"What a splendid fellow he is!\" said Richard. \"Always keen on\nsomething.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Helen, \"he's always been like that.\"\n\n\"This is a great undertaking of his,\" Richard continued. \"It's a\nbusiness that won't stop with ships, I should say. We shall see him\nin Parliament, or I'm much mistaken. He's the kind of man we want in\nParliament--the man who has done things.\"\n\nBut Helen was not much interested in her brother-in-law.\n\n\"I expect your head's aching, isn't it?\" she asked, pouring a fresh cup.\n\n\"Well, it is,\" said Richard. \"It's humiliating to find what a slave one\nis to one's body in this world. D'you know, I can never work without a\nkettle on the hob. As often as not I don't drink tea, but I must feel\nthat I can if I want to.\"\n\n\"That's very bad for you,\" said Helen.\n\n\"It shortens one's life; but I'm afraid, Mrs. Ambrose, we politicians\nmust make up our minds to that at the outset. We've got to burn the\ncandle at both ends, or--\"\n\n\"You've cooked your goose!\" said Helen brightly.\n\n\"We can't make you take us seriously, Mrs. Ambrose,\" he protested. \"May\nI ask how you've spent your time? Reading--philosophy?\" (He saw the\nblack book.) \"Metaphysics and fishing!\" he exclaimed. \"If I had to live\nagain I believe I should devote myself to one or the other.\" He began\nturning the pages.\n\n\"'Good, then, is indefinable,'\" he read out. \"How jolly to think that's\ngoing on still! 'So far as I know there is only one ethical writer,\nProfessor Henry Sidgwick, who has clearly recognised and stated this\nfact.' That's just the kind of thing we used to talk about when we were\nboys. I can remember arguing until five in the morning with Duffy--now\nSecretary for India--pacing round and round those cloisters until we\ndecided it was too late to go to bed, and we went for a ride instead.\nWhether we ever came to any conclusion--that's another matter. Still,\nit's the arguing that counts. It's things like that that stand out in\nlife. Nothing's been quite so vivid since. It's the philosophers, it's\nthe scholars,\" he continued, \"they're the people who pass the torch,\nwho keep the light burning by which we live. Being a politician doesn't\nnecessarily blind one to that, Mrs. Ambrose.\"\n\n\"No. Why should it?\" said Helen. \"But can you remember if your wife\ntakes sugar?\"\n\nShe lifted the tray and went off with it to Mrs. Dalloway.\n\nRichard twisted a muffler twice round his throat and struggled up on\ndeck. His body, which had grown white and tender in a dark room, tingled\nall over in the fresh air. He felt himself a man undoubtedly in the\nprime of life. Pride glowed in his eye as he let the wind buffet him\nand stood firm. With his head slightly lowered he sheered round corners,\nstrode uphill, and met the blast. There was a collision. For a second\nhe could not see what the body was he had run into. \"Sorry.\" \"Sorry.\"\nIt was Rachel who apologised. They both laughed, too much blown about to\nspeak. She drove open the door of her room and stepped into its calm. In\norder to speak to her, it was necessary that Richard should follow. They\nstood in a whirlpool of wind; papers began flying round in circles, the\ndoor crashed to, and they tumbled, laughing, into chairs. Richard sat\nupon Bach.\n\n\"My word! What a tempest!\" he exclaimed.\n\n\"Fine, isn't it?\" said Rachel. Certainly the struggle and wind had given\nher a decision she lacked; red was in her cheeks, and her hair was down.\n\n\"Oh, what fun!\" he cried. \"What am I sitting on? Is this your room? How\njolly!\" \"There--sit there,\" she commanded. Cowper slid once more.\n\n\"How jolly to meet again,\" said Richard. \"It seems an age. _Cowper's\nLetters_? . . . Bach? . . . _Wuthering Heights_? . . . Is this where\nyou meditate on the world, and then come out and pose poor politicians\nwith questions? In the intervals of sea-sickness I've thought a lot of\nour talk. I assure you, you made me think.\"\n\n\"I made you think! But why?\"\n\n\"What solitary icebergs we are, Miss Vinrace! How little we can\ncommunicate! There are lots of things I should like to tell you\nabout--to hear your opinion of. Have you ever read Burke?\"\n\n\"Burke?\" she repeated. \"Who was Burke?\"\n\n\"No? Well, then I shall make a point of sending you a copy. _The_\n_Speech_ _on_ _the_ _French_ _Revolution_--_The_ _American_ _Rebellion_?\nWhich shall it be, I wonder?\" He noted something in his pocket-book.\n\"And then you must write and tell me what you think of it. This\nreticence--this isolation--that's what's the matter with modern life!\nNow, tell me about yourself. What are your interests and occupations?\nI should imagine that you were a person with very strong interests. Of\ncourse you are! Good God! When I think of the age we live in, with\nits opportunities and possibilities, the mass of things to be done and\nenjoyed--why haven't we ten lives instead of one? But about yourself?\"\n\n\"You see, I'm a woman,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"I know--I know,\" said Richard, throwing his head back, and drawing his\nfingers across his eyes.\n\n\"How strange to be a woman! A young and beautiful woman,\" he continued\nsententiously, \"has the whole world at her feet. That's true, Miss\nVinrace. You have an inestimable power--for good or for evil. What\ncouldn't you do--\" he broke off.\n\n\"What?\" asked Rachel.\n\n\"You have beauty,\" he said. The ship lurched. Rachel fell slightly\nforward. Richard took her in his arms and kissed her. Holding her tight,\nhe kissed her passionately, so that she felt the hardness of his body\nand the roughness of his cheek printed upon hers. She fell back in her\nchair, with tremendous beats of the heart, each of which sent black\nwaves across her eyes. He clasped his forehead in his hands.\n\n\"You tempt me,\" he said. The tone of his voice was terrifying. He seemed\nchoked in fright. They were both trembling. Rachel stood up and went.\nHer head was cold, her knees shaking, and the physical pain of the\nemotion was so great that she could only keep herself moving above\nthe great leaps of her heart. She leant upon the rail of the ship, and\ngradually ceased to feel, for a chill of body and mind crept over her.\nFar out between the waves little black and white sea-birds were riding.\nRising and falling with smooth and graceful movements in the hollows of\nthe waves they seemed singularly detached and unconcerned.\n\n\"You're peaceful,\" she said. She became peaceful too, at the same\ntime possessed with a strange exultation. Life seemed to hold infinite\npossibilities she had never guessed at. She leant upon the rail and\nlooked over the troubled grey waters, where the sunlight was fitfully\nscattered upon the crests of the waves, until she was cold and\nabsolutely calm again. Nevertheless something wonderful had happened.\n\nAt dinner, however, she did not feel exalted, but merely uncomfortable,\nas if she and Richard had seen something together which is hidden in\nordinary life, so that they did not like to look at each other. Richard\nslid his eyes over her uneasily once, and never looked at her again.\nFormal platitudes were manufactured with effort, but Willoughby was\nkindled.\n\n\"Beef for Mr. Dalloway!\" he shouted. \"Come now--after that walk you're\nat the beef stage, Dalloway!\"\n\nWonderful masculine stories followed about Bright and Disraeli and\ncoalition governments, wonderful stories which made the people at the\ndinner-table seem featureless and small. After dinner, sitting alone\nwith Rachel under the great swinging lamp, Helen was struck by her\npallor. It once more occurred to her that there was something strange in\nthe girl's behaviour.\n\n\"You look tired. Are you tired?\" she asked.\n\n\"Not tired,\" said Rachel. \"Oh, yes, I suppose I am tired.\"\n\nHelen advised bed, and she went, not seeing Richard again. She must have\nbeen very tired for she fell asleep at once, but after an hour or two of\ndreamless sleep, she dreamt. She dreamt that she was walking down a long\ntunnel, which grew so narrow by degrees that she could touch the damp\nbricks on either side. At length the tunnel opened and became a vault;\nshe found herself trapped in it, bricks meeting her wherever she turned,\nalone with a little deformed man who squatted on the floor gibbering,\nwith long nails. His face was pitted and like the face of an animal.\nThe wall behind him oozed with damp, which collected into drops and slid\ndown. Still and cold as death she lay, not daring to move, until she\nbroke the agony by tossing herself across the bed, and woke crying \"Oh!\"\n\nLight showed her the familiar things: her clothes, fallen off the chair;\nthe water jug gleaming white; but the horror did not go at once. She\nfelt herself pursued, so that she got up and actually locked her door.\nA voice moaned for her; eyes desired her. All night long barbarian men\nharassed the ship; they came scuffling down the passages, and stopped to\nsnuffle at her door. She could not sleep again.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter VI\n\n\n\"That's the tragedy of life--as I always say!\" said Mrs. Dalloway.\n\"Beginning things and having to end them. Still, I'm not going to let\n_this_ end, if you're willing.\" It was the morning, the sea was calm,\nand the ship once again was anchored not far from another shore.\n\nShe was dressed in her long fur cloak, with the veils wound around her\nhead, and once more the rich boxes stood on top of each other so that\nthe scene of a few days back seemed to be repeated.\n\n\"D'you suppose we shall ever meet in London?\" said Ridley ironically.\n\"You'll have forgotten all about me by the time you step out there.\"\n\nHe pointed to the shore of the little bay, where they could now see the\nseparate trees with moving branches.\n\n\"How horrid you are!\" she laughed. \"Rachel's coming to see me\nanyhow--the instant you get back,\" she said, pressing Rachel's arm.\n\"Now--you've no excuse!\"\n\nWith a silver pencil she wrote her name and address on the flyleaf of\n_Persuasion_, and gave the book to Rachel. Sailors were shouldering the\nluggage, and people were beginning to congregate. There were Captain\nCobbold, Mr. Grice, Willoughby, Helen, and an obscure grateful man in a\nblue jersey.\n\n\"Oh, it's time,\" said Clarissa. \"Well, good-bye. I _do_ like you,\" she\nmurmured as she kissed Rachel. People in the way made it unnecessary\nfor Richard to shake Rachel by the hand; he managed to look at her very\nstiffly for a second before he followed his wife down the ship's side.\n\nThe boat separating from the vessel made off towards the land, and for\nsome minutes Helen, Ridley, and Rachel leant over the rail, watching.\nOnce Mrs. Dalloway turned and waved; but the boat steadily grew smaller\nand smaller until it ceased to rise and fall, and nothing could be seen\nsave two resolute backs.\n\n\"Well, that's over,\" said Ridley after a long silence. \"We shall never\nsee _them_ again,\" he added, turning to go to his books. A feeling of\nemptiness and melancholy came over them; they knew in their hearts that\nit was over, and that they had parted for ever, and the knowledge filled\nthem with far greater depression than the length of their acquaintance\nseemed to justify. Even as the boat pulled away they could feel other\nsights and sounds beginning to take the place of the Dalloways, and the\nfeeling was so unpleasant that they tried to resist it. For so, too,\nwould they be forgotten.\n\nIn much the same way as Mrs. Chailey downstairs was sweeping the\nwithered rose-leaves off the dressing-table, so Helen was anxious to\nmake things straight again after the visitors had gone. Rachel's obvious\nlanguor and listlessness made her an easy prey, and indeed Helen had\ndevised a kind of trap. That something had happened she now felt pretty\ncertain; moreover, she had come to think that they had been strangers\nlong enough; she wished to know what the girl was like, partly of course\nbecause Rachel showed no disposition to be known. So, as they turned\nfrom the rail, she said:\n\n\"Come and talk to me instead of practising,\" and led the way to the\nsheltered side where the deck-chairs were stretched in the sun. Rachel\nfollowed her indifferently. Her mind was absorbed by Richard; by the\nextreme strangeness of what had happened, and by a thousand feelings of\nwhich she had not been conscious before. She made scarcely any attempt\nto listen to what Helen was saying, as Helen indulged in commonplaces to\nbegin with. While Mrs. Ambrose arranged her embroidery, sucked her silk,\nand threaded her needle, she lay back gazing at the horizon.\n\n\"Did you like those people?\" Helen asked her casually.\n\n\"Yes,\" she replied blankly.\n\n\"You talked to him, didn't you?\"\n\nShe said nothing for a minute.\n\n\"He kissed me,\" she said without any change of tone.\n\nHelen started, looked at her, but could not make out what she felt.\n\n\"M-m-m'yes,\" she said, after a pause. \"I thought he was that kind of\nman.\"\n\n\"What kind of man?\" said Rachel.\n\n\"Pompous and sentimental.\"\n\n\"I like him,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"So you really didn't mind?\"\n\nFor the first time since Helen had known her Rachel's eyes lit up\nbrightly.\n\n\"I did mind,\" she said vehemently. \"I dreamt. I couldn't sleep.\"\n\n\"Tell me what happened,\" said Helen. She had to keep her lips from\ntwitching as she listened to Rachel's story. It was poured out abruptly\nwith great seriousness and no sense of humour.\n\n\"We talked about politics. He told me what he had done for the poor\nsomewhere. I asked him all sorts of questions. He told me about his own\nlife. The day before yesterday, after the storm, he came in to see me.\nIt happened then, quite suddenly. He kissed me. I don't know why.\" As\nshe spoke she grew flushed. \"I was a good deal excited,\" she continued.\n\"But I didn't mind till afterwards; when--\" she paused, and saw the\nfigure of the bloated little man again--\"I became terrified.\"\n\nFrom the look in her eyes it was evident she was again terrified. Helen\nwas really at a loss what to say. From the little she knew of Rachel's\nupbringing she supposed that she had been kept entirely ignorant as\nto the relations of men with women. With a shyness which she felt with\nwomen and not with men she did not like to explain simply what these\nare. Therefore she took the other course and belittled the whole affair.\n\n\"Oh, well,\" she said, \"He was a silly creature, and if I were you, I'd\nthink no more about it.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Rachel, sitting bolt upright, \"I shan't do that. I shall\nthink about it all day and all night until I find out exactly what it\ndoes mean.\"\n\n\"Don't you ever read?\" Helen asked tentatively.\n\n\"_Cowper's_ _Letters_--that kind of thing. Father gets them for me or my\nAunts.\"\n\nHelen could hardly restrain herself from saying out loud what she\nthought of a man who brought up his daughter so that at the age of\ntwenty-four she scarcely knew that men desired women and was terrified\nby a kiss. She had good reason to fear that Rachel had made herself\nincredibly ridiculous.\n\n\"You don't know many men?\" she asked.\n\n\"Mr. Pepper,\" said Rachel ironically.\n\n\"So no one's ever wanted to marry you?\"\n\n\"No,\" she answered ingenuously.\n\nHelen reflected that as, from what she had said, Rachel certainly would\nthink these things out, it might be as well to help her.\n\n\"You oughtn't to be frightened,\" she said. \"It's the most natural thing\nin the world. Men will want to kiss you, just as they'll want to marry\nyou. The pity is to get things out of proportion. It's like noticing\nthe noises people make when they eat, or men spitting; or, in short, any\nsmall thing that gets on one's nerves.\"\n\nRachel seemed to be inattentive to these remarks.\n\n\"Tell me,\" she said suddenly, \"what are those women in Piccadilly?\"\n\n\"In Picadilly? They are prostituted,\" said Helen.\n\n\"It _is_ terrifying--it _is_ disgusting,\" Rachel asserted, as if she\nincluded Helen in the hatred.\n\n\"It is,\" said Helen. \"But--\"\n\n\"I did like him,\" Rachel mused, as if speaking to herself. \"I wanted to\ntalk to him; I wanted to know what he'd done. The women in Lancashire--\"\n\nIt seemed to her as she recalled their talk that there was something\nlovable about Richard, good in their attempted friendship, and strangely\npiteous in the way they had parted.\n\nThe softening of her mood was apparent to Helen.\n\n\"You see,\" she said, \"you must take things as they are; and if you want\nfriendship with men you must run risks. Personally,\" she continued,\nbreaking into a smile, \"I think it's worth it; I don't mind being\nkissed; I'm rather jealous, I believe, that Mr. Dalloway kissed you and\ndidn't kiss me. Though,\" she added, \"he bored me considerably.\"\n\nBut Rachel did not return the smile or dismiss the whole affair, as\nHelen meant her to. Her mind was working very quickly, inconsistently\nand painfully. Helen's words hewed down great blocks which had stood\nthere always, and the light which came in was cold. After sitting for a\ntime with fixed eyes, she burst out:\n\n\"So that's why I can't walk alone!\"\n\nBy this new light she saw her life for the first time a creeping\nhedged-in thing, driven cautiously between high walls, here turned\naside, there plunged in darkness, made dull and crippled for ever--her\nlife that was the only chance she had--a thousand words and actions\nbecame plain to her.\n\n\"Because men are brutes! I hate men!\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"I thought you said you liked him?\" said Helen.\n\n\"I liked him, and I liked being kissed,\" she answered, as if that only\nadded more difficulties to her problem.\n\nHelen was surprised to see how genuine both shock and problem were, but\nshe could think of no way of easing the difficulty except by going on\ntalking. She wanted to make her niece talk, and so to understand why\nthis rather dull, kindly, plausible politician had made so deep an\nimpression on her, for surely at the age of twenty-four this was not\nnatural.\n\n\"And did you like Mrs. Dalloway too?\" she asked.\n\nAs she spoke she saw Rachel redden; for she remembered silly things she\nhad said, and also, it occurred to her that she treated this exquisite\nwoman rather badly, for Mrs. Dalloway had said that she loved her\nhusband.\n\n\"She was quite nice, but a thimble-pated creature,\" Helen continued. \"I\nnever heard such nonsense! Chitter-chatter-chitter-chatter--fish and\nthe Greek alphabet--never listened to a word any one said--chock-full of\nidiotic theories about the way to bring up children--I'd far rather talk\nto him any day. He was pompous, but he did at least understand what was\nsaid to him.\"\n\nThe glamour insensibly faded a little both from Richard and Clarissa.\nThey had not been so wonderful after all, then, in the eyes of a mature\nperson.\n\n\"It's very difficult to know what people are like,\" Rachel remarked, and\nHelen saw with pleasure that she spoke more naturally. \"I suppose I was\ntaken in.\"\n\nThere was little doubt about that according to Helen, but she restrained\nherself and said aloud:\n\n\"One has to make experiments.\"\n\n\"And they _were_ nice,\" said Rachel. \"They were extraordinarily\ninteresting.\" She tried to recall the image of the world as a live\nthing that Richard had given her, with drains like nerves, and\nbad houses like patches of diseased skin. She recalled his\nwatch-words--Unity--Imagination, and saw again the bubbles meeting in\nher tea-cup as he spoke of sisters and canaries, boyhood and his father,\nher small world becoming wonderfully enlarged.\n\n\"But all people don't seem to you equally interesting, do they?\" asked\nMrs. Ambrose.\n\nRachel explained that most people had hitherto been symbols; but that\nwhen they talked to one they ceased to be symbols, and became--\"I could\nlisten to them for ever!\" she exclaimed. She then jumped up, disappeared\ndownstairs for a minute, and came back with a fat red book.\n\n\"_Who's_ _Who_,\" she said, laying it upon Helen's knee and turning the\npages. \"It gives short lives of people--for instance: 'Sir Roland Beal;\nborn 1852; parents from Moffatt; educated at Rugby; passed first\ninto R.E.; married 1878 the daughter of T. Fishwick; served in the\nBechuanaland Expedition 1884-85 (honourably mentioned). Clubs: United\nService, Naval and Military. Recreations: an enthusiastic curler.'\"\n\nSitting on the deck at Helen's feet she went on turning the pages and\nreading biographies of bankers, writers, clergymen, sailors, surgeons,\njudges, professors, statesmen, editors, philanthropists, merchants, and\nactresses; what clubs they belonged to, where they lived, what games\nthey played, and how many acres they owned.\n\nShe became absorbed in the book.\n\nHelen meanwhile stitched at her embroidery and thought over the things\nthey had said. Her conclusion was that she would very much like to show\nher niece, if it were possible, how to live, or as she put it, how to be\na reasonable person. She thought that there must be something wrong in\nthis confusion between politics and kissing politicians, and that an\nelder person ought to be able to help.\n\n\"I quite agree,\" she said, \"that people are very interesting; only--\"\nRachel, putting her finger between the pages, looked up enquiringly.\n\n\"Only I think you ought to discriminate,\" she ended. \"It's a pity to\nbe intimate with people who are--well, rather second-rate, like the\nDalloways, and to find it out later.\"\n\n\"But how does one know?\" Rachel asked.\n\n\"I really can't tell you,\" replied Helen candidly, after a moment's\nthought. \"You'll have to find out for yourself. But try and--Why don't\nyou call me Helen?\" she added. \"'Aunt's' a horrid name. I never liked my\nAunts.\"\n\n\"I should like to call you Helen,\" Rachel answered.\n\n\"D'you think me very unsympathetic?\"\n\nRachel reviewed the points which Helen had certainly failed to\nunderstand; they arose chiefly from the difference of nearly twenty\nyears in age between them, which made Mrs. Ambrose appear too humorous\nand cool in a matter of such moment.\n\n\"No,\" she said. \"Some things you don't understand, of course.\"\n\n\"Of course,\" Helen agreed. \"So now you can go ahead and be a person on\nyour own account,\" she added.\n\nThe vision of her own personality, of herself as a real everlasting\nthing, different from anything else, unmergeable, like the sea or the\nwind, flashed into Rachel's mind, and she became profoundly excited at\nthe thought of living.\n\n\"I can by m-m-myself,\" she stammered, \"in spite of you, in spite of the\nDalloways, and Mr. Pepper, and Father, and my Aunts, in spite of these?\"\nShe swept her hand across a whole page of statesmen and soldiers.\n\n\"In spite of them all,\" said Helen gravely. She then put down her\nneedle, and explained a plan which had come into her head as they\ntalked. Instead of wandering on down the Amazons until she reached some\nsulphurous tropical port, where one had to lie within doors all day\nbeating off insects with a fan, the sensible thing to do surely was to\nspend the season with them in their villa by the seaside, where among\nother advantages Mrs. Ambrose herself would be at hand to--\"After all,\nRachel,\" she broke off, \"it's silly to pretend that because there's\ntwenty years' difference between us we therefore can't talk to each\nother like human beings.\"\n\n\"No; because we like each other,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"Yes,\" Mrs. Ambrose agreed.\n\nThat fact, together with other facts, had been made clear by their\ntwenty minutes' talk, although how they had come to these conclusions\nthey could not have said.\n\nHowever they were come by, they were sufficiently serious to send Mrs.\nAmbrose a day or two later in search of her brother-in-law. She\nfound him sitting in his room working, applying a stout blue pencil\nauthoritatively to bundles of filmy paper. Papers lay to left and to\nright of him, there were great envelopes so gorged with papers that they\nspilt papers on to the table. Above him hung a photograph of a woman's\nhead. The need of sitting absolutely still before a Cockney photographer\nhad given her lips a queer little pucker, and her eyes for the same\nreason looked as though she thought the whole situation ridiculous.\nNevertheless it was the head of an individual and interesting woman, who\nwould no doubt have turned and laughed at Willoughby if she could have\ncaught his eye; but when he looked up at her he sighed profoundly. In\nhis mind this work of his, the great factories at Hull which showed like\nmountains at night, the ships that crossed the ocean punctually, the\nschemes for combining this and that and building up a solid mass of\nindustry, was all an offering to her; he laid his success at her feet;\nand was always thinking how to educate his daughter so that Theresa\nmight be glad. He was a very ambitious man; and although he had not\nbeen particularly kind to her while she lived, as Helen thought, he now\nbelieved that she watched him from Heaven, and inspired what was good in\nhim.\n\nMrs. Ambrose apologised for the interruption, and asked whether she\nmight speak to him about a plan of hers. Would he consent to leave his\ndaughter with them when they landed, instead of taking her on up the\nAmazons?\n\n\"We would take great care of her,\" she added, \"and we should really like\nit.\"\n\nWilloughby looked very grave and carefully laid aside his papers.\n\n\"She's a good girl,\" he said at length. \"There is a likeness?\"--he\nnodded his head at the photograph of Theresa and sighed. Helen looked\nat Theresa pursing up her lips before the Cockney photographer. It\nsuggested her in an absurd human way, and she felt an intense desire to\nshare some joke.\n\n\"She's the only thing that's left to me,\" sighed Willoughby. \"We go on\nyear after year without talking about these things--\" He broke off. \"But\nit's better so. Only life's very hard.\"\n\nHelen was sorry for him, and patted him on the shoulder, but she felt\nuncomfortable when her brother-in-law expressed his feelings, and took\nrefuge in praising Rachel, and explaining why she thought her plan might\nbe a good one.\n\n\"True,\" said Willoughby when she had done. \"The social conditions are\nbound to be primitive. I should be out a good deal. I agreed because she\nwished it. And of course I have complete confidence in you. . . . You\nsee, Helen,\" he continued, becoming confidential, \"I want to bring\nher up as her mother would have wished. I don't hold with these modern\nviews--any more than you do, eh? She's a nice quiet girl, devoted to her\nmusic--a little less of _that_ would do no harm. Still, it's kept her\nhappy, and we lead a very quiet life at Richmond. I should like her to\nbegin to see more people. I want to take her about with me when I get\nhome. I've half a mind to rent a house in London, leaving my sisters at\nRichmond, and take her to see one or two people who'd be kind to her\nfor my sake. I'm beginning to realise,\" he continued, stretching himself\nout, \"that all this is tending to Parliament, Helen. It's the only way\nto get things done as one wants them done. I talked to Dalloway about\nit. In that case, of course, I should want Rachel to be able to\ntake more part in things. A certain amount of entertaining would be\nnecessary--dinners, an occasional evening party. One's constituents like\nto be fed, I believe. In all these ways Rachel could be of great help to\nme. So,\" he wound up, \"I should be very glad, if we arrange this visit\n(which must be upon a business footing, mind), if you could see your way\nto helping my girl, bringing her out--she's a little shy now,--making a\nwoman of her, the kind of woman her mother would have liked her to be,\"\nhe ended, jerking his head at the photograph.\n\nWilloughby's selfishness, though consistent as Helen saw with real\naffection for his daughter, made her determined to have the girl to stay\nwith her, even if she had to promise a complete course of instruction\nin the feminine graces. She could not help laughing at the notion\nof it--Rachel a Tory hostess!--and marvelling as she left him at the\nastonishing ignorance of a father.\n\nRachel, when consulted, showed less enthusiasm than Helen could have\nwished. One moment she was eager, the next doubtful. Visions of a great\nriver, now blue, now yellow in the tropical sun and crossed by bright\nbirds, now white in the moon, now deep in shade with moving trees and\ncanoes sliding out from the tangled banks, beset her. Helen promised a\nriver. Then she did not want to leave her father. That feeling seemed\ngenuine too, but in the end Helen prevailed, although when she had\nwon her case she was beset by doubts, and more than once regretted\nthe impulse which had entangled her with the fortunes of another human\nbeing.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter VII\n\n\nFrom a distance the _Euphrosyne_ looked very small. Glasses were turned\nupon her from the decks of great liners, and she was pronounced a tramp,\na cargo-boat, or one of those wretched little passenger steamers where\npeople rolled about among the cattle on deck. The insect-like figures\nof Dalloways, Ambroses, and Vinraces were also derided, both from the\nextreme smallness of their persons and the doubt which only strong\nglasses could dispel as to whether they were really live creatures or\nonly lumps on the rigging. Mr. Pepper with all his learning had been\nmistaken for a cormorant, and then, as unjustly, transformed into a\ncow. At night, indeed, when the waltzes were swinging in the saloon, and\ngifted passengers reciting, the little ship--shrunk to a few beads\nof light out among the dark waves, and one high in air upon the\nmast-head--seemed something mysterious and impressive to heated partners\nresting from the dance. She became a ship passing in the night--an\nemblem of the loneliness of human life, an occasion for queer\nconfidences and sudden appeals for sympathy.\n\nOn and on she went, by day and by night, following her path, until one\nmorning broke and showed the land. Losing its shadow-like appearance it\nbecame first cleft and mountainous, next coloured grey and purple, next\nscattered with white blocks which gradually separated themselves, and\nthen, as the progress of the ship acted upon the view like a field-glass\nof increasing power, became streets of houses. By nine o'clock the\n_Euphrosyne_ had taken up her position in the middle of a great bay;\nshe dropped her anchor; immediately, as if she were a recumbent giant\nrequiring examination, small boats came swarming about her. She rang\nwith cries; men jumped on to her; her deck was thumped by feet. The\nlonely little island was invaded from all quarters at once, and after\nfour weeks of silence it was bewildering to hear human speech. Mrs.\nAmbrose alone heeded none of this stir. She was pale with suspense while\nthe boat with mail bags was making towards them. Absorbed in her letters\nshe did not notice that she had left the _Euphrosyne_, and felt no\nsadness when the ship lifted up her voice and bellowed thrice like a cow\nseparated from its calf.\n\n\"The children are well!\" she exclaimed. Mr. Pepper, who sat opposite\nwith a great mound of bag and rug upon his knees, said, \"Gratifying.\"\nRachel, to whom the end of the voyage meant a complete change of\nperspective, was too much bewildered by the approach of the shore to\nrealise what children were well or why it was gratifying. Helen went on\nreading.\n\nMoving very slowly, and rearing absurdly high over each wave, the little\nboat was now approaching a white crescent of sand. Behind this was a\ndeep green valley, with distinct hills on either side. On the slope of\nthe right-hand hill white houses with brown roofs were settled, like\nnesting sea-birds, and at intervals cypresses striped the hill with\nblack bars. Mountains whose sides were flushed with red, but whose\ncrowns were bald, rose as a pinnacle, half-concealing another pinnacle\nbehind it. The hour being still early, the whole view was exquisitely\nlight and airy; the blues and greens of sky and tree were intense but\nnot sultry. As they drew nearer and could distinguish details, the\neffect of the earth with its minute objects and colours and different\nforms of life was overwhelming after four weeks of the sea, and kept\nthem silent.\n\n\"Three hundred years odd,\" said Mr. Pepper meditatively at length.\n\nAs nobody said, \"What?\" he merely extracted a bottle and swallowed a\npill. The piece of information that died within him was to the effect\nthat three hundred years ago five Elizabethan barques had anchored where\nthe _Euphrosyne_ now floated. Half-drawn up upon the beach lay an equal\nnumber of Spanish galleons, unmanned, for the country was still a virgin\nland behind a veil. Slipping across the water, the English sailors\nbore away bars of silver, bales of linen, timbers of cedar wood, golden\ncrucifixes knobbed with emeralds. When the Spaniards came down from\ntheir drinking, a fight ensued, the two parties churning up the sand,\nand driving each other into the surf. The Spaniards, bloated with fine\nliving upon the fruits of the miraculous land, fell in heaps; but the\nhardy Englishmen, tawny with sea-voyaging, hairy for lack of razors,\nwith muscles like wire, fangs greedy for flesh, and fingers itching for\ngold, despatched the wounded, drove the dying into the sea, and soon\nreduced the natives to a state of superstitious wonderment. Here a\nsettlement was made; women were imported; children grew. All seemed to\nfavour the expansion of the British Empire, and had there been men\nlike Richard Dalloway in the time of Charles the First, the map would\nundoubtedly be red where it is now an odious green. But it must be\nsupposed that the political mind of that age lacked imagination, and,\nmerely for want of a few thousand pounds and a few thousand men, the\nspark died that should have been a conflagration. From the interior came\nIndians with subtle poisons, naked bodies, and painted idols; from the\nsea came vengeful Spaniards and rapacious Portuguese; exposed to all\nthese enemies (though the climate proved wonderfully kind and the earth\nabundant) the English dwindled away and all but disappeared. Somewhere\nabout the middle of the seventeenth century a single sloop watched its\nseason and slipped out by night, bearing within it all that was left of\nthe great British colony, a few men, a few women, and perhaps a dozen\ndusky children. English history then denies all knowledge of the place.\nOwing to one cause and another civilisation shifted its centre to a spot\nsome four or five hundred miles to the south, and to-day Santa Marina is\nnot much larger than it was three hundred years ago. In population it is\na happy compromise, for Portuguese fathers wed Indian mothers, and their\nchildren intermarry with the Spanish. Although they get their ploughs\nfrom Manchester, they make their coats from their own sheep, their silk\nfrom their own worms, and their furniture from their own cedar trees,\nso that in arts and industries the place is still much where it was in\nElizabethan days.\n\nThe reasons which had drawn the English across the sea to found a small\ncolony within the last ten years are not so easily described, and will\nnever perhaps be recorded in history books. Granted facility of\ntravel, peace, good trade, and so on, there was besides a kind of\ndissatisfaction among the English with the older countries and the\nenormous accumulations of carved stone, stained glass, and rich brown\npainting which they offered to the tourist. The movement in search of\nsomething new was of course infinitely small, affecting only a handful\nof well-to-do people. It began by a few schoolmasters serving their\npassage out to South America as the pursers of tramp steamers. They\nreturned in time for the summer term, when their stories of the\nsplendours and hardships of life at sea, the humours of sea-captains,\nthe wonders of night and dawn, and the marvels of the place delighted\noutsiders, and sometimes found their way into print. The country itself\ntaxed all their powers of description, for they said it was much bigger\nthan Italy, and really nobler than Greece. Again, they declared that the\nnatives were strangely beautiful, very big in stature, dark, passionate,\nand quick to seize the knife. The place seemed new and full of new forms\nof beauty, in proof of which they showed handkerchiefs which the women\nhad worn round their heads, and primitive carvings coloured bright\ngreens and blues. Somehow or other, as fashions do, the fashion spread;\nan old monastery was quickly turned into a hotel, while a famous line of\nsteamships altered its route for the convenience of passengers.\n\nOddly enough it happened that the least satisfactory of Helen Ambrose's\nbrothers had been sent out years before to make his fortune, at any rate\nto keep clear of race-horses, in the very spot which had now become so\npopular. Often, leaning upon the column in the verandah, he had watched\nthe English ships with English schoolmasters for pursers steaming into\nthe bay. Having at length earned enough to take a holiday, and being\nsick of the place, he proposed to put his villa, on the slope of the\nmountain, at his sister's disposal. She, too, had been a little stirred\nby the talk of a new world, where there was always sun and never a fog,\nwhich went on around her, and the chance, when they were planning where\nto spend the winter out of England, seemed too good to be missed.\nFor these reasons she determined to accept Willoughby's offer of free\npassages on his ship, to place the children with their grand-parents,\nand to do the thing thoroughly while she was about it.\n\nTaking seats in a carriage drawn by long-tailed horses with pheasants'\nfeathers erect between their ears, the Ambroses, Mr. Pepper, and Rachel\nrattled out of the harbour. The day increased in heat as they drove\nup the hill. The road passed through the town, where men seemed to be\nbeating brass and crying \"Water,\" where the passage was blocked by mules\nand cleared by whips and curses, where the women walked barefoot,\ntheir heads balancing baskets, and cripples hastily displayed mutilated\nmembers; it issued among steep green fields, not so green but that the\nearth showed through. Great trees now shaded all but the centre of the\nroad, and a mountain stream, so shallow and so swift that it plaited\nitself into strands as it ran, raced along the edge. Higher they went,\nuntil Ridley and Rachel walked behind; next they turned along a lane\nscattered with stones, where Mr. Pepper raised his stick and silently\nindicated a shrub, bearing among sparse leaves a voluminous purple\nblossom; and at a rickety canter the last stage of the way was\naccomplished.\n\nThe villa was a roomy white house, which, as is the case with most\ncontinental houses, looked to an English eye frail, ramshackle, and\nabsurdly frivolous, more like a pagoda in a tea-garden than a place\nwhere one slept. The garden called urgently for the services of\ngardener. Bushes waved their branches across the paths, and the blades\nof grass, with spaces of earth between them, could be counted. In the\ncircular piece of ground in front of the verandah were two cracked\nvases, from which red flowers drooped, with a stone fountain between\nthem, now parched in the sun. The circular garden led to a long garden,\nwhere the gardener's shears had scarcely been, unless now and then, when\nhe cut a bough of blossom for his beloved. A few tall trees shaded it,\nand round bushes with wax-like flowers mobbed their heads together in\na row. A garden smoothly laid with turf, divided by thick hedges, with\nraised beds of bright flowers, such as we keep within walls in England,\nwould have been out of place upon the side of this bare hill. There\nwas no ugliness to shut out, and the villa looked straight across the\nshoulder of a slope, ribbed with olive trees, to the sea.\n\nThe indecency of the whole place struck Mrs. Chailey forcibly. There\nwere no blinds to shut out the sun, nor was there any furniture to speak\nof for the sun to spoil. Standing in the bare stone hall, and surveying\na staircase of superb breadth, but cracked and carpetless, she further\nventured the opinion that there were rats, as large as terriers at\nhome, and that if one put one's foot down with any force one would come\nthrough the floor. As for hot water--at this point her investigations\nleft her speechless.\n\n\"Poor creature!\" she murmured to the sallow Spanish servant-girl who\ncame out with the pigs and hens to receive them, \"no wonder you\nhardly look like a human being!\" Maria accepted the compliment with\nan exquisite Spanish grace. In Chailey's opinion they would have done\nbetter to stay on board an English ship, but none knew better than she\nthat her duty commanded her to stay.\n\nWhen they were settled in, and in train to find daily occupation, there\nwas some speculation as to the reasons which induced Mr. Pepper to stay,\ntaking up his lodging in the Ambroses' house. Efforts had been made\nfor some days before landing to impress upon him the advantages of the\nAmazons.\n\n\"That great stream!\" Helen would begin, gazing as if she saw a visionary\ncascade, \"I've a good mind to go with you myself, Willoughby--only I\ncan't. Think of the sunsets and the moonrises--I believe the colours are\nunimaginable.\"\n\n\"There are wild peacocks,\" Rachel hazarded.\n\n\"And marvellous creatures in the water,\" Helen asserted.\n\n\"One might discover a new reptile,\" Rachel continued.\n\n\"There's certain to be a revolution, I'm told,\" Helen urged.\n\nThe effect of these subterfuges was a little dashed by Ridley, who,\nafter regarding Pepper for some moments, sighed aloud, \"Poor fellow!\"\nand inwardly speculated upon the unkindness of women.\n\nHe stayed, however, in apparent contentment for six days, playing with\na microscope and a notebook in one of the many sparsely furnished\nsitting-rooms, but on the evening of the seventh day, as they sat at\ndinner, he appeared more restless than usual. The dinner-table was set\nbetween two long windows which were left uncurtained by Helen's orders.\nDarkness fell as sharply as a knife in this climate, and the town then\nsprang out in circles and lines of bright dots beneath them. Buildings\nwhich never showed by day showed by night, and the sea flowed right\nover the land judging by the moving lights of the steamers. The sight\nfulfilled the same purpose as an orchestra in a London restaurant, and\nsilence had its setting. William Pepper observed it for some time; he\nput on his spectacles to contemplate the scene.\n\n\"I've identified the big block to the left,\" he observed, and pointed\nwith his fork at a square formed by several rows of lights.\n\n\"One should infer that they can cook vegetables,\" he added.\n\n\"An hotel?\" said Helen.\n\n\"Once a monastery,\" said Mr. Pepper.\n\nNothing more was said then, but, the day after, Mr. Pepper returned from\na midday walk, and stood silently before Helen who was reading in the\nverandah.\n\n\"I've taken a room over there,\" he said.\n\n\"You're not going?\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"On the whole--yes,\" he remarked. \"No private cook _can_ cook\nvegetables.\"\n\nKnowing his dislike of questions, which she to some extent shared,\nHelen asked no more. Still, an uneasy suspicion lurked in her mind that\nWilliam was hiding a wound. She flushed to think that her words, or her\nhusband's, or Rachel's had penetrated and stung. She was half-moved to\ncry, \"Stop, William; explain!\" and would have returned to the subject at\nluncheon if William had not shown himself inscrutable and chill, lifting\nfragments of salad on the point of his fork, with the gesture of a man\npronging seaweed, detecting gravel, suspecting germs.\n\n\"If you all die of typhoid I won't be responsible!\" he snapped.\n\n\"If you die of dulness, neither will I,\" Helen echoed in her heart.\n\nShe reflected that she had never yet asked him whether he had been in\nlove. They had got further and further from that subject instead of\ndrawing nearer to it, and she could not help feeling it a relief when\nWilliam Pepper, with all his knowledge, his microscope, his note-books,\nhis genuine kindliness and good sense, but a certain dryness of\nsoul, took his departure. Also she could not help feeling it sad that\nfriendships should end thus, although in this case to have the room\nempty was something of a comfort, and she tried to console herself with\nthe reflection that one never knows how far other people feel the things\nthey might be supposed to feel.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter VIII\n\n\nThe next few months passed away, as many years can pass away, without\ndefinite events, and yet, if suddenly disturbed, it would be seen that\nsuch months or years had a character unlike others. The three months\nwhich had passed had brought them to the beginning of March. The climate\nhad kept its promise, and the change of season from winter to spring\nhad made very little difference, so that Helen, who was sitting in the\ndrawing-room with a pen in her hand, could keep the windows open though\na great fire of logs burnt on one side of her. Below, the sea was still\nblue and the roofs still brown and white, though the day was fading\nrapidly. It was dusk in the room, which, large and empty at all times,\nnow appeared larger and emptier than usual. Her own figure, as she sat\nwriting with a pad on her knee, shared the general effect of size and\nlack of detail, for the flames which ran along the branches, suddenly\ndevouring little green tufts, burnt intermittently and sent irregular\nilluminations across her face and the plaster walls. There were\nno pictures on the walls but here and there boughs laden with\nheavy-petalled flowers spread widely against them. Of the books fallen\non the bare floor and heaped upon the large table, it was only possible\nin this light to trace the outline.\n\nMrs. Ambrose was writing a very long letter. Beginning \"Dear Bernard,\"\nit went on to describe what had been happening in the Villa San Gervasio\nduring the past three months, as, for instance, that they had had the\nBritish Consul to dinner, and had been taken over a Spanish man-of-war,\nand had seen a great many processions and religious festivals, which\nwere so beautiful that Mrs. Ambrose couldn't conceive why, if people\nmust have a religion, they didn't all become Roman Catholics. They had\nmade several expeditions though none of any length. It was worth coming\nif only for the sake of the flowering trees which grew wild quite near\nthe house, and the amazing colours of sea and earth. The earth, instead\nof being brown, was red, purple, green. \"You won't believe me,\" she\nadded, \"there is no colour like it in England.\" She adopted, indeed,\na condescending tone towards that poor island, which was now advancing\nchilly crocuses and nipped violets in nooks, in copses, in cosy corners,\ntended by rosy old gardeners in mufflers, who were always touching\ntheir hats and bobbing obsequiously. She went on to deride the islanders\nthemselves. Rumours of London all in a ferment over a General Election\nhad reached them even out here. \"It seems incredible,\" she went on,\n\"that people should care whether Asquith is in or Austen Chamberlin out,\nand while you scream yourselves hoarse about politics you let the only\npeople who are trying for something good starve or simply laugh at them.\nWhen have you ever encouraged a living artist? Or bought his best work?\nWhy are you all so ugly and so servile? Here the servants are human\nbeings. They talk to one as if they were equals. As far as I can tell\nthere are no aristocrats.\"\n\nPerhaps it was the mention of aristocrats that reminded her of Richard\nDalloway and Rachel, for she ran on with the same penful to describe her\nniece.\n\n\"It's an odd fate that has put me in charge of a girl,\" she wrote,\n\"considering that I have never got on well with women, or had much to do\nwith them. However, I must retract some of the things that I have\nsaid against them. If they were properly educated I don't see why they\nshouldn't be much the same as men--as satisfactory I mean; though, of\ncourse, very different. The question is, how should one educate\nthem. The present method seems to me abominable. This girl, though\ntwenty-four, had never heard that men desired women, and, until I\nexplained it, did not know how children were born. Her ignorance upon\nother matters as important\" (here Mrs. Ambrose's letter may not be\nquoted) . . . \"was complete. It seems to me not merely foolish but\ncriminal to bring people up like that. Let alone the suffering to them,\nit explains why women are what they are--the wonder is they're no worse.\nI have taken it upon myself to enlighten her, and now, though still a\ngood deal prejudiced and liable to exaggerate, she is more or less a\nreasonable human being. Keeping them ignorant, of course, defeats its\nown object, and when they begin to understand they take it all much too\nseriously. My brother-in-law really deserved a catastrophe--which he\nwon't get. I now pray for a young man to come to my help; some one, I\nmean, who would talk to her openly, and prove how absurd most of her\nideas about life are. Unluckily such men seem almost as rare as the\nwomen. The English colony certainly doesn't provide one; artists,\nmerchants, cultivated people--they are stupid, conventional, and\nflirtatious. . . .\" She ceased, and with her pen in her hand sat looking\ninto the fire, making the logs into caves and mountains, for it had\ngrown too dark to go on writing. Moreover, the house began to stir as\nthe hour of dinner approached; she could hear the plates being chinked\nin the dining-room next door, and Chailey instructing the Spanish girl\nwhere to put things down in vigorous English. The bell rang; she rose,\nmet Ridley and Rachel outside, and they all went in to dinner.\n\nThree months had made but little difference in the appearance either of\nRidley or Rachel; yet a keen observer might have thought that the girl\nwas more definite and self-confident in her manner than before. Her skin\nwas brown, her eyes certainly brighter, and she attended to what was\nsaid as though she might be going to contradict it. The meal began with\nthe comfortable silence of people who are quite at their ease together.\nThen Ridley, leaning on his elbow and looking out of the window,\nobserved that it was a lovely night.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Helen. She added, \"The season's begun,\" looking at the\nlights beneath them. She asked Maria in Spanish whether the hotel was\nnot filling up with visitors. Maria informed her with pride that there\nwould come a time when it was positively difficult to buy eggs--the\nshopkeepers would not mind what prices they asked; they would get them,\nat any rate, from the English.\n\n\"That's an English steamer in the bay,\" said Rachel, looking at a\ntriangle of lights below. \"She came in early this morning.\"\n\n\"Then we may hope for some letters and send ours back,\" said Helen.\n\nFor some reason the mention of letters always made Ridley groan, and the\nrest of the meal passed in a brisk argument between husband and wife\nas to whether he was or was not wholly ignored by the entire civilised\nworld.\n\n\"Considering the last batch,\" said Helen, \"you deserve beating. You\nwere asked to lecture, you were offered a degree, and some silly woman\npraised not only your books but your beauty--she said he was what\nShelley would have been if Shelley had lived to fifty-five and grown\na beard. Really, Ridley, I think you're the vainest man I know,\" she\nended, rising from the table, \"which I may tell you is saying a good\ndeal.\"\n\nFinding her letter lying before the fire she added a few lines to it,\nand then announced that she was going to take the letters now--Ridley\nmust bring his--and Rachel?\n\n\"I hope you've written to your Aunts? It's high time.\"\n\nThe women put on cloaks and hats, and after inviting Ridley to come with\nthem, which he emphatically refused to do, exclaiming that Rachel he\nexpected to be a fool, but Helen surely knew better, they turned to go.\nHe stood over the fire gazing into the depths of the looking-glass, and\ncompressing his face into the likeness of a commander surveying a field\nof battle, or a martyr watching the flames lick his toes, rather than\nthat of a secluded Professor.\n\nHelen laid hold of his beard.\n\n\"Am I a fool?\" she said.\n\n\"Let me go, Helen.\"\n\n\"Am I a fool?\" she repeated.\n\n\"Vile woman!\" he exclaimed, and kissed her.\n\n\"We'll leave you to your vanities,\" she called back as they went out of\nthe door.\n\nIt was a beautiful evening, still light enough to see a long way down\nthe road, though the stars were coming out. The pillar-box was let into\na high yellow wall where the lane met the road, and having dropped the\nletters into it, Helen was for turning back.\n\n\"No, no,\" said Rachel, taking her by the wrist. \"We're going to see\nlife. You promised.\"\n\n\"Seeing life\" was the phrase they used for their habit of strolling\nthrough the town after dark. The social life of Santa Marina was carried\non almost entirely by lamp-light, which the warmth of the nights and the\nscents culled from flowers made pleasant enough. The young women, with\ntheir hair magnificently swept in coils, a red flower behind the ear,\nsat on the doorsteps, or issued out on to balconies, while the young men\nranged up and down beneath, shouting up a greeting from time to time and\nstopping here and there to enter into amorous talk. At the open windows\nmerchants could be seen making up the day's account, and older women\nlifting jars from shelf to shelf. The streets were full of people, men\nfor the most part, who interchanged their views of the world as they\nwalked, or gathered round the wine-tables at the street corner, where an\nold cripple was twanging his guitar strings, while a poor girl cried\nher passionate song in the gutter. The two Englishwomen excited some\nfriendly curiosity, but no one molested them.\n\nHelen sauntered on, observing the different people in their shabby\nclothes, who seemed so careless and so natural, with satisfaction.\n\n\"Just think of the Mall to-night!\" she exclaimed at length. \"It's the\nfifteenth of March. Perhaps there's a Court.\" She thought of the crowd\nwaiting in the cold spring air to see the grand carriages go by. \"It's\nvery cold, if it's not raining,\" she said. \"First there are men selling\npicture postcards; then there are wretched little shop-girls with round\nbandboxes; then there are bank clerks in tail coats; and then--any\nnumber of dressmakers. People from South Kensington drive up in a\nhired fly; officials have a pair of bays; earls, on the other hand, are\nallowed one footman to stand up behind; dukes have two, royal dukes--so\nI was told--have three; the king, I suppose, can have as many as he\nlikes. And the people believe in it!\"\n\nOut here it seemed as though the people of England must be shaped in the\nbody like the kings and queens, knights and pawns of the chessboard, so\nstrange were their differences, so marked and so implicitly believed in.\n\nThey had to part in order to circumvent a crowd.\n\n\"They believe in God,\" said Rachel as they regained each other. She\nmeant that the people in the crowd believed in Him; for she remembered\nthe crosses with bleeding plaster figures that stood where foot-paths\njoined, and the inexplicable mystery of a service in a Roman Catholic\nchurch.\n\n\"We shall never understand!\" she sighed.\n\nThey had walked some way and it was now night, but they could see a\nlarge iron gate a little way farther down the road on their left.\n\n\"Do you mean to go right up to the hotel?\" Helen asked.\n\nRachel gave the gate a push; it swung open, and, seeing no one about and\njudging that nothing was private in this country, they walked straight\non. An avenue of trees ran along the road, which was completely\nstraight. The trees suddenly came to an end; the road turned a corner,\nand they found themselves confronted by a large square building. They\nhad come out upon the broad terrace which ran round the hotel and were\nonly a few feet distant from the windows. A row of long windows opened\nalmost to the ground. They were all of them uncurtained, and all\nbrilliantly lighted, so that they could see everything inside. Each\nwindow revealed a different section of the life of the hotel. They drew\ninto one of the broad columns of shadow which separated the windows and\ngazed in. They found themselves just outside the dining-room. It was\nbeing swept; a waiter was eating a bunch of grapes with his leg across\nthe corner of a table. Next door was the kitchen, where they were\nwashing up; white cooks were dipping their arms into cauldrons, while\nthe waiters made their meal voraciously off broken meats, sopping up the\ngravy with bits of crumb. Moving on, they became lost in a plantation\nof bushes, and then suddenly found themselves outside the drawing-room,\nwhere the ladies and gentlemen, having dined well, lay back in\ndeep arm-chairs, occasionally speaking or turning over the pages of\nmagazines. A thin woman was flourishing up and down the piano.\n\n\"What is a dahabeeyah, Charles?\" the distinct voice of a widow, seated\nin an arm-chair by the window, asked her son.\n\nIt was the end of the piece, and his answer was lost in the general\nclearing of throats and tapping of knees.\n\n\"They're all old in this room,\" Rachel whispered.\n\nCreeping on, they found that the next window revealed two men in\nshirt-sleeves playing billiards with two young ladies.\n\n\"He pinched my arm!\" the plump young woman cried, as she missed her\nstroke.\n\n\"Now you two--no ragging,\" the young man with the red face reproved\nthem, who was marking.\n\n\"Take care or we shall be seen,\" whispered Helen, plucking Rachel by the\narm. Incautiously her head had risen to the middle of the window.\n\nTurning the corner they came to the largest room in the hotel, which was\nsupplied with four windows, and was called the Lounge, although it was\nreally a hall. Hung with armour and native embroideries, furnished with\ndivans and screens, which shut off convenient corners, the room was less\nformal than the others, and was evidently the haunt of youth. Signor\nRodriguez, whom they knew to be the manager of the hotel, stood quite\nnear them in the doorway surveying the scene--the gentlemen lounging in\nchairs, the couples leaning over coffee-cups, the game of cards in the\ncentre under profuse clusters of electric light. He was congratulating\nhimself upon the enterprise which had turned the refectory, a cold stone\nroom with pots on trestles, into the most comfortable room in the house.\nThe hotel was very full, and proved his wisdom in decreeing that no\nhotel can flourish without a lounge.\n\nThe people were scattered about in couples or parties of four, and\neither they were actually better acquainted, or the informal room made\ntheir manners easier. Through the open window came an uneven humming\nsound like that which rises from a flock of sheep pent within hurdles at\ndusk. The card-party occupied the centre of the foreground.\n\nHelen and Rachel watched them play for some minutes without being able\nto distinguish a word. Helen was observing one of the men intently. He\nwas a lean, somewhat cadaverous man of about her own age, whose profile\nwas turned to them, and he was the partner of a highly-coloured girl,\nobviously English by birth.\n\nSuddenly, in the strange way in which some words detach themselves from\nthe rest, they heard him say quite distinctly:--\n\n\"All you want is practice, Miss Warrington; courage and practice--one's\nno good without the other.\"\n\n\"Hughling Elliot! Of course!\" Helen exclaimed. She ducked her head\nimmediately, for at the sound of his name he looked up. The game went on\nfor a few minutes, and was then broken up by the approach of a wheeled\nchair, containing a voluminous old lady who paused by the table and\nsaid:--\n\n\"Better luck to-night, Susan?\"\n\n\"All the luck's on our side,\" said a young man who until now had kept\nhis back turned to the window. He appeared to be rather stout, and had a\nthick crop of hair.\n\n\"Luck, Mr. Hewet?\" said his partner, a middle-aged lady with spectacles.\n\"I assure you, Mrs. Paley, our success is due solely to our brilliant\nplay.\"\n\n\"Unless I go to bed early I get practically no sleep at all,\" Mrs. Paley\nwas heard to explain, as if to justify her seizure of Susan, who got up\nand proceeded to wheel the chair to the door.\n\n\"They'll get some one else to take my place,\" she said cheerfully. But\nshe was wrong. No attempt was made to find another player, and after the\nyoung man had built three stories of a card-house, which fell down, the\nplayers strolled off in different directions.\n\nMr. Hewet turned his full face towards the window. They could see that\nhe had large eyes obscured by glasses; his complexion was rosy, his\nlips clean-shaven; and, seen among ordinary people, it appeared to be an\ninteresting face. He came straight towards them, but his eyes were fixed\nnot upon the eavesdroppers but upon a spot where the curtain hung in\nfolds.\n\n\"Asleep?\" he said.\n\nHelen and Rachel started to think that some one had been sitting near\nto them unobserved all the time. There were legs in the shadow. A\nmelancholy voice issued from above them.\n\n\"Two women,\" it said.\n\nA scuffling was heard on the gravel. The women had fled. They did not\nstop running until they felt certain that no eye could penetrate the\ndarkness and the hotel was only a square shadow in the distance, with\nred holes regularly cut in it.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter IX\n\n\nAn hour passed, and the downstairs rooms at the hotel grew dim and\nwere almost deserted, while the little box-like squares above them were\nbrilliantly irradiated. Some forty or fifty people were going to bed.\nThe thump of jugs set down on the floor above could be heard and the\nclink of china, for there was not as thick a partition between the rooms\nas one might wish, so Miss Allan, the elderly lady who had been playing\nbridge, determined, giving the wall a smart rap with her knuckles. It\nwas only matchboard, she decided, run up to make many little rooms of\none large one. Her grey petticoats slipped to the ground, and, stooping,\nshe folded her clothes with neat, if not loving fingers, screwed her\nhair into a plait, wound her father's great gold watch, and opened the\ncomplete works of Wordsworth. She was reading the \"Prelude,\" partly\nbecause she always read the \"Prelude\" abroad, and partly because\nshe was engaged in writing a short _Primer_ _of_ _English_\n_Literature_--_Beowulf_ _to_ _Swinburne_--which would have a paragraph\non Wordsworth. She was deep in the fifth book, stopping indeed to pencil\na note, when a pair of boots dropped, one after another, on the floor\nabove her. She looked up and speculated. Whose boots were they, she\nwondered. She then became aware of a swishing sound next door--a woman,\nclearly, putting away her dress. It was succeeded by a gentle tapping\nsound, such as that which accompanies hair-dressing. It was very\ndifficult to keep her attention fixed upon the \"Prelude.\" Was it Susan\nWarrington tapping? She forced herself, however, to read to the end of\nthe book, when she placed a mark between the pages, sighed contentedly,\nand then turned out the light.\n\nVery different was the room through the wall, though as like in shape\nas one egg-box is like another. As Miss Allan read her book, Susan\nWarrington was brushing her hair. Ages have consecrated this hour,\nand the most majestic of all domestic actions, to talk of love between\nwomen; but Miss Warrington being alone could not talk; she could only\nlook with extreme solicitude at her own face in the glass. She turned\nher head from side to side, tossing heavy locks now this way now that;\nand then withdrew a pace or two, and considered herself seriously.\n\n\"I'm nice-looking,\" she determined. \"Not pretty--possibly,\" she drew\nherself up a little. \"Yes--most people would say I was handsome.\"\n\nShe was really wondering what Arthur Venning would say she was. Her\nfeeling about him was decidedly queer. She would not admit to herself\nthat she was in love with him or that she wanted to marry him, yet she\nspent every minute when she was alone in wondering what he thought of\nher, and in comparing what they had done to-day with what they had done\nthe day before.\n\n\"He didn't ask me to play, but he certainly followed me into the hall,\"\nshe meditated, summing up the evening. She was thirty years of age,\nand owing to the number of her sisters and the seclusion of life in a\ncountry parsonage had as yet had no proposal of marriage. The hour of\nconfidences was often a sad one, and she had been known to jump into\nbed, treating her hair unkindly, feeling herself overlooked by life in\ncomparison with others. She was a big, well-made woman, the red lying\nupon her cheeks in patches that were too well defined, but her serious\nanxiety gave her a kind of beauty.\n\nShe was just about to pull back the bed-clothes when she exclaimed, \"Oh,\nbut I'm forgetting,\" and went to her writing-table. A brown volume lay\nthere stamped with the figure of the year. She proceeded to write in the\nsquare ugly hand of a mature child, as she wrote daily year after year,\nkeeping the diaries, though she seldom looked at them.\n\n\"A.M.--Talked to Mrs. H. Elliot about country neighbours. She knows the\nManns; also the Selby-Carroways. How small the world is! Like her. Read\na chapter of _Miss_ _Appleby's_ _Adventure_ to Aunt E. P.M.--Played\nlawn-tennis with Mr. Perrott and Evelyn M. Don't _like_ Mr. P. Have a\nfeeling that he is not 'quite,' though clever certainly. Beat them. Day\nsplendid, view wonderful. One gets used to no trees, though much too\nbare at first. Cards after dinner. Aunt E. cheerful, though twingy, she\nsays. Mem.: _ask_ _about_ _damp_ _sheets_.\"\n\nShe knelt in prayer, and then lay down in bed, tucking the blankets\ncomfortably about her, and in a few minutes her breathing showed that\nshe was asleep. With its profoundly peaceful sighs and hesitations it\nresembled that of a cow standing up to its knees all night through in\nthe long grass.\n\nA glance into the next room revealed little more than a nose, prominent\nabove the sheets. Growing accustomed to the darkness, for the windows\nwere open and showed grey squares with splinters of starlight, one could\ndistinguish a lean form, terribly like the body of a dead person, the\nbody indeed of William Pepper, asleep too. Thirty-six, thirty-seven,\nthirty-eight--here were three Portuguese men of business, asleep\npresumably, since a snore came with the regularity of a great ticking\nclock. Thirty-nine was a corner room, at the end of the passage, but\nlate though it was--\"One\" struck gently downstairs--a line of light\nunder the door showed that some one was still awake.\n\n\"How late you are, Hugh!\" a woman, lying in bed, said in a peevish\nbut solicitous voice. Her husband was brushing his teeth, and for some\nmoments did not answer.\n\n\"You should have gone to sleep,\" he replied. \"I was talking to\nThornbury.\"\n\n\"But you know that I never can sleep when I'm waiting for you,\" she\nsaid.\n\nTo that he made no answer, but only remarked, \"Well then, we'll turn out\nthe light.\" They were silent.\n\nThe faint but penetrating pulse of an electric bell could now be heard\nin the corridor. Old Mrs. Paley, having woken hungry but without her\nspectacles, was summoning her maid to find the biscuit-box. The maid\nhaving answered the bell, drearily respectful even at this hour though\nmuffled in a mackintosh, the passage was left in silence. Downstairs all\nwas empty and dark; but on the upper floor a light still burnt in the\nroom where the boots had dropped so heavily above Miss Allan's head.\nHere was the gentleman who, a few hours previously, in the shade of the\ncurtain, had seemed to consist entirely of legs. Deep in an arm-chair he\nwas reading the third volume of Gibbon's _History_ _of_ _the_ _Decline_\n_and_ _Fall_ _of_ _Rome_ by candle-light. As he read he knocked the ash\nautomatically, now and again, from his cigarette and turned the page,\nwhile a whole procession of splendid sentences entered his capacious\nbrow and went marching through his brain in order. It seemed likely\nthat this process might continue for an hour or more, until the entire\nregiment had shifted its quarters, had not the door opened, and the\nyoung man, who was inclined to be stout, come in with large naked feet.\n\n\"Oh, Hirst, what I forgot to say was--\"\n\n\"Two minutes,\" said Hirst, raising his finger.\n\nHe safely stowed away the last words of the paragraph.\n\n\"What was it you forgot to say?\" he asked.\n\n\"D'you think you _do_ make enough allowance for feelings?\" asked Mr.\nHewet. He had again forgotten what he had meant to say.\n\nAfter intense contemplation of the immaculate Gibbon Mr. Hirst smiled at\nthe question of his friend. He laid aside his book and considered.\n\n\"I should call yours a singularly untidy mind,\" he observed. \"Feelings?\nAren't they just what we do allow for? We put love up there, and all the\nrest somewhere down below.\" With his left hand he indicated the top of a\npyramid, and with his right the base.\n\n\"But you didn't get out of bed to tell me that,\" he added severely.\n\n\"I got out of bed,\" said Hewet vaguely, \"merely to talk I suppose.\"\n\n\"Meanwhile I shall undress,\" said Hirst. When naked of all but his\nshirt, and bent over the basin, Mr. Hirst no longer impressed one with\nthe majesty of his intellect, but with the pathos of his young yet ugly\nbody, for he stooped, and he was so thin that there were dark lines\nbetween the different bones of his neck and shoulders.\n\n\"Women interest me,\" said Hewet, who, sitting on the bed with his chin\nresting on his knees, paid no attention to the undressing of Mr. Hirst.\n\n\"They're so stupid,\" said Hirst. \"You're sitting on my pyjamas.\"\n\n\"I suppose they _are_ stupid?\" Hewet wondered.\n\n\"There can't be two opinions about that, I imagine,\" said Hirst,\nhopping briskly across the room, \"unless you're in love--that fat woman\nWarrington?\" he enquired.\n\n\"Not one fat woman--all fat women,\" Hewet sighed.\n\n\"The women I saw to-night were not fat,\" said Hirst, who was taking\nadvantage of Hewet's company to cut his toe-nails.\n\n\"Describe them,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"You know I can't describe things!\" said Hirst. \"They were much like\nother women, I should think. They always are.\"\n\n\"No; that's where we differ,\" said Hewet. \"I say everything's different.\nNo two people are in the least the same. Take you and me now.\"\n\n\"So I used to think once,\" said Hirst. \"But now they're all types. Don't\ntake us,--take this hotel. You could draw circles round the whole lot of\nthem, and they'd never stray outside.\"\n\n(\"You can kill a hen by doing that\"), Hewet murmured.\n\n\"Mr. Hughling Elliot, Mrs. Hughling Elliot, Miss Allan, Mr. and Mrs.\nThornbury--one circle,\" Hirst continued. \"Miss Warrington, Mr. Arthur\nVenning, Mr. Perrott, Evelyn M. another circle; then there are a whole\nlot of natives; finally ourselves.\"\n\n\"Are we all alone in our circle?\" asked Hewet.\n\n\"Quite alone,\" said Hirst. \"You try to get out, but you can't. You only\nmake a mess of things by trying.\"\n\n\"I'm not a hen in a circle,\" said Hewet. \"I'm a dove on a tree-top.\"\n\n\"I wonder if this is what they call an ingrowing toe-nail?\" said Hirst,\nexamining the big toe on his left foot.\n\n\"I flit from branch to branch,\" continued Hewet. \"The world is\nprofoundly pleasant.\" He lay back on the bed, upon his arms.\n\n\"I wonder if it's really nice to be as vague as you are?\" asked Hirst,\nlooking at him. \"It's the lack of continuity--that's what's so odd bout\nyou,\" he went on. \"At the age of twenty-seven, which is nearly thirty,\nyou seem to have drawn no conclusions. A party of old women excites you\nstill as though you were three.\"\n\nHewet contemplated the angular young man who was neatly brushing the\nrims of his toe-nails into the fire-place in silence for a moment.\n\n\"I respect you, Hirst,\" he remarked.\n\n\"I envy you--some things,\" said Hirst. \"One: your capacity for not\nthinking; two: people like you better than they like me. Women like you,\nI suppose.\"\n\n\"I wonder whether that isn't really what matters most?\" said Hewet.\nLying now flat on the bed he waved his hand in vague circles above him.\n\n\"Of course it is,\" said Hirst. \"But that's not the difficulty. The\ndifficulty is, isn't it, to find an appropriate object?\"\n\n\"There are no female hens in your circle?\" asked Hewet.\n\n\"Not the ghost of one,\" said Hirst.\n\nAlthough they had known each other for three years Hirst had never yet\nheard the true story of Hewet's loves. In general conversation it was\ntaken for granted that they were many, but in private the subject was\nallowed to lapse. The fact that he had money enough to do no work, and\nthat he had left Cambridge after two terms owing to a difference with\nthe authorities, and had then travelled and drifted, made his life\nstrange at many points where his friends' lives were much of a piece.\n\n\"I don't see your circles--I don't see them,\" Hewet continued. \"I see a\nthing like a teetotum spinning in and out--knocking into things--dashing\nfrom side to side--collecting numbers--more and more and more, till the\nwhole place is thick with them. Round and round they go--out there, over\nthe rim--out of sight.\"\n\nHis fingers showed that the waltzing teetotums had spun over the edge of\nthe counterpane and fallen off the bed into infinity.\n\n\"Could you contemplate three weeks alone in this hotel?\" asked Hirst,\nafter a moment's pause.\n\nHewet proceeded to think.\n\n\"The truth of it is that one never is alone, and one never is in\ncompany,\" he concluded.\n\n\"Meaning?\" said Hirst.\n\n\"Meaning? Oh, something about bubbles--auras--what d'you call 'em? You\ncan't see my bubble; I can't see yours; all we see of each other is a\nspeck, like the wick in the middle of that flame. The flame goes about\nwith us everywhere; it's not ourselves exactly, but what we feel; the\nworld is short, or people mainly; all kinds of people.\"\n\n\"A nice streaky bubble yours must be!\" said Hirst.\n\n\"And supposing my bubble could run into some one else's bubble--\"\n\n\"And they both burst?\" put in Hirst.\n\n\"Then--then--then--\" pondered Hewet, as if to himself, \"it would be an\ne-nor-mous world,\" he said, stretching his arms to their full width, as\nthough even so they could hardly clasp the billowy universe, for when he\nwas with Hirst he always felt unusually sanguine and vague.\n\n\"I don't think you altogether as foolish as I used to, Hewet,\" said\nHirst. \"You don't know what you mean but you try to say it.\"\n\n\"But aren't you enjoying yourself here?\" asked Hewet.\n\n\"On the whole--yes,\" said Hirst. \"I like observing people. I like\nlooking at things. This country is amazingly beautiful. Did you notice\nhow the top of the mountain turned yellow to-night? Really we must take\nour lunch and spend the day out. You're getting disgustingly fat.\" He\npointed at the calf of Hewet's bare leg.\n\n\"We'll get up an expedition,\" said Hewet energetically. \"We'll ask the\nentire hotel. We'll hire donkeys and--\"\n\n\"Oh, Lord!\" said Hirst, \"do shut it! I can see Miss Warrington and Miss\nAllan and Mrs. Elliot and the rest squatting on the stones and quacking,\n'How jolly!'\"\n\n\"We'll ask Venning and Perrott and Miss Murgatroyd--every one we can lay\nhands on,\" went on Hewet. \"What's the name of the little old grasshopper\nwith the eyeglasses? Pepper?--Pepper shall lead us.\"\n\n\"Thank God, you'll never get the donkeys,\" said Hirst.\n\n\"I must make a note of that,\" said Hewet, slowly dropping his feet to\nthe floor. \"Hirst escorts Miss Warrington; Pepper advances alone on a\nwhite ass; provisions equally distributed--or shall we hire a mule? The\nmatrons--there's Mrs. Paley, by Jove!--share a carriage.\"\n\n\"That's where you'll go wrong,\" said Hirst. \"Putting virgins among\nmatrons.\"\n\n\"How long should you think that an expedition like that would take,\nHirst?\" asked Hewet.\n\n\"From twelve to sixteen hours I would say,\" said Hirst. \"The time\nusually occupied by a first confinement.\"\n\n\"It will need considerable organisation,\" said Hewet. He was now padding\nsoftly round the room, and stopped to stir the books on the table. They\nlay heaped one upon another.\n\n\"We shall want some poets too,\" he remarked. \"Not Gibbon; no; d'you\nhappen to have _Modern_ _Love_ or _John_ _Donne_? You see, I contemplate\npauses when people get tired of looking at the view, and then it would\nbe nice to read something rather difficult aloud.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Paley _will_ enjoy herself,\" said Hirst.\n\n\"Mrs. Paley will enjoy it certainly,\" said Hewet. \"It's one of the\nsaddest things I know--the way elderly ladies cease to read poetry. And\nyet how appropriate this is:\n\n     I speak as one who plumbs\n       Life's dim profound,\n     One who at length can sound\n       Clear views and certain.\n\n     But--after love what comes?\n     A scene that lours,\n       A few sad vacant hours,\n       And then, the Curtain.\n\nI daresay Mrs. Paley is the only one of us who can really understand\nthat.\"\n\n\"We'll ask her,\" said Hirst. \"Please, Hewet, if you must go to bed, draw\nmy curtain. Few things distress me more than the moonlight.\"\n\nHewet retreated, pressing the poems of Thomas Hardy beneath his arm,\nand in their beds next door to each other both the young men were soon\nasleep.\n\nBetween the extinction of Hewet's candle and the rising of a dusky\nSpanish boy who was the first to survey the desolation of the hotel in\nthe early morning, a few hours of silence intervened. One could almost\nhear a hundred people breathing deeply, and however wakeful and restless\nit would have been hard to escape sleep in the middle of so much sleep.\nLooking out of the windows, there was only darkness to be seen. All over\nthe shadowed half of the world people lay prone, and a few flickering\nlights in empty streets marked the places where their cities were\nbuilt. Red and yellow omnibuses were crowding each other in Piccadilly;\nsumptuous women were rocking at a standstill; but here in the darkness\nan owl flitted from tree to tree, and when the breeze lifted the\nbranches the moon flashed as if it were a torch. Until all people should\nawake again the houseless animals were abroad, the tigers and the stags,\nand the elephants coming down in the darkness to drink at pools. The\nwind at night blowing over the hills and woods was purer and fresher\nthan the wind by day, and the earth, robbed of detail, more mysterious\nthan the earth coloured and divided by roads and fields. For six hours\nthis profound beauty existed, and then as the east grew whiter and\nwhiter the ground swam to the surface, the roads were revealed, the\nsmoke rose and the people stirred, and the sun shone upon the windows\nof the hotel at Santa Marina until they were uncurtained, and the gong\nblaring all through the house gave notice of breakfast.\n\nDirectly breakfast was over, the ladies as usual circled vaguely,\npicking up papers and putting them down again, about the hall.\n\n\"And what are you going to do to-day?\" asked Mrs. Elliot drifting up\nagainst Miss Warrington.\n\nMrs. Elliot, the wife of Hughling the Oxford Don, was a short woman,\nwhose expression was habitually plaintive. Her eyes moved from thing to\nthing as though they never found anything sufficiently pleasant to rest\nupon for any length of time.\n\n\"I'm going to try to get Aunt Emma out into the town,\" said Susan.\n\"She's not seen a thing yet.\"\n\n\"I call it so spirited of her at her age,\" said Mrs. Elliot, \"coming all\nthis way from her own fireside.\"\n\n\"Yes, we always tell her she'll die on board ship,\" Susan replied. \"She\nwas born on one,\" she added.\n\n\"In the old days,\" said Mrs. Elliot, \"a great many people were. I always\npity the poor women so! We've got a lot to complain of!\" She shook her\nhead. Her eyes wandered about the table, and she remarked irrelevantly,\n\"The poor little Queen of Holland! Newspaper reporters practically, one\nmay say, at her bedroom door!\"\n\n\"Were you talking of the Queen of Holland?\" said the pleasant voice of\nMiss Allan, who was searching for the thick pages of _The_ _Times_ among\na litter of thin foreign sheets.\n\n\"I always envy any one who lives in such an excessively flat country,\"\nshe remarked.\n\n\"How very strange!\" said Mrs. Elliot. \"I find a flat country so\ndepressing.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid you can't be very happy here then, Miss Allan,\" said Susan.\n\n\"On the contrary,\" said Miss Allan, \"I am exceedingly fond of\nmountains.\" Perceiving _The_ _Times_ at some distance, she moved off to\nsecure it.\n\n\"Well, I must find my husband,\" said Mrs. Elliot, fidgeting away.\n\n\"And I must go to my aunt,\" said Miss Warrington, and taking up the\nduties of the day they moved away.\n\nWhether the flimsiness of foreign sheets and the coarseness of their\ntype is any proof of frivolity and ignorance, there is no doubt that\nEnglish people scarce consider news read there as news, any more than a\nprogramme bought from a man in the street inspires confidence in what it\nsays. A very respectable elderly pair, having inspected the long tables\nof newspapers, did not think it worth their while to read more than the\nheadlines.\n\n\"The debate on the fifteenth should have reached us by now,\" Mrs.\nThornbury murmured. Mr. Thornbury, who was beautifully clean and had\nred rubbed into his handsome worn face like traces of paint on a\nweather-beaten wooden figure, looked over his glasses and saw that Miss\nAllan had _The_ _Times_.\n\nThe couple therefore sat themselves down in arm-chairs and waited.\n\n\"Ah, there's Mr. Hewet,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"Mr. Hewet,\" she\ncontinued, \"do come and sit by us. I was telling my husband how much you\nreminded me of a dear old friend of mine--Mary Umpleby. She was a most\ndelightful woman, I assure you. She grew roses. We used to stay with her\nin the old days.\"\n\n\"No young man likes to have it said that he resembles an elderly\nspinster,\" said Mr. Thornbury.\n\n\"On the contrary,\" said Mr. Hewet, \"I always think it a compliment\nto remind people of some one else. But Miss Umpleby--why did she grow\nroses?\"\n\n\"Ah, poor thing,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, \"that's a long story. She had\ngone through dreadful sorrows. At one time I think she would have lost\nher senses if it hadn't been for her garden. The soil was very much\nagainst her--a blessing in disguise; she had to be up at dawn--out\nin all weathers. And then there are creatures that eat roses. But she\ntriumphed. She always did. She was a brave soul.\" She sighed deeply but\nat the same time with resignation.\n\n\"I did not realise that I was monopolising the paper,\" said Miss Allan,\ncoming up to them.\n\n\"We were so anxious to read about the debate,\" said Mrs. Thornbury,\naccepting it on behalf of her husband.\n\n\"One doesn't realise how interesting a debate can be until one has sons\nin the navy. My interests are equally balanced, though; I have sons in\nthe army too; and one son who makes speeches at the Union--my baby!\"\n\n\"Hirst would know him, I expect,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"Mr. Hirst has such an interesting face,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"But I\nfeel one ought to be very clever to talk to him. Well, William?\" she\nenquired, for Mr. Thornbury grunted.\n\n\"They're making a mess of it,\" said Mr. Thornbury. He had reached the\nsecond column of the report, a spasmodic column, for the Irish members\nhad been brawling three weeks ago at Westminster over a question of\nnaval efficiency. After a disturbed paragraph or two, the column of\nprint once more ran smoothly.\n\n\"You have read it?\" Mrs. Thornbury asked Miss Allan.\n\n\"No, I am ashamed to say I have only read about the discoveries in\nCrete,\" said Miss Allan.\n\n\"Oh, but I would give so much to realise the ancient world!\" cried\nMrs. Thornbury. \"Now that we old people are alone,--we're on our second\nhoneymoon,--I am really going to put myself to school again. After all\nwe are _founded_ on the past, aren't we, Mr. Hewet? My soldier son says\nthat there is still a great deal to be learnt from Hannibal. One ought\nto know so much more than one does. Somehow when I read the paper, I\nbegin with the debates first, and, before I've done, the door always\nopens--we're a very large party at home--and so one never does think\nenough about the ancients and all they've done for us. But _you_ begin\nat the beginning, Miss Allan.\"\n\n\"When I think of the Greeks I think of them as naked black men,\" said\nMiss Allan, \"which is quite incorrect, I'm sure.\"\n\n\"And you, Mr. Hirst?\" said Mrs. Thornbury, perceiving that the gaunt\nyoung man was near. \"I'm sure you read everything.\"\n\n\"I confine myself to cricket and crime,\" said Hirst. \"The worst of\ncoming from the upper classes,\" he continued, \"is that one's friends are\nnever killed in railway accidents.\"\n\nMr. Thornbury threw down the paper, and emphatically dropped his\neyeglasses. The sheets fell in the middle of the group, and were eyed by\nthem all.\n\n\"It's not gone well?\" asked his wife solicitously.\n\nHewet picked up one sheet and read, \"A lady was walking yesterday in\nthe streets of Westminster when she perceived a cat in the window of a\ndeserted house. The famished animal--\"\n\n\"I shall be out of it anyway,\" Mr. Thornbury interrupted peevishly.\n\n\"Cats are often forgotten,\" Miss Allan remarked.\n\n\"Remember, William, the Prime Minister has reserved his answer,\" said\nMrs. Thornbury.\n\n\"At the age of eighty, Mr. Joshua Harris of Eeles Park, Brondesbury, has\nhad a son,\" said Hirst.\n\n\". . . The famished animal, which had been noticed by workmen for some\ndays, was rescued, but--by Jove! it bit the man's hand to pieces!\"\n\n\"Wild with hunger, I suppose,\" commented Miss Allan.\n\n\"You're all neglecting the chief advantage of being abroad,\" said Mr.\nHughling Elliot, who had joined the group. \"You might read your news in\nFrench, which is equivalent to reading no news at all.\"\n\nMr. Elliot had a profound knowledge of Coptic, which he concealed as far\nas possible, and quoted French phrases so exquisitely that it was hard\nto believe that he could also speak the ordinary tongue. He had an\nimmense respect for the French.\n\n\"Coming?\" he asked the two young men. \"We ought to start before it's\nreally hot.\"\n\n\"I beg of you not to walk in the heat, Hugh,\" his wife pleaded, giving\nhim an angular parcel enclosing half a chicken and some raisins.\n\n\"Hewet will be our barometer,\" said Mr. Elliot. \"He will melt before I\nshall.\" Indeed, if so much as a drop had melted off his spare ribs, the\nbones would have lain bare. The ladies were left alone now, surrounding\n_The_ _Times_ which lay upon the floor. Miss Allan looked at her\nfather's watch.\n\n\"Ten minutes to eleven,\" she observed.\n\n\"Work?\" asked Mrs. Thornbury.\n\n\"Work,\" replied Miss Allan.\n\n\"What a fine creature she is!\" murmured Mrs. Thornbury, as the square\nfigure in its manly coat withdrew.\n\n\"And I'm sure she has a hard life,\" sighed Mrs. Elliot.\n\n\"Oh, it _is_ a hard life,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"Unmarried\nwomen--earning their livings--it's the hardest life of all.\"\n\n\"Yet she seems pretty cheerful,\" said Mrs. Elliot.\n\n\"It must be very interesting,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"I envy her her\nknowledge.\"\n\n\"But that isn't what women want,\" said Mrs. Elliot.\n\n\"I'm afraid it's all a great many can hope to have,\" sighed Mrs.\nThornbury. \"I believe that there are more of us than ever now. Sir\nHarley Lethbridge was telling me only the other day how difficult it is\nto find boys for the navy--partly because of their teeth, it is true.\nAnd I have heard young women talk quite openly of--\"\n\n\"Dreadful, dreadful!\" exclaimed Mrs. Elliot. \"The crown, as one may call\nit, of a woman's life. I, who know what it is to be childless--\" she\nsighed and ceased.\n\n\"But we must not be hard,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"The conditions are so\nmuch changed since I was a young woman.\"\n\n\"Surely _maternity_ does not change,\" said Mrs. Elliot.\n\n\"In some ways we can learn a great deal from the young,\" said Mrs.\nThornbury. \"I learn so much from my own daughters.\"\n\n\"I believe that Hughling really doesn't mind,\" said Mrs. Elliot. \"But\nthen he has his work.\"\n\n\"Women without children can do so much for the children of others,\"\nobserved Mrs. Thornbury gently.\n\n\"I sketch a great deal,\" said Mrs. Elliot, \"but that isn't really an\noccupation. It's so disconcerting to find girls just beginning doing\nbetter than one does oneself! And nature's difficult--very difficult!\"\n\n\"Are there not institutions--clubs--that you could help?\" asked Mrs.\nThornbury.\n\n\"They are so exhausting,\" said Mrs. Elliot. \"I look strong, because of\nmy colour; but I'm not; the youngest of eleven never is.\"\n\n\"If the mother is careful before,\" said Mrs. Thornbury judicially,\n\"there is no reason why the size of the family should make any\ndifference. And there is no training like the training that brothers and\nsisters give each other. I am sure of that. I have seen it with my own\nchildren. My eldest boy Ralph, for instance--\"\n\nBut Mrs. Elliot was inattentive to the elder lady's experience, and her\neyes wandered about the hall.\n\n\"My mother had two miscarriages, I know,\" she said suddenly. \"The first\nbecause she met one of those great dancing bears--they shouldn't be\nallowed; the other--it was a horrid story--our cook had a child and\nthere was a dinner party. So I put my dyspepsia down to that.\"\n\n\"And a miscarriage is so much worse than a confinement,\" Mrs. Thornbury\nmurmured absentmindedly, adjusting her spectacles and picking up _The_\n_Times_. Mrs. Elliot rose and fluttered away.\n\nWhen she had heard what one of the million voices speaking in the paper\nhad to say, and noticed that a cousin of hers had married a clergyman at\nMinehead--ignoring the drunken women, the golden animals of Crete,\nthe movements of battalions, the dinners, the reforms, the fires, the\nindignant, the learned and benevolent, Mrs. Thornbury went upstairs to\nwrite a letter for the mail.\n\nThe paper lay directly beneath the clock, the two together seeming to\nrepresent stability in a changing world. Mr. Perrott passed through;\nMr. Venning poised for a second on the edge of a table. Mrs. Paley was\nwheeled past. Susan followed. Mr. Venning strolled after her. Portuguese\nmilitary families, their clothes suggesting late rising in untidy\nbedrooms, trailed across, attended by confidential nurses carrying noisy\nchildren. As midday drew on, and the sun beat straight upon the roof,\nan eddy of great flies droned in a circle; iced drinks were served under\nthe palms; the long blinds were pulled down with a shriek, turning all\nthe light yellow. The clock now had a silent hall to tick in, and an\naudience of four or five somnolent merchants. By degrees white figures\nwith shady hats came in at the door, admitting a wedge of the hot summer\nday, and shutting it out again. After resting in the dimness for a\nminute, they went upstairs. Simultaneously, the clock wheezed one, and\nthe gong sounded, beginning softly, working itself into a frenzy, and\nceasing. There was a pause. Then all those who had gone upstairs came\ndown; cripples came, planting both feet on the same step lest they\nshould slip; prim little girls came, holding the nurse's finger; fat old\nmen came still buttoning waistcoats. The gong had been sounded in the\ngarden, and by degrees recumbent figures rose and strolled in to eat,\nsince the time had come for them to feed again. There were pools and\nbars of shade in the garden even at midday, where two or three visitors\ncould lie working or talking at their ease.\n\nOwing to the heat of the day, luncheon was generally a silent meal, when\npeople observed their neighbors and took stock of any new faces there\nmight be, hazarding guesses as to who they were and what they did. Mrs.\nPaley, although well over seventy and crippled in the legs, enjoyed her\nfood and the peculiarities of her fellow-beings. She was seated at a\nsmall table with Susan.\n\n\"I shouldn't like to say what _she_ is!\" she chuckled, surveying a tall\nwoman dressed conspicuously in white, with paint in the hollows of her\ncheeks, who was always late, and always attended by a shabby female\nfollower, at which remark Susan blushed, and wondered why her aunt said\nsuch things.\n\nLunch went on methodically, until each of the seven courses was left in\nfragments and the fruit was merely a toy, to be peeled and sliced as\na child destroys a daisy, petal by petal. The food served as an\nextinguisher upon any faint flame of the human spirit that might survive\nthe midday heat, but Susan sat in her room afterwards, turning over and\nover the delightful fact that Mr. Venning had come to her in the garden,\nand had sat there quite half an hour while she read aloud to her aunt.\nMen and women sought different corners where they could lie unobserved,\nand from two to four it might be said without exaggeration that the\nhotel was inhabited by bodies without souls. Disastrous would have been\nthe result if a fire or a death had suddenly demanded something heroic\nof human nature, but tragedies come in the hungry hours. Towards four\no'clock the human spirit again began to lick the body, as a flame licks\na black promontory of coal. Mrs. Paley felt it unseemly to open her\ntoothless jaw so widely, though there was no one near, and Mrs. Elliot\nsurveyed her found flushed face anxiously in the looking-glass.\n\nHalf an hour later, having removed the traces of sleep, they met each\nother in the hall, and Mrs. Paley observed that she was going to have\nher tea.\n\n\"You like your tea too, don't you?\" she said, and invited Mrs. Elliot,\nwhose husband was still out, to join her at a special table which she\nhad placed for her under a tree.\n\n\"A little silver goes a long way in this country,\" she chuckled.\n\nShe sent Susan back to fetch another cup.\n\n\"They have such excellent biscuits here,\" she said, contemplating a\nplateful. \"Not sweet biscuits, which I don't like--dry biscuits . . .\nHave you been sketching?\"\n\n\"Oh, I've done two or three little daubs,\" said Mrs. Elliot, speaking\nrather louder than usual. \"But it's so difficult after Oxfordshire,\nwhere there are so many trees. The light's so strong here. Some people\nadmire it, I know, but I find it very fatiguing.\"\n\n\"I really don't need cooking, Susan,\" said Mrs. Paley, when her niece\nreturned. \"I must trouble you to move me.\" Everything had to be moved.\nFinally the old lady was placed so that the light wavered over her,\nas though she were a fish in a net. Susan poured out tea, and was just\nremarking that they were having hot weather in Wiltshire too, when Mr.\nVenning asked whether he might join them.\n\n\"It's so nice to find a young man who doesn't despise tea,\" said Mrs.\nPaley, regaining her good humour. \"One of my nephews the other day asked\nfor a glass of sherry--at five o'clock! I told him he could get it at\nthe public house round the corner, but not in my drawing room.\"\n\n\"I'd rather go without lunch than tea,\" said Mr. Venning. \"That's not\nstrictly true. I want both.\"\n\nMr. Venning was a dark young man, about thirty-two years of age, very\nslapdash and confident in his manner, although at this moment obviously\na little excited. His friend Mr. Perrott was a barrister, and as Mr.\nPerrott refused to go anywhere without Mr. Venning it was necessary,\nwhen Mr. Perrott came to Santa Marina about a Company, for Mr. Venning\nto come too. He was a barrister also, but he loathed a profession which\nkept him indoors over books, and directly his widowed mother died he was\ngoing, so he confided to Susan, to take up flying seriously, and become\npartner in a large business for making aeroplanes. The talk rambled on.\nIt dealt, of course, with the beauties and singularities of the place,\nthe streets, the people, and the quantities of unowned yellow dogs.\n\n\"Don't you think it dreadfully cruel the way they treat dogs in this\ncountry?\" asked Mrs. Paley.\n\n\"I'd have 'em all shot,\" said Mr. Venning.\n\n\"Oh, but the darling puppies,\" said Susan.\n\n\"Jolly little chaps,\" said Mr. Venning. \"Look here, you've got nothing\nto eat.\" A great wedge of cake was handed Susan on the point of a\ntrembling knife. Her hand trembled too as she took it.\n\n\"I have such a dear dog at home,\" said Mrs. Elliot.\n\n\"My parrot can't stand dogs,\" said Mrs. Paley, with the air of one\nmaking a confidence. \"I always suspect that he (or she) was teased by a\ndog when I was abroad.\"\n\n\"You didn't get far this morning, Miss Warrington,\" said Mr. Venning.\n\n\"It was hot,\" she answered. Their conversation became private, owing\nto Mrs. Paley's deafness and the long sad history which Mrs. Elliot had\nembarked upon of a wire-haired terrier, white with just one black spot,\nbelonging to an uncle of hers, which had committed suicide. \"Animals do\ncommit suicide,\" she sighed, as if she asserted a painful fact.\n\n\"Couldn't we explore the town this evening?\" Mr. Venning suggested.\n\n\"My aunt--\" Susan began.\n\n\"You deserve a holiday,\" he said. \"You're always doing things for other\npeople.\"\n\n\"But that's my life,\" she said, under cover of refilling the teapot.\n\n\"That's no one's life,\" he returned, \"no young person's. You'll come?\"\n\n\"I should like to come,\" she murmured.\n\nAt this moment Mrs. Elliot looked up and exclaimed, \"Oh, Hugh! He's\nbringing some one,\" she added.\n\n\"He would like some tea,\" said Mrs. Paley. \"Susan, run and get some\ncups--there are the two young men.\"\n\n\"We're thirsting for tea,\" said Mr. Elliot. \"You know Mr. Ambrose,\nHilda? We met on the hill.\"\n\n\"He dragged me in,\" said Ridley, \"or I should have been ashamed. I'm\ndusty and dirty and disagreeable.\" He pointed to his boots which were\nwhite with dust, while a dejected flower drooping in his buttonhole,\nlike an exhausted animal over a gate, added to the effect of length and\nuntidiness. He was introduced to the others. Mr. Hewet and Mr. Hirst\nbrought chairs, and tea began again, Susan pouring cascades of water\nfrom pot to pot, always cheerfully, and with the competence of long use.\n\n\"My wife's brother,\" Ridley explained to Hilda, whom he failed to\nremember, \"has a house here, which he has lent us. I was sitting on a\nrock thinking of nothing at all when Elliot started up like a fairy in a\npantomime.\"\n\n\"Our chicken got into the salt,\" Hewet said dolefully to Susan. \"Nor is\nit true that bananas include moisture as well as sustenance.\"\n\nHirst was already drinking.\n\n\"We've been cursing you,\" said Ridley in answer to Mrs. Elliot's kind\nenquiries about his wife. \"You tourists eat up all the eggs, Helen\ntells me. That's an eye-sore too\"--he nodded his head at the hotel.\n\"Disgusting luxury, I call it. We live with pigs in the drawing-room.\"\n\n\"The food is not at all what it ought to be, considering the price,\"\nsaid Mrs. Paley seriously. \"But unless one goes to a hotel where is one\nto go to?\"\n\n\"Stay at home,\" said Ridley. \"I often wish I had! Everyone ought to stay\nat home. But, of course, they won't.\"\n\nMrs. Paley conceived a certain grudge against Ridley, who seemed to be\ncriticising her habits after an acquaintance of five minutes.\n\n\"I believe in foreign travel myself,\" she stated, \"if one knows one's\nnative land, which I think I can honestly say I do. I should not allow\nany one to travel until they had visited Kent and Dorsetshire--Kent for\nthe hops, and Dorsetshire for its old stone cottages. There is nothing\nto compare with them here.\"\n\n\"Yes--I always think that some people like the flat and other people\nlike the downs,\" said Mrs. Elliot rather vaguely.\n\nHirst, who had been eating and drinking without interruption, now lit\na cigarette, and observed, \"Oh, but we're all agreed by this time that\nnature's a mistake. She's either very ugly, appallingly uncomfortable,\nor absolutely terrifying. I don't know which alarms me most--a cow or a\ntree. I once met a cow in a field by night. The creature looked at me.\nI assure you it turned my hair grey. It's a disgrace that the animals\nshould be allowed to go at large.\"\n\n\"And what did the cow think of _him_?\" Venning mumbled to Susan, who\nimmediately decided in her own mind that Mr. Hirst was a dreadful young\nman, and that although he had such an air of being clever he probably\nwasn't as clever as Arthur, in the ways that really matter.\n\n\"Wasn't it Wilde who discovered the fact that nature makes no allowance\nfor hip-bones?\" enquired Hughling Elliot. He knew by this time exactly\nwhat scholarships and distinction Hirst enjoyed, and had formed a very\nhigh opinion of his capacities.\n\nBut Hirst merely drew his lips together very tightly and made no reply.\n\nRidley conjectured that it was now permissible for him to take his\nleave. Politeness required him to thank Mrs. Elliot for his tea, and to\nadd, with a wave of his hand, \"You must come up and see us.\"\n\nThe wave included both Hirst and Hewet, and Hewet answered, \"I should\nlike it immensely.\"\n\nThe party broke up, and Susan, who had never felt so happy in her life,\nwas just about to start for her walk in the town with Arthur, when Mrs.\nPaley beckoned her back. She could not understand from the book how\nDouble Demon patience is played; and suggested that if they sat down and\nworked it out together it would fill up the time nicely before dinner.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter X\n\n\nAmong the promises which Mrs. Ambrose had made her niece should she stay\nwas a room cut off from the rest of the house, large, private--a room in\nwhich she could play, read, think, defy the world, a fortress as well as\na sanctuary. Rooms, she knew, became more like worlds than rooms at the\nage of twenty-four. Her judgment was correct, and when she shut the door\nRachel entered an enchanted place, where the poets sang and things fell\ninto their right proportions. Some days after the vision of the hotel\nby night she was sitting alone, sunk in an arm-chair, reading a\nbrightly-covered red volume lettered on the back _Works_ _of_ _Henrik_\n_Ibsen_. Music was open on the piano, and books of music rose in two\njagged pillars on the floor; but for the moment music was deserted.\n\nFar from looking bored or absent-minded, her eyes were concentrated\nalmost sternly upon the page, and from her breathing, which was slow but\nrepressed, it could be seen that her whole body was constrained by the\nworking of her mind. At last she shut the book sharply, lay back, and\ndrew a deep breath, expressive of the wonder which always marks the\ntransition from the imaginary world to the real world.\n\n\"What I want to know,\" she said aloud, \"is this: What is the truth?\nWhat's the truth of it all?\" She was speaking partly as herself, and\npartly as the heroine of the play she had just read. The landscape\noutside, because she had seen nothing but print for the space of two\nhours, now appeared amazingly solid and clear, but although there were\nmen on the hill washing the trunks of olive trees with a white liquid,\nfor the moment she herself was the most vivid thing in it--an heroic\nstatue in the middle of the foreground, dominating the view. Ibsen's\nplays always left her in that condition. She acted them for days at a\ntime, greatly to Helen's amusement; and then it would be Meredith's turn\nand she became Diana of the Crossways. But Helen was aware that it was\nnot all acting, and that some sort of change was taking place in the\nhuman being. When Rachel became tired of the rigidity of her pose on the\nback of the chair, she turned round, slid comfortably down into it, and\ngazed out over the furniture through the window opposite which opened on\nthe garden. (Her mind wandered away from Nora, but she went on thinking\nof things that the book suggested to her, of women and life.)\n\nDuring the three months she had been here she had made up considerably,\nas Helen meant she should, for time spent in interminable walks round\nsheltered gardens, and the household gossip of her aunts. But Mrs.\nAmbrose would have been the first to disclaim any influence, or indeed\nany belief that to influence was within her power. She saw her less shy,\nand less serious, which was all to the good, and the violent leaps and\nthe interminable mazes which had led to that result were usually not\neven guessed at by her. Talk was the medicine she trusted to, talk about\neverything, talk that was free, unguarded, and as candid as a habit of\ntalking with men made natural in her own case. Nor did she encourage\nthose habits of unselfishness and amiability founded upon insincerity\nwhich are put at so high a value in mixed households of men and women.\nShe desired that Rachel should think, and for this reason offered books\nand discouraged too entire a dependence upon Bach and Beethoven and\nWagner. But when Mrs. Ambrose would have suggested Defoe, Maupassant, or\nsome spacious chronicle of family life, Rachel chose modern books, books\nin shiny yellow covers, books with a great deal of gilding on the back,\nwhich were tokens in her aunt's eyes of harsh wrangling and disputes\nabout facts which had no such importance as the moderns claimed for\nthem. But she did not interfere. Rachel read what she chose, reading\nwith the curious literalness of one to whom written sentences are\nunfamiliar, and handling words as though they were made of wood,\nseparately of great importance, and possessed of shapes like tables or\nchairs. In this way she came to conclusions, which had to be remodelled\naccording to the adventures of the day, and were indeed recast as\nliberally as any one could desire, leaving always a small grain of\nbelief behind them.\n\nIbsen was succeeded by a novel such as Mrs. Ambrose detested, whose\npurpose was to distribute the guilt of a woman's downfall upon the right\nshoulders; a purpose which was achieved, if the reader's discomfort\nwere any proof of it. She threw the book down, looked out of the window,\nturned away from the window, and relapsed into an arm-chair.\n\nThe morning was hot, and the exercise of reading left her mind\ncontracting and expanding like the main-spring of a clock, and the\nsmall noises of midday, which one can ascribe to no definite cause, in\na regular rhythm. It was all very real, very big, very impersonal, and\nafter a moment or two she began to raise her first finger and to let\nit fall on the arm of her chair so as to bring back to herself some\nconsciousness of her own existence. She was next overcome by the\nunspeakable queerness of the fact that she should be sitting in an\narm-chair, in the morning, in the middle of the world. Who were the\npeople moving in the house--moving things from one place to another? And\nlife, what was that? It was only a light passing over the surface and\nvanishing, as in time she would vanish, though the furniture in the\nroom would remain. Her dissolution became so complete that she could\nnot raise her finger any more, and sat perfectly still, listening and\nlooking always at the same spot. It became stranger and stranger. She\nwas overcome with awe that things should exist at all. . . . She forgot\nthat she had any fingers to raise. . . . The things that existed were\nso immense and so desolate. . . . She continued to be conscious of these\nvast masses of substance for a long stretch of time, the clock still\nticking in the midst of the universal silence.\n\n\"Come in,\" she said mechanically, for a string in her brain seemed to\nbe pulled by a persistent knocking at the door. With great slowness the\ndoor opened and a tall human being came towards her, holding out her arm\nand saying:\n\n\"What am I to say to this?\"\n\nThe utter absurdity of a woman coming into a room with a piece of paper\nin her hand amazed Rachel.\n\n\"I don't know what to answer, or who Terence Hewet is,\" Helen continued,\nin the toneless voice of a ghost. She put a paper before Rachel on which\nwere written the incredible words:\n\n\nDEAR MRS. AMBROSE--I am getting up a picnic for next Friday, when we\npropose to start at eleven-thirty if the weather is fine, and to make\nthe ascent of Monte Rosa. It will take some time, but the view should\nbe magnificent. It would give me great pleasure if you and Miss Vinrace\nwould consent to be of the party.--\n\nYours sincerely, TERENCE HEWET\n\n\nRachel read the words aloud to make herself believe in them. For the\nsame reason she put her hand on Helen's shoulder.\n\n\"Books--books--books,\" said Helen, in her absent-minded way. \"More new\nbooks--I wonder what you find in them. . . .\"\n\nFor the second time Rachel read the letter, but to herself. This\ntime, instead of seeming vague as ghosts, each word was astonishingly\nprominent; they came out as the tops of mountains come through a mist.\n_Friday_--_eleven-thirty_--_Miss_ _Vinrace_. The blood began to run in\nher veins; she felt her eyes brighten.\n\n\"We must go,\" she said, rather surprising Helen by her decision. \"We\nmust certainly go\"--such was the relief of finding that things still\nhappened, and indeed they appeared the brighter for the mist surrounding\nthem.\n\n\"Monte Rosa--that's the mountain over there, isn't it?\" said Helen; \"but\nHewet--who's he? One of the young men Ridley met, I suppose. Shall I say\nyes, then? It may be dreadfully dull.\"\n\nShe took the letter back and went, for the messenger was waiting for her\nanswer.\n\nThe party which had been suggested a few nights ago in Mr. Hirst's\nbedroom had taken shape and was the source of great satisfaction to Mr.\nHewet, who had seldom used his practical abilities, and was pleased\nto find them equal to the strain. His invitations had been universally\naccepted, which was the more encouraging as they had been issued against\nHirst's advice to people who were very dull, not at all suited to each\nother, and sure not to come.\n\n\"Undoubtedly,\" he said, as he twirled and untwirled a note signed Helen\nAmbrose, \"the gifts needed to make a great commander have been absurdly\noverrated. About half the intellectual effort which is needed to review\na book of modern poetry has enabled me to get together seven or eight\npeople, of opposite sexes, at the same spot at the same hour on the same\nday. What else is generalship, Hirst? What more did Wellington do on the\nfield of Waterloo? It's like counting the number of pebbles of a path,\ntedious but not difficult.\"\n\nHe was sitting in his bedroom, one leg over the arm of the chair, and\nHirst was writing a letter opposite. Hirst was quick to point out that\nall the difficulties remained.\n\n\"For instance, here are two women you've never seen. Suppose one of them\nsuffers from mountain-sickness, as my sister does, and the other--\"\n\n\"Oh, the women are for you,\" Hewet interrupted. \"I asked them solely for\nyour benefit. What you want, Hirst, you know, is the society of young\nwomen of your own age. You don't know how to get on with women, which is\na great defect, considering that half the world consists of women.\"\n\nHirst groaned that he was quite aware of that.\n\nBut Hewet's complacency was a little chilled as he walked with Hirst to\nthe place where a general meeting had been appointed. He wondered why\non earth he had asked these people, and what one really expected to get\nfrom bunching human beings up together.\n\n\"Cows,\" he reflected, \"draw together in a field; ships in a calm; and\nwe're just the same when we've nothing else to do. But why do we do\nit?--is it to prevent ourselves from seeing to the bottom of things\"\n(he stopped by a stream and began stirring it with his walking-stick\nand clouding the water with mud), \"making cities and mountains and whole\nuniverses out of nothing, or do we really love each other, or do we,\non the other hand, live in a state of perpetual uncertainty, knowing\nnothing, leaping from moment to moment as from world to world?--which\nis, on the whole, the view _I_ incline to.\"\n\nHe jumped over the stream; Hirst went round and joined him, remarking\nthat he had long ceased to look for the reason of any human action.\n\nHalf a mile further, they came to a group of plane trees and the\nsalmon-pink farmhouse standing by the stream which had been chosen as\nmeeting-place. It was a shady spot, lying conveniently just where the\nhill sprung out from the flat. Between the thin stems of the plane trees\nthe young men could see little knots of donkeys pasturing, and a tall\nwoman rubbing the nose of one of them, while another woman was kneeling\nby the stream lapping water out of her palms.\n\nAs they entered the shady place, Helen looked up and then held out her\nhand.\n\n\"I must introduce myself,\" she said. \"I am Mrs. Ambrose.\"\n\nHaving shaken hands, she said, \"That's my niece.\"\n\nRachel approached awkwardly. She held out her hand, but withdrew it.\n\"It's all wet,\" she said.\n\nScarcely had they spoken, when the first carriage drew up.\n\nThe donkeys were quickly jerked into attention, and the second carriage\narrived. By degrees the grove filled with people--the Elliots, the\nThornburys, Mr. Venning and Susan, Miss Allan, Evelyn Murgatroyd, and\nMr. Perrott. Mr. Hirst acted the part of hoarse energetic sheep-dog. By\nmeans of a few words of caustic Latin he had the animals marshalled, and\nby inclining a sharp shoulder he lifted the ladies. \"What Hewet fails to\nunderstand,\" he remarked, \"is that we must break the back of the\nascent before midday.\" He was assisting a young lady, by name Evelyn\nMurgatroyd, as he spoke. She rose light as a bubble to her seat. With a\nfeather drooping from a broad-brimmed hat, in white from top to toe,\nshe looked like a gallant lady of the time of Charles the First leading\nroyalist troops into action.\n\n\"Ride with me,\" she commanded; and, as soon as Hirst had swung himself\nacross a mule, the two started, leading the cavalcade.\n\n\"You're not to call me Miss Murgatroyd. I hate it,\" she said. \"My name's\nEvelyn. What's yours?\"\n\n\"St. John,\" he said.\n\n\"I like that,\" said Evelyn. \"And what's your friend's name?\"\n\n\"His initials being R. S. T., we call him Monk,\" said Hirst.\n\n\"Oh, you're all too clever,\" she said. \"Which way? Pick me a branch.\nLet's canter.\"\n\nShe gave her donkey a sharp cut with a switch and started forward. The\nfull and romantic career of Evelyn Murgatroyd is best hit off by her\nown words, \"Call me Evelyn and I'll call you St. John.\" She said that\non very slight provocation--her surname was enough--but although a great\nmany young men had answered her already with considerable spirit she\nwent on saying it and making choice of none. But her donkey stumbled to\na jog-trot, and she had to ride in advance alone, for the path when\nit began to ascend one of the spines of the hill became narrow\nand scattered with stones. The cavalcade wound on like a jointed\ncaterpillar, tufted with the white parasols of the ladies, and the\npanama hats of the gentlemen. At one point where the ground rose\nsharply, Evelyn M. jumped off, threw her reins to the native boy, and\nadjured St. John Hirst to dismount too. Their example was followed by\nthose who felt the need of stretching.\n\n\"I don't see any need to get off,\" said Miss Allan to Mrs. Elliot just\nbehind her, \"considering the difficulty I had getting on.\"\n\n\"These little donkeys stand anything, _n'est-ce_ _pas_?\" Mrs. Elliot\naddressed the guide, who obligingly bowed his head.\n\n\"Flowers,\" said Helen, stooping to pick the lovely little bright flowers\nwhich grew separately here and there. \"You pinch their leaves and then\nthey smell,\" she said, laying one on Miss Allan's knee.\n\n\"Haven't we met before?\" asked Miss Allan, looking at her.\n\n\"I was taking it for granted,\" Helen laughed, for in the confusion of\nmeeting they had not been introduced.\n\n\"How sensible!\" chirped Mrs. Elliot. \"That's just what one would always\nlike--only unfortunately it's not possible.\" \"Not possible?\" said Helen.\n\"Everything's possible. Who knows what mayn't happen before night-fall?\"\nshe continued, mocking the poor lady's timidity, who depended implicitly\nupon one thing following another that the mere glimpse of a world\nwhere dinner could be disregarded, or the table moved one inch from its\naccustomed place, filled her with fears for her own stability.\n\nHigher and higher they went, becoming separated from the world. The\nworld, when they turned to look back, flattened itself out, and was\nmarked with squares of thin green and grey.\n\n\"Towns are very small,\" Rachel remarked, obscuring the whole of Santa\nMarina and its suburbs with one hand. The sea filled in all the angles\nof the coast smoothly, breaking in a white frill, and here and there\nships were set firmly in the blue. The sea was stained with purple and\ngreen blots, and there was a glittering line upon the rim where it met\nthe sky. The air was very clear and silent save for the sharp noise of\ngrasshoppers and the hum of bees, which sounded loud in the ear as they\nshot past and vanished. The party halted and sat for a time in a quarry\non the hillside.\n\n\"Amazingly clear,\" exclaimed St. John, identifying one cleft in the land\nafter another.\n\nEvelyn M. sat beside him, propping her chin on her hand. She surveyed\nthe view with a certain look of triumph.\n\n\"D'you think Garibaldi was ever up here?\" she asked Mr. Hirst. Oh, if\nshe had been his bride! If, instead of a picnic party, this was a party\nof patriots, and she, red-shirted like the rest, had lain among grim\nmen, flat on the turf, aiming her gun at the white turrets beneath them,\nscreening her eyes to pierce through the smoke! So thinking, her foot\nstirred restlessly, and she exclaimed:\n\n\"I don't call this _life_, do you?\"\n\n\"What do you call life?\" said St. John.\n\n\"Fighting--revolution,\" she said, still gazing at the doomed city. \"You\nonly care for books, I know.\"\n\n\"You're quite wrong,\" said St. John.\n\n\"Explain,\" she urged, for there were no guns to be aimed at bodies, and\nshe turned to another kind of warfare.\n\n\"What do I care for? People,\" he said.\n\n\"Well, I _am_ surprised!\" she exclaimed. \"You look so awfully serious.\nDo let's be friends and tell each other what we're like. I hate being\ncautious, don't you?\"\n\nBut St. John was decidedly cautious, as she could see by the sudden\nconstriction of his lips, and had no intention of revealing his soul to\na young lady. \"The ass is eating my hat,\" he remarked, and stretched out\nfor it instead of answering her. Evelyn blushed very slightly and then\nturned with some impetuosity upon Mr. Perrott, and when they mounted\nagain it was Mr. Perrott who lifted her to her seat.\n\n\"When one has laid the eggs one eats the omelette,\" said Hughling\nElliot, exquisitely in French, a hint to the rest of them that it was\ntime to ride on again.\n\nThe midday sun which Hirst had foretold was beginning to beat down\nhotly. The higher they got the more of the sky appeared, until the\nmountain was only a small tent of earth against an enormous blue\nbackground. The English fell silent; the natives who walked beside the\ndonkeys broke into queer wavering songs and tossed jokes from one to the\nother. The way grew very steep, and each rider kept his eyes fixed on\nthe hobbling curved form of the rider and donkey directly in front of\nhim. Rather more strain was being put upon their bodies than is quite\nlegitimate in a party of pleasure, and Hewet overheard one or two\nslightly grumbling remarks.\n\n\"Expeditions in such heat are perhaps a little unwise,\" Mrs. Elliot\nmurmured to Miss Allan.\n\nBut Miss Allan returned, \"I always like to get to the top\"; and it was\ntrue, although she was a big woman, stiff in the joints, and unused to\ndonkey-riding, but as her holidays were few she made the most of them.\n\nThe vivacious white figure rode well in front; she had somehow possessed\nherself of a leafy branch and wore it round her hat like a garland. They\nwent on for a few minutes in silence.\n\n\"The view will be wonderful,\" Hewet assured them, turning round in his\nsaddle and smiling encouragement. Rachel caught his eye and smiled too.\nThey struggled on for some time longer, nothing being heard but the\nclatter of hooves striving on the loose stones. Then they saw that\nEvelyn was off her ass, and that Mr. Perrott was standing in the\nattitude of a statesman in Parliament Square, stretching an arm of stone\ntowards the view. A little to the left of them was a low ruined wall,\nthe stump of an Elizabethan watch-tower.\n\n\"I couldn't have stood it much longer,\" Mrs. Elliot confided to Mrs.\nThornbury, but the excitement of being at the top in another moment and\nseeing the view prevented any one from answering her. One after another\nthey came out on the flat space at the top and stood overcome with\nwonder. Before them they beheld an immense space--grey sands running\ninto forest, and forest merging in mountains, and mountains washed by\nair, the infinite distances of South America. A river ran across the\nplain, as flat as the land, and appearing quite as stationary. The\neffect of so much space was at first rather chilling. They felt\nthemselves very small, and for some time no one said anything. Then\nEvelyn exclaimed, \"Splendid!\" She took hold of the hand that was next\nher; it chanced to be Miss Allan's hand.\n\n\"North--South--East--West,\" said Miss Allan, jerking her head slightly\ntowards the points of the compass.\n\nHewet, who had gone a little in front, looked up at his guests as if to\njustify himself for having brought them. He observed how strangely the\npeople standing in a row with their figures bent slightly forward\nand their clothes plastered by the wind to the shape of their bodies\nresembled naked statues. On their pedestal of earth they looked\nunfamiliar and noble, but in another moment they had broken their rank,\nand he had to see to the laying out of food. Hirst came to his help, and\nthey handed packets of chicken and bread from one to another.\n\nAs St. John gave Helen her packet she looked him full in the face and\nsaid:\n\n\"Do you remember--two women?\"\n\nHe looked at her sharply.\n\n\"I do,\" he answered.\n\n\"So you're the two women!\" Hewet exclaimed, looking from Helen to\nRachel.\n\n\"Your lights tempted us,\" said Helen. \"We watched you playing cards, but\nwe never knew that we were being watched.\"\n\n\"It was like a thing in a play,\" Rachel added.\n\n\"And Hirst couldn't describe you,\" said Hewet.\n\nIt was certainly odd to have seen Helen and to find nothing to say about\nher.\n\nHughling Elliot put up his eyeglass and grasped the situation.\n\n\"I don't know of anything more dreadful,\" he said, pulling at the joint\nof a chicken's leg, \"than being seen when one isn't conscious of it. One\nfeels sure one has been caught doing something ridiculous--looking at\none's tongue in a hansom, for instance.\"\n\nNow the others ceased to look at the view, and drawing together sat down\nin a circle round the baskets.\n\n\"And yet those little looking-glasses in hansoms have a fascination of\ntheir own,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"One's features look so different when\none can only see a bit of them.\"\n\n\"There will soon be very few hansom cabs left,\" said Mrs. Elliot. \"And\nfour-wheeled cabs--I assure you even at Oxford it's almost impossible to\nget a four-wheeled cab.\"\n\n\"I wonder what happens to the horses,\" said Susan.\n\n\"Veal pie,\" said Arthur.\n\n\"It's high time that horses should become extinct anyhow,\" said Hirst.\n\"They're distressingly ugly, besides being vicious.\"\n\nBut Susan, who had been brought up to understand that the horse is the\nnoblest of God's creatures, could not agree, and Venning thought Hirst\nan unspeakable ass, but was too polite not to continue the conversation.\n\n\"When they see us falling out of aeroplanes they get some of their own\nback, I expect,\" he remarked.\n\n\"You fly?\" said old Mr. Thornbury, putting on his spectacles to look at\nhim.\n\n\"I hope to, some day,\" said Arthur.\n\nHere flying was discussed at length, and Mrs. Thornbury delivered an\nopinion which was almost a speech to the effect that it would be quite\nnecessary in time of war, and in England we were terribly behind-hand.\n\"If I were a young fellow,\" she concluded, \"I should certainly qualify.\"\nIt was odd to look at the little elderly lady, in her grey coat and\nskirt, with a sandwich in her hand, her eyes lighting up with zeal\nas she imagined herself a young man in an aeroplane. For some reason,\nhowever, the talk did not run easily after this, and all they said was\nabout drink and salt and the view. Suddenly Miss Allan, who was\nseated with her back to the ruined wall, put down her sandwich,\npicked something off her neck, and remarked, \"I'm covered with little\ncreatures.\" It was true, and the discovery was very welcome. The ants\nwere pouring down a glacier of loose earth heaped between the stones of\nthe ruin--large brown ants with polished bodies. She held out one on the\nback of her hand for Helen to look at.\n\n\"Suppose they sting?\" said Helen.\n\n\"They will not sting, but they may infest the victuals,\" said Miss\nAllan, and measures were taken at once to divert the ants from their\ncourse. At Hewet's suggestion it was decided to adopt the methods of\nmodern warfare against an invading army. The table-cloth represented the\ninvaded country, and round it they built barricades of baskets, set\nup the wine bottles in a rampart, made fortifications of bread and dug\nfosses of salt. When an ant got through it was exposed to a fire of\nbread-crumbs, until Susan pronounced that that was cruel, and rewarded\nthose brave spirits with spoil in the shape of tongue. Playing this game\nthey lost their stiffness, and even became unusually daring, for Mr.\nPerrott, who was very shy, said, \"Permit me,\" and removed an ant from\nEvelyn's neck.\n\n\"It would be no laughing matter really,\" said Mrs. Elliot confidentially\nto Mrs. Thornbury, \"if an ant did get between the vest and the skin.\"\n\nThe noise grew suddenly more clamorous, for it was discovered that a\nlong line of ants had found their way on to the table-cloth by a back\nentrance, and if success could be gauged by noise, Hewet had every\nreason to think his party a success. Nevertheless he became, for no\nreason at all, profoundly depressed.\n\n\"They are not satisfactory; they are ignoble,\" he thought, surveying\nhis guests from a little distance, where he was gathering together the\nplates. He glanced at them all, stooping and swaying and gesticulating\nround the table-cloth. Amiable and modest, respectable in many ways,\nlovable even in their contentment and desire to be kind, how mediocre\nthey all were, and capable of what insipid cruelty to one another!\nThere was Mrs. Thornbury, sweet but trivial in her maternal egoism; Mrs.\nElliot, perpetually complaining of her lot; her husband a mere pea in\na pod; and Susan--she had no self, and counted neither one way nor the\nother; Venning was as honest and as brutal as a schoolboy; poor old\nThornbury merely trod his round like a horse in a mill; and the less\none examined into Evelyn's character the better, he suspected. Yet these\nwere the people with money, and to them rather than to others was given\nthe management of the world. Put among them some one more vital, who\ncared for life or for beauty, and what an agony, what a waste would they\ninflict on him if he tried to share with them and not to scourge!\n\n\"There's Hirst,\" he concluded, coming to the figure of his friend; with\nhis usual little frown of concentration upon his forehead he was peeling\nthe skin off a banana. \"And he's as ugly as sin.\" For the ugliness of\nSt. John Hirst, and the limitations that went with it, he made the rest\nin some way responsible. It was their fault that he had to live alone.\nThen he came to Helen, attracted to her by the sound of her laugh. She\nwas laughing at Miss Allan. \"You wear combinations in this heat?\" she\nsaid in a voice which was meant to be private. He liked the look of her\nimmensely, not so much her beauty, but her largeness and simplicity,\nwhich made her stand out from the rest like a great stone woman, and\nhe passed on in a gentler mood. His eye fell upon Rachel. She was lying\nback rather behind the others resting on one elbow; she might have been\nthinking precisely the same thoughts as Hewet himself. Her eyes were\nfixed rather sadly but not intently upon the row of people opposite her.\nHewet crawled up to her on his knees, with a piece of bread in his hand.\n\n\"What are you looking at?\" he asked.\n\nShe was a little startled, but answered directly, \"Human beings.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XI\n\n\nOne after another they rose and stretched themselves, and in a few\nminutes divided more or less into two separate parties. One of these\nparties was dominated by Hughling Elliot and Mrs. Thornbury, who, having\nboth read the same books and considered the same questions, were now\nanxious to name the places beneath them and to hang upon them stores\nof information about navies and armies, political parties, natives and\nmineral products--all of which combined, they said, to prove that South\nAmerica was the country of the future.\n\nEvelyn M. listened with her bright blue eyes fixed upon the oracles.\n\n\"How it makes one long to be a man!\" she exclaimed.\n\nMr. Perrott answered, surveying the plain, that a country with a future\nwas a very fine thing.\n\n\"If I were you,\" said Evelyn, turning to him and drawing her glove\nvehemently through her fingers, \"I'd raise a troop and conquer some\ngreat territory and make it splendid. You'd want women for that. I'd\nlove to start life from the very beginning as it ought to be--nothing\nsqualid--but great halls and gardens and splendid men and women. But\nyou--you only like Law Courts!\"\n\n\"And would you really be content without pretty frocks and sweets and\nall the things young ladies like?\" asked Mr. Perrott, concealing a\ncertain amount of pain beneath his ironical manner.\n\n\"I'm not a young lady,\" Evelyn flashed; she bit her underlip. \"Just\nbecause I like splendid things you laugh at me. Why are there no men\nlike Garibaldi now?\" she demanded.\n\n\"Look here,\" said Mr. Perrott, \"you don't give me a chance. You think we\nought to begin things fresh. Good. But I don't see precisely--conquer a\nterritory? They're all conquered already, aren't they?\"\n\n\"It's not any territory in particular,\" Evelyn explained. \"It's the\nidea, don't you see? We lead such tame lives. And I feel sure you've got\nsplendid things in you.\"\n\nHewet saw the scars and hollows in Mr. Perrott's sagacious face relax\npathetically. He could imagine the calculations which even then went on\nwithin his mind, as to whether he would be justified in asking a woman\nto marry him, considering that he made no more than five hundred a\nyear at the Bar, owned no private means, and had an invalid sister to\nsupport. Mr. Perrott again knew that he was not \"quite,\" as Susan stated\nin her diary; not quite a gentleman she meant, for he was the son of a\ngrocer in Leeds, had started life with a basket on his back, and now,\nthough practically indistinguishable from a born gentleman, showed his\norigin to keen eyes in an impeccable neatness of dress, lack of freedom\nin manner, extreme cleanliness of person, and a certain indescribable\ntimidity and precision with his knife and fork which might be the relic\nof days when meat was rare, and the way of handling it by no means\ngingerly.\n\nThe two parties who were strolling about and losing their unity now\ncame together, and joined each other in a long stare over the yellow and\ngreen patches of the heated landscape below. The hot air danced across\nit, making it impossible to see the roofs of a village on the plain\ndistinctly. Even on the top of the mountain where a breeze played\nlightly, it was very hot, and the heat, the food, the immense space, and\nperhaps some less well-defined cause produced a comfortable drowsiness\nand a sense of happy relaxation in them. They did not say much, but felt\nno constraint in being silent.\n\n\"Suppose we go and see what's to be seen over there?\" said Arthur to\nSusan, and the pair walked off together, their departure certainly\nsending some thrill of emotion through the rest.\n\n\"An odd lot, aren't they?\" said Arthur. \"I thought we should never\nget 'em all to the top. But I'm glad we came, by Jove! I wouldn't have\nmissed this for something.\"\n\n\"I don't _like_ Mr. Hirst,\" said Susan inconsequently. \"I suppose he's\nvery clever, but why should clever people be so--I expect he's awfully\nnice, really,\" she added, instinctively qualifying what might have\nseemed an unkind remark.\n\n\"Hirst? Oh, he's one of these learned chaps,\" said Arthur indifferently.\n\"He don't look as if he enjoyed it. You should hear him talking to\nElliot. It's as much as I can do to follow 'em at all. . . . I was never\ngood at my books.\"\n\nWith these sentences and the pauses that came between them they reached\na little hillock, on the top of which grew several slim trees.\n\n\"D'you mind if we sit down here?\" said Arthur, looking about him. \"It's\njolly in the shade--and the view--\" They sat down, and looked straight\nahead of them in silence for some time.\n\n\"But I do envy those clever chaps sometimes,\" Arthur remarked. \"I don't\nsuppose they ever . . .\" He did not finish his sentence.\n\n\"I can't see why you should envy them,\" said Susan, with great\nsincerity.\n\n\"Odd things happen to one,\" said Arthur. \"One goes along smoothly\nenough, one thing following another, and it's all very jolly and plain\nsailing, and you think you know all about it, and suddenly one doesn't\nknow where one is a bit, and everything seems different from what it\nused to seem. Now to-day, coming up that path, riding behind you, I\nseemed to see everything as if--\" he paused and plucked a piece of\ngrass up by the roots. He scattered the little lumps of earth which were\nsticking to the roots--\"As if it had a kind of meaning. You've made the\ndifference to me,\" he jerked out, \"I don't see why I shouldn't tell you.\nI've felt it ever since I knew you. . . . It's because I love you.\"\n\nEven while they had been saying commonplace things Susan had been\nconscious of the excitement of intimacy, which seemed not only to lay\nbare something in her, but in the trees and the sky, and the progress of\nhis speech which seemed inevitable was positively painful to her, for no\nhuman being had ever come so close to her before.\n\nShe was struck motionless as his speech went on, and her heart gave\ngreat separate leaps at the last words. She sat with her fingers curled\nround a stone, looking straight in front of her down the mountain over\nthe plain. So then, it had actually happened to her, a proposal of\nmarriage.\n\nArthur looked round at her; his face was oddly twisted. She was drawing\nher breath with such difficulty that she could hardly answer.\n\n\"You might have known.\" He seized her in his arms; again and again and\nagain they clasped each other, murmuring inarticulately.\n\n\"Well,\" sighed Arthur, sinking back on the ground, \"that's the most\nwonderful thing that's ever happened to me.\" He looked as if he were\ntrying to put things seen in a dream beside real things.\n\nThere was a long silence.\n\n\"It's the most perfect thing in the world,\" Susan stated, very gently\nand with great conviction. It was no longer merely a proposal of\nmarriage, but of marriage with Arthur, with whom she was in love.\n\nIn the silence that followed, holding his hand tightly in hers, she\nprayed to God that she might make him a good wife.\n\n\"And what will Mr. Perrott say?\" she asked at the end of it.\n\n\"Dear old fellow,\" said Arthur who, now that the first shock was over,\nwas relaxing into an enormous sense of pleasure and contentment. \"We\nmust be very nice to him, Susan.\"\n\nHe told her how hard Perrott's life had been, and how absurdly devoted\nhe was to Arthur himself. He went on to tell her about his mother, a\nwidow lady, of strong character. In return Susan sketched the portraits\nof her own family--Edith in particular, her youngest sister, whom she\nloved better than any one else, \"except you, Arthur. . . . Arthur,\" she\ncontinued, \"what was it that you first liked me for?\"\n\n\"It was a buckle you wore one night at sea,\" said Arthur, after\ndue consideration. \"I remember noticing--it's an absurd thing to\nnotice!--that you didn't take peas, because I don't either.\"\n\nFrom this they went on to compare their more serious tastes, or rather\nSusan ascertained what Arthur cared about, and professed herself very\nfond of the same thing. They would live in London, perhaps have a\ncottage in the country near Susan's family, for they would find it\nstrange without her at first. Her mind, stunned to begin with, now flew\nto the various changes that her engagement would make--how delightful it\nwould be to join the ranks of the married women--no longer to hang on to\ngroups of girls much younger than herself--to escape the long solitude\nof an old maid's life. Now and then her amazing good fortune overcame\nher, and she turned to Arthur with an exclamation of love.\n\nThey lay in each other's arms and had no notion that they were observed.\nYet two figures suddenly appeared among the trees above them. \"Here's\nshade,\" began Hewet, when Rachel suddenly stopped dead. They saw a man\nand woman lying on the ground beneath them, rolling slightly this\nway and that as the embrace tightened and slackened. The man then sat\nupright and the woman, who now appeared to be Susan Warrington, lay back\nupon the ground, with her eyes shut and an absorbed look upon her face,\nas though she were not altogether conscious. Nor could you tell from her\nexpression whether she was happy, or had suffered something. When Arthur\nagain turned to her, butting her as a lamb butts a ewe, Hewet and Rachel\nretreated without a word. Hewet felt uncomfortably shy.\n\n\"I don't like that,\" said Rachel after a moment.\n\n\"I can remember not liking it either,\" said Hewet. \"I can remember--\"\nbut he changed his mind and continued in an ordinary tone of voice,\n\"Well, we may take it for granted that they're engaged. D'you think\nhe'll ever fly, or will she put a stop to that?\"\n\nBut Rachel was still agitated; she could not get away from the sight\nthey had just seen. Instead of answering Hewet she persisted.\n\n\"Love's an odd thing, isn't it, making one's heart beat.\"\n\n\"It's so enormously important, you see,\" Hewet replied. \"Their lives are\nnow changed for ever.\"\n\n\"And it makes one sorry for them too,\" Rachel continued, as though she\nwere tracing the course of her feelings. \"I don't know either of them,\nbut I could almost burst into tears. That's silly, isn't it?\"\n\n\"Just because they're in love,\" said Hewet. \"Yes,\" he added after a\nmoment's consideration, \"there's something horribly pathetic about it, I\nagree.\"\n\nAnd now, as they had walked some way from the grove of trees, and had\ncome to a rounded hollow very tempting to the back, they proceeded\nto sit down, and the impression of the lovers lost some of its force,\nthough a certain intensity of vision, which was probably the result of\nthe sight, remained with them. As a day upon which any emotion has been\nrepressed is different from other days, so this day was now different,\nmerely because they had seen other people at a crisis of their lives.\n\n\"A great encampment of tents they might be,\" said Hewet, looking in\nfront of him at the mountains. \"Isn't it like a water-colour too--you\nknow the way water-colours dry in ridges all across the paper--I've been\nwondering what they looked like.\"\n\nHis eyes became dreamy, as though he were matching things, and reminded\nRachel in their colour of the green flesh of a snail. She sat beside him\nlooking at the mountains too. When it became painful to look any longer,\nthe great size of the view seeming to enlarge her eyes beyond their\nnatural limit, she looked at the ground; it pleased her to scrutinise\nthis inch of the soil of South America so minutely that she noticed\nevery grain of earth and made it into a world where she was endowed with\nthe supreme power. She bent a blade of grass, and set an insect on the\nutmost tassel of it, and wondered if the insect realised his strange\nadventure, and thought how strange it was that she should have bent that\ntassel rather than any other of the million tassels.\n\n\"You've never told me you name,\" said Hewet suddenly. \"Miss Somebody\nVinrace. . . . I like to know people's Christian names.\"\n\n\"Rachel,\" she replied.\n\n\"Rachel,\" he repeated. \"I have an aunt called Rachel, who put the life\nof Father Damien into verse. She is a religious fanatic--the result of\nthe way she was brought up, down in Northamptonshire, never seeing a\nsoul. Have you any aunts?\"\n\n\"I live with them,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"And I wonder what they're doing now?\" Hewet enquired.\n\n\"They are probably buying wool,\" Rachel determined. She tried to\ndescribe them. \"They are small, rather pale women,\" she began, \"very\nclean. We live in Richmond. They have an old dog, too, who will only\neat the marrow out of bones. . . . They are always going to church.\nThey tidy their drawers a good deal.\" But here she was overcome by the\ndifficulty of describing people.\n\n\"It's impossible to believe that it's all going on still!\" she\nexclaimed.\n\nThe sun was behind them and two long shadows suddenly lay upon the\nground in front of them, one waving because it was made by a skirt, and\nthe other stationary, because thrown by a pair of legs in trousers.\n\n\"You look very comfortable!\" said Helen's voice above them.\n\n\"Hirst,\" said Hewet, pointing at the scissorlike shadow; he then rolled\nround to look up at them.\n\n\"There's room for us all here,\" he said.\n\nWhen Hirst had seated himself comfortably, he said:\n\n\"Did you congratulate the young couple?\"\n\nIt appeared that, coming to the same spot a few minutes after Hewet and\nRachel, Helen and Hirst had seen precisely the same thing.\n\n\"No, we didn't congratulate them,\" said Hewet. \"They seemed very happy.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Hirst, pursing up his lips, \"so long as I needn't marry\neither of them--\"\n\n\"We were very much moved,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"I thought you would be,\" said Hirst. \"Which was it, Monk? The thought\nof the immortal passions, or the thought of new-born males to keep the\nRoman Catholics out? I assure you,\" he said to Helen, \"he's capable of\nbeing moved by either.\"\n\nRachel was a good deal stung by his banter, which she felt to be\ndirected equally against them both, but she could think of no repartee.\n\n\"Nothing moves Hirst,\" Hewet laughed; he did not seem to be stung at\nall. \"Unless it were a transfinite number falling in love with a finite\none--I suppose such things do happen, even in mathematics.\"\n\n\"On the contrary,\" said Hirst with a touch of annoyance, \"I consider\nmyself a person of very strong passions.\" It was clear from the way he\nspoke that he meant it seriously; he spoke of course for the benefit of\nthe ladies.\n\n\"By the way, Hirst,\" said Hewet, after a pause, \"I have a terrible\nconfession to make. Your book--the poems of Wordsworth, which if you\nremember I took off your table just as we were starting, and certainly\nput in my pocket here--\"\n\n\"Is lost,\" Hirst finished for him.\n\n\"I consider that there is still a chance,\" Hewet urged, slapping himself\nto right and left, \"that I never did take it after all.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Hirst. \"It is here.\" He pointed to his breast.\n\n\"Thank God,\" Hewet exclaimed. \"I need no longer feel as though I'd\nmurdered a child!\"\n\n\"I should think you were always losing things,\" Helen remarked, looking\nat him meditatively.\n\n\"I don't lose things,\" said Hewet. \"I mislay them. That was the reason\nwhy Hirst refused to share a cabin with me on the voyage out.\"\n\n\"You came out together?\" Helen enquired.\n\n\"I propose that each member of this party now gives a short biographical\nsketch of himself or herself,\" said Hirst, sitting upright. \"Miss\nVinrace, you come first; begin.\"\n\nRachel stated that she was twenty-four years of age, the daughter of a\nship-owner, that she had never been properly educated; played the piano,\nhad no brothers or sisters, and lived at Richmond with aunts, her mother\nbeing dead.\n\n\"Next,\" said Hirst, having taken in these facts; he pointed at Hewet. \"I\nam the son of an English gentleman. I am twenty-seven,\" Hewet began. \"My\nfather was a fox-hunting squire. He died when I was ten in the hunting\nfield. I can remember his body coming home, on a shutter I suppose, just\nas I was going down to tea, and noticing that there was jam for tea, and\nwondering whether I should be allowed--\"\n\n\"Yes; but keep to the facts,\" Hirst put in.\n\n\"I was educated at Winchester and Cambridge, which I had to leave after\na time. I have done a good many things since--\"\n\n\"Profession?\"\n\n\"None--at least--\"\n\n\"Tastes?\"\n\n\"Literary. I'm writing a novel.\"\n\n\"Brothers and sisters?\"\n\n\"Three sisters, no brother, and a mother.\"\n\n\"Is that all we're to hear about you?\" said Helen. She stated that she\nwas very old--forty last October, and her father had been a solicitor in\nthe city who had gone bankrupt, for which reason she had never had much\neducation--they lived in one place after another--but an elder brother\nused to lend her books.\n\n\"If I were to tell you everything--\" she stopped and smiled. \"It would\ntake too long,\" she concluded. \"I married when I was thirty, and I have\ntwo children. My husband is a scholar. And now--it's your turn,\" she\nnodded at Hirst.\n\n\"You've left out a great deal,\" he reproved her. \"My name\nis St. John Alaric Hirst,\" he began in a jaunty tone of voice.\n\"I'm twenty-four years old. I'm the son of the Reverend Sidney\nHirst, vicar of Great Wappyng in Norfolk. Oh, I got scholarships\neverywhere--Westminster--King's. I'm now a fellow of King's. Don't it\nsound dreary? Parents both alive (alas). Two brothers and one sister.\nI'm a very distinguished young man,\" he added.\n\n\"One of the three, or is it five, most distinguished men in England,\"\nHewet remarked.\n\n\"Quite correct,\" said Hirst.\n\n\"That's all very interesting,\" said Helen after a pause. \"But of course\nwe've left out the only questions that matter. For instance, are we\nChristians?\"\n\n\"I am not,\" \"I am not,\" both the young men replied.\n\n\"I am,\" Rachel stated.\n\n\"You believe in a personal God?\" Hirst demanded, turning round and\nfixing her with his eyeglasses.\n\n\"I believe--I believe,\" Rachel stammered, \"I believe there are things\nwe don't know about, and the world might change in a minute and anything\nappear.\"\n\nAt this Helen laughed outright. \"Nonsense,\" she said. \"You're not a\nChristian. You've never thought what you are.--And there are lots of\nother questions,\" she continued, \"though perhaps we can't ask them yet.\"\nAlthough they had talked so freely they were all uncomfortably conscious\nthat they really knew nothing about each other.\n\n\"The important questions,\" Hewet pondered, \"the really interesting ones.\nI doubt that one ever does ask them.\"\n\nRachel, who was slow to accept the fact that only a very few things can\nbe said even by people who know each other well, insisted on knowing\nwhat he meant.\n\n\"Whether we've ever been in love?\" she enquired. \"Is that the kind of\nquestion you mean?\"\n\nAgain Helen laughed at her, benignantly strewing her with handfuls of\nthe long tasselled grass, for she was so brave and so foolish.\n\n\"Oh, Rachel,\" she cried. \"It's like having a puppy in the house having\nyou with one--a puppy that brings one's underclothes down into the\nhall.\"\n\nBut again the sunny earth in front of them was crossed by fantastic\nwavering figures, the shadows of men and women.\n\n\"There they are!\" exclaimed Mrs. Elliot. There was a touch of\npeevishness in her voice. \"And we've had _such_ a hunt to find you. Do\nyou know what the time is?\"\n\nMrs. Elliot and Mr. and Mrs. Thornbury now confronted them; Mrs. Elliot\nwas holding out her watch, and playfully tapping it upon the face.\nHewet was recalled to the fact that this was a party for which he was\nresponsible, and he immediately led them back to the watch-tower, where\nthey were to have tea before starting home again. A bright crimson scarf\nfluttered from the top of the wall, which Mr. Perrott and Evelyn were\ntying to a stone as the others came up. The heat had changed just so\nfar that instead of sitting in the shadow they sat in the sun, which\nwas still hot enough to paint their faces red and yellow, and to colour\ngreat sections of the earth beneath them.\n\n\"There's nothing half so nice as tea!\" said Mrs. Thornbury, taking her\ncup.\n\n\"Nothing,\" said Helen. \"Can't you remember as a child chopping up hay--\"\nshe spoke much more quickly than usual, and kept her eye fixed upon\nMrs. Thornbury, \"and pretending it was tea, and getting scolded by the\nnurses--why I can't imagine, except that nurses are such brutes, won't\nallow pepper instead of salt though there's no earthly harm in it.\nWeren't your nurses just the same?\"\n\nDuring this speech Susan came into the group, and sat down by Helen's\nside. A few minutes later Mr. Venning strolled up from the opposite\ndirection. He was a little flushed, and in the mood to answer\nhilariously whatever was said to him.\n\n\"What have you been doing to that old chap's grave?\" he asked, pointing\nto the red flag which floated from the top of the stones.\n\n\"We have tried to make him forget his misfortune in having died three\nhundred years ago,\" said Mr. Perrott.\n\n\"It would be awful--to be dead!\" ejaculated Evelyn M.\n\n\"To be dead?\" said Hewet. \"I don't think it would be awful. It's quite\neasy to imagine. When you go to bed to-night fold your hands so--breathe\nslower and slower--\" He lay back with his hands clasped upon his breast,\nand his eyes shut, \"Now,\" he murmured in an even monotonous voice, \"I\nshall never, never, never move again.\" His body, lying flat among them,\ndid for a moment suggest death.\n\n\"This is a horrible exhibition, Mr. Hewet!\" cried Mrs. Thornbury.\n\n\"More cake for us!\" said Arthur.\n\n\"I assure you there's nothing horrible about it,\" said Hewet, sitting up\nand laying hands upon the cake.\n\n\"It's so natural,\" he repeated. \"People with children should make them\ndo that exercise every night. . . . Not that I look forward to being\ndead.\"\n\n\"And when you allude to a grave,\" said Mr. Thornbury, who spoke almost\nfor the first time, \"have you any authority for calling that ruin\na grave? I am quite with you in refusing to accept the common\ninterpretation which declares it to be the remains of an Elizabethan\nwatch-tower--any more than I believe that the circular mounds or\nbarrows which we find on the top of our English downs were camps. The\nantiquaries call everything a camp. I am always asking them, Well then,\nwhere do you think our ancestors kept their cattle? Half the camps in\nEngland are merely the ancient pound or barton as we call it in my part\nof the world. The argument that no one would keep his cattle in such\nexposed and inaccessible spots has no weight at all, if you reflect that\nin those days a man's cattle were his capital, his stock-in-trade, his\ndaughter's dowries. Without cattle he was a serf, another man's man. . . .\"\nHis eyes slowly lost their intensity, and he muttered a few\nconcluding words under his breath, looking curiously old and forlorn.\n\nHughling Elliot, who might have been expected to engage the old\ngentleman in argument, was absent at the moment. He now came up holding\nout a large square of cotton upon which a fine design was printed in\npleasant bright colours that made his hand look pale.\n\n\"A bargain,\" he announced, laying it down on the cloth. \"I've just\nbought it from the big man with the ear-rings. Fine, isn't it? It\nwouldn't suit every one, of course, but it's just the thing--isn't it,\nHilda?--for Mrs. Raymond Parry.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Raymond Parry!\" cried Helen and Mrs. Thornbury at the same moment.\n\nThey looked at each other as though a mist hitherto obscuring their\nfaces had been blown away.\n\n\"Ah--you have been to those wonderful parties too?\" Mrs. Elliot asked\nwith interest.\n\nMrs. Parry's drawing-room, though thousands of miles away, behind a vast\ncurve of water on a tiny piece of earth, came before their eyes. They\nwho had had no solidity or anchorage before seemed to be attached to it\nsomehow, and at once grown more substantial. Perhaps they had been in\nthe drawing-room at the same moment; perhaps they had passed each other\non the stairs; at any rate they knew some of the same people. They\nlooked one another up and down with new interest. But they could do no\nmore than look at each other, for there was no time to enjoy the fruits\nof the discovery. The donkeys were advancing, and it was advisable to\nbegin the descent immediately, for the night fell so quickly that it\nwould be dark before they were home again.\n\nAccordingly, remounting in order, they filed off down the hillside.\nScraps of talk came floating back from one to another. There were jokes\nto begin with, and laughter; some walked part of the way, and picked\nflowers, and sent stones bounding before them.\n\n\"Who writes the best Latin verse in your college, Hirst?\" Mr. Elliot\ncalled back incongruously, and Mr. Hirst returned that he had no idea.\n\nThe dusk fell as suddenly as the natives had warned them, the hollows\nof the mountain on either side filling up with darkness and the path\nbecoming so dim that it was surprising to hear the donkeys' hooves still\nstriking on hard rock. Silence fell upon one, and then upon another,\nuntil they were all silent, their minds spilling out into the deep blue\nair. The way seemed shorter in the dark than in the day; and soon the\nlights of the town were seen on the flat far beneath them.\n\nSuddenly some one cried, \"Ah!\"\n\nIn a moment the slow yellow drop rose again from the plain below; it\nrose, paused, opened like a flower, and fell in a shower of drops.\n\n\"Fireworks,\" they cried.\n\nAnother went up more quickly; and then another; they could almost hear\nit twist and roar.\n\n\"Some Saint's day, I suppose,\" said a voice. The rush and embrace of\nthe rockets as they soared up into the air seemed like the fiery way in\nwhich lovers suddenly rose and united, leaving the crowd gazing up at\nthem with strained white faces. But Susan and Arthur, riding down the\nhill, never said a word to each other, and kept accurately apart.\n\nThen the fireworks became erratic, and soon they ceased altogether, and\nthe rest of the journey was made almost in darkness, the mountain being\na great shadow behind them, and bushes and trees little shadows which\nthrew darkness across the road. Among the plane-trees they separated,\nbundling into carriages and driving off, without saying good-night, or\nsaying it only in a half-muffled way.\n\nIt was so late that there was no time for normal conversation between\ntheir arrival at the hotel and their retirement to bed. But Hirst\nwandered into Hewet's room with a collar in his hand.\n\n\"Well, Hewet,\" he remarked, on the crest of a gigantic yawn, \"that was a\ngreat success, I consider.\" He yawned. \"But take care you're not landed\nwith that young woman. . . . I don't really like young women. . . .\"\n\nHewet was too much drugged by hours in the open air to make any reply.\nIn fact every one of the party was sound asleep within ten minutes or\nso of each other, with the exception of Susan Warrington. She lay for\na considerable time looking blankly at the wall opposite, her hands\nclasped above her heart, and her light burning by her side. All\narticulate thought had long ago deserted her; her heart seemed to have\ngrown to the size of a sun, and to illuminate her entire body, shedding\nlike the sun a steady tide of warmth.\n\n\"I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy,\" she repeated. \"I love every one. I'm\nhappy.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XII\n\n\nWhen Susan's engagement had been approved at home, and made public to\nany one who took an interest in it at the hotel--and by this time the\nsociety at the hotel was divided so as to point to invisible chalk-marks\nsuch as Mr. Hirst had described, the news was felt to justify some\ncelebration--an expedition? That had been done already. A dance then.\nThe advantage of a dance was that it abolished one of those long\nevenings which were apt to become tedious and lead to absurdly early\nhours in spite of bridge.\n\nTwo or three people standing under the erect body of the stuffed leopard\nin the hall very soon had the matter decided. Evelyn slid a pace or two\nthis way and that, and pronounced that the floor was excellent.\nSignor Rodriguez informed them of an old Spaniard who fiddled at\nweddings--fiddled so as to make a tortoise waltz; and his daughter,\nalthough endowed with eyes as black as coal-scuttles, had the same\npower over the piano. If there were any so sick or so surly as to prefer\nsedentary occupations on the night in question to spinning and watching\nothers spin, the drawing-room and billiard-room were theirs. Hewet made\nit his business to conciliate the outsiders as much as possible. To\nHirst's theory of the invisible chalk-marks he would pay no attention\nwhatever. He was treated to a snub or two, but, in reward, found obscure\nlonely gentlemen delighted to have this opportunity of talking to\ntheir kind, and the lady of doubtful character showed every symptom of\nconfiding her case to him in the near future. Indeed it was made quite\nobvious to him that the two or three hours between dinner and bed\ncontained an amount of unhappiness, which was really pitiable, so many\npeople had not succeeded in making friends.\n\nIt was settled that the dance was to be on Friday, one week after the\nengagement, and at dinner Hewet declared himself satisfied.\n\n\"They're all coming!\" he told Hirst. \"Pepper!\" he called, seeing William\nPepper slip past in the wake of the soup with a pamphlet beneath his\narm, \"We're counting on you to open the ball.\"\n\n\"You will certainly put sleep out of the question,\" Pepper returned.\n\n\"You are to take the floor with Miss Allan,\" Hewet continued, consulting\na sheet of pencilled notes.\n\nPepper stopped and began a discourse upon round dances, country dances,\nmorris dances, and quadrilles, all of which are entirely superior to the\nbastard waltz and spurious polka which have ousted them most unjustly\nin contemporary popularity--when the waiters gently pushed him on to his\ntable in the corner.\n\nThe dining-room at this moment had a certain fantastic resemblance to a\nfarmyard scattered with grain on which bright pigeons kept descending.\nAlmost all the ladies wore dresses which they had not yet displayed, and\ntheir hair rose in waves and scrolls so as to appear like carved wood in\nGothic churches rather than hair. The dinner was shorter and less formal\nthan usual, even the waiters seeming to be affected with the general\nexcitement. Ten minutes before the clock struck nine the committee made\na tour through the ballroom. The hall, when emptied of its furniture,\nbrilliantly lit, adorned with flowers whose scent tinged the air,\npresented a wonderful appearance of ethereal gaiety.\n\n\"It's like a starlit sky on an absolutely cloudless night,\" Hewet\nmurmured, looking about him, at the airy empty room.\n\n\"A heavenly floor, anyhow,\" Evelyn added, taking a run and sliding two\nor three feet along.\n\n\"What about those curtains?\" asked Hirst. The crimson curtains were\ndrawn across the long windows. \"It's a perfect night outside.\"\n\n\"Yes, but curtains inspire confidence,\" Miss Allan decided. \"When the\nball is in full swing it will be time to draw them. We might even open\nthe windows a little. . . . If we do it now elderly people will imagine\nthere are draughts.\"\n\nHer wisdom had come to be recognised, and held in respect. Meanwhile as\nthey stood talking, the musicians were unwrapping their instruments, and\nthe violin was repeating again and again a note struck upon the piano.\nEverything was ready to begin.\n\nAfter a few minutes' pause, the father, the daughter, and the son-in-law\nwho played the horn flourished with one accord. Like the rats who\nfollowed the piper, heads instantly appeared in the doorway. There\nwas another flourish; and then the trio dashed spontaneously into the\ntriumphant swing of the waltz. It was as though the room were instantly\nflooded with water. After a moment's hesitation first one couple, then\nanother, leapt into mid-stream, and went round and round in the eddies.\nThe rhythmic swish of the dancers sounded like a swirling pool. By\ndegrees the room grew perceptibly hotter. The smell of kid gloves\nmingled with the strong scent of flowers. The eddies seemed to circle\nfaster and faster, until the music wrought itself into a crash, ceased,\nand the circles were smashed into little separate bits. The couples\nstruck off in different directions, leaving a thin row of elderly people\nstuck fast to the walls, and here and there a piece of trimming or a\nhandkerchief or a flower lay upon the floor. There was a pause, and then\nthe music started again, the eddies whirled, the couples circled round\nin them, until there was a crash, and the circles were broken up into\nseparate pieces.\n\nWhen this had happened about five times, Hirst, who leant against a\nwindow-frame, like some singular gargoyle, perceived that Helen Ambrose\nand Rachel stood in the doorway. The crowd was such that they could\nnot move, but he recognised them by a piece of Helen's shoulder and a\nglimpse of Rachel's head turning round. He made his way to them; they\ngreeted him with relief.\n\n\"We are suffering the tortures of the damned,\" said Helen.\n\n\"This is my idea of hell,\" said Rachel.\n\nHer eyes were bright and she looked bewildered.\n\nHewet and Miss Allan, who had been waltzing somewhat laboriously, paused\nand greeted the newcomers.\n\n\"This _is_ nice,\" said Hewet. \"But where is Mr. Ambrose?\"\n\n\"Pindar,\" said Helen. \"May a married woman who was forty in October\ndance? I can't stand still.\" She seemed to fade into Hewet, and they\nboth dissolved in the crowd.\n\n\"We must follow suit,\" said Hirst to Rachel, and he took her resolutely\nby the elbow. Rachel, without being expert, danced well, because of a\ngood ear for rhythm, but Hirst had no taste for music, and a few dancing\nlessons at Cambridge had only put him into possession of the anatomy of\na waltz, without imparting any of its spirit. A single turn proved to\nthem that their methods were incompatible; instead of fitting into each\nother their bones seemed to jut out in angles making smooth turning an\nimpossibility, and cutting, moreover, into the circular progress of the\nother dancers.\n\n\"Shall we stop?\" said Hirst. Rachel gathered from his expression that he\nwas annoyed.\n\nThey staggered to seats in the corner, from which they had a view of the\nroom. It was still surging, in waves of blue and yellow, striped by the\nblack evening-clothes of the gentlemen.\n\n\"An amazing spectacle,\" Hirst remarked. \"Do you dance much in London?\"\nThey were both breathing fast, and both a little excited, though each\nwas determined not to show any excitement at all.\n\n\"Scarcely ever. Do you?\"\n\n\"My people give a dance every Christmas.\"\n\n\"This isn't half a bad floor,\" Rachel said. Hirst did not attempt to\nanswer her platitude. He sat quite silent, staring at the dancers. After\nthree minutes the silence became so intolerable to Rachel that she was\ngoaded to advance another commonplace about the beauty of the night.\nHirst interrupted her ruthlessly.\n\n\"Was that all nonsense what you said the other day about being a\nChristian and having no education?\" he asked.\n\n\"It was practically true,\" she replied. \"But I also play the piano very\nwell,\" she said, \"better, I expect than any one in this room. You are\nthe most distinguished man in England, aren't you?\" she asked shyly.\n\n\"One of the three,\" he corrected.\n\nHelen whirling past here tossed a fan into Rachel's lap.\n\n\"She is very beautiful,\" Hirst remarked.\n\nThey were again silent. Rachel was wondering whether he thought her also\nnice-looking; St. John was considering the immense difficulty of talking\nto girls who had no experience of life. Rachel had obviously never\nthought or felt or seen anything, and she might be intelligent or\nshe might be just like all the rest. But Hewet's taunt rankled in his\nmind--\"you don't know how to get on with women,\" and he was determined\nto profit by this opportunity. Her evening-clothes bestowed on her just\nthat degree of unreality and distinction which made it romantic to speak\nto her, and stirred a desire to talk, which irritated him because he\ndid not know how to begin. He glanced at her, and she seemed to him\nvery remote and inexplicable, very young and chaste. He drew a sigh, and\nbegan.\n\n\"About books now. What have you read? Just Shakespeare and the Bible?\"\n\n\"I haven't read many classics,\" Rachel stated. She was slightly\nannoyed by his jaunty and rather unnatural manner, while his masculine\nacquirements induced her to take a very modest view of her own power.\n\n\"D'you mean to tell me you've reached the age of twenty-four without\nreading Gibbon?\" he demanded.\n\n\"Yes, I have,\" she answered.\n\n\"Mon Dieu!\" he exclaimed, throwing out his hands. \"You must begin\nto-morrow. I shall send you my copy. What I want to know is--\" he looked\nat her critically. \"You see, the problem is, can one really talk to you?\nHave you got a mind, or are you like the rest of your sex? You seem to\nme absurdly young compared with men of your age.\"\n\nRachel looked at him but said nothing.\n\n\"About Gibbon,\" he continued. \"D'you think you'll be able to appreciate\nhim? He's the test, of course. It's awfully difficult to tell about\nwomen,\" he continued, \"how much, I mean, is due to lack of training,\nand how much is native incapacity. I don't see myself why you shouldn't\nunderstand--only I suppose you've led an absurd life until now--you've\njust walked in a crocodile, I suppose, with your hair down your back.\"\n\nThe music was again beginning. Hirst's eye wandered about the room in\nsearch of Mrs. Ambrose. With the best will in the world he was conscious\nthat they were not getting on well together.\n\n\"I'd like awfully to lend you books,\" he said, buttoning his gloves,\nand rising from his seat. \"We shall meet again. I'm going to leave you\nnow.\"\n\nHe got up and left her.\n\nRachel looked round. She felt herself surrounded, like a child at a\nparty, by the faces of strangers all hostile to her, with hooked noses\nand sneering, indifferent eyes. She was by a window, she pushed it open\nwith a jerk. She stepped out into the garden. Her eyes swam with tears\nof rage.\n\n\"Damn that man!\" she exclaimed, having acquired some of Helen's words.\n\"Damn his insolence!\"\n\nShe stood in the middle of the pale square of light which the window\nshe had opened threw upon the grass. The forms of great black trees rose\nmassively in front of her. She stood still, looking at them, shivering\nslightly with anger and excitement. She heard the trampling and swinging\nof the dancers behind her, and the rhythmic sway of the waltz music.\n\n\"There are trees,\" she said aloud. Would the trees make up for St. John\nHirst? She would be a Persian princess far from civilisation, riding her\nhorse upon the mountains alone, and making her women sing to her in the\nevening, far from all this, from the strife and men and women--a\nform came out of the shadow; a little red light burnt high up in its\nblackness.\n\n\"Miss Vinrace, is it?\" said Hewet, peering at her. \"You were dancing\nwith Hirst?\"\n\n\"He's made me furious!\" she cried vehemently. \"No one's any right to be\ninsolent!\"\n\n\"Insolent?\" Hewet repeated, taking his cigar from his mouth in surprise.\n\"Hirst--insolent?\"\n\n\"It's insolent to--\" said Rachel, and stopped. She did not know exactly\nwhy she had been made so angry. With a great effort she pulled herself\ntogether.\n\n\"Oh, well,\" she added, the vision of Helen and her mockery before her,\n\"I dare say I'm a fool.\" She made as though she were going back into the\nballroom, but Hewet stopped her.\n\n\"Please explain to me,\" he said. \"I feel sure Hirst didn't mean to hurt\nyou.\"\n\nWhen Rachel tried to explain, she found it very difficult. She could not\nsay that she found the vision of herself walking in a crocodile with her\nhair down her back peculiarly unjust and horrible, nor could she explain\nwhy Hirst's assumption of the superiority of his nature and experience\nhad seemed to her not only galling but terrible--as if a gate had\nclanged in her face. Pacing up and down the terrace beside Hewet she\nsaid bitterly:\n\n\"It's no good; we should live separate; we cannot understand each other;\nwe only bring out what's worst.\"\n\nHewet brushed aside her generalisation as to the natures of the two\nsexes, for such generalisations bored him and seemed to him generally\nuntrue. But, knowing Hirst, he guessed fairly accurately what had\nhappened, and, though secretly much amused, was determined that Rachel\nshould not store the incident away in her mind to take its place in the\nview she had of life.\n\n\"Now you'll hate him,\" he said, \"which is wrong. Poor old Hirst--he\ncan't help his method. And really, Miss Vinrace, he was doing his best;\nhe was paying you a compliment--he was trying--he was trying--\" he could\nnot finish for the laughter that overcame him.\n\nRachel veered round suddenly and laughed out too. She saw that there was\nsomething ridiculous about Hirst, and perhaps about herself.\n\n\"It's his way of making friends, I suppose,\" she laughed. \"Well--I shall\ndo my part. I shall begin--'Ugly in body, repulsive in mind as you are,\nMr. Hirst--\"\n\n\"Hear, hear!\" cried Hewet. \"That's the way to treat him. You see, Miss\nVinrace, you must make allowances for Hirst. He's lived all his life\nin front of a looking-glass, so to speak, in a beautiful panelled room,\nhung with Japanese prints and lovely old chairs and tables, just one\nsplash of colour, you know, in the right place,--between the windows\nI think it is,--and there he sits hour after hour with his toes on the\nfender, talking about philosophy and God and his liver and his heart and\nthe hearts of his friends. They're all broken. You can't expect him to\nbe at his best in a ballroom. He wants a cosy, smoky, masculine\nplace, where he can stretch his legs out, and only speak when he's got\nsomething to say. For myself, I find it rather dreary. But I do respect\nit. They're all so much in earnest. They do take the serious things very\nseriously.\"\n\nThe description of Hirst's way of life interested Rachel so much that\nshe almost forgot her private grudge against him, and her respect\nrevived.\n\n\"They are really very clever then?\" she asked.\n\n\"Of course they are. So far as brains go I think it's true what he said\nthe other day; they're the cleverest people in England. But--you ought\nto take him in hand,\" he added. \"There's a great deal more in him than's\never been got at. He wants some one to laugh at him. . . . The idea of\nHirst telling you that you've had no experiences! Poor old Hirst!\"\n\nThey had been pacing up and down the terrace while they talked, and now\none by one the dark windows were uncurtained by an invisible hand, and\npanes of light fell regularly at equal intervals upon the grass. They\nstopped to look in at the drawing-room, and perceived Mr. Pepper writing\nalone at a table.\n\n\"There's Pepper writing to his aunt,\" said Hewet. \"She must be a very\nremarkable old lady, eighty-five he tells me, and he takes her for\nwalking tours in the New Forest. . . . Pepper!\" he cried, rapping on the\nwindow. \"Go and do your duty. Miss Allan expects you.\"\n\nWhen they came to the windows of the ballroom, the swing of the dancers\nand the lilt of the music was irresistible.\n\n\"Shall we?\" said Hewet, and they clasped hands and swept off\nmagnificently into the great swirling pool. Although this was only the\nsecond time they had met, the first time they had seen a man and woman\nkissing each other, and the second time Mr. Hewet had found that a young\nwoman angry is very like a child. So that when they joined hands in the\ndance they felt more at their ease than is usual.\n\nIt was midnight and the dance was now at its height. Servants were\npeeping in at the windows; the garden was sprinkled with the white\nshapes of couples sitting out. Mrs. Thornbury and Mrs. Elliot sat side\nby side under a palm tree, holding fans, handkerchiefs, and brooches\ndeposited in their laps by flushed maidens. Occasionally they exchanged\ncomments.\n\n\"Miss Warrington _does_ look happy,\" said Mrs. Elliot; they both smiled;\nthey both sighed.\n\n\"He has a great deal of character,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, alluding to\nArthur.\n\n\"And character is what one wants,\" said Mrs. Elliot. \"Now that young\nman is _clever_ enough,\" she added, nodding at Hirst, who came past with\nMiss Allan on his arm.\n\n\"He does not look strong,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"His complexion is\nnot good.--Shall I tear it off?\" she asked, for Rachel had stopped,\nconscious of a long strip trailing behind her.\n\n\"I hope you are enjoying yourselves?\" Hewet asked the ladies.\n\n\"This is a very familiar position for me!\" smiled Mrs. Thornbury. \"I\nhave brought out five daughters--and they all loved dancing! You love it\ntoo, Miss Vinrace?\" she asked, looking at Rachel with maternal eyes. \"I\nknow I did when I was your age. How I used to beg my mother to let me\nstay--and now I sympathise with the poor mothers--but I sympathise with\nthe daughters too!\"\n\nShe smiled sympathetically, and at the same time rather keenly, at\nRachel.\n\n\"They seem to find a great deal to say to each other,\" said Mrs. Elliot,\nlooking significantly at the backs of the couple as they turned away.\n\"Did you notice at the picnic? He was the only person who could make her\nutter.\"\n\n\"Her father is a very interesting man,\" said Mrs. Thornbury. \"He has one\nof the largest shipping businesses in Hull. He made a very able reply,\nyou remember, to Mr. Asquith at the last election. It is so interesting\nto find that a man of his experience is a strong Protectionist.\"\n\nShe would have liked to discuss politics, which interested her more than\npersonalities, but Mrs. Elliot would only talk about the Empire in a\nless abstract form.\n\n\"I hear there are dreadful accounts from England about the rats,\" she\nsaid. \"A sister-in-law, who lives at Norwich, tells me it has been quite\nunsafe to order poultry. The plague--you see. It attacks the rats, and\nthrough them other creatures.\"\n\n\"And the local authorities are not taking proper steps?\" asked Mrs.\nThornbury.\n\n\"That she does not say. But she describes the attitude of the educated\npeople--who should know better--as callous in the extreme. Of course,\nmy sister-in-law is one of those active modern women, who always takes\nthings up, you know--the kind of woman one admires, though one does not\nfeel, at least I do not feel--but then she has a constitution of iron.\"\n\nMrs. Elliot, brought back to the consideration of her own delicacy, here\nsighed.\n\n\"A very animated face,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, looking at Evelyn M. who\nhad stopped near them to pin tight a scarlet flower at her breast. It\nwould not stay, and, with a spirited gesture of impatience, she thrust\nit into her partner's button-hole. He was a tall melancholy youth, who\nreceived the gift as a knight might receive his lady's token.\n\n\"Very trying to the eyes,\" was Mrs. Eliot's next remark, after watching\nthe yellow whirl in which so few of the whirlers had either name or\ncharacter for her, for a few minutes. Bursting out of the crowd, Helen\napproached them, and took a vacant chair.\n\n\"May I sit by you?\" she said, smiling and breathing fast. \"I suppose I\nought to be ashamed of myself,\" she went on, sitting down, \"at my age.\"\n\nHer beauty, now that she was flushed and animated, was more expansive\nthan usual, and both the ladies felt the same desire to touch her.\n\n\"I _am_ enjoying myself,\" she panted. \"Movement--isn't it amazing?\"\n\n\"I have always heard that nothing comes up to dancing if one is a good\ndancer,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, looking at her with a smile.\n\nHelen swayed slightly as if she sat on wires.\n\n\"I could dance for ever!\" she said. \"They ought to let themselves go\nmore!\" she exclaimed. \"They ought to leap and swing. Look! How they\nmince!\"\n\n\"Have you seen those wonderful Russian dancers?\" began Mrs. Elliot. But\nHelen saw her partner coming and rose as the moon rises. She was half\nround the room before they took their eyes off her, for they could not\nhelp admiring her, although they thought it a little odd that a woman of\nher age should enjoy dancing.\n\nDirectly Helen was left alone for a minute she was joined by St. John\nHirst, who had been watching for an opportunity.\n\n\"Should you mind sitting out with me?\" he asked. \"I'm quite incapable\nof dancing.\" He piloted Helen to a corner which was supplied with two\narm-chairs, and thus enjoyed the advantage of semi-privacy. They sat\ndown, and for a few minutes Helen was too much under the influence of\ndancing to speak.\n\n\"Astonishing!\" she exclaimed at last. \"What sort of shape can she think\nher body is?\" This remark was called forth by a lady who came past them,\nwaddling rather than walking, and leaning on the arm of a stout man with\nglobular green eyes set in a fat white face. Some support was necessary,\nfor she was very stout, and so compressed that the upper part of her\nbody hung considerably in advance of her feet, which could only trip in\ntiny steps, owing to the tightness of the skirt round her ankles. The\ndress itself consisted of a small piece of shiny yellow satin, adorned\nhere and there indiscriminately with round shields of blue and green\nbeads made to imitate hues of a peacock's breast. On the summit of a\nfrothy castle of hair a purple plume stood erect, while her short neck\nwas encircled by a black velvet ribbon knobbed with gems, and golden\nbracelets were tightly wedged into the flesh of her fat gloved arms. She\nhad the face of an impertinent but jolly little pig, mottled red under a\ndusting of powder.\n\nSt. John could not join in Helen's laughter.\n\n\"It makes me sick,\" he declared. \"The whole thing makes me sick. . . .\nConsider the minds of those people--their feelings. Don't you agree?\"\n\n\"I always make a vow never to go to another party of any description,\"\nHelen replied, \"and I always break it.\"\n\nShe leant back in her chair and looked laughingly at the young man.\nShe could see that he was genuinely cross, if at the same time slightly\nexcited.\n\n\"However,\" he said, resuming his jaunty tone, \"I suppose one must just\nmake up one's mind to it.\"\n\n\"To what?\"\n\n\"There never will be more than five people in the world worth talking\nto.\"\n\nSlowly the flush and sparkle in Helen's face died away, and she looked\nas quiet and as observant as usual.\n\n\"Five people?\" she remarked. \"I should say there were more than five.\"\n\n\"You've been very fortunate, then,\" said Hirst. \"Or perhaps I've been\nvery unfortunate.\" He became silent.\n\n\"Should you say I was a difficult kind of person to get on with?\" he\nasked sharply.\n\n\"Most clever people are when they're young,\" Helen replied.\n\n\"And of course I am--immensely clever,\" said Hirst. \"I'm infinitely\ncleverer than Hewet. It's quite possible,\" he continued in his curiously\nimpersonal manner, \"that I'm going to be one of the people who really\nmatter. That's utterly different from being clever, though one can't\nexpect one's family to see it,\" he added bitterly.\n\nHelen thought herself justified in asking, \"Do you find your family\ndifficult to get on with?\"\n\n\"Intolerable. . . . They want me to be a peer and a privy councillor.\nI've come out here partly in order to settle the matter. It's got to be\nsettled. Either I must go to the bar, or I must stay on in Cambridge. Of\ncourse, there are obvious drawbacks to each, but the arguments certainly\ndo seem to me in favour of Cambridge. This kind of thing!\" he waved his\nhand at the crowded ballroom. \"Repulsive. I'm conscious of great powers\nof affection too. I'm not susceptible, of course, in the way Hewet\nis. I'm very fond of a few people. I think, for example, that there's\nsomething to be said for my mother, though she is in many ways so\ndeplorable. . . . At Cambridge, of course, I should inevitably become\nthe most important man in the place, but there are other reasons why I\ndread Cambridge--\" he ceased.\n\n\"Are you finding me a dreadful bore?\" he asked. He changed curiously\nfrom a friend confiding in a friend to a conventional young man at a\nparty.\n\n\"Not in the least,\" said Helen. \"I like it very much.\"\n\n\"You can't think,\" he exclaimed, speaking almost with emotion, \"what\na difference it makes finding someone to talk to! Directly I saw you I\nfelt you might possibly understand me. I'm very fond of Hewet, but he\nhasn't the remotest idea what I'm like. You're the only woman I've ever\nmet who seems to have the faintest conception of what I mean when I say\na thing.\"\n\nThe next dance was beginning; it was the Barcarolle out of Hoffman,\nwhich made Helen beat her toe in time to it; but she felt that after\nsuch a compliment it was impossible to get up and go, and, besides\nbeing amused, she was really flattered, and the honesty of his conceit\nattracted her. She suspected that he was not happy, and was sufficiently\nfeminine to wish to receive confidences.\n\n\"I'm very old,\" she sighed.\n\n\"The odd thing is that I don't find you old at all,\" he replied. \"I feel\nas though we were exactly the same age. Moreover--\" here he hesitated,\nbut took courage from a glance at her face, \"I feel as if I could talk\nquite plainly to you as one does to a man--about the relations between\nthe sexes, about . . . and . . .\"\n\nIn spite of his certainty a slight redness came into his face as he\nspoke the last two words.\n\nShe reassured him at once by the laugh with which she exclaimed, \"I\nshould hope so!\"\n\nHe looked at her with real cordiality, and the lines which were drawn\nabout his nose and lips slackened for the first time.\n\n\"Thank God!\" he exclaimed. \"Now we can behave like civilised human\nbeings.\"\n\nCertainly a barrier which usually stands fast had fallen, and it was\npossible to speak of matters which are generally only alluded to between\nmen and women when doctors are present, or the shadow of death. In five\nminutes he was telling her the history of his life. It was long, for it\nwas full of extremely elaborate incidents, which led on to a discussion\nof the principles on which morality is founded, and thus to several very\ninteresting matters, which even in this ballroom had to be discussed in\na whisper, lest one of the pouter pigeon ladies or resplendent merchants\nshould overhear them, and proceed to demand that they should leave the\nplace. When they had come to an end, or, to speak more accurately, when\nHelen intimated by a slight slackening of her attention that they had\nsat there long enough, Hirst rose, exclaiming, \"So there's no reason\nwhatever for all this mystery!\"\n\n\"None, except that we are English people,\" she answered. She took his\narm and they crossed the ball-room, making their way with difficulty\nbetween the spinning couples, who were now perceptibly dishevelled,\nand certainly to a critical eye by no means lovely in their shapes. The\nexcitement of undertaking a friendship and the length of their talk,\nmade them hungry, and they went in search of food to the dining-room,\nwhich was now full of people eating at little separate tables. In the\ndoorway they met Rachel, going up to dance again with Arthur Venning.\nShe was flushed and looked very happy, and Helen was struck by the fact\nthat in this mood she was certainly more attractive than the generality\nof young women. She had never noticed it so clearly before.\n\n\"Enjoying yourself?\" she asked, as they stopped for a second.\n\n\"Miss Vinrace,\" Arthur answered for her, \"has just made a confession;\nshe'd no idea that dances could be so delightful.\"\n\n\"Yes!\" Rachel exclaimed. \"I've changed my view of life completely!\"\n\n\"You don't say so!\" Helen mocked. They passed on.\n\n\"That's typical of Rachel,\" she said. \"She changes her view of life\nabout every other day. D'you know, I believe you're just the person I\nwant,\" she said, as they sat down, \"to help me complete her education?\nShe's been brought up practically in a nunnery. Her father's too absurd.\nI've been doing what I can--but I'm too old, and I'm a woman. Why\nshouldn't you talk to her--explain things to her--talk to her, I mean,\nas you talk to me?\"\n\n\"I have made one attempt already this evening,\" said St. John. \"I\nrather doubt that it was successful. She seems to me so very young and\ninexperienced. I have promised to lend her Gibbon.\"\n\n\"It's not Gibbon exactly,\" Helen pondered. \"It's the facts of life, I\nthink--d'you see what I mean? What really goes on, what people feel,\nalthough they generally try to hide it? There's nothing to be frightened\nof. It's so much more beautiful than the pretences--always more\ninteresting--always better, I should say, than _that_ kind of thing.\"\n\nShe nodded her head at a table near them, where two girls and two\nyoung men were chaffing each other very loudly, and carrying on an arch\ninsinuating dialogue, sprinkled with endearments, about, it seemed, a\npair of stockings or a pair of legs. One of the girls was flirting a fan\nand pretending to be shocked, and the sight was very unpleasant, partly\nbecause it was obvious that the girls were secretly hostile to each\nother.\n\n\"In my old age, however,\" Helen sighed, \"I'm coming to think that it\ndoesn't much matter in the long run what one does: people always go\ntheir own way--nothing will ever influence them.\" She nodded her head at\nthe supper party.\n\nBut St. John did not agree. He said that he thought one could really\nmake a great deal of difference by one's point of view, books and so\non, and added that few things at the present time mattered more than the\nenlightenment of women. He sometimes thought that almost everything was\ndue to education.\n\nIn the ballroom, meanwhile, the dancers were being formed into squares\nfor the lancers. Arthur and Rachel, Susan and Hewet, Miss Allan and\nHughling Elliot found themselves together.\n\nMiss Allan looked at her watch.\n\n\"Half-past one,\" she stated. \"And I have to despatch Alexander Pope\nto-morrow.\"\n\n\"Pope!\" snorted Mr. Elliot. \"Who reads Pope, I should like to know?\nAnd as for reading about him--No, no, Miss Allan; be persuaded you will\nbenefit the world much more by dancing than by writing.\" It was one of\nMr. Elliot's affectations that nothing in the world could compare\nwith the delights of dancing--nothing in the world was so tedious as\nliterature. Thus he sought pathetically enough to ingratiate himself\nwith the young, and to prove to them beyond a doubt that though married\nto a ninny of a wife, and rather pale and bent and careworn by his\nweight of learning, he was as much alive as the youngest of them all.\n\n\"It's a question of bread and butter,\" said Miss Allan calmly. \"However,\nthey seem to expect me.\" She took up her position and pointed a square\nblack toe.\n\n\"Mr. Hewet, you bow to me.\" It was evident at once that Miss Allan was\nthe only one of them who had a thoroughly sound knowledge of the figures\nof the dance.\n\nAfter the lancers there was a waltz; after the waltz a polka; and then\na terrible thing happened; the music, which had been sounding regularly\nwith five-minute pauses, stopped suddenly. The lady with the great dark\neyes began to swathe her violin in silk, and the gentleman placed his\nhorn carefully in its case. They were surrounded by couples imploring\nthem in English, in French, in Spanish, of one more dance, one only; it\nwas still early. But the old man at the piano merely exhibited his watch\nand shook his head. He turned up the collar of his coat and produced\na red silk muffler, which completely dashed his festive appearance.\nStrange as it seemed, the musicians were pale and heavy-eyed; they\nlooked bored and prosaic, as if the summit of their desire was cold meat\nand beer, succeeded immediately by bed.\n\nRachel was one of those who had begged them to continue. When they\nrefused she began turning over the sheets of dance music which lay upon\nthe piano. The pieces were generally bound in coloured covers, with\npictures on them of romantic scenes--gondoliers astride on the crescent\nof the moon, nuns peering through the bars of a convent window, or young\nwomen with their hair down pointing a gun at the stars. She remembered\nthat the general effect of the music to which they had danced so gaily\nwas one of passionate regret for dead love and the innocent years of\nyouth; dreadful sorrows had always separated the dancers from their past\nhappiness.\n\n\"No wonder they get sick of playing stuff like this,\" she remarked\nreading a bar or two; \"they're really hymn tunes, played very fast, with\nbits out of Wagner and Beethoven.\"\n\n\"Do you play? Would you play? Anything, so long as we can dance to it!\"\nFrom all sides her gift for playing the piano was insisted upon, and\nshe had to consent. As very soon she had played the only pieces of dance\nmusic she could remember, she went on to play an air from a sonata by\nMozart.\n\n\"But that's not a dance,\" said some one pausing by the piano.\n\n\"It is,\" she replied, emphatically nodding her head. \"Invent the steps.\"\nSure of her melody she marked the rhythm boldly so as to simplify the\nway. Helen caught the idea; seized Miss Allan by the arm, and whirled\nround the room, now curtseying, now spinning round, now tripping this\nway and that like a child skipping through a meadow.\n\n\"This is the dance for people who don't know how to dance!\" she cried.\nThe tune changed to a minuet; St. John hopped with incredible swiftness\nfirst on his left leg, then on his right; the tune flowed melodiously;\nHewet, swaying his arms and holding out the tails of his coat, swam down\nthe room in imitation of the voluptuous dreamy dance of an Indian maiden\ndancing before her Rajah. The tune marched; and Miss Allen advanced with\nskirts extended and bowed profoundly to the engaged pair. Once\ntheir feet fell in with the rhythm they showed a complete lack of\nself-consciousness. From Mozart Rachel passed without stopping to old\nEnglish hunting songs, carols, and hymn tunes, for, as she had observed,\nany good tune, with a little management, became a tune one could dance\nto. By degrees every person in the room was tripping and turning in\npairs or alone. Mr. Pepper executed an ingenious pointed step derived\nfrom figure-skating, for which he once held some local championship;\nwhile Mrs. Thornbury tried to recall an old country dance which she had\nseen danced by her father's tenants in Dorsetshire in the old days. As\nfor Mr. and Mrs. Elliot, they gallopaded round and round the room with\nsuch impetuosity that the other dancers shivered at their approach. Some\npeople were heard to criticise the performance as a romp; to others it\nwas the most enjoyable part of the evening.\n\n\"Now for the great round dance!\" Hewet shouted. Instantly a gigantic\ncircle was formed, the dancers holding hands and shouting out, \"D'you\nken John Peel,\" as they swung faster and faster and faster, until the\nstrain was too great, and one link of the chain--Mrs. Thornbury--gave\nway, and the rest went flying across the room in all directions, to\nland upon the floor or the chairs or in each other's arms as seemed most\nconvenient.\n\nRising from these positions, breathless and unkempt, it struck them for\nthe first time that the electric lights pricked the air very vainly, and\ninstinctively a great many eyes turned to the windows. Yes--there was\nthe dawn. While they had been dancing the night had passed, and it had\ncome. Outside, the mountains showed very pure and remote; the dew was\nsparkling on the grass, and the sky was flushed with blue, save for the\npale yellows and pinks in the East. The dancers came crowding to the\nwindows, pushed them open, and here and there ventured a foot upon the\ngrass.\n\n\"How silly the poor old lights look!\" said Evelyn M. in a curiously\nsubdued tone of voice. \"And ourselves; it isn't becoming.\" It was true;\nthe untidy hair, and the green and yellow gems, which had seemed so\nfestive half an hour ago, now looked cheap and slovenly. The complexions\nof the elder ladies suffered terribly, and, as if conscious that a cold\neye had been turned upon them, they began to say good-night and to make\ntheir way up to bed.\n\nRachel, though robbed of her audience, had gone on playing to herself.\nFrom John Peel she passed to Bach, who was at this time the subject of\nher intense enthusiasm, and one by one some of the younger dancers\ncame in from the garden and sat upon the deserted gilt chairs round the\npiano, the room being now so clear that they turned out the lights. As\nthey sat and listened, their nerves were quieted; the heat and soreness\nof their lips, the result of incessant talking and laughing, was\nsmoothed away. They sat very still as if they saw a building with spaces\nand columns succeeding each other rising in the empty space. Then they\nbegan to see themselves and their lives, and the whole of human life\nadvancing very nobly under the direction of the music. They felt\nthemselves ennobled, and when Rachel stopped playing they desired\nnothing but sleep.\n\nSusan rose. \"I think this has been the happiest night of my life!\" she\nexclaimed. \"I do adore music,\" she said, as she thanked Rachel. \"It just\nseems to say all the things one can't say oneself.\" She gave a nervous\nlittle laugh and looked from one to another with great benignity, as\nthough she would like to say something but could not find the words in\nwhich to express it. \"Every one's been so kind--so very kind,\" she said.\nThen she too went to bed.\n\nThe party having ended in the very abrupt way in which parties do end,\nHelen and Rachel stood by the door with their cloaks on, looking for a\ncarriage.\n\n\"I suppose you realise that there are no carriages left?\" said St. John,\nwho had been out to look. \"You must sleep here.\"\n\n\"Oh, no,\" said Helen; \"we shall walk.\"\n\n\"May we come too?\" Hewet asked. \"We can't go to bed. Imagine lying among\nbolsters and looking at one's washstand on a morning like this--Is that\nwhere you live?\" They had begun to walk down the avenue, and he turned\nand pointed at the white and green villa on the hillside, which seemed\nto have its eyes shut.\n\n\"That's not a light burning, is it?\" Helen asked anxiously.\n\n\"It's the sun,\" said St. John. The upper windows had each a spot of gold\non them.\n\n\"I was afraid it was my husband, still reading Greek,\" she said. \"All\nthis time he's been editing _Pindar_.\"\n\nThey passed through the town and turned up the steep road, which was\nperfectly clear, though still unbordered by shadows. Partly because\nthey were tired, and partly because the early light subdued them, they\nscarcely spoke, but breathed in the delicious fresh air, which seemed\nto belong to a different state of life from the air at midday. When they\ncame to the high yellow wall, where the lane turned off from the road,\nHelen was for dismissing the two young men.\n\n\"You've come far enough,\" she said. \"Go back to bed.\"\n\nBut they seemed unwilling to move.\n\n\"Let's sit down a moment,\" said Hewet. He spread his coat on the ground.\n\"Let's sit down and consider.\" They sat down and looked out over the\nbay; it was very still, the sea was rippling faintly, and lines of green\nand blue were beginning to stripe it. There were no sailing boats as\nyet, but a steamer was anchored in the bay, looking very ghostly in the\nmist; it gave one unearthly cry, and then all was silent.\n\nRachel occupied herself in collecting one grey stone after another\nand building them into a little cairn; she did it very quietly and\ncarefully.\n\n\"And so you've changed your view of life, Rachel?\" said Helen.\n\nRachel added another stone and yawned. \"I don't remember,\" she said, \"I\nfeel like a fish at the bottom of the sea.\" She yawned again. None of\nthese people possessed any power to frighten her out here in the dawn,\nand she felt perfectly familiar even with Mr. Hirst.\n\n\"My brain, on the contrary,\" said Hirst, \"is in a condition of abnormal\nactivity.\" He sat in his favourite position with his arms binding his\nlegs together and his chin resting on the top of his knees. \"I see\nthrough everything--absolutely everything. Life has no more mysteries\nfor me.\" He spoke with conviction, but did not appear to wish for an\nanswer. Near though they sat, and familiar though they felt, they seemed\nmere shadows to each other.\n\n\"And all those people down there going to sleep,\" Hewet began dreamily,\n\"thinking such different things,--Miss Warrington, I suppose, is now on\nher knees; the Elliots are a little startled, it's not often _they_ get\nout of breath, and they want to get to sleep as quickly as possible;\nthen there's the poor lean young man who danced all night with\nEvelyn; he's putting his flower in water and asking himself, 'Is this\nlove?'--and poor old Perrott, I daresay, can't get to sleep at all,\nand is reading his favourite Greek book to console himself--and the\nothers--no, Hirst,\" he wound up, \"I don't find it simple at all.\"\n\n\"I have a key,\" said Hirst cryptically. His chin was still upon his\nknees and his eyes fixed in front of him.\n\nA silence followed. Then Helen rose and bade them good-night. \"But,\" she\nsaid, \"remember that you've got to come and see us.\"\n\nThey waved good-night and parted, but the two young men did not go back\nto the hotel; they went for a walk, during which they scarcely\nspoke, and never mentioned the names of the two women, who were, to a\nconsiderable extent, the subject of their thoughts. They did not wish\nto share their impressions. They returned to the hotel in time for\nbreakfast.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XIII\n\n\nThere were many rooms in the villa, but one room which possessed a\ncharacter of its own because the door was always shut, and no sound of\nmusic or laughter issued from it. Every one in the house was vaguely\nconscious that something went on behind that door, and without in the\nleast knowing what it was, were influenced in their own thoughts by the\nknowledge that if the passed it the door would be shut, and if they made\na noise Mr. Ambrose inside would be disturbed. Certain acts therefore\npossessed merit, and others were bad, so that life became more\nharmonious and less disconnected than it would have been had Mr. Ambrose\ngiven up editing _Pindar_, and taken to a nomad existence, in and out\nof every room in the house. As it was, every one was conscious that by\nobserving certain rules, such as punctuality and quiet, by cooking\nwell, and performing other small duties, one ode after another was\nsatisfactorily restored to the world, and they shared the continuity of\nthe scholar's life. Unfortunately, as age puts one barrier between human\nbeings, and learning another, and sex a third, Mr. Ambrose in his study\nwas some thousand miles distant from the nearest human being, who in\nthis household was inevitably a woman. He sat hour after hour among\nwhite-leaved books, alone like an idol in an empty church, still except\nfor the passage of his hand from one side of the sheet to another,\nsilent save for an occasional choke, which drove him to extend his pipe\na moment in the air. As he worked his way further and further into the\nheart of the poet, his chair became more and more deeply encircled\nby books, which lay open on the floor, and could only be crossed by a\ncareful process of stepping, so delicate that his visitors generally\nstopped and addressed him from the outskirts.\n\nOn the morning after the dance, however, Rachel came into her uncle's\nroom and hailed him twice, \"Uncle Ridley,\" before he paid her any\nattention.\n\nAt length he looked over his spectacles.\n\n\"Well?\" he asked.\n\n\"I want a book,\" she replied. \"Gibbon's _History_ _of_ _the_ _Roman_\n_Empire_. May I have it?\"\n\nShe watched the lines on her uncle's face gradually rearrange themselves\nat her question. It had been smooth as a mask before she spoke.\n\n\"Please say that again,\" said her uncle, either because he had not heard\nor because he had not understood.\n\nShe repeated the same words and reddened slightly as she did so.\n\n\"Gibbon! What on earth d'you want him for?\" he enquired.\n\n\"Somebody advised me to read it,\" Rachel stammered.\n\n\"But I don't travel about with a miscellaneous collection of\neighteenth-century historians!\" her uncle exclaimed. \"Gibbon! Ten big\nvolumes at least.\"\n\nRachel said that she was sorry to interrupt, and was turning to go.\n\n\"Stop!\" cried her uncle. He put down his pipe, placed his book on one\nside, and rose and led her slowly round the room, holding her by the\narm. \"Plato,\" he said, laying one finger on the first of a row of small\ndark books, \"and Jorrocks next door, which is wrong. Sophocles, Swift.\nYou don't care for German commentators, I presume. French, then. You\nread French? You should read Balzac. Then we come to Wordsworth and\nColeridge, Pope, Johnson, Addison, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats. One thing\nleads to another. Why is Marlowe here? Mrs. Chailey, I presume. But\nwhat's the use of reading if you don't read Greek? After all, if you\nread Greek, you need never read anything else, pure waste of time--pure\nwaste of time,\" thus speaking half to himself, with quick movements\nof his hands; they had come round again to the circle of books on the\nfloor, and their progress was stopped.\n\n\"Well,\" he demanded, \"which shall it be?\"\n\n\"Balzac,\" said Rachel, \"or have you the _Speech_ _on_ _the_ _American_\n_Revolution_, Uncle Ridley?\"\n\n\"_The_ _Speech_ _on_ _the_ _American_ _Revolution_?\" he asked. He looked\nat her very keenly again. \"Another young man at the dance?\"\n\n\"No. That was Mr. Dalloway,\" she confessed.\n\n\"Good Lord!\" he flung back his head in recollection of Mr. Dalloway.\n\nShe chose for herself a volume at random, submitted it to her uncle,\nwho, seeing that it was _La_ _Cousine_ _bette_, bade her throw it\naway if she found it too horrible, and was about to leave him when he\ndemanded whether she had enjoyed her dance?\n\nHe then wanted to know what people did at dances, seeing that he had\nonly been to one thirty-five years ago, when nothing had seemed to him\nmore meaningless and idiotic. Did they enjoy turning round and round to\nthe screech of a fiddle? Did they talk, and say pretty things, and\nif so, why didn't they do it, under reasonable conditions? As for\nhimself--he sighed and pointed at the signs of industry lying all about\nhim, which, in spite of his sigh, filled his face with such satisfaction\nthat his niece thought good to leave. On bestowing a kiss she was\nallowed to go, but not until she had bound herself to learn at any rate\nthe Greek alphabet, and to return her French novel when done with, upon\nwhich something more suitable would be found for her.\n\nAs the rooms in which people live are apt to give off something of the\nsame shock as their faces when seen for the first time, Rachel walked\nvery slowly downstairs, lost in wonder at her uncle, and his books,\nand his neglect of dances, and his queer, utterly inexplicable, but\napparently satisfactory view of life, when her eye was caught by a note\nwith her name on it lying in the hall. The address was written in a\nsmall strong hand unknown to her, and the note, which had no beginning,\nran:--\n\n\nI send the first volume of Gibbon as I promised. Personally I find\nlittle to be said for the moderns, but I'm going to send you Wedekind\nwhen I've done him. Donne? Have you read Webster and all that set? I\nenvy you reading them for the first time. Completely exhausted after\nlast night. And you?\n\n\nThe flourish of initials which she took to be St. J. A. H., wound up\nthe letter. She was very much flattered that Mr. Hirst should have\nremembered her, and fulfilled his promise so quickly.\n\nThere was still an hour to luncheon, and with Gibbon in one hand, and\nBalzac in the other she strolled out of the gate and down the little\npath of beaten mud between the olive trees on the slope of the hill. It\nwas too hot for climbing hills, but along the valley there were trees\nand a grass path running by the river bed. In this land where the\npopulation was centred in the towns it was possible to lose sight of\ncivilisation in a very short time, passing only an occasional farmhouse,\nwhere the women were handling red roots in the courtyard; or a little\nboy lying on his elbows on the hillside surrounded by a flock of black\nstrong-smelling goats. Save for a thread of water at the bottom, the\nriver was merely a deep channel of dry yellow stones. On the bank grew\nthose trees which Helen had said it was worth the voyage out merely\nto see. April had burst their buds, and they bore large blossoms among\ntheir glossy green leaves with petals of a thick wax-like substance\ncoloured an exquisite cream or pink or deep crimson. But filled with one\nof those unreasonable exultations which start generally from an unknown\ncause, and sweep whole countries and skies into their embrace, she\nwalked without seeing. The night was encroaching upon the day. Her ears\nhummed with the tunes she had played the night before; she sang, and\nthe singing made her walk faster and faster. She did not see distinctly\nwhere she was going, the trees and the landscape appearing only as\nmasses of green and blue, with an occasional space of differently\ncoloured sky. Faces of people she had seen last night came before her;\nshe heard their voices; she stopped singing, and began saying things\nover again or saying things differently, or inventing things that might\nhave been said. The constraint of being among strangers in a long silk\ndress made it unusually exciting to stride thus alone. Hewet, Hirst, Mr.\nVenning, Miss Allan, the music, the light, the dark trees in the\ngarden, the dawn,--as she walked they went surging round in her head,\na tumultuous background from which the present moment, with its\nopportunity of doing exactly as she liked, sprung more wonderfully vivid\neven than the night before.\n\nSo she might have walked until she had lost all knowledge of her way,\nhad it not been for the interruption of a tree, which, although it did\nnot grow across her path, stopped her as effectively as if the branches\nhad struck her in the face. It was an ordinary tree, but to her it\nappeared so strange that it might have been the only tree in the world.\nDark was the trunk in the middle, and the branches sprang here and\nthere, leaving jagged intervals of light between them as distinctly as\nif it had but that second risen from the ground. Having seen a sight\nthat would last her for a lifetime, and for a lifetime would preserve\nthat second, the tree once more sank into the ordinary ranks of trees,\nand she was able to seat herself in its shade and to pick the red\nflowers with the thin green leaves which were growing beneath it. She\nlaid them side by side, flower to flower and stalk to stalk, caressing\nthem for walking alone. Flowers and even pebbles in the earth had their\nown life and disposition, and brought back the feelings of a child to\nwhom they were companions. Looking up, her eye was caught by the line of\nthe mountains flying out energetically across the sky like the lash of\na curling whip. She looked at the pale distant sky, and the high bare\nplaces on the mountain-tops lying exposed to the sun. When she sat\ndown she had dropped her books on to the earth at her feet, and now she\nlooked down on them lying there, so square in the grass, a tall stem\nbending over and tickling the smooth brown cover of Gibbon, while the\nmottled blue Balzac lay naked in the sun. With a feeling that to open\nand read would certainly be a surprising experience, she turned the\nhistorian's page and read that--\n\n\nHis generals, in the early part of his reign, attempted the reduction\nof Aethiopia and Arabia Felix. They marched near a thousand miles to\nthe south of the tropic; but the heat of the climate soon repelled\nthe invaders and protected the unwarlike natives of those sequestered\nregions. . . . The northern countries of Europe scarcely deserved the\nexpense and labour of conquest. The forests and morasses of Germany were\nfilled with a hardy race of barbarians, who despised life when it was\nseparated from freedom.\n\n\nNever had any words been so vivid and so beautiful--Arabia\nFelix--Aethiopia. But those were not more noble than the others, hardy\nbarbarians, forests, and morasses. They seemed to drive roads back to\nthe very beginning of the world, on either side of which the populations\nof all times and countries stood in avenues, and by passing down them\nall knowledge would be hers, and the book of the world turned back to\nthe very first page. Such was her excitement at the possibilities of\nknowledge now opening before her that she ceased to read, and a breeze\nturning the page, the covers of Gibbon gently ruffled and closed\ntogether. She then rose again and walked on. Slowly her mind became less\nconfused and sought the origins of her exaltation, which were twofold\nand could be limited by an effort to the persons of Mr. Hirst and Mr.\nHewet. Any clear analysis of them was impossible owing to the haze of\nwonder in which they were enveloped. She could not reason about them as\nabout people whose feelings went by the same rule as her own did, and\nher mind dwelt on them with a kind of physical pleasure such as is\ncaused by the contemplation of bright things hanging in the sun. From\nthem all life seemed to radiate; the very words of books were steeped\nin radiance. She then became haunted by a suspicion which she was so\nreluctant to face that she welcomed a trip and stumble over the grass\nbecause thus her attention was dispersed, but in a second it had\ncollected itself again. Unconsciously she had been walking faster and\nfaster, her body trying to outrun her mind; but she was now on the\nsummit of a little hillock of earth which rose above the river and\ndisplayed the valley. She was no longer able to juggle with several\nideas, but must deal with the most persistent, and a kind of melancholy\nreplaced her excitement. She sank down on to the earth clasping her\nknees together, and looking blankly in front of her. For some time she\nobserved a great yellow butterfly, which was opening and closing its\nwings very slowly on a little flat stone.\n\n\"What is it to be in love?\" she demanded, after a long silence; each\nword as it came into being seemed to shove itself out into an unknown\nsea. Hypnotised by the wings of the butterfly, and awed by the discovery\nof a terrible possibility in life, she sat for some time longer. When\nthe butterfly flew away, she rose, and with her two books beneath her\narm returned home again, much as a soldier prepared for battle.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XIV\n\n\nThe sun of that same day going down, dusk was saluted as usual at the\nhotel by an instantaneous sparkle of electric lights. The hours between\ndinner and bedtime were always difficult enough to kill, and the night\nafter the dance they were further tarnished by the peevishness of\ndissipation. Certainly, in the opinion of Hirst and Hewet, who lay back\nin long arm-chairs in the middle of the hall, with their coffee-cups\nbeside them, and their cigarettes in their hands, the evening was\nunusually dull, the women unusually badly dressed, the men unusually\nfatuous. Moreover, when the mail had been distributed half an hour ago\nthere were no letters for either of the two young men. As every other\nperson, practically, had received two or three plump letters from\nEngland, which they were now engaged in reading, this seemed hard, and\nprompted Hirst to make the caustic remark that the animals had been fed.\nTheir silence, he said, reminded him of the silence in the lion-house\nwhen each beast holds a lump of raw meat in its paws. He went on,\nstimulated by this comparison, to liken some to hippopotamuses, some\nto canary birds, some to swine, some to parrots, and some to loathsome\nreptiles curled round the half-decayed bodies of sheep. The intermittent\nsounds--now a cough, now a horrible wheezing or throat-clearing, now a\nlittle patter of conversation--were just, he declared, what you hear if\nyou stand in the lion-house when the bones are being mauled. But these\ncomparisons did not rouse Hewet, who, after a careless glance round\nthe room, fixed his eyes upon a thicket of native spears which were so\ningeniously arranged as to run their points at you whichever way you\napproached them. He was clearly oblivious of his surroundings; whereupon\nHirst, perceiving that Hewet's mind was a complete blank, fixed his\nattention more closely upon his fellow-creatures. He was too far from\nthem, however, to hear what they were saying, but it pleased him to\nconstruct little theories about them from their gestures and appearance.\n\nMrs. Thornbury had received a great many letters. She was completely\nengrossed in them. When she had finished a page she handed it to her\nhusband, or gave him the sense of what she was reading in a series of\nshort quotations linked together by a sound at the back of her throat.\n\"Evie writes that George has gone to Glasgow. 'He finds Mr. Chadbourne\nso nice to work with, and we hope to spend Christmas together, but I\nshould not like to move Betty and Alfred any great distance (no, quite\nright), though it is difficult to imagine cold weather in this heat. . . .\nEleanor and Roger drove over in the new trap. . . . Eleanor certainly\nlooked more like herself than I've seen her since the winter. She has\nput Baby on three bottles now, which I'm sure is wise (I'm sure it is\ntoo), and so gets better nights. . . . My hair still falls out. I find\nit on the pillow! But I am cheered by hearing from Tottie Hall Green.\n. . . Muriel is in Torquay enjoying herself greatly at dances. She _is_\ngoing to show her black put after all.' . . . A line from Herbert--so\nbusy, poor fellow! Ah! Margaret says, 'Poor old Mrs. Fairbank died\non the eighth, quite suddenly in the conservatory, only a maid in the\nhouse, who hadn't the presence of mind to lift her up, which they think\nmight have saved her, but the doctor says it might have come at any\nmoment, and one can only feel thankful that it was in the house and not\nin the street (I should think so!). The pigeons have increased terribly,\njust as the rabbits did five years ago . . .'\" While she read her\nhusband kept nodding his head very slightly, but very steadily in sign\nof approval.\n\nNear by, Miss Allan was reading her letters too. They were not\naltogether pleasant, as could be seen from the slight rigidity which\ncame over her large fine face as she finished reading them and replaced\nthem neatly in their envelopes. The lines of care and responsibility\non her face made her resemble an elderly man rather than a woman. The\nletters brought her news of the failure of last year's fruit crop in New\nZealand, which was a serious matter, for Hubert, her only brother, made\nhis living on a fruit farm, and if it failed again, of course, he would\nthrow up his place, come back to England, and what were they to do with\nhim this time? The journey out here, which meant the loss of a term's\nwork, became an extravagance and not the just and wonderful holiday due\nto her after fifteen years of punctual lecturing and correcting essays\nupon English literature. Emily, her sister, who was a teacher also,\nwrote: \"We ought to be prepared, though I have no doubt Hubert will be\nmore reasonable this time.\" And then went on in her sensible way to say\nthat she was enjoying a very jolly time in the Lakes. \"They are looking\nexceedingly pretty just now. I have seldom seen the trees so forward at\nthis time of year. We have taken our lunch out several days. Old Alice\nis as young as ever, and asks after every one affectionately. The days\npass very quickly, and term will soon be here. Political prospects _not_\ngood, I think privately, but do not like to damp Ellen's enthusiasm.\nLloyd George has taken the Bill up, but so have many before now, and we\nare where we are; but trust to find myself mistaken. Anyhow, we have our\nwork cut out for us. . . . Surely Meredith lacks the _human_ note one\nlikes in W. W.?\" she concluded, and went on to discuss some questions of\nEnglish literature which Miss Allan had raised in her last letter.\n\nAt a little distance from Miss Allan, on a seat shaded and made\nsemi-private by a thick clump of palm trees, Arthur and Susan\nwere reading each other's letters. The big slashing manuscripts of\nhockey-playing young women in Wiltshire lay on Arthur's knee, while\nSusan deciphered tight little legal hands which rarely filled more than\na page, and always conveyed the same impression of jocular and breezy\ngoodwill.\n\n\"I do hope Mr. Hutchinson will like me, Arthur,\" she said, looking up.\n\n\"Who's your loving Flo?\" asked Arthur.\n\n\"Flo Graves--the girl I told you about, who was engaged to that dreadful\nMr. Vincent,\" said Susan. \"Is Mr. Hutchinson married?\" she asked.\n\nAlready her mind was busy with benevolent plans for her friends, or\nrather with one magnificent plan--which was simple too--they were all to\nget married--at once--directly she got back. Marriage, marriage that was\nthe right thing, the only thing, the solution required by every one she\nknew, and a great part of her meditations was spent in tracing every\ninstance of discomfort, loneliness, ill-health, unsatisfied ambition,\nrestlessness, eccentricity, taking things up and dropping them again,\npublic speaking, and philanthropic activity on the part of men and\nparticularly on the part of women to the fact that they wanted to marry,\nwere trying to marry, and had not succeeded in getting married. If, as\nshe was bound to own, these symptoms sometimes persisted after marriage,\nshe could only ascribe them to the unhappy law of nature which decreed\nthat there was only one Arthur Venning, and only one Susan who could\nmarry him. Her theory, of course, had the merit of being fully supported\nby her own case. She had been vaguely uncomfortable at home for two or\nthree years now, and a voyage like this with her selfish old aunt,\nwho paid her fare but treated her as servant and companion in one, was\ntypical of the kind of thing people expected of her. Directly she\nbecame engaged, Mrs. Paley behaved with instinctive respect, positively\nprotested when Susan as usual knelt down to lace her shoes, and appeared\nreally grateful for an hour of Susan's company where she had been used\nto exact two or three as her right. She therefore foresaw a life of far\ngreater comfort than she had been used to, and the change had already\nproduced a great increase of warmth in her feelings towards other\npeople.\n\nIt was close on twenty years now since Mrs. Paley had been able to lace\nher own shoes or even to see them, the disappearance of her feet having\ncoincided more or less accurately with the death of her husband, a man\nof business, soon after which event Mrs. Paley began to grow stout.\nShe was a selfish, independent old woman, possessed of a considerable\nincome, which she spent upon the upkeep of a house that needed seven\nservants and a charwoman in Lancaster Gate, and another with a garden\nand carriage-horses in Surrey. Susan's engagement relieved her of the\none great anxiety of her life--that her son Christopher should \"entangle\nhimself\" with his cousin. Now that this familiar source of interest was\nremoved, she felt a little low and inclined to see more in Susan\nthan she used to. She had decided to give her a very handsome wedding\npresent, a cheque for two hundred, two hundred and fifty, or possibly,\nconceivably--it depended upon the under-gardener and Huths' bill for\ndoing up the drawing-room--three hundred pounds sterling.\n\nShe was thinking of this very question, revolving the figures, as she\nsat in her wheeled chair with a table spread with cards by her side. The\nPatience had somehow got into a muddle, and she did not like to call for\nSusan to help her, as Susan seemed to be busy with Arthur.\n\n\"She's every right to expect a handsome present from me, of course,\" she\nthought, looking vaguely at the leopard on its hind legs, \"and I've no\ndoubt she does! Money goes a long way with every one. The young are very\nselfish. If I were to die, nobody would miss me but Dakyns, and she'll\nbe consoled by the will! However, I've got no reason to complain. . . .\nI can still enjoy myself. I'm not a burden to any-one. . . . I like a\ngreat many things a good deal, in spite of my legs.\"\n\nBeing slightly depressed, however, she went on to think of the only\npeople she had known who had not seemed to her at all selfish or fond of\nmoney, who had seemed to her somehow rather finer than the general run;\npeople she willingly acknowledged, who were finer than she was. There\nwere only two of them. One was her brother, who had been drowned before\nher eyes, the other was a girl, her greatest friend, who had died in\ngiving birth to her first child. These things had happened some fifty\nyears ago.\n\n\"They ought not to have died,\" she thought. \"However, they did--and we\nselfish old creatures go on.\" The tears came to her eyes; she felt a\ngenuine regret for them, a kind of respect for their youth and beauty,\nand a kind of shame for herself; but the tears did not fall; and she\nopened one of those innumerable novels which she used to pronounce good\nor bad, or pretty middling, or really wonderful. \"I can't think how\npeople come to imagine such things,\" she would say, taking off her\nspectacles and looking up with the old faded eyes, that were becoming\nringed with white.\n\nJust behind the stuffed leopard Mr. Elliot was playing chess with Mr.\nPepper. He was being defeated, naturally, for Mr. Pepper scarcely took\nhis eyes off the board, and Mr. Elliot kept leaning back in his chair\nand throwing out remarks to a gentleman who had only arrived the night\nbefore, a tall handsome man, with a head resembling the head of an\nintellectual ram. After a few remarks of a general nature had passed,\nthey were discovering that they knew some of the same people, as indeed\nhad been obvious from their appearance directly they saw each other.\n\n\"Ah yes, old Truefit,\" said Mr. Elliot. \"He has a son at Oxford. I've\noften stayed with them. It's a lovely old Jacobean house. Some exquisite\nGreuzes--one or two Dutch pictures which the old boy kept in the\ncellars. Then there were stacks upon stacks of prints. Oh, the dirt in\nthat house! He was a miser, you know. The boy married a daughter of\nLord Pinwells. I know them too. The collecting mania tends to run in\nfamilies. This chap collects buckles--men's shoe-buckles they must be,\nin use between the years 1580 and 1660; the dates mayn't be right, but\nfact's as I say. Your true collector always has some unaccountable\nfad of that kind. On other points he's as level-headed as a breeder of\nshorthorns, which is what he happens to be. Then the Pinwells, as you\nprobably know, have their share of eccentricity too. Lady Maud, for\ninstance--\" he was interrupted here by the necessity of considering his\nmove,--\"Lady Maud has a horror of cats and clergymen, and people with\nbig front teeth. I've heard her shout across a table, 'Keep your mouth\nshut, Miss Smith; they're as yellow as carrots!' across a table, mind\nyou. To me she's always been civility itself. She dabbles in literature,\nlikes to collect a few of us in her drawing-room, but mention a\nclergyman, a bishop even, nay, the Archbishop himself, and she gobbles\nlike a turkey-cock. I've been told it's a family feud--something to do\nwith an ancestor in the reign of Charles the First. Yes,\" he continued,\nsuffering check after check, \"I always like to know something of the\ngrandmothers of our fashionable young men. In my opinion they preserve\nall that we admire in the eighteenth century, with the advantage, in the\nmajority of cases, that they are personally clean. Not that one would\ninsult old Lady Barborough by calling her clean. How often d'you think,\nHilda,\" he called out to his wife, \"her ladyship takes a bath?\"\n\n\"I should hardly like to say, Hugh,\" Mrs. Elliot tittered, \"but wearing\npuce velvet, as she does even on the hottest August day, it somehow\ndoesn't show.\"\n\n\"Pepper, you have me,\" said Mr. Elliot. \"My chess is even worse than I\nremembered.\" He accepted his defeat with great equanimity, because he\nreally wished to talk.\n\nHe drew his chair beside Mr. Wilfrid Flushing, the newcomer.\n\n\"Are these at all in your line?\" he asked, pointing at a case in front\nof them, where highly polished crosses, jewels, and bits of embroidery,\nthe work of the natives, were displayed to tempt visitors.\n\n\"Shams, all of them,\" said Mr. Flushing briefly. \"This rug, now, isn't\nat all bad.\" He stopped and picked up a piece of the rug at their feet.\n\"Not old, of course, but the design is quite in the right tradition.\nAlice, lend me your brooch. See the difference between the old work and\nthe new.\"\n\nA lady, who was reading with great concentration, unfastened her brooch\nand gave it to her husband without looking at him or acknowledging the\ntentative bow which Mr. Elliot was desirous of giving her. If she\nhad listened, she might have been amused by the reference to old Lady\nBarborough, her great-aunt, but, oblivious of her surroundings, she went\non reading.\n\nThe clock, which had been wheezing for some minutes like an old man\npreparing to cough, now struck nine. The sound slightly disturbed\ncertain somnolent merchants, government officials, and men of\nindependent means who were lying back in their chairs, chatting,\nsmoking, ruminating about their affairs, with their eyes half shut;\nthey raised their lids for an instant at the sound and then closed them\nagain. They had the appearance of crocodiles so fully gorged by their\nlast meal that the future of the world gives them no anxiety whatever.\nThe only disturbance in the placid bright room was caused by a large\nmoth which shot from light to light, whizzing over elaborate heads of\nhair, and causing several young women to raise their hands nervously and\nexclaim, \"Some one ought to kill it!\"\n\nAbsorbed in their own thoughts, Hewet and Hirst had not spoken for a\nlong time.\n\nWhen the clock struck, Hirst said:\n\n\"Ah, the creatures begin to stir. . . .\" He watched them raise\nthemselves, look about them, and settle down again. \"What I abhor most\nof all,\" he concluded, \"is the female breast. Imagine being Venning and\nhaving to get into bed with Susan! But the really repulsive thing is\nthat they feel nothing at all--about what I do when I have a hot bath.\nThey're gross, they're absurd, they're utterly intolerable!\"\n\nSo saying, and drawing no reply from Hewet, he proceeded to think about\nhimself, about science, about Cambridge, about the Bar, about Helen and\nwhat she thought of him, until, being very tired, he was nodding off to\nsleep.\n\nSuddenly Hewet woke him up.\n\n\"How d'you know what you feel, Hirst?\"\n\n\"Are you in love?\" asked Hirst. He put in his eyeglass.\n\n\"Don't be a fool,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"Well, I'll sit down and think about it,\" said Hirst. \"One really ought\nto. If these people would only think about things, the world would be a\nfar better place for us all to live in. Are you trying to think?\"\n\nThat was exactly what Hewet had been doing for the last half-hour, but\nhe did not find Hirst sympathetic at the moment.\n\n\"I shall go for a walk,\" he said.\n\n\"Remember we weren't in bed last night,\" said Hirst with a prodigious\nyawn.\n\nHewet rose and stretched himself.\n\n\"I want to go and get a breath of air,\" he said.\n\nAn unusual feeling had been bothering him all the evening and forbidding\nhim to settle into any one train of thought. It was precisely as if he\nhad been in the middle of a talk which interested him profoundly when\nsome one came up and interrupted him. He could not finish the talk, and\nthe longer he sat there the more he wanted to finish it. As the talk\nthat had been interrupted was a talk with Rachel, he had to ask himself\nwhy he felt this, and why he wanted to go on talking to her. Hirst would\nmerely say that he was in love with her. But he was not in love with\nher. Did love begin in that way, with the wish to go on talking? No. It\nalways began in his case with definite physical sensations, and these\nwere now absent, he did not even find her physically attractive.\nThere was something, of course, unusual about her--she was young,\ninexperienced, and inquisitive, they had been more open with each other\nthan was usually possible. He always found girls interesting to talk to,\nand surely these were good reasons why he should wish to go on talking\nto her; and last night, what with the crowd and the confusion, he had\nonly been able to begin to talk to her. What was she doing now? Lying on\na sofa and looking at the ceiling, perhaps. He could imagine her doing\nthat, and Helen in an arm-chair, with her hands on the arm of it,\nso--looking ahead of her, with her great big eyes--oh no, they'd be\ntalking, of course, about the dance. But suppose Rachel was going away\nin a day or two, suppose this was the end of her visit, and her\nfather had arrived in one of the steamers anchored in the bay,--it was\nintolerable to know so little. Therefore he exclaimed, \"How d'you know\nwhat you feel, Hirst?\" to stop himself from thinking.\n\nBut Hirst did not help him, and the other people with their aimless\nmovements and their unknown lives were disturbing, so that he longed for\nthe empty darkness. The first thing he looked for when he stepped out\nof the hall door was the light of the Ambroses' villa. When he had\ndefinitely decided that a certain light apart from the others higher up\nthe hill was their light, he was considerably reassured. There seemed\nto be at once a little stability in all this incoherence. Without any\ndefinite plan in his head, he took the turning to the right and walked\nthrough the town and came to the wall by the meeting of the roads, where\nhe stopped. The booming of the sea was audible. The dark-blue mass of\nthe mountains rose against the paler blue of the sky. There was no moon,\nbut myriads of stars, and lights were anchored up and down in the dark\nwaves of earth all round him. He had meant to go back, but the single\nlight of the Ambroses' villa had now become three separate lights, and\nhe was tempted to go on. He might as well make sure that Rachel was\nstill there. Walking fast, he soon stood by the iron gate of their\ngarden, and pushed it open; the outline of the house suddenly appeared\nsharply before his eyes, and the thin column of the verandah cutting\nacross the palely lit gravel of the terrace. He hesitated. At the back\nof the house some one was rattling cans. He approached the front; the\nlight on the terrace showed him that the sitting-rooms were on that\nside. He stood as near the light as he could by the corner of the house,\nthe leaves of a creeper brushing his face. After a moment he could hear\na voice. The voice went on steadily; it was not talking, but from the\ncontinuity of the sound it was a voice reading aloud. He crept a little\ncloser; he crumpled the leaves together so as to stop their rustling\nabout his ears. It might be Rachel's voice. He left the shadow and\nstepped into the radius of the light, and then heard a sentence spoken\nquite distinctly.\n\n\"And there we lived from the year 1860 to 1895, the happiest years of\nmy parents' lives, and there in 1862 my brother Maurice was born, to the\ndelight of his parents, as he was destined to be the delight of all who\nknew him.\"\n\nThe voice quickened, and the tone became conclusive rising slightly in\npitch, as if these words were at the end of the chapter. Hewet drew\nback again into the shadow. There was a long silence. He could just\nhear chairs being moved inside. He had almost decided to go back, when\nsuddenly two figures appeared at the window, not six feet from him.\n\n\"It was Maurice Fielding, of course, that your mother was engaged to,\"\nsaid Helen's voice. She spoke reflectively, looking out into the dark\ngarden, and thinking evidently as much of the look of the night as of\nwhat she was saying.\n\n\"Mother?\" said Rachel. Hewet's heart leapt, and he noticed the fact. Her\nvoice, though low, was full of surprise.\n\n\"You didn't know that?\" said Helen.\n\n\"I never knew there'd been any one else,\" said Rachel. She was clearly\nsurprised, but all they said was said low and inexpressively, because\nthey were speaking out into the cool dark night.\n\n\"More people were in love with her than with any one I've ever known,\"\nHelen stated. \"She had that power--she enjoyed things. She wasn't\nbeautiful, but--I was thinking of her last night at the dance. She\ngot on with every kind of person, and then she made it all so\namazingly--funny.\"\n\nIt appeared that Helen was going back into the past, choosing her words\ndeliberately, comparing Theresa with the people she had known since\nTheresa died.\n\n\"I don't know how she did it,\" she continued, and ceased, and there was\na long pause, in which a little owl called first here, then there, as it\nmoved from tree to tree in the garden.\n\n\"That's so like Aunt Lucy and Aunt Katie,\" said Rachel at last. \"They\nalways make out that she was very sad and very good.\"\n\n\"Then why, for goodness' sake, did they do nothing but criticize her\nwhen she was alive?\" said Helen. Very gentle their voices sounded, as if\nthey fell through the waves of the sea.\n\n\"If I were to die to-morrow . . .\" she began.\n\nThe broken sentences had an extraordinary beauty and detachment in\nHewet's ears, and a kind of mystery too, as though they were spoken by\npeople in their sleep.\n\n\"No, Rachel,\" Helen's voice continued, \"I'm not going to walk in the\ngarden; it's damp--it's sure to be damp; besides, I see at least a dozen\ntoads.\"\n\n\"Toads? Those are stones, Helen. Come out. It's nicer out. The flowers\nsmell,\" Rachel replied.\n\nHewet drew still farther back. His heart was beating very quickly.\nApparently Rachel tried to pull Helen out on to the terrace, and\nhelen resisted. There was a certain amount of scuffling, entreating,\nresisting, and laughter from both of them. Then a man's form appeared.\nHewet could not hear what they were all saying. In a minute they had\ngone in; he could hear bolts grating then; there was dead silence, and\nall the lights went out.\n\nHe turned away, still crumpling and uncrumpling a handful of leaves\nwhich he had torn from the wall. An exquisite sense of pleasure and\nrelief possessed him; it was all so solid and peaceful after the ball\nat the hotel, whether he was in love with them or not, and he was not in\nlove with them; no, but it was good that they should be alive.\n\nAfter standing still for a minute or two he turned and began to walk\ntowards the gate. With the movement of his body, the excitement, the\nromance and the richness of life crowded into his brain. He shouted out\na line of poetry, but the words escaped him, and he stumbled among lines\nand fragments of lines which had no meaning at all except for the beauty\nof the words. He shut the gate, and ran swinging from side to side down\nthe hill, shouting any nonsense that came into his head. \"Here am I,\"\nhe cried rhythmically, as his feet pounded to the left and to the right,\n\"plunging along, like an elephant in the jungle, stripping the branches\nas I go (he snatched at the twigs of a bush at the roadside), roaring\ninnumerable words, lovely words about innumerable things, running\ndownhill and talking nonsense aloud to myself about roads and leaves\nand lights and women coming out into the darkness--about women--about\nRachel, about Rachel.\" He stopped and drew a deep breath. The night\nseemed immense and hospitable, and although so dark there seemed to\nbe things moving down there in the harbour and movement out at sea.\nHe gazed until the darkness numbed him, and then he walked on quickly,\nstill murmuring to himself. \"And I ought to be in bed, snoring\nand dreaming, dreaming, dreaming. Dreams and realities, dreams and\nrealities, dreams and realities,\" he repeated all the way up the avenue,\nscarcely knowing what he said, until he reached the front door. Here he\npaused for a second, and collected himself before he opened the door.\n\nHis eyes were dazed, his hands very cold, and his brain excited and yet\nhalf asleep. Inside the door everything was as he had left it except\nthat the hall was now empty. There were the chairs turning in towards\neach other where people had sat talking, and the empty glasses on little\ntables, and the newspapers scattered on the floor. As he shut the door\nhe felt as if he were enclosed in a square box, and instantly shrivelled\nup. It was all very bright and very small. He stopped for a minute by\nthe long table to find a paper which he had meant to read, but he was\nstill too much under the influence of the dark and the fresh air to\nconsider carefully which paper it was or where he had seen it.\n\nAs he fumbled vaguely among the papers he saw a figure cross the tail of\nhis eye, coming downstairs. He heard the swishing sound of skirts, and\nto his great surprise, Evelyn M. came up to him, laid her hand on the\ntable as if to prevent him from taking up a paper, and said:\n\n\"You're just the person I wanted to talk to.\" Her voice was a little\nunpleasant and metallic, her eyes were very bright, and she kept them\nfixed upon him.\n\n\"To talk to me?\" he repeated. \"But I'm half asleep.\"\n\n\"But I think you understand better than most people,\" she answered, and\nsat down on a little chair placed beside a big leather chair so that\nHewet had to sit down beside her.\n\n\"Well?\" he said. He yawned openly, and lit a cigarette. He could not\nbelieve that this was really happening to him. \"What is it?\"\n\n\"Are you really sympathetic, or is it just a pose?\" she demanded.\n\n\"It's for you to say,\" he replied. \"I'm interested, I think.\" He still\nfelt numb all over and as if she was much too close to him.\n\n\"Any one can be interested!\" she cried impatiently. \"Your friend Mr.\nHirst's interested, I daresay however, I do believe in you. You look\nas if you'd got a nice sister, somehow.\" She paused, picking at some\nsequins on her knees, and then, as if she had made up her mind, she\nstarted off, \"Anyhow, I'm going to ask your advice. D'you ever get into\na state where you don't know your own mind? That's the state I'm in now.\nYou see, last night at the dance Raymond Oliver,--he's the tall dark\nboy who looks as if he had Indian blood in him, but he says he's not\nreally,--well, we were sitting out together, and he told me all about\nhimself, how unhappy he is at home, and how he hates being out here.\nThey've put him into some beastly mining business. He says it's\nbeastly--I should like it, I know, but that's neither here nor there.\nAnd I felt awfully sorry for him, one couldn't help being sorry for him,\nand when he asked me to let him kiss me, I did. I don't see any harm\nin that, do you? And then this morning he said he'd thought I meant\nsomething more, and I wasn't the sort to let any one kiss me. And we\ntalked and talked. I daresay I was very silly, but one can't help liking\npeople when one's sorry for them. I do like him most awfully--\" She\npaused. \"So I gave him half a promise, and then, you see, there's Alfred\nPerrott.\"\n\n\"Oh, Perrott,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"We got to know each other on that picnic the other day,\" she continued.\n\"He seemed so lonely, especially as Arthur had gone off with Susan, and\none couldn't help guessing what was in his mind. So we had quite a long\ntalk when you were looking at the ruins, and he told me all about his\nlife, and his struggles, and how fearfully hard it had been. D'you know,\nhe was a boy in a grocer's shop and took parcels to people's houses in\na basket? That interested me awfully, because I always say it doesn't\nmatter how you're born if you've got the right stuff in you. And he told\nme about his sister who's paralysed, poor girl, and one can see she's a\ngreat trial, though he's evidently very devoted to her. I must say I do\nadmire people like that! I don't expect you do because you're so clever.\nWell, last night we sat out in the garden together, and I couldn't help\nseeing what he wanted to say, and comforting him a little, and telling\nhim I did care--I really do--only, then, there's Raymond Oliver. What I\nwant you to tell me is, can one be in love with two people at once, or\ncan't one?\"\n\nShe became silent, and sat with her chin on her hands, looking very\nintent, as if she were facing a real problem which had to be discussed\nbetween them.\n\n\"I think it depends what sort of person you are,\" said Hewet. He\nlooked at her. She was small and pretty, aged perhaps twenty-eight or\ntwenty-nine, but though dashing and sharply cut, her features expressed\nnothing very clearly, except a great deal of spirit and good health.\n\n\"Who are you, what are you; you see, I know nothing about you,\" he\ncontinued.\n\n\"Well, I was coming to that,\" said Evelyn M. She continued to rest her\nchin on her hands and to look intently ahead of her. \"I'm the daughter\nof a mother and no father, if that interests you,\" she said. \"It's not a\nvery nice thing to be. It's what often happens in the country. She was\na farmer's daughter, and he was rather a swell--the young man up at the\ngreat house. He never made things straight--never married her--though\nhe allowed us quite a lot of money. His people wouldn't let him. Poor\nfather! I can't help liking him. Mother wasn't the sort of woman who\ncould keep him straight, anyhow. He was killed in the war. I believe\nhis men worshipped him. They say great big troopers broke down and cried\nover his body on the battlefield. I wish I'd known him. Mother had all\nthe life crushed out of her. The world--\" She clenched her fist. \"Oh,\npeople can be horrid to a woman like that!\" She turned upon Hewet.\n\n\"Well,\" she said, \"d'you want to know any more about me?\"\n\n\"But you?\" he asked, \"Who looked after you?\"\n\n\"I've looked after myself mostly,\" she laughed. \"I've had splendid\nfriends. I do like people! That's the trouble. What would you do if you\nliked two people, both of them tremendously, and you couldn't tell which\nmost?\"\n\n\"I should go on liking them--I should wait and see. Why not?\"\n\n\"But one has to make up one's mind,\" said Evelyn. \"Or are you one of the\npeople who doesn't believe in marriages and all that? Look here--this\nisn't fair, I do all the telling, and you tell nothing. Perhaps you're\nthe same as your friend\"--she looked at him suspiciously; \"perhaps you\ndon't like me?\"\n\n\"I don't know you,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"I know when I like a person directly I see them! I knew I liked you the\nvery first night at dinner. Oh dear,\" she continued impatiently, \"what\na lot of bother would be saved if only people would say the things they\nthink straight out! I'm made like that. I can't help it.\"\n\n\"But don't you find it leads to difficulties?\" Hewet asked.\n\n\"That's men's fault,\" she answered. \"They always drag it in-love, I\nmean.\"\n\n\"And so you've gone on having one proposal after another,\" said Hewet.\n\n\"I don't suppose I've had more proposals than most women,\" said Evelyn,\nbut she spoke without conviction.\n\n\"Five, six, ten?\" Hewet ventured.\n\nEvelyn seemed to intimate that perhaps ten was the right figure, but\nthat it really was not a high one.\n\n\"I believe you're thinking me a heartless flirt,\" she protested. \"But\nI don't care if you are. I don't care what any one thinks of me. Just\nbecause one's interested and likes to be friends with men, and talk to\nthem as one talks to women, one's called a flirt.\"\n\n\"But Miss Murgatroyd--\"\n\n\"I wish you'd call me Evelyn,\" she interrupted.\n\n\"After ten proposals do you honestly think that men are the same as\nwomen?\"\n\n\"Honestly, honestly,--how I hate that word! It's always used by prigs,\"\ncried Evelyn. \"Honestly I think they ought to be. That's what's so\ndisappointing. Every time one thinks it's not going to happen, and every\ntime it does.\"\n\n\"The pursuit of Friendship,\" said Hewet. \"The title of a comedy.\"\n\n\"You're horrid,\" she cried. \"You don't care a bit really. You might be\nMr. Hirst.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Hewet, \"let's consider. Let us consider--\" He paused,\nbecause for the moment he could not remember what it was that they had\nto consider. He was far more interested in her than in her story, for as\nshe went on speaking his numbness had disappeared, and he was conscious\nof a mixture of liking, pity, and distrust. \"You've promised to marry\nboth Oliver and Perrott?\" he concluded.\n\n\"Not exactly promised,\" said Evelyn. \"I can't make up my mind which I\nreally like best. Oh how I detest modern life!\" she flung off. \"It must\nhave been so much easier for the Elizabethans! I thought the other day\non that mountain how I'd have liked to be one of those colonists, to cut\ndown trees and make laws and all that, instead of fooling about with all\nthese people who think one's just a pretty young lady. Though I'm not.\nI really might _do_ something.\" She reflected in silence for a minute.\nThen she said:\n\n\"I'm afraid right down in my heart that Alfred Perrot _won't_ do. He's\nnot strong, is he?\"\n\n\"Perhaps he couldn't cut down a tree,\" said Hewet. \"Have you never cared\nfor anybody?\" he asked.\n\n\"I've cared for heaps of people, but not to marry them,\" she said. \"I\nsuppose I'm too fastidious. All my life I've wanted somebody I could\nlook up to, somebody great and big and splendid. Most men are so small.\"\n\n\"What d'you mean by splendid?\" Hewet asked. \"People are--nothing more.\"\n\nEvelyn was puzzled.\n\n\"We don't care for people because of their qualities,\" he tried to\nexplain. \"It's just them that we care for,\"--he struck a match--\"just\nthat,\" he said, pointing to the flames.\n\n\"I see what you mean,\" she said, \"but I don't agree. I do know why I\ncare for people, and I think I'm hardly ever wrong. I see at once what\nthey've got in them. Now I think you must be rather splendid; but not\nMr. Hirst.\"\n\nHewlet shook his head.\n\n\"He's not nearly so unselfish, or so sympathetic, or so big, or so\nunderstanding,\" Evelyn continued.\n\nHewet sat silent, smoking his cigarette.\n\n\"I should hate cutting down trees,\" he remarked.\n\n\"I'm not trying to flirt with you, though I suppose you think I am!\"\nEvelyn shot out. \"I'd never have come to you if I'd thought you'd merely\nthink odious things of me!\" The tears came into her eyes.\n\n\"Do you never flirt?\" he asked.\n\n\"Of course I don't,\" she protested. \"Haven't I told you? I want\nfriendship; I want to care for some one greater and nobler than I am,\nand if they fall in love with me it isn't my fault; I don't want it; I\npositively hate it.\"\n\nHewet could see that there was very little use in going on with the\nconversation, for it was obvious that Evelyn did not wish to say\nanything in particular, but to impress upon him an image of herself,\nbeing, for some reason which she would not reveal, unhappy, or insecure.\nHe was very tired, and a pale waiter kept walking ostentatiously into\nthe middle of the room and looking at them meaningly.\n\n\"They want to shut up,\" he said. \"My advice is that you should tell\nOliver and Perrott to-morrow that you've made up your mind that you\ndon't mean to marry either of them. I'm certain you don't. If you\nchange your mind you can always tell them so. They're both sensible men;\nthey'll understand. And then all this bother will be over.\" He got up.\n\nBut Evelyn did not move. She sat looking up at him with her bright eager\neyes, in the depths of which he thought he detected some disappointment,\nor dissatisfaction.\n\n\"Good-night,\" he said.\n\n\"There are heaps of things I want to say to you still,\" she said. \"And\nI'm going to, some time. I suppose you must go to bed now?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Hewet. \"I'm half asleep.\" He left her still sitting by\nherself in the empty hall.\n\n\"Why is it that they _won't_ be honest?\" he muttered to himself as he\nwent upstairs. Why was it that relations between different people were\nso unsatisfactory, so fragmentary, so hazardous, and words so dangerous\nthat the instinct to sympathise with another human being was an instinct\nto be examined carefully and probably crushed? What had Evelyn really\nwished to say to him? What was she feeling left alone in the empty\nhall? The mystery of life and the unreality even of one's own sensations\novercame him as he walked down the corridor which led to his room. It\nwas dimly lighted, but sufficiently for him to see a figure in a bright\ndressing-gown pass swiftly in front of him, the figure of a woman\ncrossing from one room to another.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XV\n\n\nWhether too slight or too vague the ties that bind people casually\nmeeting in a hotel at midnight, they possess one advantage at least over\nthe bonds which unite the elderly, who have lived together once and so\nmust live for ever. Slight they may be, but vivid and genuine, merely\nbecause the power to break them is within the grasp of each, and there\nis no reason for continuance except a true desire that continue they\nshall. When two people have been married for years they seem to become\nunconscious of each other's bodily presence so that they move as if\nalone, speak aloud things which they do not expect to be answered, and\nin general seem to experience all the comfort of solitude without its\nloneliness. The joint lives of Ridley and Helen had arrived at this\nstage of community, and it was often necessary for one or the other to\nrecall with an effort whether a thing had been said or only thought,\nshared or dreamt in private. At four o'clock in the afternoon two or\nthree days later Mrs. Ambrose was standing brushing her hair, while\nher husband was in the dressing-room which opened out of her room, and\noccasionally, through the cascade of water--he was washing his face--she\ncaught exclamations, \"So it goes on year after year; I wish, I wish, I\nwish I could make an end of it,\" to which she paid no attention.\n\n\"It's white? Or only brown?\" Thus she herself murmured, examining a hair\nwhich gleamed suspiciously among the brown. She pulled it out and laid\nit on the dressing-table. She was criticising her own appearance, or\nrather approving of it, standing a little way back from the glass and\nlooking at her own face with superb pride and melancholy, when her\nhusband appeared in the doorway in his shirt sleeves, his face half\nobscured by a towel.\n\n\"You often tell me I don't notice things,\" he remarked.\n\n\"Tell me if this is a white hair, then?\" she replied. She laid the hair\non his hand.\n\n\"There's not a white hair on your head,\" he exclaimed.\n\n\"Ah, Ridley, I begin to doubt,\" she sighed; and bowed her head under\nhis eyes so that he might judge, but the inspection produced only a kiss\nwhere the line of parting ran, and husband and wife then proceeded to\nmove about the room, casually murmuring.\n\n\"What was that you were saying?\" Helen remarked, after an interval of\nconversation which no third person could have understood.\n\n\"Rachel--you ought to keep an eye upon Rachel,\" he observed\nsignificantly, and Helen, though she went on brushing her hair, looked\nat him. His observations were apt to be true.\n\n\"Young gentlemen don't interest themselves in young women's education\nwithout a motive,\" he remarked.\n\n\"Oh, Hirst,\" said Helen.\n\n\"Hirst and Hewet, they're all the same to me--all covered with spots,\"\nhe replied. \"He advises her to read Gibbon. Did you know that?\"\n\nHelen did not know that, but she would not allow herself inferior to her\nhusband in powers of observation. She merely said:\n\n\"Nothing would surprise me. Even that dreadful flying man we met at the\ndance--even Mr. Dalloway--even--\"\n\n\"I advise you to be circumspect,\" said Ridley. \"There's Willoughby,\nremember--Willoughby\"; he pointed at a letter.\n\nHelen looked with a sigh at an envelope which lay upon her\ndressing-table. Yes, there lay Willoughby, curt, inexpressive,\nperpetually jocular, robbing a whole continent of mystery, enquiring\nafter his daughter's manners and morals--hoping she wasn't a bore, and\nbidding them pack her off to him on board the very next ship if she\nwere--and then grateful and affectionate with suppressed emotion, and\nthen half a page about his own triumphs over wretched little natives who\nwent on strike and refused to load his ships, until he roared English\noaths at them, \"popping my head out of the window just as I was, in my\nshirt sleeves. The beggars had the sense to scatter.\"\n\n\"If Theresa married Willoughby,\" she remarked, turning the page with a\nhairpin, \"one doesn't see what's to prevent Rachel--\"\n\nBut Ridley was now off on grievances of his own connected with the\nwashing of his shirts, which somehow led to the frequent visits of\nHughling Elliot, who was a bore, a pedant, a dry stick of a man, and yet\nRidley couldn't simply point at the door and tell him to go. The truth\nof it was, they saw too many people. And so on and so on, more conjugal\ntalk pattering softly and unintelligibly, until they were both ready to\ngo down to tea.\n\nThe first thing that caught Helen's eye as she came downstairs was a\ncarriage at the door, filled with skirts and feathers nodding on the\ntops of hats. She had only time to gain the drawing-room before two\nnames were oddly mispronounced by the Spanish maid, and Mrs. Thornbury\ncame in slightly in advance of Mrs. Wilfrid Flushing.\n\n\"Mrs. Wilfrid Flushing,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, with a wave of her hand.\n\"A friend of our common friend Mrs. Raymond Parry.\"\n\nMrs. Flushing shook hands energetically. She was a woman of forty\nperhaps, very well set up and erect, splendidly robust, though not as\ntall as the upright carriage of her body made her appear.\n\nShe looked Helen straight in the face and said, \"You have a charmin'\nhouse.\"\n\nShe had a strongly marked face, her eyes looked straight at you, and\nthough naturally she was imperious in her manner she was nervous at the\nsame time. Mrs. Thornbury acted as interpreter, making things smooth all\nround by a series of charming commonplace remarks.\n\n\"I've taken it upon myself, Mr. Ambrose,\" she said, \"to promise that you\nwill be so kind as to give Mrs. Flushing the benefit of your experience.\nI'm sure no one here knows the country as well as you do. No one takes\nsuch wonderful long walks. No one, I'm sure, has your encyclopaedic\nknowledge upon every subject. Mr. Wilfrid Flushing is a collector. He\nhas discovered really beautiful things already. I had no notion that the\npeasants were so artistic--though of course in the past--\"\n\n\"Not old things--new things,\" interrupted Mrs. Flushing curtly. \"That\nis, if he takes my advice.\"\n\nThe Ambroses had not lived for many years in London without knowing\nsomething of a good many people, by name at least, and Helen remembered\nhearing of the Flushings. Mr. Flushing was a man who kept an old\nfurniture shop; he had always said he would not marry because most women\nhave red cheeks, and would not take a house because most houses have\nnarrow staircases, and would not eat meat because most animals bleed\nwhen they are killed; and then he had married an eccentric aristocratic\nlady, who certainly was not pale, who looked as if she ate meat, who had\nforced him to do all the things he most disliked--and this then was the\nlady. Helen looked at her with interest. They had moved out into the\ngarden, where the tea was laid under a tree, and Mrs. Flushing was\nhelping herself to cherry jam. She had a peculiar jerking movement of\nthe body when she spoke, which caused the canary-coloured plume on\nher hat to jerk too. Her small but finely-cut and vigorous features,\ntogether with the deep red of lips and cheeks, pointed to many\ngenerations of well-trained and well-nourished ancestors behind her.\n\n\"Nothin' that's more than twenty years old interests me,\" she continued.\n\"Mouldy old pictures, dirty old books, they stick 'em in museums when\nthey're only fit for burnin'.\"\n\n\"I quite agree,\" Helen laughed. \"But my husband spends his life in\ndigging up manuscripts which nobody wants.\" She was amused by Ridley's\nexpression of startled disapproval.\n\n\"There's a clever man in London called John who paints ever so much\nbetter than the old masters,\" Mrs. Flushing continued. \"His pictures\nexcite me--nothin' that's old excites me.\"\n\n\"But even his pictures will become old,\" Mrs. Thornbury intervened.\n\n\"Then I'll have 'em burnt, or I'll put it in my will,\" said Mrs.\nFlushing.\n\n\"And Mrs. Flushing lived in one of the most beautiful old houses in\nEngland--Chillingley,\" Mrs. Thornbury explained to the rest of them.\n\n\"If I'd my way I'd burn that to-morrow,\" Mrs. Flushing laughed. She had\na laugh like the cry of a jay, at once startling and joyless.\n\n\"What does any sane person want with those great big houses?\" she\ndemanded. \"If you go downstairs after dark you're covered with black\nbeetles, and the electric lights always goin' out. What would you do\nif spiders came out of the tap when you turned on the hot water?\" she\ndemanded, fixing her eye on Helen.\n\nMrs. Ambrose shrugged her shoulders with a smile.\n\n\"This is what I like,\" said Mrs. Flushing. She jerked her head at the\nVilla. \"A little house in a garden. I had one once in Ireland. One could\nlie in bed in the mornin' and pick roses outside the window with one's\ntoes.\"\n\n\"And the gardeners, weren't they surprised?\" Mrs. Thornbury enquired.\n\n\"There were no gardeners,\" Mrs. Flushing chuckled. \"Nobody but me and\nan old woman without any teeth. You know the poor in Ireland lose their\nteeth after they're twenty. But you wouldn't expect a politician to\nunderstand that--Arthur Balfour wouldn't understand that.\"\n\nRidley sighed that he never expected any one to understand anything,\nleast of all politicians.\n\n\"However,\" he concluded, \"there's one advantage I find in extreme old\nage--nothing matters a hang except one's food and one's digestion. All\nI ask is to be left alone to moulder away in solitude. It's obvious that\nthe world's going as fast as it can to--the Nethermost Pit, and all I\ncan do is to sit still and consume as much of my own smoke as possible.\"\nHe groaned, and with a melancholy glance laid the jam on his bread, for\nhe felt the atmosphere of this abrupt lady distinctly unsympathetic.\n\n\"I always contradict my husband when he says that,\" said Mrs. Thornbury\nsweetly. \"You men! Where would you be if it weren't for the women!\"\n\n\"Read the _Symposium_,\" said Ridley grimly.\n\n\"_Symposium_?\" cried Mrs. Flushing. \"That's Latin or Greek? Tell me, is\nthere a good translation?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Ridley. \"You will have to learn Greek.\"\n\nMrs. Flushing cried, \"Ah, ah, ah! I'd rather break stones in the road. I\nalways envy the men who break stones and sit on those nice little heaps\nall day wearin' spectacles. I'd infinitely rather break stones than\nclean out poultry runs, or feed the cows, or--\"\n\nHere Rachel came up from the lower garden with a book in her hand.\n\n\"What's that book?\" said Ridley, when she had shaken hands.\n\n\"It's Gibbon,\" said Rachel as she sat down.\n\n\"_The_ _Decline_ _and_ _Fall_ _of_ _the_ _Roman_ _Empire_?\" said Mrs.\nThornbury. \"A very wonderful book, I know. My dear father was always\nquoting it at us, with the result that we resolved never to read a\nline.\"\n\n\"Gibbon the historian?\" enquired Mrs. Flushing. \"I connect him with\nsome of the happiest hours of my life. We used to lie in bed and read\nGibbon--about the massacres of the Christians, I remember--when we were\nsupposed to be asleep. It's no joke, I can tell you, readin' a great\nbig book, in double columns, by a night-light, and the light that comes\nthrough a chink in the door. Then there were the moths--tiger moths,\nyellow moths, and horrid cockchafers. Louisa, my sister, would have the\nwindow open. I wanted it shut. We fought every night of our lives over\nthat window. Have you ever seen a moth dyin' in a night-light?\" she\nenquired.\n\nAgain there was an interruption. Hewet and Hirst appeared at the\ndrawing-room window and came up to the tea-table.\n\nRachel's heart beat hard. She was conscious of an extraordinary\nintensity in everything, as though their presence stripped some\ncover off the surface of things; but the greetings were remarkably\ncommonplace.\n\n\"Excuse me,\" said Hirst, rising from his chair directly he had sat down.\nHe went into the drawing-room, and returned with a cushion which he\nplaced carefully upon his seat.\n\n\"Rheumatism,\" he remarked, as he sat down for the second time.\n\n\"The result of the dance?\" Helen enquired.\n\n\"Whenever I get at all run down I tend to be rheumatic,\" Hirst stated.\nHe bent his wrist back sharply. \"I hear little pieces of chalk grinding\ntogether!\"\n\nRachel looked at him. She was amused, and yet she was respectful; if\nsuch a thing could be, the upper part of her face seemed to laugh, and\nthe lower part to check its laughter.\n\nHewet picked up the book that lay on the ground.\n\n\"You like this?\" he asked in an undertone.\n\n\"No, I don't like it,\" she replied. She had indeed been trying all\nthe afternoon to read it, and for some reason the glory which she had\nperceived at first had faded, and, read as she would, she could not\ngrasp the meaning with her mind.\n\n\"It goes round, round, round, like a roll of oil-cloth,\" she hazarded.\nEvidently she meant Hewet alone to hear her words, but Hirst demanded,\n\"What d'you mean?\"\n\nShe was instantly ashamed of her figure of speech, for she could not\nexplain it in words of sober criticism.\n\n\"Surely it's the most perfect style, so far as style goes, that's ever\nbeen invented,\" he continued. \"Every sentence is practically perfect,\nand the wit--\"\n\n\"Ugly in body, repulsive in mind,\" she thought, instead of thinking\nabout Gibbon's style. \"Yes, but strong, searching, unyielding in\nmind.\" She looked at his big head, a disproportionate part of which was\noccupied by the forehead, and at the direct, severe eyes.\n\n\"I give you up in despair,\" he said. He meant it lightly, but she took\nit seriously, and believed that her value as a human being was lessened\nbecause she did not happen to admire the style of Gibbon. The others\nwere talking now in a group about the native villages which Mrs.\nFlushing ought to visit.\n\n\"I despair too,\" she said impetuously. \"How are you going to judge\npeople merely by their minds?\"\n\n\"You agree with my spinster Aunt, I expect,\" said St. John in his jaunty\nmanner, which was always irritating because it made the person he\ntalked to appear unduly clumsy and in earnest. \"'Be good, sweet maid'--I\nthought Mr. Kingsley and my Aunt were now obsolete.\"\n\n\"One can be very nice without having read a book,\" she asserted. Very\nsilly and simple her words sounded, and laid her open to derision.\n\n\"Did I ever deny it?\" Hirst enquired, raising his eyebrows.\n\nMost unexpectedly Mrs. Thornbury here intervened, either because it\nwas her mission to keep things smooth or because she had long wished to\nspeak to Mr. Hirst, feeling as she did that young men were her sons.\n\n\"I have lived all my life with people like your Aunt, Mr. Hirst,\" she\nsaid, leaning forward in her chair. Her brown squirrel-like eyes became\neven brighter than usual. \"They have never heard of Gibbon. They only\ncare for their pheasants and their peasants. They are great big men who\nlook so fine on horseback, as people must have done, I think, in the\ndays of the great wars. Say what you like against them--they are animal,\nthey are unintellectual; they don't read themselves, and they don't want\nothers to read, but they are some of the finest and the kindest human\nbeings on the face of the earth! You would be surprised at some of\nthe stories I could tell. You have never guessed, perhaps, at all the\nromances that go on in the heart of the country. There are the people,\nI feel, among whom Shakespeare will be born if he is ever born again. In\nthose old houses, up among the Downs--\"\n\n\"My Aunt,\" Hirst interrupted, \"spends her life in East Lambeth among\nthe degraded poor. I only quoted my Aunt because she is inclined to\npersecute people she calls 'intellectual,' which is what I suspect Miss\nVinrace of doing. It's all the fashion now. If you're clever it's\nalways taken for granted that you're completely without sympathy,\nunderstanding, affection--all the things that really matter. Oh, you\nChristians! You're the most conceited, patronising, hypocritical set of\nold humbugs in the kingdom! Of course,\" he continued, \"I'm the first\nto allow your country gentlemen great merits. For one thing, they're\nprobably quite frank about their passions, which we are not. My father,\nwho is a clergyman in Norfolk, says that there is hardly a squire in the\ncountry who does not--\"\n\n\"But about Gibbon?\" Hewet interrupted. The look of nervous tension which\nhad come over every face was relaxed by the interruption.\n\n\"You find him monotonous, I suppose. But you know--\" He opened the book,\nand began searching for passages to read aloud, and in a little time he\nfound a good one which he considered suitable. But there was nothing in\nthe world that bored Ridley more than being read aloud to, and he was\nbesides scrupulously fastidious as to the dress and behaviour of ladies.\nIn the space of fifteen minutes he had decided against Mrs. Flushing on\nthe ground that her orange plume did not suit her complexion, that she\nspoke too loud, that she crossed her legs, and finally, when he saw\nher accept a cigarette that Hewet offered her, he jumped up, exclaiming\nsomething about \"bar parlours,\" and left them. Mrs. Flushing was\nevidently relieved by his departure. She puffed her cigarette, stuck her\nlegs out, and examined Helen closely as to the character and reputation\nof their common friend Mrs. Raymond Parry. By a series of little\nstrategems she drove her to define Mrs. Parry as somewhat elderly, by no\nmeans beautiful, very much made up--an insolent old harridan, in short,\nwhose parties were amusing because one met odd people; but Helen\nherself always pitied poor Mr. Parry, who was understood to be shut up\ndownstairs with cases full of gems, while his wife enjoyed herself\nin the drawing-room. \"Not that I believe what people say against\nher--although she hints, of course--\" Upon which Mrs. Flushing cried out\nwith delight:\n\n\"She's my first cousin! Go on--go on!\"\n\nWhen Mrs. Flushing rose to go she was obviously delighted with her new\nacquaintances. She made three or four different plans for meeting or\ngoing on an expedition, or showing Helen the things they had bought,\non her way to the carriage. She included them all in a vague but\nmagnificent invitation.\n\nAs Helen returned to the garden again, Ridley's words of warning came\ninto her head, and she hesitated a moment and looked at Rachel sitting\nbetween Hirst and Hewet. But she could draw no conclusions, for Hewet\nwas still reading Gibbon aloud, and Rachel, for all the expression she\nhad, might have been a shell, and his words water rubbing against her\nears, as water rubs a shell on the edge of a rock.\n\nHewet's voice was very pleasant. When he reached the end of the period\nHewet stopped, and no one volunteered any criticism.\n\n\"I do adore the aristocracy!\" Hirst exclaimed after a moment's pause.\n\"They're so amazingly unscrupulous. None of us would dare to behave as\nthat woman behaves.\"\n\n\"What I like about them,\" said Helen as she sat down, \"is that they're\nso well put together. Naked, Mrs. Flushing would be superb. Dressed as\nshe dresses, it's absurd, of course.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Hirst. A shade of depression crossed his face. \"I've never\nweighed more than ten stone in my life,\" he said, \"which is ridiculous,\nconsidering my height, and I've actually gone down in weight since we\ncame here. I daresay that accounts for the rheumatism.\" Again he jerked\nhis wrist back sharply, so that Helen might hear the grinding of the\nchalk stones. She could not help smiling.\n\n\"It's no laughing matter for me, I assure you,\" he protested. \"My\nmother's a chronic invalid, and I'm always expecting to be told that\nI've got heart disease myself. Rheumatism always goes to the heart in\nthe end.\"\n\n\"For goodness' sake, Hirst,\" Hewet protested; \"one might think you were\nan old cripple of eighty. If it comes to that, I had an aunt who died of\ncancer myself, but I put a bold face on it--\" He rose and began tilting\nhis chair backwards and forwards on its hind legs. \"Is any one here\ninclined for a walk?\" he said. \"There's a magnificent walk, up behind\nthe house. You come out on to a cliff and look right down into the sea.\nThe rocks are all red; you can see them through the water. The other day\nI saw a sight that fairly took my breath away--about twenty jelly-fish,\nsemi-transparent, pink, with long streamers, floating on the top of the\nwaves.\"\n\n\"Sure they weren't mermaids?\" said Hirst. \"It's much too hot to climb\nuphill.\" He looked at Helen, who showed no signs of moving.\n\n\"Yes, it's too hot,\" Helen decided.\n\nThere was a short silence.\n\n\"I'd like to come,\" said Rachel.\n\n\"But she might have said that anyhow,\" Helen thought to herself as Hewet\nand Rachel went away together, and Helen was left alone with St. John,\nto St. John's obvious satisfaction.\n\nHe may have been satisfied, but his usual difficulty in deciding that\none subject was more deserving of notice than another prevented him from\nspeaking for some time. He sat staring intently at the head of a dead\nmatch, while Helen considered--so it seemed from the expression of her\neyes--something not closely connected with the present moment.\n\nAt last St. John exclaimed, \"Damn! Damn everything! Damn everybody!\" he\nadded. \"At Cambridge there are people to talk to.\"\n\n\"At Cambridge there are people to talk to,\" Helen echoed him,\nrhythmically and absent-mindedly. Then she woke up. \"By the way, have\nyou settled what you're going to do--is it to be Cambridge or the Bar?\"\n\nHe pursed his lips, but made no immediate answer, for Helen was still\nslightly inattentive. She had been thinking about Rachel and which of\nthe two young men she was likely to fall in love with, and now sitting\nopposite to Hirst she thought, \"He's ugly. It's a pity they're so ugly.\"\n\nShe did not include Hewet in this criticism; she was thinking of the\nclever, honest, interesting young men she knew, of whom Hirst was a\ngood example, and wondering whether it was necessary that thought and\nscholarship should thus maltreat their bodies, and should thus elevate\ntheir minds to a very high tower from which the human race appeared to\nthem like rats and mice squirming on the flat.\n\n\"And the future?\" she reflected, vaguely envisaging a race of men\nbecoming more and more like Hirst, and a race of women becoming more and\nmore like Rachel. \"Oh no,\" she concluded, glancing at him, \"one wouldn't\nmarry you. Well, then, the future of the race is in the hands of Susan\nand Arthur; no--that's dreadful. Of farm labourers; no--not of the\nEnglish at all, but of Russians and Chinese.\" This train of thought did\nnot satisfy her, and was interrupted by St. John, who began again:\n\n\"I wish you knew Bennett. He's the greatest man in the world.\"\n\n\"Bennett?\" she enquired. Becoming more at ease, St. John dropped the\nconcentrated abruptness of his manner, and explained that Bennett was\na man who lived in an old windmill six miles out of Cambridge. He lived\nthe perfect life, according to St. John, very lonely, very simple,\ncaring only for the truth of things, always ready to talk, and\nextraordinarily modest, though his mind was of the greatest.\n\n\"Don't you think,\" said St. John, when he had done describing him, \"that\nkind of thing makes this kind of thing rather flimsy? Did you notice at\ntea how poor old Hewet had to change the conversation? How they were\nall ready to pounce upon me because they thought I was going to say\nsomething improper? It wasn't anything, really. If Bennett had been\nthere he'd have said exactly what he meant to say, or he'd have got up\nand gone. But there's something rather bad for the character in that--I\nmean if one hasn't got Bennett's character. It's inclined to make one\nbitter. Should you say that I was bitter?\"\n\nHelen did not answer, and he continued:\n\n\"Of course I am, disgustingly bitter, and it's a beastly thing to be.\nBut the worst of me is that I'm so envious. I envy every one. I can't\nendure people who do things better than I do--perfectly absurd things\ntoo--waiters balancing piles of plates--even Arthur, because Susan's in\nlove with him. I want people to like me, and they don't. It's partly my\nappearance, I expect,\" he continued, \"though it's an absolute lie to\nsay I've Jewish blood in me--as a matter of fact we've been in Norfolk,\nHirst of Hirstbourne Hall, for three centuries at least. It must be\nawfully soothing to be like you--every one liking one at once.\"\n\n\"I assure you they don't,\" Helen laughed.\n\n\"They do,\" said Hirst with conviction. \"In the first place, you're\nthe most beautiful woman I've ever seen; in the second, you have an\nexceptionally nice nature.\"\n\nIf Hirst had looked at her instead of looking intently at his teacup\nhe would have seen Helen blush, partly with pleasure, partly with an\nimpulse of affection towards the young man who had seemed, and would\nseem again, so ugly and so limited. She pitied him, for she suspected\nthat he suffered, and she was interested in him, for many of the things\nhe said seemed to her true; she admired the morality of youth, and yet\nshe felt imprisoned. As if her instinct were to escape to something\nbrightly coloured and impersonal, which she could hold in her hands,\nshe went into the house and returned with her embroidery. But he was not\ninterested in her embroidery; he did not even look at it.\n\n\"About Miss Vinrace,\" he began,--\"oh, look here, do let's be St. John\nand Helen, and Rachel and Terence--what's she like? Does she reason,\ndoes she feel, or is she merely a kind of footstool?\"\n\n\"Oh no,\" said Helen, with great decision. From her observations at\ntea she was inclined to doubt whether Hirst was the person to educate\nRachel. She had gradually come to be interested in her niece, and fond\nof her; she disliked some things about her very much, she was amused by\nothers; but she felt her, on the whole, a live if unformed human being,\nexperimental, and not always fortunate in her experiments, but with\npowers of some kind, and a capacity for feeling. Somewhere in the\ndepths of her, too, she was bound to Rachel by the indestructible if\ninexplicable ties of sex. \"She seems vague, but she's a will of her\nown,\" she said, as if in the interval she had run through her qualities.\n\nThe embroidery, which was a matter for thought, the design being\ndifficult and the colours wanting consideration, brought lapses into the\ndialogue when she seemed to be engrossed in her skeins of silk, or, with\nhead a little drawn back and eyes narrowed, considered the effect of\nthe whole. Thus she merely said, \"Um-m-m\" to St. John's next remark, \"I\nshall ask her to go for a walk with me.\"\n\nPerhaps he resented this division of attention. He sat silent watching\nHelen closely.\n\n\"You're absolutely happy,\" he proclaimed at last.\n\n\"Yes?\" Helen enquired, sticking in her needle.\n\n\"Marriage, I suppose,\" said St. John.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Helen, gently drawing her needle out.\n\n\"Children?\" St. John enquired.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Helen, sticking her needle in again. \"I don't know why I'm\nhappy,\" she suddenly laughed, looking him full in the face. There was a\nconsiderable pause.\n\n\"There's an abyss between us,\" said St. John. His voice sounded as if\nit issued from the depths of a cavern in the rocks. \"You're infinitely\nsimpler than I am. Women always are, of course. That's the difficulty.\nOne never knows how a woman gets there. Supposing all the time you're\nthinking, 'Oh, what a morbid young man!'\"\n\nHelen sat and looked at him with her needle in her hand. From\nher position she saw his head in front of the dark pyramid of a\nmagnolia-tree. With one foot raised on the rung of a chair, and her\nelbow out in the attitude for sewing, her own figure possessed the\nsublimity of a woman's of the early world, spinning the thread of\nfate--the sublimity possessed by many women of the present day who fall\ninto the attitude required by scrubbing or sewing. St. John looked at\nher.\n\n\"I suppose you've never paid any a compliment in the course of your\nlife,\" he said irrelevantly.\n\n\"I spoil Ridley rather,\" Helen considered.\n\n\"I'm going to ask you point blank--do you like me?\"\n\nAfter a certain pause, she replied, \"Yes, certainly.\"\n\n\"Thank God!\" he exclaimed. \"That's one mercy. You see,\" he continued\nwith emotion, \"I'd rather you liked me than any one I've ever met.\"\n\n\"What about the five philosophers?\" said Helen, with a laugh, stitching\nfirmly and swiftly at her canvas. \"I wish you'd describe them.\"\n\nHirst had no particular wish to describe them, but when he began to\nconsider them he found himself soothed and strengthened. Far away to the\nother side of the world as they were, in smoky rooms, and grey medieval\ncourts, they appeared remarkable figures, free-spoken men with whom one\ncould be at ease; incomparably more subtle in emotion than the people\nhere. They gave him, certainly, what no woman could give him, not Helen\neven. Warming at the thought of them, he went on to lay his case before\nMrs. Ambrose. Should he stay on at Cambridge or should he go to the\nBar? One day he thought one thing, another day another. Helen listened\nattentively. At last, without any preface, she pronounced her decision.\n\n\"Leave Cambridge and go to the Bar,\" she said. He pressed her for her\nreasons.\n\n\"I think you'd enjoy London more,\" she said. It did not seem a very\nsubtle reason, but she appeared to think it sufficient. She looked at\nhim against the background of flowering magnolia. There was something\ncurious in the sight. Perhaps it was that the heavy wax-like flowers\nwere so smooth and inarticulate, and his face--he had thrown his hat\naway, his hair was rumpled, he held his eye-glasses in his hand, so\nthat a red mark appeared on either side of his nose--was so worried and\ngarrulous. It was a beautiful bush, spreading very widely, and all the\ntime she had sat there talking she had been noticing the patches of\nshade and the shape of the leaves, and the way the great white flowers\nsat in the midst of the green. She had noticed it half-consciously,\nnevertheless the pattern had become part of their talk. She laid down\nher sewing, and began to walk up and down the garden, and Hirst rose too\nand paced by her side. He was rather disturbed, uncomfortable, and full\nof thought. Neither of them spoke.\n\nThe sun was beginning to go down, and a change had come over the\nmountains, as if they were robbed of their earthly substance, and\ncomposed merely of intense blue mist. Long thin clouds of flamingo red,\nwith edges like the edges of curled ostrich feathers, lay up and down\nthe sky at different altitudes. The roofs of the town seemed to have\nsunk lower than usual; the cypresses appeared very black between the\nroofs, and the roofs themselves were brown and white. As usual in\nthe evening, single cries and single bells became audible rising from\nbeneath.\n\nSt. John stopped suddenly.\n\n\"Well, you must take the responsibility,\" he said. \"I've made up my\nmind; I shall go to the Bar.\"\n\nHis words were very serious, almost emotional; they recalled Helen after\na second's hesitation.\n\n\"I'm sure you're right,\" she said warmly, and shook the hand he held\nout. \"You'll be a great man, I'm certain.\"\n\nThen, as if to make him look at the scene, she swept her hand round the\nimmense circumference of the view. From the sea, over the roofs of the\ntown, across the crests of the mountains, over the river and the plain,\nand again across the crests of the mountains it swept until it reached\nthe villa, the garden, the magnolia-tree, and the figures of Hirst and\nherself standing together, when it dropped to her side.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XVI\n\n\nHewet and Rachel had long ago reached the particular place on the edge\nof the cliff where, looking down into the sea, you might chance on\njelly-fish and dolphins. Looking the other way, the vast expanse of land\ngave them a sensation which is given by no view, however extended, in\nEngland; the villages and the hills there having names, and the farthest\nhorizon of hills as often as not dipping and showing a line of mist\nwhich is the sea; here the view was one of infinite sun-dried earth,\nearth pointed in pinnacles, heaped in vast barriers, earth widening\nand spreading away and away like the immense floor of the sea, earth\nchequered by day and by night, and partitioned into different lands,\nwhere famous cities were founded, and the races of men changed from dark\nsavages to white civilised men, and back to dark savages again. Perhaps\ntheir English blood made this prospect uncomfortably impersonal and\nhostile to them, for having once turned their faces that way they next\nturned them to the sea, and for the rest of the time sat looking at\nthe sea. The sea, though it was a thin and sparkling water here, which\nseemed incapable of surge or anger, eventually narrowed itself, clouded\nits pure tint with grey, and swirled through narrow channels and dashed\nin a shiver of broken waters against massive granite rocks. It was this\nsea that flowed up to the mouth of the Thames; and the Thames washed the\nroots of the city of London.\n\nHewet's thoughts had followed some such course as this, for the first\nthing he said as they stood on the edge of the cliff was--\n\n\"I'd like to be in England!\"\n\nRachel lay down on her elbow, and parted the tall grasses which grew on\nthe edge, so that she might have a clear view. The water was very calm;\nrocking up and down at the base of the cliff, and so clear that one\ncould see the red of the stones at the bottom of it. So it had been at\nthe birth of the world, and so it had remained ever since. Probably no\nhuman being had ever broken that water with boat or with body. Obeying\nsome impulse, she determined to mar that eternity of peace, and threw\nthe largest pebble she could find. It struck the water, and the ripples\nspread out and out. Hewet looked down too.\n\n\"It's wonderful,\" he said, as they widened and ceased. The freshness and\nthe newness seemed to him wonderful. He threw a pebble next. There was\nscarcely any sound.\n\n\"But England,\" Rachel murmured in the absorbed tone of one whose eyes\nare concentrated upon some sight. \"What d'you want with England?\"\n\n\"My friends chiefly,\" he said, \"and all the things one does.\"\n\nHe could look at Rachel without her noticing it. She was still absorbed\nin the water and the exquisitely pleasant sensations which a little\ndepth of the sea washing over rocks suggests. He noticed that she was\nwearing a dress of deep blue colour, made of a soft thin cotton stuff,\nwhich clung to the shape of her body. It was a body with the angles\nand hollows of a young woman's body not yet developed, but in no way\ndistorted, and thus interesting and even lovable. Raising his eyes Hewet\nobserved her head; she had taken her hat off, and the face rested on her\nhand. As she looked down into the sea, her lips were slightly parted.\nThe expression was one of childlike intentness, as if she were watching\nfor a fish to swim past over the clear red rocks. Nevertheless her\ntwenty-four years of life had given her a look of reserve. Her hand,\nwhich lay on the ground, the fingers curling slightly in, was well\nshaped and competent; the square-tipped and nervous fingers were the\nfingers of a musician. With something like anguish Hewet realised that,\nfar from being unattractive, her body was very attractive to him. She\nlooked up suddenly. Her eyes were full of eagerness and interest.\n\n\"You write novels?\" she asked.\n\nFor the moment he could not think what he was saying. He was overcome\nwith the desire to hold her in his arms.\n\n\"Oh yes,\" he said. \"That is, I want to write them.\"\n\nShe would not take her large grey eyes off his face.\n\n\"Novels,\" she repeated. \"Why do you write novels? You ought to write\nmusic. Music, you see\"--she shifted her eyes, and became less desirable\nas her brain began to work, inflicting a certain change upon her\nface--\"music goes straight for things. It says all there is to say at\nonce. With writing it seems to me there's so much\"--she paused for an\nexpression, and rubbed her fingers in the earth--\"scratching on the\nmatchbox. Most of the time when I was reading Gibbon this afternoon\nI was horribly, oh infernally, damnably bored!\" She gave a shake of\nlaughter, looking at Hewet, who laughed too.\n\n\"_I_ shan't lend you books,\" he remarked.\n\n\"Why is it,\" Rachel continued, \"that I can laugh at Mr. Hirst to you,\nbut not to his face? At tea I was completely overwhelmed, not by his\nugliness--by his mind.\" She enclosed a circle in the air with her hands.\nShe realised with a great sense of comfort who easily she could talk\nto Hewet, those thorns or ragged corners which tear the surface of some\nrelationships being smoothed away.\n\n\"So I observed,\" said Hewet. \"That's a thing that never ceases to amaze\nme.\" He had recovered his composure to such an extent that he could\nlight and smoke a cigarette, and feeling her ease, became happy and easy\nhimself.\n\n\"The respect that women, even well-educated, very able women, have for\nmen,\" he went on. \"I believe we must have the sort of power over you\nthat we're said to have over horses. They see us three times as big as\nwe are or they'd never obey us. For that very reason, I'm inclined to\ndoubt that you'll ever do anything even when you have the vote.\" He\nlooked at her reflectively. She appeared very smooth and sensitive and\nyoung. \"It'll take at least six generations before you're sufficiently\nthick-skinned to go into law courts and business offices. Consider what\na bully the ordinary man is,\" he continued, \"the ordinary hard-working,\nrather ambitious solicitor or man of business with a family to bring up\nand a certain position to maintain. And then, of course, the daughters\nhave to give way to the sons; the sons have to be educated; they have to\nbully and shove for their wives and families, and so it all comes over\nagain. And meanwhile there are the women in the background. . . . Do you\nreally think that the vote will do you any good?\"\n\n\"The vote?\" Rachel repeated. She had to visualise it as a little bit of\npaper which she dropped into a box before she understood his question,\nand looking at each other they smiled at something absurd in the\nquestion.\n\n\"Not to me,\" she said. \"But I play the piano. . . . Are men really like\nthat?\" she asked, returning to the question that interested her. \"I'm\nnot afraid of you.\" She looked at him easily.\n\n\"Oh, I'm different,\" Hewet replied. \"I've got between six and seven\nhundred a year of my own. And then no one takes a novelist seriously,\nthank heavens. There's no doubt it helps to make up for the drudgery of\na profession if a man's taken very, very seriously by every one--if\nhe gets appointments, and has offices and a title, and lots of letters\nafter his name, and bits of ribbon and degrees. I don't grudge it 'em,\nthough sometimes it comes over me--what an amazing concoction! What a\nmiracle the masculine conception of life is--judges, civil servants,\narmy, navy, Houses of Parliament, lord mayors--what a world we've made\nof it! Look at Hirst now. I assure you,\" he said, \"not a day's passed\nsince we came here without a discussion as to whether he's to stay on at\nCambridge or to go to the Bar. It's his career--his sacred career. And\nif I've heard it twenty times, I'm sure his mother and sister have heard\nit five hundred times. Can't you imagine the family conclaves, and the\nsister told to run out and feed the rabbits because St. John must have\nthe school-room to himself--'St. John's working,' 'St. John wants his\ntea brought to him.' Don't you know the kind of thing? No wonder that\nSt. John thinks it a matter of considerable importance. It is too.\nHe has to earn his living. But St. John's sister--\" Hewet puffed in\nsilence. \"No one takes her seriously, poor dear. She feeds the rabbits.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Rachel. \"I've fed rabbits for twenty-four years; it seems\nodd now.\" She looked meditative, and Hewet, who had been talking much at\nrandom and instinctively adopting the feminine point of view, saw that\nshe would now talk about herself, which was what he wanted, for so they\nmight come to know each other.\n\nShe looked back meditatively upon her past life.\n\n\"How do you spend your day?\" he asked.\n\nShe meditated still. When she thought of their day it seemed to her it\nwas cut into four pieces by their meals. These divisions were absolutely\nrigid, the contents of the day having to accommodate themselves within\nthe four rigid bars. Looking back at her life, that was what she saw.\n\n\"Breakfast nine; luncheon one; tea five; dinner eight,\" she said.\n\n\"Well,\" said Hewet, \"what d'you do in the morning?\"\n\n\"I need to play the piano for hours and hours.\"\n\n\"And after luncheon?\"\n\n\"Then I went shopping with one of my aunts. Or we went to see some one,\nor we took a message; or we did something that had to be done--the taps\nmight be leaking. They visit the poor a good deal--old char-women with\nbad legs, women who want tickets for hospitals. Or I used to walk in the\npark by myself. And after tea people sometimes called; or in summer we\nsat in the garden or played croquet; in winter I read aloud, while\nthey worked; after dinner I played the piano and they wrote letters.\nIf father was at home we had friends of his to dinner, and about once a\nmonth we went up to the play. Every now and then we dined out; sometimes\nI went to a dance in London, but that was difficult because of getting\nback. The people we saw were old family friends, and relations, but we\ndidn't see many people. There was the clergyman, Mr. Pepper, and the\nHunts. Father generally wanted to be quiet when he came home, because he\nworks very hard at Hull. Also my aunts aren't very strong. A house takes\nup a lot of time if you do it properly. Our servants were always bad,\nand so Aunt Lucy used to do a good deal in the kitchen, and Aunt Clara,\nI think, spent most of the morning dusting the drawing-room and going\nthrough the linen and silver. Then there were the dogs. They had to be\nexercised, besides being washed and brushed. Now Sandy's dead, but Aunt\nClara has a very old cockatoo that came from India. Everything in\nour house,\" she exclaimed, \"comes from somewhere! It's full of old\nfurniture, not really old, Victorian, things mother's family had or\nfather's family had, which they didn't like to get rid of, I suppose,\nthough we've really no room for them. It's rather a nice house,\" she\ncontinued, \"except that it's a little dingy--dull I should say.\" She\ncalled up before her eyes a vision of the drawing-room at home; it was\na large oblong room, with a square window opening on the garden. Green\nplush chairs stood against the wall; there was a heavy carved book-case,\nwith glass doors, and a general impression of faded sofa covers, large\nspaces of pale green, and baskets with pieces of wool-work dropping out\nof them. Photographs from old Italian masterpieces hung on the walls,\nand views of Venetian bridges and Swedish waterfalls which members of\nthe family had seen years ago. There were also one or two portraits of\nfathers and grandmothers, and an engraving of John Stuart Mill, after\nthe picture by Watts. It was a room without definite character, being\nneither typically and openly hideous, nor strenuously artistic, nor\nreally comfortable. Rachel roused herself from the contemplation of this\nfamiliar picture.\n\n\"But this isn't very interesting for you,\" she said, looking up.\n\n\"Good Lord!\" Hewet exclaimed. \"I've never been so much interested in my\nlife.\" She then realised that while she had been thinking of Richmond,\nhis eyes had never left her face. The knowledge of this excited her.\n\n\"Go on, please go on,\" he urged. \"Let's imagine it's a Wednesday. You're\nall at luncheon. You sit there, and Aunt Lucy there, and Aunt Clara\nhere\"; he arranged three pebbles on the grass between them.\n\n\"Aunt Clara carves the neck of lamb,\" Rachel continued. She fixed her\ngaze upon the pebbles. \"There's a very ugly yellow china stand in\nfront of me, called a dumb waiter, on which are three dishes, one for\nbiscuits, one for butter, and one for cheese. There's a pot of ferns.\nThen there's Blanche the maid, who snuffles because of her nose. We\ntalk--oh yes, it's Aunt Lucy's afternoon at Walworth, so we're rather\nquick over luncheon. She goes off. She has a purple bag, and a black\nnotebook. Aunt Clara has what they call a G.F.S. meeting in the\ndrawing-room on Wednesday, so I take the dogs out. I go up Richmond\nHill, along the terrace, into the park. It's the 18th of April--the same\nday as it is here. It's spring in England. The ground is rather damp.\nHowever, I cross the road and get on to the grass and we walk along, and\nI sing as I always do when I'm alone, until we come to the open place\nwhere you can see the whole of London beneath you on a clear day.\nHampstead Church spire there, Westminster Cathedral over there, and\nfactory chimneys about here. There's generally a haze over the low parts\nof London; but it's often blue over the park when London's in a mist.\nIt's the open place that the balloons cross going over to Hurlingham.\nThey're pale yellow. Well, then, it smells very good, particularly if\nthey happen to be burning wood in the keeper's lodge which is there.\nI could tell you now how to get from place to place, and exactly what\ntrees you'd pass, and where you'd cross the roads. You see, I played\nthere when I was small. Spring is good, but it's best in the autumn\nwhen the deer are barking; then it gets dusky, and I go back through the\nstreets, and you can't see people properly; they come past very quick,\nyou just see their faces and then they're gone--that's what I like--and\nno one knows in the least what you're doing--\"\n\n\"But you have to be back for tea, I suppose?\" Hewet checked her.\n\n\"Tea? Oh yes. Five o'clock. Then I say what I've done, and my aunts\nsay what they've done, and perhaps some one comes in: Mrs. Hunt, let's\nsuppose. She's an old lady with a lame leg. She has or she once had\neight children; so we ask after them. They're all over the world; so we\nask where they are, and sometimes they're ill, or they're stationed in\na cholera district, or in some place where it only rains once in five\nmonths. Mrs. Hunt,\" she said with a smile, \"had a son who was hugged to\ndeath by a bear.\"\n\nHere she stopped and looked at Hewet to see whether he was amused by\nthe same things that amused her. She was reassured. But she thought it\nnecessary to apologise again; she had been talking too much.\n\n\"You can't conceive how it interests me,\" he said. Indeed, his cigarette\nhad gone out, and he had to light another.\n\n\"Why does it interest you?\" she asked.\n\n\"Partly because you're a woman,\" he replied. When he said this, Rachel,\nwho had become oblivious of anything, and had reverted to a\nchildlike state of interest and pleasure, lost her freedom and became\nself-conscious. She felt herself at once singular and under observation,\nas she felt with St. John Hirst. She was about to launch into an\nargument which would have made them both feel bitterly against each\nother, and to define sensations which had no such importance as words\nwere bound to give them when Hewet led her thoughts in a different\ndirection.\n\n\"I've often walked along the streets where people live all in a row, and\none house is exactly like another house, and wondered what on earth the\nwomen were doing inside,\" he said. \"Just consider: it's the beginning of\nthe twentieth century, and until a few years ago no woman had ever come\nout by herself and said things at all. There it was going on in the\nbackground, for all those thousands of years, this curious silent\nunrepresented life. Of course we're always writing about women--abusing\nthem, or jeering at them, or worshipping them; but it's never come from\nwomen themselves. I believe we still don't know in the least how they\nlive, or what they feel, or what they do precisely. If one's a man, the\nonly confidences one gets are from young women about their love affairs.\nBut the lives of women of forty, of unmarried women, of working women,\nof women who keep shops and bring up children, of women like your aunts\nor Mrs. Thornbury or Miss Allan--one knows nothing whatever about them.\nThey won't tell you. Either they're afraid, or they've got a way of\ntreating men. It's the man's view that's represented, you see. Think of\na railway train: fifteen carriages for men who want to smoke. Doesn't it\nmake your blood boil? If I were a woman I'd blow some one's brains\nout. Don't you laugh at us a great deal? Don't you think it all a great\nhumbug? You, I mean--how does it all strike you?\"\n\nHis determination to know, while it gave meaning to their talk, hampered\nher; he seemed to press further and further, and made it appear so\nimportant. She took some time to answer, and during that time she went\nover and over the course of her twenty-four years, lighting now on one\npoint, now on another--on her aunts, her mother, her father, and at last\nher mind fixed upon her aunts and her father, and she tried to describe\nthem as at this distance they appeared to her.\n\nThey were very much afraid of her father. He was a great dim force in\nthe house, by means of which they held on to the great world which is\nrepresented every morning in the _Times_. But the real life of the house\nwas something quite different from this. It went on independently of\nMr. Vinrace, and tended to hide itself from him. He was good-humoured\ntowards them, but contemptuous. She had always taken it for granted that\nhis point of view was just, and founded upon an ideal scale of things\nwhere the life of one person was absolutely more important than the life\nof another, and that in that scale they were much less importance than\nhe was. But did she really believe that? Hewet's words made her think.\nShe always submitted to her father, just as they did, but it was her\naunts who influenced her really; her aunts who built up the fine,\nclosely woven substance of their life at home. They were less splendid\nbut more natural than her father was. All her rages had been against\nthem; it was their world with its four meals, its punctuality, and\nservants on the stairs at half-past ten, that she examined so closely\nand wanted so vehemently to smash to atoms. Following these thoughts she\nlooked up and said:\n\n\"And there's a sort of beauty in it--there they are at Richmond at this\nvery moment building things up. They're all wrong, perhaps, but there's\na sort of beauty in it,\" she repeated. \"It's so unconscious, so modest.\nAnd yet they feel things. They do mind if people die. Old spinsters are\nalways doing things. I don't quite know what they do. Only that was what\nI felt when I lived with them. It was very real.\"\n\nShe reviewed their little journeys to and fro, to Walworth, to charwomen\nwith bad legs, to meetings for this and that, their minute acts of\ncharity and unselfishness which flowered punctually from a definite view\nof what they ought to do, their friendships, their tastes and habits;\nshe saw all these things like grains of sand falling, falling through\ninnumerable days, making an atmosphere and building up a solid mass, a\nbackground. Hewet observed her as she considered this.\n\n\"Were you happy?\" he demanded.\n\nAgain she had become absorbed in something else, and he called her back\nto an unusually vivid consciousness of herself.\n\n\"I was both,\" she replied. \"I was happy and I was miserable. You've no\nconception what it's like--to be a young woman.\" She looked straight at\nhim. \"There are terrors and agonies,\" she said, keeping her eye on him\nas if to detect the slightest hint of laughter.\n\n\"I can believe it,\" he said. He returned her look with perfect\nsincerity.\n\n\"Women one sees in the streets,\" she said.\n\n\"Prostitutes?\"\n\n\"Men kissing one.\"\n\nHe nodded his head.\n\n\"You were never told?\"\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n\"And then,\" she began and stopped. Here came in the great space of life\ninto which no one had ever penetrated. All that she had been saying\nabout her father and her aunts and walks in Richmond Park, and what they\ndid from hour to hour, was merely on the surface. Hewet was watching\nher. Did he demand that she should describe that also? Why did he sit\nso near and keep his eye on her? Why did they not have done with this\nsearching and agony? Why did they not kiss each other simply? She wished\nto kiss him. But all the time she went on spinning out words.\n\n\"A girl is more lonely than a boy. No one cares in the least what she\ndoes. Nothing's expected of her. Unless one's very pretty people don't\nlisten to what you say. . . . And that is what I like,\" she added\nenergetically, as if the memory were very happy. \"I like walking in\nRichmond Park and singing to myself and knowing it doesn't matter a damn\nto anybody. I like seeing things go on--as we saw you that night when\nyou didn't see us--I love the freedom of it--it's like being the wind or\nthe sea.\" She turned with a curious fling of her hands and looked at the\nsea. It was still very blue, dancing away as far as the eye could reach,\nbut the light on it was yellower, and the clouds were turning flamingo\nred.\n\nA feeling of intense depression crossed Hewet's mind as she spoke.\nIt seemed plain that she would never care for one person rather than\nanother; she was evidently quite indifferent to him; they seemed to\ncome very near, and then they were as far apart as ever again; and her\ngesture as she turned away had been oddly beautiful.\n\n\"Nonsense,\" he said abruptly. \"You like people. You like admiration.\nYour real grudge against Hirst is that he doesn't admire you.\"\n\nShe made no answer for some time. Then she said:\n\n\"That's probably true. Of course I like people--I like almost every one\nI've ever met.\"\n\nShe turned her back on the sea and regarded Hewet with friendly if\ncritical eyes. He was good-looking in the sense that he had always had\na sufficiency of beef to eat and fresh air to breathe. His head was big;\nthe eyes were also large; though generally vague they could be forcible;\nand the lips were sensitive. One might account him a man of considerable\npassion and fitful energy, likely to be at the mercy of moods which had\nlittle relation to facts; at once tolerant and fastidious. The breadth\nof his forehead showed capacity for thought. The interest with which\nRachel looked at him was heard in her voice.\n\n\"What novels do you write?\" she asked.\n\n\"I want to write a novel about Silence,\" he said; \"the things people\ndon't say. But the difficulty is immense.\" He sighed. \"However, you\ndon't care,\" he continued. He looked at her almost severely. \"Nobody\ncares. All you read a novel for is to see what sort of person the writer\nis, and, if you know him, which of his friends he's put in. As for the\nnovel itself, the whole conception, the way one's seen the thing,\nfelt about it, make it stand in relation to other things, not one in\na million cares for that. And yet I sometimes wonder whether there's\nanything else in the whole world worth doing. These other people,\" he\nindicated the hotel, \"are always wanting something they can't get. But\nthere's an extraordinary satisfaction in writing, even in the attempt\nto write. What you said just now is true: one doesn't want to be things;\none wants merely to be allowed to see them.\"\n\nSome of the satisfaction of which he spoke came into his face as he\ngazed out to sea.\n\nIt was Rachel's turn now to feel depressed. As he talked of writing he\nhad become suddenly impersonal. He might never care for any one; all\nthat desire to know her and get at her, which she had felt pressing on\nher almost painfully, had completely vanished.\n\n\"Are you a good writer?\" she asked.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said. \"I'm not first-rate, of course; I'm good second-rate;\nabout as good as Thackeray, I should say.\"\n\nRachel was amazed. For one thing it amazed her to hear Thackeray called\nsecond-rate; and then she could not widen her point of view to believe\nthat there could be great writers in existence at the present day, or\nif there were, that any one she knew could be a great writer, and his\nself-confidence astounded her, and he became more and more remote.\n\n\"My other novel,\" Hewet continued, \"is about a young man who is obsessed\nby an idea--the idea of being a gentleman. He manages to exist at\nCambridge on a hundred pounds a year. He has a coat; it was once a very\ngood coat. But the trousers--they're not so good. Well, he goes up to\nLondon, gets into good society, owing to an early-morning adventure on\nthe banks of the Serpentine. He is led into telling lies--my idea, you\nsee, is to show the gradual corruption of the soul--calls himself the\nson of some great landed proprietor in Devonshire. Meanwhile the coat\nbecomes older and older, and he hardly dares to wear the trousers. Can't\nyou imagine the wretched man, after some splendid evening of debauchery,\ncontemplating these garments--hanging them over the end of the bed,\narranging them now in full light, now in shade, and wondering whether\nthey will survive him, or he will survive them? Thoughts of suicide\ncross his mind. He has a friend, too, a man who somehow subsists\nupon selling small birds, for which he sets traps in the fields near\nUxbridge. They're scholars, both of them. I know one or two wretched\nstarving creatures like that who quote Aristotle at you over a fried\nherring and a pint of porter. Fashionable life, too, I have to represent\nat some length, in order to show my hero under all circumstances. Lady\nTheo Bingham Bingley, whose bay mare he had the good fortune to stop,\nis the daughter of a very fine old Tory peer. I'm going to describe the\nkind of parties I once went to--the fashionable intellectuals, you know,\nwho like to have the latest book on their tables. They give parties,\nriver parties, parties where you play games. There's no difficulty in\nconceiving incidents; the difficulty is to put them into shape--not to\nget run away with, as Lady Theo was. It ended disastrously for her, poor\nwoman, for the book, as I planned it, was going to end in profound and\nsordid respectability. Disowned by her father, she marries my hero, and\nthey live in a snug little villa outside Croydon, in which town he is\nset up as a house agent. He never succeeds in becoming a real gentleman\nafter all. That's the interesting part of it. Does it seem to you the\nkind of book you'd like to read?\" he enquired; \"or perhaps you'd like my\nStuart tragedy better,\" he continued, without waiting for her to answer\nhim. \"My idea is that there's a certain quality of beauty in the past,\nwhich the ordinary historical novelist completely ruins by his absurd\nconventions. The moon becomes the Regent of the Skies. People clap spurs\nto their horses, and so on. I'm going to treat people as though they\nwere exactly the same as we are. The advantage is that, detached from\nmodern conditions, one can make them more intense and more abstract then\npeople who live as we do.\"\n\nRachel had listened to all this with attention, but with a certain\namount of bewilderment. They both sat thinking their own thoughts.\n\n\"I'm not like Hirst,\" said Hewet, after a pause; he spoke meditatively;\n\"I don't see circles of chalk between people's feet. I sometimes wish I\ndid. It seems to me so tremendously complicated and confused. One can't\ncome to any decision at all; one's less and less capable of making\njudgments. D'you find that? And then one never knows what any one feels.\nWe're all in the dark. We try to find out, but can you imagine anything\nmore ludicrous than one person's opinion of another person? One goes\nalong thinking one knows; but one really doesn't know.\"\n\nAs he said this he was leaning on his elbow arranging and rearranging\nin the grass the stones which had represented Rachel and her aunts\nat luncheon. He was speaking as much to himself as to Rachel. He was\nreasoning against the desire, which had returned with intensity, to take\nher in his arms; to have done with indirectness; to explain exactly what\nhe felt. What he said was against his belief; all the things that were\nimportant about her he knew; he felt them in the air around them; but he\nsaid nothing; he went on arranging the stones.\n\n\"I like you; d'you like me?\" Rachel suddenly observed.\n\n\"I like you immensely,\" Hewet replied, speaking with the relief of a\nperson who is unexpectedly given an opportunity of saying what he wants\nto say. He stopped moving the pebbles.\n\n\"Mightn't we call each other Rachel and Terence?\" he asked.\n\n\"Terence,\" Rachel repeated. \"Terence--that's like the cry of an owl.\"\n\nShe looked up with a sudden rush of delight, and in looking at Terence\nwith eyes widened by pleasure she was struck by the change that had come\nover the sky behind them. The substantial blue day had faded to a paler\nand more ethereal blue; the clouds were pink, far away and closely\npacked together; and the peace of evening had replaced the heat of the\nsouthern afternoon, in which they had started on their walk.\n\n\"It must be late!\" she exclaimed.\n\nIt was nearly eight o'clock.\n\n\"But eight o'clock doesn't count here, does it?\" Terence asked, as they\ngot up and turned inland again. They began to walk rather quickly down\nthe hill on a little path between the olive trees.\n\nThey felt more intimate because they shared the knowledge of what eight\no'clock in Richmond meant. Terence walked in front, for there was not\nroom for them side by side.\n\n\"What I want to do in writing novels is very much what you want to do\nwhen you play the piano, I expect,\" he began, turning and speaking over\nhis shoulder. \"We want to find out what's behind things, don't we?--Look\nat the lights down there,\" he continued, \"scattered about anyhow. Things\nI feel come to me like lights. . . . I want to combine them. . . . Have\nyou ever seen fireworks that make figures? . . . I want to make figures.\n. . . Is that what you want to do?\"\n\nNow they were out on the road and could walk side by side.\n\n\"When I play the piano? Music is different. . . . But I see what you\nmean.\" They tried to invent theories and to make their theories agree.\nAs Hewet had no knowledge of music, Rachel took his stick and drew\nfigures in the thin white dust to explain how Bach wrote his fugues.\n\n\"My musical gift was ruined,\" he explained, as they walked on after\none of these demonstrations, \"by the village organist at home, who\nhad invented a system of notation which he tried to teach me, with the\nresult that I never got to the tune-playing at all. My mother\nthought music wasn't manly for boys; she wanted me to kill rats and\nbirds--that's the worst of living in the country. We live in Devonshire.\nIt's the loveliest place in the world. Only--it's always difficult at\nhome when one's grown up. I'd like you to know one of my sisters. . . .\nOh, here's your gate--\" He pushed it open. They paused for a moment.\nShe could not ask him to come in. She could not say that she hoped they\nwould meet again; there was nothing to be said, and so without a word\nshe went through the gate, and was soon invisible. Directly Hewet lost\nsight of her, he felt the old discomfort return, even more strongly than\nbefore. Their talk had been interrupted in the middle, just as he was\nbeginning to say the things he wanted to say. After all, what had they\nbeen able to say? He ran his mind over the things they had said, the\nrandom, unnecessary things which had eddied round and round and used\nup all the time, and drawn them so close together and flung them so far\napart, and left him in the end unsatisfied, ignorant still of what she\nfelt and of what she was like. What was the use of talking, talking,\nmerely talking?\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XVII\n\n\nIt was now the height of the season, and every ship that came from\nEngland left a few people on the shores of Santa Marina who drove up to\nthe hotel. The fact that the Ambroses had a house where one could escape\nmomentarily from the slightly inhuman atmosphere of an hotel was a\nsource of genuine pleasure not only to Hirst and Hewet, but to the\nElliots, the Thornburys, the Flushings, Miss Allan, Evelyn M., together\nwith other people whose identity was so little developed that the\nAmbroses did not discover that they possessed names. By degrees there\nwas established a kind of correspondence between the two houses, the big\nand the small, so that at most hours of the day one house could guess\nwhat was going on in the other, and the words \"the villa\" and \"the\nhotel\" called up the idea of two separate systems of life. Acquaintances\nshowed signs of developing into friends, for that one tie to Mrs.\nParry's drawing-room had inevitably split into many other ties attached\nto different parts of England, and sometimes these alliances seemed\ncynically fragile, and sometimes painfully acute, lacking as they did\nthe supporting background of organised English life. One night when the\nmoon was round between the trees, Evelyn M. told Helen the story of\nher life, and claimed her everlasting friendship; or another occasion,\nmerely because of a sigh, or a pause, or a word thoughtlessly dropped,\npoor Mrs. Elliot left the villa half in tears, vowing never again to\nmeet the cold and scornful woman who had insulted her, and in truth,\nmeet again they never did. It did not seem worth while to piece together\nso slight a friendship.\n\nHewet, indeed, might have found excellent material at this time up\nat the villa for some chapters in the novel which was to be called\n\"Silence, or the Things People don't say.\" Helen and Rachel had become\nvery silent. Having detected, as she thought, a secret, and judging that\nRachel meant to keep it from her, Mrs. Ambrose respected it carefully,\nbut from that cause, though unintentionally, a curious atmosphere of\nreserve grew up between them. Instead of sharing their views upon all\nsubjects, and plunging after an idea wherever it might lead, they spoke\nchiefly in comment upon the people they saw, and the secret between\nthem made itself felt in what they said even of Thornburys and Elliots.\nAlways calm and unemotional in her judgments, Mrs. Ambrose was\nnow inclined to be definitely pessimistic. She was not severe upon\nindividuals so much as incredulous of the kindness of destiny, fate,\nwhat happens in the long run, and apt to insist that this was generally\nadverse to people in proportion as they deserved well. Even this theory\nshe was ready to discard in favour of one which made chaos triumphant,\nthings happening for no reason at all, and every one groping about in\nillusion and ignorance. With a certain pleasure she developed these\nviews to her niece, taking a letter from home as her test: which gave\ngood news, but might just as well have given bad. How did she know that\nat this very moment both her children were not lying dead, crushed by\nmotor omnibuses? \"It's happening to somebody: why shouldn't it happen\nto me?\" she would argue, her face taking on the stoical expression of\nanticipated sorrow. However sincere these views may have been, they were\nundoubtedly called forth by the irrational state of her niece's mind.\nIt was so fluctuating, and went so quickly from joy to despair, that it\nseemed necessary to confront it with some stable opinion which naturally\nbecame dark as well as stable. Perhaps Mrs. Ambrose had some idea that\nin leading the talk into these quarters she might discover what was in\nRachel's mind, but it was difficult to judge, for sometimes she would\nagree with the gloomiest thing that was said, at other times she refused\nto listen, and rammed Helen's theories down her throat with laughter,\nchatter, ridicule of the wildest, and fierce bursts of anger even at\nwhat she called the \"croaking of a raven in the mud.\"\n\n\"It's hard enough without that,\" she asserted.\n\n\"What's hard?\" Helen demanded.\n\n\"Life,\" she replied, and then they both became silent.\n\nHelen might draw her own conclusions as to why life was hard, as to why\nan hour later, perhaps, life was something so wonderful and vivid\nthat the eyes of Rachel beholding it were positively exhilarating to a\nspectator. True to her creed, she did not attempt to interfere, although\nthere were enough of those weak moments of depression to make it\nperfectly easy for a less scrupulous person to press through and know\nall, and perhaps Rachel was sorry that she did not choose. All these\nmoods ran themselves into one general effect, which Helen compared to\nthe sliding of a river, quick, quicker, quicker still, as it races to a\nwaterfall. Her instinct was to cry out Stop! but even had there been\nany use in crying Stop! she would have refrained, thinking it best that\nthings should take their way, the water racing because the earth was\nshaped to make it race.\n\nIt seemed that Rachel herself had no suspicion that she was watched, or\nthat there was anything in her manner likely to draw attention to her.\nWhat had happened to her she did not know. Her mind was very much in the\ncondition of the racing water to which Helen compared it. She wanted\nto see Terence; she was perpetually wishing to see him when he was not\nthere; it was an agony to miss seeing him; agonies were strewn all about\nher day on account of him, but she never asked herself what this force\ndriving through her life arose from. She thought of no result any more\nthan a tree perpetually pressed downwards by the wind considers the\nresult of being pressed downwards by the wind.\n\nDuring the two or three weeks which had passed since their walk, half a\ndozen notes from him had accumulated in her drawer. She would read\nthem, and spend the whole morning in a daze of happiness; the sunny land\noutside the window being no less capable of analysing its own colour\nand heat than she was of analysing hers. In these moods she found it\nimpossible to read or play the piano, even to move being beyond her\ninclination. The time passed without her noticing it. When it was dark\nshe was drawn to the window by the lights of the hotel. A light that\nwent in and out was the light in Terence's window: there he sat, reading\nperhaps, or now he was walking up and down pulling out one book after\nanother; and now he was seated in his chair again, and she tried to\nimagine what he was thinking about. The steady lights marked the rooms\nwhere Terence sat with people moving round him. Every one who stayed in\nthe hotel had a peculiar romance and interest about them. They were not\nordinary people. She would attribute wisdom to Mrs. Elliot, beauty to\nSusan Warrington, a splendid vitality to Evelyn M., because Terence\nspoke to them. As unreflecting and pervasive were the moods of\ndepression. Her mind was as the landscape outside when dark beneath\nclouds and straitly lashed by wind and hail. Again she would sit passive\nin her chair exposed to pain, and Helen's fantastical or gloomy words\nwere like so many darts goading her to cry out against the hardness of\nlife. Best of all were the moods when for no reason again this stress of\nfeeling slackened, and life went on as usual, only with a joy and colour\nin its events that was unknown before; they had a significance like that\nwhich she had seen in the tree: the nights were black bars separating\nher from the days; she would have liked to run all the days into one\nlong continuity of sensation. Although these moods were directly or\nindirectly caused by the presence of Terence or the thought of him, she\nnever said to herself that she was in love with him, or considered what\nwas to happen if she continued to feel such things, so that Helen's\nimage of the river sliding on to the waterfall had a great likeness to\nthe facts, and the alarm which Helen sometimes felt was justified.\n\nIn her curious condition of unanalysed sensations she was incapable of\nmaking a plan which should have any effect upon her state of mind. She\nabandoned herself to the mercy of accidents, missing Terence one day,\nmeeting him the next, receiving his letters always with a start of\nsurprise. Any woman experienced in the progress of courtship would have\ncome by certain opinions from all this which would have given her at\nleast a theory to go upon; but no one had ever been in love with Rachel,\nand she had never been in love with any one. Moreover, none of the books\nshe read, from _Wuthering_ _Heights_ to _Man_ _and_ _Superman_, and the\nplays of Ibsen, suggested from their analysis of love that what their\nheroines felt was what she was feeling now. It seemed to her that her\nsensations had no name.\n\nShe met Terence frequently. When they did not meet, he was apt to send a\nnote with a book or about a book, for he had not been able after all to\nneglect that approach to intimacy. But sometimes he did not come or did\nnot write for several days at a time. Again when they met their meeting\nmight be one of inspiriting joy or of harassing despair. Over all their\npartings hung the sense of interruption, leaving them both unsatisfied,\nthough ignorant that the other shared the feeling.\n\nIf Rachel was ignorant of her own feelings, she was even more completely\nignorant of his. At first he moved as a god; as she came to know him\nbetter he was still the centre of light, but combined with this beauty\na wonderful power of making her daring and confident of herself. She\nwas conscious of emotions and powers which she had never suspected in\nherself, and of a depth in the world hitherto unknown. When she thought\nof their relationship she saw rather than reasoned, representing her\nview of what Terence felt by a picture of him drawn across the room to\nstand by her side. This passage across the room amounted to a physical\nsensation, but what it meant she did not know.\n\nThus the time went on, wearing a calm, bright look upon its surface.\nLetters came from England, letters came from Willoughby, and the days\naccumulated their small events which shaped the year. Superficially,\nthree odes of Pindar were mended, Helen covered about five inches of her\nembroidery, and St. John completed the first two acts of a play. He and\nRachel being now very good friends, he read them aloud to her, and she\nwas so genuinely impressed by the skill of his rhythms and the variety\nof his adjectives, as well as by the fact that he was Terence's friend,\nthat he began to wonder whether he was not intended for literature\nrather than for law. It was a time of profound thought and sudden\nrevelations for more than one couple, and several single people.\n\nA Sunday came, which no one in the villa with the exception of Rachel\nand the Spanish maid proposed to recognise. Rachel still went to church,\nbecause she had never, according to Helen, taken the trouble to think\nabout it. Since they had celebrated the service at the hotel she went\nthere expecting to get some pleasure from her passage across the garden\nand through the hall of the hotel, although it was very doubtful whether\nshe would see Terence, or at any rate have the chance of speaking to\nhim.\n\nAs the greater number of visitors at the hotel were English, there was\nalmost as much difference between Sunday and Wednesday as there is in\nEngland, and Sunday appeared here as there, the mute black ghost or\npenitent spirit of the busy weekday. The English could not pale the\nsunshine, but they could in some miraculous way slow down the hours,\ndull the incidents, lengthen the meals, and make even the servants and\npage-boys wear a look of boredom and propriety. The best clothes which\nevery one put on helped the general effect; it seemed that no lady could\nsit down without bending a clean starched petticoat, and no gentleman\ncould breathe without a sudden crackle from a stiff shirt-front. As the\nhands of the clock neared eleven, on this particular Sunday, various\npeople tended to draw together in the hall, clasping little red-leaved\nbooks in their hands. The clock marked a few minutes to the hour when\na stout black figure passed through the hall with a preoccupied\nexpression, as though he would rather not recognise salutations,\nalthough aware of them, and disappeared down the corridor which led from\nit.\n\n\"Mr. Bax,\" Mrs. Thornbury whispered.\n\nThe little group of people then began to move off in the same direction\nas the stout black figure. Looked at in an odd way by people who made\nno effort to join them, they moved with one exception slowly and\nconsciously towards the stairs. Mrs. Flushing was the exception. She\ncame running downstairs, strode across the hall, joined the procession\nmuch out of breath, demanding of Mrs. Thornbury in an agitated whisper,\n\"Where, where?\"\n\n\"We are all going,\" said Mrs. Thornbury gently, and soon they were\ndescending the stairs two by two. Rachel was among the first to descend.\nShe did not see that Terence and Hirst came in at the rear possessed of\nno black volume, but of one thin book bound in light-blue cloth, which\nSt. John carried under his arm.\n\nThe chapel was the old chapel of the monks. It was a profound cool place\nwhere they had said Mass for hundreds of years, and done penance in\nthe cold moonlight, and worshipped old brown pictures and carved saints\nwhich stood with upraised hands of blessing in the hollows in the walls.\nThe transition from Catholic to Protestant worship had been bridged by a\ntime of disuse, when there were no services, and the place was used for\nstoring jars of oil, liqueur, and deck-chairs; the hotel flourishing,\nsome religious body had taken the place in hand, and it was now fitted\nout with a number of glazed yellow benches, claret-coloured footstools;\nit had a small pulpit, and a brass eagle carrying the Bible on its back,\nwhile the piety of different women had supplied ugly squares of carpet,\nand long strips of embroidery heavily wrought with monograms in gold.\n\nAs the congregation entered they were met by mild sweet chords issuing\nfrom a harmonium, where Miss Willett, concealed from view by a baize\ncurtain, struck emphatic chords with uncertain fingers. The sound spread\nthrough the chapel as the rings of water spread from a fallen stone. The\ntwenty or twenty-five people who composed the congregation first bowed\ntheir heads and then sat up and looked about them. It was very quiet,\nand the light down here seemed paler than the light above. The usual\nbows and smiles were dispensed with, but they recognised each other.\nThe Lord's Prayer was read over them. As the childlike battle of voices\nrose, the congregation, many of whom had only met on the staircase, felt\nthemselves pathetically united and well-disposed towards each other.\nAs if the prayer were a torch applied to fuel, a smoke seemed to rise\nautomatically and fill the place with the ghosts of innumerable services\non innumerable Sunday mornings at home. Susan Warrington in particular\nwas conscious of the sweetest sense of sisterhood, as she covered her\nface with her hands and saw slips of bent backs through the chinks\nbetween her fingers. Her emotions rose calmly and evenly, approving of\nherself and of life at the same time. It was all so quiet and so good.\nBut having created this peaceful atmosphere Mr. Bax suddenly turned the\npage and read a psalm. Though he read it with no change of voice the\nmood was broken.\n\n\"Be merciful unto me, O God,\" he read, \"for man goeth about to devour\nme: he is daily fighting and troubling me. . . . They daily mistake my\nwords: all that they imagine is to do me evil. They hold all together\nand keep themselves close. . . . Break their teeth, O God, in their\nmouths; smite the jaw-bones of the lions, O Lord: let them fall away\nlike water that runneth apace; and when they shoot their arrows let them\nbe rooted out.\"\n\nNothing in Susan's experience at all corresponded with this, and as she\nhad no love of language she had long ceased to attend to such remarks,\nalthough she followed them with the same kind of mechanical respect with\nwhich she heard many of Lear's speeches read aloud. Her mind was still\nserene and really occupied with praise of her own nature and praise of\nGod, that is of the solemn and satisfactory order of the world.\n\nBut it could be seen from a glance at their faces that most of the\nothers, the men in particular, felt the inconvenience of the sudden\nintrusion of this old savage. They looked more secular and critical as\nthen listened to the ravings of the old black man with a cloth round his\nloins cursing with vehement gesture by a camp-fire in the desert. After\nthat there was a general sound of pages being turned as if they were in\nclass, and then they read a little bit of the Old Testament about making\na well, very much as school boys translate an easy passage from the\n_Anabasis_ when they have shut up their French grammar. Then they\nreturned to the New Testament and the sad and beautiful figure\nof Christ. While Christ spoke they made another effort to fit his\ninterpretation of life upon the lives they lived, but as they were all\nvery different, some practical, some ambitious, some stupid, some wild\nand experimental, some in love, and others long past any feeling except\na feeling of comfort, they did very different things with the words of\nChrist.\n\nFrom their faces it seemed that for the most part they made no effort\nat all, and, recumbent as it were, accepted the ideas the words gave\nas representing goodness, in the same way, no doubt, as one of those\nindustrious needlewomen had accepted the bright ugly pattern on her mat\nas beauty.\n\nWhatever the reason might be, for the first time in her life, instead\nof slipping at once into some curious pleasant cloud of emotion, too\nfamiliar to be considered, Rachel listened critically to what was being\nsaid. By the time they had swung in an irregular way from prayer to\npsalm, from psalm to history, from history to poetry, and Mr. Bax was\ngiving out his text, she was in a state of acute discomfort. Such was\nthe discomfort she felt when forced to sit through an unsatisfactory\npiece of music badly played. Tantalised, enraged by the clumsy\ninsensitiveness of the conductor, who put the stress on the wrong\nplaces, and annoyed by the vast flock of the audience tamely praising\nand acquiescing without knowing or caring, so she was not tantalized and\nenraged, only here, with eyes half-shut and lips pursed together, the\natmosphere of forced solemnity increased her anger. All round her were\npeople pretending to feel what they did not feel, while somewhere above\nher floated the idea which they could none of them grasp, which they\npretended to grasp, always escaping out of reach, a beautiful idea,\nan idea like a butterfly. One after another, vast and hard and cold,\nappeared to her the churches all over the world where this blundering\neffort and misunderstanding were perpetually going on, great buildings,\nfilled with innumerable men and women, not seeing clearly, who\nfinally gave up the effort to see, and relapsed tamely into praise and\nacquiescence, half-shutting their eyes and pursing up their lips. The\nthought had the same sort of physical discomfort as is caused by a film\nof mist always coming between the eyes and the printed page. She did her\nbest to brush away the film and to conceive something to be worshipped\nas the service went on, but failed, always misled by the voice of Mr.\nBax saying things which misrepresented the idea, and by the patter of\nbaaing inexpressive human voices falling round her like damp leaves. The\neffort was tiring and dispiriting. She ceased to listen, and fixed her\neyes on the face of a woman near her, a hospital nurse, whose expression\nof devout attention seemed to prove that she was at any rate receiving\nsatisfaction. But looking at her carefully she came to the conclusion\nthat the hospital nurse was only slavishly acquiescent, and that the\nlook of satisfaction was produced by no splendid conception of God\nwithin her. How indeed, could she conceive anything far outside her own\nexperience, a woman with a commonplace face like hers, a little round\nred face, upon which trivial duties and trivial spites had drawn lines,\nwhose weak blue eyes saw without intensity or individuality, whose\nfeatures were blurred, insensitive, and callous? She was adoring\nsomething shallow and smug, clinging to it, so the obstinate mouth\nwitnessed, with the assiduity of a limpet; nothing would tear her from\nher demure belief in her own virtue and the virtues of her religion. She\nwas a limpet, with the sensitive side of her stuck to a rock, for ever\ndead to the rush of fresh and beautiful things past her. The face\nof this single worshipper became printed on Rachel's mind with an\nimpression of keen horror, and she had it suddenly revealed to her what\nHelen meant and St. John meant when they proclaimed their hatred of\nChristianity. With the violence that now marked her feelings, she\nrejected all that she had implicitly believed.\n\nMeanwhile Mr. Bax was half-way through the second lesson. She looked at\nhim. He was a man of the world with supple lips and an agreeable manner,\nhe was indeed a man of much kindliness and simplicity, though by no\nmeans clever, but she was not in the mood to give any one credit for\nsuch qualities, and examined him as though he were an epitome of all the\nvices of his service.\n\nRight at the back of the chapel Mrs. Flushing, Hirst, and Hewet sat in\na row in a very different frame of mind. Hewet was staring at the roof\nwith his legs stuck out in front of him, for as he had never tried to\nmake the service fit any feeling or idea of his, he was able to enjoy\nthe beauty of the language without hindrance. His mind was occupied\nfirst with accidental things, such as the women's hair in front of\nhim, the light on the faces, then with the words which seemed to him\nmagnificent, and then more vaguely with the characters of the other\nworshippers. But when he suddenly perceived Rachel, all these thoughts\nwere driven out of his head, and he thought only of her. The psalms,\nthe prayers, the Litany, and the sermon were all reduced to one chanting\nsound which paused, and then renewed itself, a little higher or a little\nlower. He stared alternately at Rachel and at the ceiling, but his\nexpression was now produced not by what he saw but by something in his\nmind. He was almost as painfully disturbed by his thoughts as she was by\nhers.\n\nEarly in the service Mrs. Flushing had discovered that she had taken up\na Bible instead of a prayer-book, and, as she was sitting next to Hirst,\nshe stole a glance over his shoulder. He was reading steadily in the\nthin pale-blue volume. Unable to understand, she peered closer, upon\nwhich Hirst politely laid the book before her, pointing to the first\nline of a Greek poem and then to the translation opposite.\n\n\"What's that?\" she whispered inquisitively.\n\n\"Sappho,\" he replied. \"The one Swinburne did--the best thing that's ever\nbeen written.\"\n\nMrs. Flushing could not resist such an opportunity. She gulped down the\nOde to Aphrodite during the Litany, keeping herself with difficulty from\nasking when Sappho lived, and what else she wrote worth reading, and\ncontriving to come in punctually at the end with \"the forgiveness of\nsins, the Resurrection of the body, and the life everlastin'. Amen.\"\n\nMeanwhile Hirst took out an envelope and began scribbling on the back of\nit. When Mr. Bax mounted the pulpit he shut up Sappho with his envelope\nbetween the pages, settled his spectacles, and fixed his gaze intently\nupon the clergyman. Standing in the pulpit he looked very large and fat;\nthe light coming through the greenish unstained window-glass made his\nface appear smooth and white like a very large egg.\n\nHe looked round at all the faces looking mildly up at him, although\nsome of them were the faces of men and women old enough to be his\ngrandparents, and gave out his text with weighty significance. The\nargument of the sermon was that visitors to this beautiful land,\nalthough they were on a holiday, owed a duty to the natives. It did not,\nin truth, differ very much from a leading article upon topics of general\ninterest in the weekly newspapers. It rambled with a kind of amiable\nverbosity from one heading to another, suggesting that all human beings\nare very much the same under their skins, illustrating this by the\nresemblance of the games which little Spanish boys play to the games\nlittle boys in London streets play, observing that very small things do\ninfluence people, particularly natives; in fact, a very dear friend of\nMr. Bax's had told him that the success of our rule in India, that vast\ncountry, largely depended upon the strict code of politeness which the\nEnglish adopted towards the natives, which led to the remark that small\nthings were not necessarily small, and that somehow to the virtue of\nsympathy, which was a virtue never more needed than to-day, when we\nlived in a time of experiment and upheaval--witness the aeroplane and\nwireless telegraph, and there were other problems which hardly presented\nthemselves to our fathers, but which no man who called himself a man\ncould leave unsettled. Here Mr. Bax became more definitely clerical, if\nit were possible, he seemed to speak with a certain innocent craftiness,\nas he pointed out that all this laid a special duty upon earnest\nChristians. What men were inclined to say now was, \"Oh, that\nfellow--he's a parson.\" What we want them to say is, \"He's a good\nfellow\"--in other words, \"He is my brother.\" He exhorted them to keep\nin touch with men of the modern type; they must sympathise with their\nmultifarious interests in order to keep before their eyes that whatever\ndiscoveries were made there was one discovery which could not be\nsuperseded, which was indeed as much of a necessity to the most\nsuccessful and most brilliant of them all as it had been to their\nfathers. The humblest could help; the least important things had an\ninfluence (here his manner became definitely priestly and his remarks\nseemed to be directed to women, for indeed Mr. Bax's congregations were\nmainly composed of women, and he was used to assigning them their duties\nin his innocent clerical campaigns). Leaving more definite instruction,\nhe passed on, and his theme broadened into a peroration for which\nhe drew a long breath and stood very upright,--\"As a drop of water,\ndetached, alone, separate from others, falling from the cloud and\nentering the great ocean, alters, so scientists tell us, not only the\nimmediate spot in the ocean where it falls, but all the myriad drops\nwhich together compose the great universe of waters, and by this means\nalters the configuration of the globe and the lives of millions of sea\ncreatures, and finally the lives of the men and women who seek their\nliving upon the shores--as all this is within the compass of a single\ndrop of water, such as any rain shower sends in millions to lose\nthemselves in the earth, to lose themselves we say, but we know very\nwell that the fruits of the earth could not flourish without them--so\nis a marvel comparable to this within the reach of each one of us, who\ndropping a little word or a little deed into the great universe alters\nit; yea, it is a solemn thought, _alters_ it, for good or for evil, not\nfor one instant, or in one vicinity, but throughout the entire race,\nand for all eternity.\" Whipping round as though to avoid applause, he\ncontinued with the same breath, but in a different tone of voice,--\"And\nnow to God the Father . . .\"\n\nHe gave his blessing, and then, while the solemn chords again issued\nfrom the harmonium behind the curtain, the different people began\nscraping and fumbling and moving very awkwardly and consciously towards\nthe door. Half-way upstairs, at a point where the light and sounds of\nthe upper world conflicted with the dimness and the dying hymn-tune of\nthe under, Rachel felt a hand drop upon her shoulder.\n\n\"Miss Vinrace,\" Mrs. Flushing whispered peremptorily, \"stay to luncheon.\nIt's such a dismal day. They don't even give one beef for luncheon.\nPlease stay.\"\n\nHere they came out into the hall, where once more the little band was\ngreeted with curious respectful glances by the people who had not gone\nto church, although their clothing made it clear that they approved of\nSunday to the very verge of going to church. Rachel felt unable to stand\nany more of this particular atmosphere, and was about to say she must\ngo back, when Terence passed them, drawn along in talk with Evelyn M.\nRachel thereupon contented herself with saying that the people looked\nvery respectable, which negative remark Mrs. Flushing interpreted to\nmean that she would stay.\n\n\"English people abroad!\" she returned with a vivid flash of malice.\n\"Ain't they awful! But we won't stay here,\" she continued, plucking at\nRachel's arm. \"Come up to my room.\"\n\nShe bore her past Hewet and Evelyn and the Thornburys and the Elliots.\nHewet stepped forward.\n\n\"Luncheon--\" he began.\n\n\"Miss Vinrace has promised to lunch with me,\" said Mrs. Flushing, and\nbegan to pound energetically up the staircase, as though the middle\nclasses of England were in pursuit. She did not stop until she had\nslammed her bedroom door behind them.\n\n\"Well, what did you think of it?\" she demanded, panting slightly.\n\nAll the disgust and horror which Rachel had been accumulating burst\nforth beyond her control.\n\n\"I thought it the most loathsome exhibition I'd ever seen!\" she broke\nout. \"How can they--how dare they--what do you mean by it--Mr. Bax,\nhospital nurses, old men, prostitutes, disgusting--\"\n\nShe hit off the points she remembered as fast as she could, but she was\ntoo indignant to stop to analyse her feelings. Mrs. Flushing watched her\nwith keen gusto as she stood ejaculating with emphatic movements of her\nhead and hands in the middle of the room.\n\n\"Go on, go on, do go on,\" she laughed, clapping her hands. \"It's\ndelightful to hear you!\"\n\n\"But why do you go?\" Rachel demanded.\n\n\"I've been every Sunday of my life ever since I can remember,\" Mrs.\nFlushing chuckled, as though that were a reason by itself.\n\nRachel turned abruptly to the window. She did not know what it was that\nhad put her into such a passion; the sight of Terence in the hall had\nconfused her thoughts, leaving her merely indignant. She looked straight\nat their own villa, half-way up the side of the mountain. The most\nfamiliar view seen framed through glass has a certain unfamiliar\ndistinction, and she grew calm as she gazed. Then she remembered that\nshe was in the presence of some one she did not know well, and she\nturned and looked at Mrs. Flushing. Mrs. Flushing was still sitting\non the edge of the bed, looking up, with her lips parted, so that her\nstrong white teeth showed in two rows.\n\n\"Tell me,\" she said, \"which d'you like best, Mr. Hewet or Mr. Hirst?\"\n\n\"Mr. Hewet,\" Rachel replied, but her voice did not sound natural.\n\n\"Which is the one who reads Greek in church?\" Mrs. Flushing demanded.\n\nIt might have been either of them and while Mrs. Flushing proceeded\nto describe them both, and to say that both frightened her, but one\nfrightened her more than the other, Rachel looked for a chair. The room,\nof course, was one of the largest and most luxurious in the hotel. There\nwere a great many arm-chairs and settees covered in brown holland, but\neach of these was occupied by a large square piece of yellow cardboard,\nand all the pieces of cardboard were dotted or lined with spots or\ndashes of bright oil paint.\n\n\"But you're not to look at those,\" said Mrs. Flushing as she saw\nRachel's eye wander. She jumped up, and turned as many as she could,\nface downwards, upon the floor. Rachel, however, managed to possess\nherself of one of them, and, with the vanity of an artist, Mrs. Flushing\ndemanded anxiously, \"Well, well?\"\n\n\"It's a hill,\" Rachel replied. There could be no doubt that Mrs.\nFlushing had represented the vigorous and abrupt fling of the earth up\ninto the air; you could almost see the clods flying as it whirled.\n\nRachel passed from one to another. They were all marked by something of\nthe jerk and decision of their maker; they were all perfectly untrained\nonslaughts of the brush upon some half-realised idea suggested by hill\nor tree; and they were all in some way characteristic of Mrs. Flushing.\n\n\"I see things movin',\" Mrs. Flushing explained. \"So\"--she swept her hand\nthrough a yard of the air. She then took up one of the cardboards which\nRachel had laid aside, seated herself on a stool, and began to flourish\na stump of charcoal. While she occupied herself in strokes which seemed\nto serve her as speech serves others, Rachel, who was very restless,\nlooked about her.\n\n\"Open the wardrobe,\" said Mrs. Flushing after a pause, speaking\nindistinctly because of a paint-brush in her mouth, \"and look at the\nthings.\"\n\nAs Rachel hesitated, Mrs. Flushing came forward, still with a\npaint-brush in her mouth, flung open the wings of her wardrobe, and\ntossed a quantity of shawls, stuffs, cloaks, embroideries, on to the\nbed. Rachel began to finger them. Mrs. Flushing came up once more, and\ndropped a quantity of beads, brooches, earrings, bracelets, tassels, and\ncombs among the draperies. Then she went back to her stool and began to\npaint in silence. The stuffs were coloured and dark and pale; they made\na curious swarm of lines and colours upon the counterpane, with\nthe reddish lumps of stone and peacocks' feathers and clear pale\ntortoise-shell combs lying among them.\n\n\"The women wore them hundreds of years ago, they wear 'em still,\" Mrs.\nFlushing remarked. \"My husband rides about and finds 'em; they don't\nknow what they're worth, so we get 'em cheap. And we shall sell 'em to\nsmart women in London,\" she chuckled, as though the thought of these\nladies and their absurd appearance amused her. After painting for\nsome minutes, she suddenly laid down her brush and fixed her eyes upon\nRachel.\n\n\"I tell you what I want to do,\" she said. \"I want to go up there and see\nthings for myself. It's silly stayin' here with a pack of old maids as\nthough we were at the seaside in England. I want to go up the river and\nsee the natives in their camps. It's only a matter of ten days under\ncanvas. My husband's done it. One would lie out under the trees at night\nand be towed down the river by day, and if we saw anythin' nice we'd\nshout out and tell 'em to stop.\" She rose and began piercing the bed\nagain and again with a long golden pin, as she watched to see what\neffect her suggestion had upon Rachel.\n\n\"We must make up a party,\" she went on. \"Ten people could hire a launch.\nNow you'll come, and Mrs. Ambrose'll come, and will Mr. Hirst and\nt'other gentleman come? Where's a pencil?\"\n\nShe became more and more determined and excited as she evolved her plan.\nShe sat on the edge of the bed and wrote down a list of surnames, which\nshe invariably spelt wrong. Rachel was enthusiastic, for indeed the idea\nwas immeasurably delightful to her. She had always had a great desire to\nsee the river, and the name of Terence threw a lustre over the prospect,\nwhich made it almost too good to come true. She did what she could to\nhelp Mrs. Flushing by suggesting names, helping her to spell them, and\ncounting up the days of the week upon her fingers. As Mrs. Flushing\nwanted to know all she could tell her about the birth and pursuits of\nevery person she suggested, and threw in wild stories of her own as to\nthe temperaments and habits of artists, and people of the same name who\nused to come to Chillingley in the old days, but were doubtless not the\nsame, though they too were very clever men interested in Egyptology, the\nbusiness took some time.\n\nAt last Mrs. Flushing sought her diary for help, the method of reckoning\ndates on the fingers proving unsatisfactory. She opened and shut every\ndrawer in her writing-table, and then cried furiously, \"Yarmouth!\nYarmouth! Drat the woman! She's always out of the way when she's\nwanted!\"\n\nAt this moment the luncheon gong began to work itself into its midday\nfrenzy. Mrs. Flushing rang her bell violently. The door was opened by a\nhandsome maid who was almost as upright as her mistress.\n\n\"Oh, Yarmouth,\" said Mrs. Flushing, \"just find my diary and see where\nten days from now would bring us to, and ask the hall porter how many\nmen 'ud be wanted to row eight people up the river for a week, and\nwhat it 'ud cost, and put it on a slip of paper and leave it on my\ndressing-table. Now--\" she pointed at the door with a superb forefinger\nso that Rachel had to lead the way.\n\n\"Oh, and Yarmouth,\" Mrs. Flushing called back over her shoulder. \"Put\nthose things away and hang 'em in their right places, there's a good\ngirl, or it fusses Mr. Flushin'.\"\n\nTo all of which Yarmouth merely replied, \"Yes, ma'am.\"\n\nAs they entered the long dining-room it was obvious that the day was\nstill Sunday, although the mood was slightly abating. The Flushings'\ntable was set by the side in the window, so that Mrs. Flushing could\nscrutinise each figure as it entered, and her curiosity seemed to be\nintense.\n\n\"Old Mrs. Paley,\" she whispered as the wheeled chair slowly made its way\nthrough the door, Arthur pushing behind. \"Thornburys\" came next. \"That\nnice woman,\" she nudged Rachel to look at Miss Allan. \"What's her name?\"\nThe painted lady who always came in late, tripping into the room with\na prepared smile as though she came out upon a stage, might well\nhave quailed before Mrs. Flushing's stare, which expressed her steely\nhostility to the whole tribe of painted ladies. Next came the two young\nmen whom Mrs. Flushing called collectively the Hirsts. They sat down\nopposite, across the gangway.\n\nMr. Flushing treated his wife with a mixture of admiration and\nindulgence, making up by the suavity and fluency of his speech for the\nabruptness of hers. While she darted and ejaculated he gave Rachel a\nsketch of the history of South American art. He would deal with one\nof his wife's exclamations, and then return as smoothly as ever to his\ntheme. He knew very well how to make a luncheon pass agreeably, without\nbeing dull or intimate. He had formed the opinion, so he told Rachel,\nthat wonderful treasures lay hid in the depths of the land; the things\nRachel had seen were merely trifles picked up in the course of one short\njourney. He thought there might be giant gods hewn out of stone in the\nmountain-side; and colossal figures standing by themselves in the middle\nof vast green pasture lands, where none but natives had ever trod.\nBefore the dawn of European art he believed that the primitive huntsmen\nand priests had built temples of massive stone slabs, had formed out of\nthe dark rocks and the great cedar trees majestic figures of gods and\nof beasts, and symbols of the great forces, water, air, and forest among\nwhich they lived. There might be prehistoric towns, like those in Greece\nand Asia, standing in open places among the trees, filled with the works\nof this early race. Nobody had been there; scarcely anything was known.\nThus talking and displaying the most picturesque of his theories,\nRachel's attention was fixed upon him.\n\nShe did not see that Hewet kept looking at her across the gangway,\nbetween the figures of waiters hurrying past with plates. He was\ninattentive, and Hirst was finding him also very cross and disagreeable.\nThey had touched upon all the usual topics--upon politics and\nliterature, gossip and Christianity. They had quarrelled over the\nservice, which was every bit as fine as Sappho, according to Hewet;\nso that Hirst's paganism was mere ostentation. Why go to church, he\ndemanded, merely in order to read Sappho? Hirst observed that he had\nlistened to every word of the sermon, as he could prove if Hewet would\nlike a repetition of it; and he went to church in order to realise the\nnature of his Creator, which he had done very vividly that morning,\nthanks to Mr. Bax, who had inspired him to write three of the most\nsuperb lines in English literature, an invocation to the Deity.\n\n\"I wrote 'em on the back of the envelope of my aunt's last letter,\" he\nsaid, and pulled it from between the pages of Sappho.\n\n\"Well, let's hear them,\" said Hewet, slightly mollified by the prospect\nof a literary discussion.\n\n\"My dear Hewet, do you wish us both to be flung out of the hotel by\nan enraged mob of Thornburys and Elliots?\" Hirst enquired. \"The merest\nwhisper would be sufficient to incriminate me for ever. God!\" he broke\nout, \"what's the use of attempting to write when the world's peopled by\nsuch damned fools? Seriously, Hewet, I advise you to give up literature.\nWhat's the good of it? There's your audience.\"\n\nHe nodded his head at the tables where a very miscellaneous collection\nof Europeans were now engaged in eating, in some cases in gnawing, the\nstringy foreign fowls. Hewet looked, and grew more out of temper than\never. Hirst looked too. His eyes fell upon Rachel, and he bowed to her.\n\n\"I rather think Rachel's in love with me,\" he remarked, as his eyes\nreturned to his plate. \"That's the worst of friendships with young\nwomen--they tend to fall in love with one.\"\n\nTo that Hewet made no answer whatever, and sat singularly still. Hirst\ndid not seem to mind getting no answer, for he returned to Mr. Bax\nagain, quoting the peroration about the drop of water; and when Hewet\nscarcely replied to these remarks either, he merely pursed his lips,\nchose a fig, and relapsed quite contentedly into his own thoughts, of\nwhich he always had a very large supply. When luncheon was over they\nseparated, taking their cups of coffee to different parts of the hall.\n\nFrom his chair beneath the palm-tree Hewet saw Rachel come out of the\ndining-room with the Flushings; he saw them look round for chairs, and\nchoose three in a corner where they could go on talking in private. Mr.\nFlushing was now in the full tide of his discourse. He produced a sheet\nof paper upon which he made drawings as he went on with his talk. He saw\nRachel lean over and look, pointing to this and that with her finger.\nHewet unkindly compared Mr. Flushing, who was extremely well dressed for\na hot climate, and rather elaborate in his manner, to a very persuasive\nshop-keeper. Meanwhile, as he sat looking at them, he was entangled in\nthe Thornburys and Miss Allan, who, after hovering about for a minute\nor two, settled in chairs round him, holding their cups in their hands.\nThey wanted to know whether he could tell them anything about Mr. Bax.\nMr. Thornbury as usual sat saying nothing, looking vaguely ahead of him,\noccasionally raising his eye-glasses, as if to put them on, but always\nthinking better of it at the last moment, and letting them fall again.\nAfter some discussion, the ladies put it beyond a doubt that Mr. Bax was\nnot the son of Mr. William Bax. There was a pause. Then Mrs. Thornbury\nremarked that she was still in the habit of saying Queen instead of\nKing in the National Anthem. There was another pause. Then Miss Allan\nobserved reflectively that going to church abroad always made her feel\nas if she had been to a sailor's funeral.\n\nThere was then a very long pause, which threatened to be final, when,\nmercifully, a bird about the size of a magpie, but of a metallic blue\ncolour, appeared on the section of the terrace that could be seen from\nwhere they sat. Mrs. Thornbury was led to enquire whether we should\nlike it if all our rooks were blue--\"What do _you_ think, William?\" she\nasked, touching her husband on the knee.\n\n\"If all our rooks were blue,\" he said,--he raised his glasses;\nhe actually placed them on his nose--\"they would not live long in\nWiltshire,\" he concluded; he dropped his glasses to his side again. The\nthree elderly people now gazed meditatively at the bird, which was so\nobliging as to stay in the middle of the view for a considerable space\nof time, thus making it unnecessary for them to speak again. Hewet began\nto wonder whether he might not cross over to the Flushings' corner, when\nHirst appeared from the background, slipped into a chair by Rachel's\nside, and began to talk to her with every appearance of familiarity.\nHewet could stand it no longer. He rose, took his hat and dashed out of\ndoors.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XVIII\n\n\nEverything he saw was distasteful to him. He hated the blue and white,\nthe intensity and definiteness, the hum and heat of the south;\nthe landscape seemed to him as hard and as romantic as a cardboard\nbackground on the stage, and the mountain but a wooden screen against a\nsheet painted blue. He walked fast in spite of the heat of the sun.\n\nTwo roads led out of the town on the eastern side; one branched\noff towards the Ambroses' villa, the other struck into the country,\neventually reaching a village on the plain, but many footpaths, which\nhad been stamped in the earth when it was wet, led off from it, across\ngreat dry fields, to scattered farm-houses, and the villas of rich\nnatives. Hewet stepped off the road on to one of these, in order to\navoid the hardness and heat of the main road, the dust of which was\nalways being raised in small clouds by carts and ramshackle flies which\ncarried parties of festive peasants, or turkeys swelling unevenly like\na bundle of air balls beneath a net, or the brass bedstead and black\nwooden boxes of some newly wedded pair.\n\nThe exercise indeed served to clear away the superficial irritations of\nthe morning, but he remained miserable. It seemed proved beyond a doubt\nthat Rachel was indifferent to him, for she had scarcely looked at him,\nand she had talked to Mr. Flushing with just the same interest with\nwhich she talked to him. Finally, Hirst's odious words flicked his mind\nlike a whip, and he remembered that he had left her talking to Hirst.\nShe was at this moment talking to him, and it might be true, as he said,\nthat she was in love with him. He went over all the evidence for this\nsupposition--her sudden interest in Hirst's writing, her way of quoting\nhis opinions respectfully, or with only half a laugh; her very nickname\nfor him, \"the great Man,\" might have some serious meaning in it.\nSupposing that there were an understanding between them, what would it\nmean to him?\n\n\"Damn it all!\" he demanded, \"am I in love with her?\" To that he could\nonly return himself one answer. He certainly was in love with her, if\nhe knew what love meant. Ever since he had first seen her he had been\ninterested and attracted, more and more interested and attracted, until\nhe was scarcely able to think of anything except Rachel. But just as he\nwas sliding into one of the long feasts of meditation about them both,\nhe checked himself by asking whether he wanted to marry her? That was\nthe real problem, for these miseries and agonies could not be endured,\nand it was necessary that he should make up his mind. He instantly\ndecided that he did not want to marry any one. Partly because he was\nirritated by Rachel the idea of marriage irritated him. It immediately\nsuggested the picture of two people sitting alone over the fire; the man\nwas reading, the woman sewing. There was a second picture. He saw a\nman jump up, say good-night, leave the company and hasten away with\nthe quiet secret look of one who is stealing to certain happiness.\nBoth these pictures were very unpleasant, and even more so was a third\npicture, of husband and wife and friend; and the married people\nglancing at each other as though they were content to let something\npass unquestioned, being themselves possessed of the deeper truth. Other\npictures--he was walking very fast in his irritation, and they\ncame before him without any conscious effort, like pictures on a\nsheet--succeeded these. Here were the worn husband and wife sitting with\ntheir children round them, very patient, tolerant, and wise. But that\ntoo, was an unpleasant picture. He tried all sorts of pictures, taking\nthem from the lives of friends of his, for he knew many different\nmarried couples; but he saw them always, walled up in a warm firelit\nroom. When, on the other hand, he began to think of unmarried people, he\nsaw them active in an unlimited world; above all, standing on the\nsame ground as the rest, without shelter or advantage. All the most\nindividual and humane of his friends were bachelors and spinsters;\nindeed he was surprised to find that the women he most admired and knew\nbest were unmarried women. Marriage seemed to be worse for them than\nit was for men. Leaving these general pictures he considered the people\nwhom he had been observing lately at the hotel. He had often revolved\nthese questions in his mind, as he watched Susan and Arthur, or Mr.\nand Mrs. Thornbury, or Mr. and Mrs. Elliot. He had observed how the shy\nhappiness and surprise of the engaged couple had gradually been replaced\nby a comfortable, tolerant state of mind, as if they had already done\nwith the adventure of intimacy and were taking up their parts. Susan\nused to pursue Arthur about with a sweater, because he had one day let\nslip that a brother of his had died of pneumonia. The sight amused him,\nbut was not pleasant if you substituted Terence and Rachel for Arthur\nand Susan; and Arthur was far less eager to get you in a corner and talk\nabout flying and the mechanics of aeroplanes. They would settle down.\nHe then looked at the couples who had been married for several years. It\nwas true that Mrs. Thornbury had a husband, and that for the most part\nshe was wonderfully successful in bringing him into the conversation,\nbut one could not imagine what they said to each other when they were\nalone. There was the same difficulty with regard to the Elliots, except\nthat they probably bickered openly in private. They sometimes bickered\nin public, though these disagreements were painfully covered over by\nlittle insincerities on the part of the wife, who was afraid of public\nopinion, because she was much stupider than her husband, and had to make\nefforts to keep hold of him. There could be no doubt, he decided,\nthat it would have been far better for the world if these couples\nhad separated. Even the Ambroses, whom he admired and respected\nprofoundly--in spite of all the love between them, was not their\nmarriage too a compromise? She gave way to him; she spoilt him; she\narranged things for him; she who was all truth to others was not true to\nher husband, was not true to her friends if they came in conflict with\nher husband. It was a strange and piteous flaw in her nature. Perhaps\nRachel had been right, then, when she said that night in the garden, \"We\nbring out what's worst in each other--we should live separate.\"\n\nNo Rachel had been utterly wrong! Every argument seemed to be against\nundertaking the burden of marriage until he came to Rachel's argument,\nwhich was manifestly absurd. From having been the pursued, he turned\nand became the pursuer. Allowing the case against marriage to lapse, he\nbegan to consider the peculiarities of character which had led to her\nsaying that. Had she meant it? Surely one ought to know the character of\nthe person with whom one might spend all one's life; being a novelist,\nlet him try to discover what sort of person she was. When he was with\nher he could not analyse her qualities, because he seemed to know them\ninstinctively, but when he was away from her it sometimes seemed to him\nthat he did not know her at all. She was young, but she was also old;\nshe had little self-confidence, and yet she was a good judge of people.\nShe was happy; but what made her happy? If they were alone and the\nexcitement had worn off, and they had to deal with the ordinary facts of\nthe day, what would happen? Casting his eye upon his own character,\ntwo things appeared to him: that he was very unpunctual, and that he\ndisliked answering notes. As far as he knew Rachel was inclined to be\npunctual, but he could not remember that he had ever seen her with a pen\nin her hand. Let him next imagine a dinner-party, say at the Crooms, and\nWilson, who had taken her down, talking about the state of the Liberal\nparty. She would say--of course she was absolutely ignorant of politics.\nNevertheless she was intelligent certainly, and honest too. Her temper\nwas uncertain--that he had noticed--and she was not domestic, and\nshe was not easy, and she was not quiet, or beautiful, except in\nsome dresses in some lights. But the great gift she had was that she\nunderstood what was said to her; there had never been any one like her\nfor talking to. You could say anything--you could say everything, and\nyet she was never servile. Here he pulled himself up, for it seemed to\nhim suddenly that he knew less about her than about any one. All these\nthoughts had occurred to him many times already; often had he tried to\nargue and reason; and again he had reached the old state of doubt. He\ndid not know her, and he did not know what she felt, or whether they\ncould live together, or whether he wanted to marry her, and yet he was\nin love with her.\n\nSupposing he went to her and said (he slackened his pace and began to\nspeak aloud, as if he were speaking to Rachel):\n\n\"I worship you, but I loathe marriage, I hate its smugness, its safety,\nits compromise, and the thought of you interfering in my work, hindering\nme; what would you answer?\"\n\nHe stopped, leant against the trunk of a tree, and gazed without seeing\nthem at some stones scattered on the bank of the dry river-bed. He saw\nRachel's face distinctly, the grey eyes, the hair, the mouth; the face\nthat could look so many things--plain, vacant, almost insignificant, or\nwild, passionate, almost beautiful, yet in his eyes was always the same\nbecause of the extraordinary freedom with which she looked at him, and\nspoke as she felt. What would she answer? What did she feel? Did she\nlove him, or did she feel nothing at all for him or for any other man,\nbeing, as she had said that afternoon, free, like the wind or the sea?\n\n\"Oh, you're free!\" he exclaimed, in exultation at the thought of her,\n\"and I'd keep you free. We'd be free together. We'd share everything\ntogether. No happiness would be like ours. No lives would compare with\nours.\" He opened his arms wide as if to hold her and the world in one\nembrace.\n\nNo longer able to consider marriage, or to weigh coolly what her nature\nwas, or how it would be if they lived together, he dropped to the ground\nand sat absorbed in the thought of her, and soon tormented by the desire\nto be in her presence again.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XIX\n\n\nBut Hewet need not have increased his torments by imagining that Hirst\nwas still talking to Rachel. The party very soon broke up, the Flushings\ngoing in one direction, Hirst in another, and Rachel remaining in the\nhall, pulling the illustrated papers about, turning from one to another,\nher movements expressing the unformed restless desire in her mind.\nShe did not know whether to go or to stay, though Mrs. Flushing had\ncommanded her to appear at tea. The hall was empty, save for Miss\nWillett who was playing scales with her fingers upon a sheet of sacred\nmusic, and the Carters, an opulent couple who disliked the girl, because\nher shoe laces were untied, and she did not look sufficiently cheery,\nwhich by some indirect process of thought led them to think that she\nwould not like them. Rachel certainly would not have liked them, if\nshe had seen them, for the excellent reason that Mr. Carter waxed his\nmoustache, and Mrs. Carter wore bracelets, and they were evidently the\nkind of people who would not like her; but she was too much absorbed by\nher own restlessness to think or to look.\n\nShe was turning over the slippery pages of an American magazine, when\nthe hall door swung, a wedge of light fell upon the floor, and a small\nwhite figure upon whom the light seemed focussed, made straight across\nthe room to her.\n\n\"What! You here?\" Evelyn exclaimed. \"Just caught a glimpse of you at\nlunch; but you wouldn't condescend to look at _me_.\"\n\nIt was part of Evelyn's character that in spite of many snubs which she\nreceived or imagined, she never gave up the pursuit of people she wanted\nto know, and in the long run generally succeeded in knowing them and\neven in making them like her.\n\nShe looked round her. \"I hate this place. I hate these people,\" she\nsaid. \"I wish you'd come up to my room with me. I do want to talk to\nyou.\"\n\nAs Rachel had no wish to go or to stay, Evelyn took her by the wrist and\ndrew her out of the hall and up the stairs. As they went upstairs\ntwo steps at a time, Evelyn, who still kept hold of Rachel's hand,\nejaculated broken sentences about not caring a hang what people said.\n\"Why should one, if one knows one's right? And let 'em all go to blazes!\nThem's my opinions!\"\n\nShe was in a state of great excitement, and the muscles of her arms were\ntwitching nervously. It was evident that she was only waiting for the\ndoor to shut to tell Rachel all about it. Indeed, directly they were\ninside her room, she sat on the end of the bed and said, \"I suppose you\nthink I'm mad?\"\n\nRachel was not in the mood to think clearly about any one's state of\nmind. She was however in the mood to say straight out whatever occurred\nto her without fear of the consequences.\n\n\"Somebody's proposed to you,\" she remarked.\n\n\"How on earth did you guess that?\" Evelyn exclaimed, some pleasure\nmingling with her surprise. \"Do as I look as if I'd just had a\nproposal?\"\n\n\"You look as if you had them every day,\" Rachel replied.\n\n\"But I don't suppose I've had more than you've had,\" Evelyn laughed\nrather insincerely.\n\n\"I've never had one.\"\n\n\"But you will--lots--it's the easiest thing in the world--But that's\nnot what's happened this afternoon exactly. It's--Oh, it's a muddle, a\ndetestable, horrible, disgusting muddle!\"\n\nShe went to the wash-stand and began sponging her cheeks with cold\nwater; for they were burning hot. Still sponging them and trembling\nslightly she turned and explained in the high pitched voice of nervous\nexcitement: \"Alfred Perrott says I've promised to marry him, and I say I\nnever did. Sinclair says he'll shoot himself if I don't marry him, and\nI say, 'Well, shoot yourself!' But of course he doesn't--they never do.\nAnd Sinclair got hold of me this afternoon and began bothering me to\ngive an answer, and accusing me of flirting with Alfred Perrott, and\ntold me I'd no heart, and was merely a Siren, oh, and quantities of\npleasant things like that. So at last I said to him, 'Well, Sinclair,\nyou've said enough now. You can just let me go.' And then he caught me\nand kissed me--the disgusting brute--I can still feel his nasty hairy\nface just there--as if he'd any right to, after what he'd said!\"\n\nShe sponged a spot on her left cheek energetically.\n\n\"I've never met a man that was fit to compare with a woman!\" she cried;\n\"they've no dignity, they've no courage, they've nothing but their\nbeastly passions and their brute strength! Would any woman have\nbehaved like that--if a man had said he didn't want her? We've too much\nself-respect; we're infinitely finer than they are.\"\n\nShe walked about the room, dabbing her wet cheeks with a towel. Tears\nwere now running down with the drops of cold water.\n\n\"It makes me angry,\" she explained, drying her eyes.\n\nRachel sat watching her. She did not think of Evelyn's position; she\nonly thought that the world was full or people in torment.\n\n\"There's only one man here I really like,\" Evelyn continued; \"Terence\nHewet. One feels as if one could trust him.\"\n\nAt these words Rachel suffered an indescribable chill; her heart seemed\nto be pressed together by cold hands.\n\n\"Why?\" she asked. \"Why can you trust him?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Evelyn. \"Don't you have feelings about people?\nFeelings you're absolutely certain are right? I had a long talk with\nTerence the other night. I felt we were really friends after that.\nThere's something of a woman in him--\" She paused as though she were\nthinking of very intimate things that Terence had told her, so at least\nRachel interpreted her gaze.\n\nShe tried to force herself to say, \"Has to be proposed to you?\" but the\nquestion was too tremendous, and in another moment Evelyn was saying\nthat the finest men were like women, and women were nobler than men--for\nexample, one couldn't imagine a woman like Lillah Harrison thinking a\nmean thing or having anything base about her.\n\n\"How I'd like you to know her!\" she exclaimed.\n\nShe was becoming much calmer, and her cheeks were now quite dry. Her\neyes had regained their usual expression of keen vitality, and she\nseemed to have forgotten Alfred and Sinclair and her emotion. \"Lillah\nruns a home for inebriate women in the Deptford Road,\" she continued.\n\"She started it, managed it, did everything off her own bat, and it's\nnow the biggest of its kind in England. You can't think what those women\nare like--and their homes. But she goes among them at all hours of the\nday and night. I've often been with her. . . . That's what's the matter\nwith us. . . . We don't _do_ things. What do you _do_?\" she demanded,\nlooking at Rachel with a slightly ironical smile. Rachel had scarcely\nlistened to any of this, and her expression was vacant and unhappy. She\nhad conceived an equal dislike for Lillah Harrison and her work in the\nDeptford Road, and for Evelyn M. and her profusion of love affairs.\n\n\"I play,\" she said with an affection of stolid composure.\n\n\"That's about it!\" Evelyn laughed. \"We none of us do anything but play.\nAnd that's why women like Lillah Harrison, who's worth twenty of you and\nme, have to work themselves to the bone. But I'm tired of playing,\" she\nwent on, lying flat on the bed, and raising her arms above her head.\nThus stretched out, she looked more diminutive than ever.\n\n\"I'm going to do something. I've got a splendid idea. Look here, you\nmust join. I'm sure you've got any amount of stuff in you, though you\nlook--well, as if you'd lived all your life in a garden.\" She sat up,\nand began to explain with animation. \"I belong to a club in London. It\nmeets every Saturday, so it's called the Saturday Club. We're supposed\nto talk about art, but I'm sick of talking about art--what's the good\nof it? With all kinds of real things going on round one? It isn't as if\nthey'd got anything to say about art, either. So what I'm going to tell\n'em is that we've talked enough about art, and we'd better talk about\nlife for a change. Questions that really matter to people's lives, the\nWhite Slave Traffic, Women Suffrage, the Insurance Bill, and so on. And\nwhen we've made up our mind what we want to do we could form ourselves\ninto a society for doing it. . . . I'm certain that if people like\nourselves were to take things in hand instead of leaving it to policemen\nand magistrates, we could put a stop to--prostitution\"--she lowered her\nvoice at the ugly word--\"in six months. My idea is that men and women\nought to join in these matters. We ought to go into Piccadilly and stop\none of these poor wretches and say: 'Now, look here, I'm no better than\nyou are, and I don't pretend to be any better, but you're doing what you\nknow to be beastly, and I won't have you doing beastly things, because\nwe're all the same under our skins, and if you do a beastly thing it\ndoes matter to me.' That's what Mr. Bax was saying this morning,\nand it's true, though you clever people--you're clever too, aren't\nyou?--don't believe it.\"\n\nWhen Evelyn began talking--it was a fact she often regretted--her\nthoughts came so quickly that she never had any time to listen to other\npeople's thoughts. She continued without more pause than was needed for\ntaking breath.\n\n\"I don't see why the Saturday club people shouldn't do a really great\nwork in that way,\" she went on. \"Of course it would want organisation,\nsome one to give their life to it, but I'm ready to do that. My notion's\nto think of the human beings first and let the abstract ideas take care\nof themselves. What's wrong with Lillah--if there is anything wrong--is\nthat she thinks of Temperance first and the women afterwards. Now\nthere's one thing I'll say to my credit,\" she continued; \"I'm not\nintellectual or artistic or anything of that sort, but I'm jolly human.\"\nShe slipped off the bed and sat on the floor, looking up at Rachel. She\nsearched up into her face as if she were trying to read what kind of\ncharacter was concealed behind the face. She put her hand on Rachel's\nknee.\n\n\"It _is_ being human that counts, isn't it?\" she continued. \"Being real,\nwhatever Mr. Hirst may say. Are you real?\"\n\nRachel felt much as Terence had felt that Evelyn was too close to her,\nand that there was something exciting in this closeness, although it was\nalso disagreeable. She was spared the need of finding an answer to the\nquestion, for Evelyn proceeded, \"Do you _believe_ in anything?\"\n\nIn order to put an end to the scrutiny of these bright blue eyes, and to\nrelieve her own physical restlessness, Rachel pushed back her chair and\nexclaimed, \"In everything!\" and began to finger different objects, the\nbooks on the table, the photographs, the freshly leaved plant with the\nstiff bristles, which stood in a large earthenware pot in the window.\n\n\"I believe in the bed, in the photographs, in the pot, in the balcony,\nin the sun, in Mrs. Flushing,\" she remarked, still speaking recklessly,\nwith something at the back of her mind forcing her to say the things\nthat one usually does not say. \"But I don't believe in God, I don't\nbelieve in Mr. Bax, I don't believe in the hospital nurse. I don't\nbelieve--\" She took up a photograph and, looking at it, did not finish\nher sentence.\n\n\"That's my mother,\" said Evelyn, who remained sitting on the floor\nbinding her knees together with her arms, and watching Rachel curiously.\n\nRachel considered the portrait. \"Well, I don't much believe in her,\" she\nremarked after a time in a low tone of voice.\n\nMrs. Murgatroyd looked indeed as if the life had been crushed out of\nher; she knelt on a chair, gazing piteously from behind the body of a\nPomeranian dog which she clasped to her cheek, as if for protection.\n\n\"And that's my dad,\" said Evelyn, for there were two photographs in one\nframe. The second photograph represented a handsome soldier with high\nregular features and a heavy black moustache; his hand rested on the\nhilt of his sword; there was a decided likeness between him and Evelyn.\n\n\"And it's because of them,\" said Evelyn, \"that I'm going to help the\nother women. You've heard about me, I suppose? They weren't married, you\nsee; I'm not anybody in particular. I'm not a bit ashamed of it. They\nloved each other anyhow, and that's more than most people can say of\ntheir parents.\"\n\nRachel sat down on the bed, with the two pictures in her hands, and\ncompared them--the man and the woman who had, so Evelyn said, loved\neach other. That fact interested her more than the campaign on behalf of\nunfortunate women which Evelyn was once more beginning to describe. She\nlooked again from one to the other.\n\n\"What d'you think it's like,\" she asked, as Evelyn paused for a minute,\n\"being in love?\"\n\n\"Have you never been in love?\" Evelyn asked. \"Oh no--one's only got to\nlook at you to see that,\" she added. She considered. \"I really was in\nlove once,\" she said. She fell into reflection, her eyes losing\ntheir bright vitality and approaching something like an expression of\ntenderness. \"It was heavenly!--while it lasted. The worst of it is it\ndon't last, not with me. That's the bother.\"\n\nShe went on to consider the difficulty with Alfred and Sinclair about\nwhich she had pretended to ask Rachel's advice. But she did not want\nadvice; she wanted intimacy. When she looked at Rachel, who was still\nlooking at the photographs on the bed, she could not help seeing that\nRachel was not thinking about her. What was she thinking about, then?\nEvelyn was tormented by the little spark of life in her which was always\ntrying to work through to other people, and was always being rebuffed.\nFalling silent she looked at her visitor, her shoes, her stockings, the\ncombs in her hair, all the details of her dress in short, as though by\nseizing every detail she might get closer to the life within.\n\nRachel at last put down the photographs, walked to the window and\nremarked, \"It's odd. People talk as much about love as they do about\nreligion.\"\n\n\"I wish you'd sit down and talk,\" said Evelyn impatiently.\n\nInstead Rachel opened the window, which was made in two long panes, and\nlooked down into the garden below.\n\n\"That's where we got lost the first night,\" she said. \"It must have been\nin those bushes.\"\n\n\"They kill hens down there,\" said Evelyn. \"They cut their heads off with\na knife--disgusting! But tell me--what--\"\n\n\"I'd like to explore the hotel,\" Rachel interrupted. She drew her head\nin and looked at Evelyn, who still sat on the floor.\n\n\"It's just like other hotels,\" said Evelyn.\n\nThat might be, although every room and passage and chair in the place\nhad a character of its own in Rachel's eyes; but she could not bring\nherself to stay in one place any longer. She moved slowly towards the\ndoor.\n\n\"What is it you want?\" said Evelyn. \"You make me feel as if you were\nalways thinking of something you don't say. . . . Do say it!\"\n\nBut Rachel made no response to this invitation either. She stopped with\nher fingers on the handle of the door, as if she remembered that some\nsort of pronouncement was due from her.\n\n\"I suppose you'll marry one of them,\" she said, and then turned the\nhandle and shut the door behind her. She walked slowly down the passage,\nrunning her hand along the wall beside her. She did not think which way\nshe was going, and therefore walked down a passage which only led to a\nwindow and a balcony. She looked down at the kitchen premises, the wrong\nside of the hotel life, which was cut off from the right side by a maze\nof small bushes. The ground was bare, old tins were scattered about, and\nthe bushes wore towels and aprons upon their heads to dry. Every now and\nthen a waiter came out in a white apron and threw rubbish on to a\nheap. Two large women in cotton dresses were sitting on a bench with\nblood-smeared tin trays in front of them and yellow bodies across\ntheir knees. They were plucking the birds, and talking as they plucked.\nSuddenly a chicken came floundering, half flying, half running into the\nspace, pursued by a third woman whose age could hardly be under eighty.\nAlthough wizened and unsteady on her legs she kept up the chase, egged\non by the laughter of the others; her face was expressive of furious\nrage, and as she ran she swore in Spanish. Frightened by hand-clapping\nhere, a napkin there, the bird ran this way and that in sharp angles,\nand finally fluttered straight at the old woman, who opened her scanty\ngrey skirts to enclose it, dropped upon it in a bundle, and then holding\nit out cut its head off with an expression of vindictive energy and\ntriumph combined. The blood and the ugly wriggling fascinated Rachel, so\nthat although she knew that some one had come up behind and was standing\nbeside her, she did not turn round until the old woman had settled down\non the bench beside the others. Then she looked up sharply, because of\nthe ugliness of what she had seen. It was Miss Allan who stood beside\nher.\n\n\"Not a pretty sight,\" said Miss Allan, \"although I daresay it's really\nmore humane than our method. . . . I don't believe you've ever been in\nmy room,\" she added, and turned away as if she meant Rachel to follow\nher. Rachel followed, for it seemed possible that each new person might\nremove the mystery which burdened her.\n\nThe bedrooms at the hotel were all on the same pattern, save that some\nwere larger and some smaller; they had a floor of dark red tiles;\nthey had a high bed, draped in mosquito curtains; they had each a\nwriting-table and a dressing-table, and a couple of arm-chairs. But\ndirectly a box was unpacked the rooms became very different, so that\nMiss Allan's room was very unlike Evelyn's room. There were no variously\ncoloured hatpins on her dressing-table; no scent-bottles; no narrow\ncurved pairs of scissors; no great variety of shoes and boots; no silk\npetticoats lying on the chairs. The room was extremely neat. There\nseemed to be two pairs of everything. The writing-table, however,\nwas piled with manuscript, and a table was drawn out to stand by the\narm-chair on which were two separate heaps of dark library books, in\nwhich there were many slips of paper sticking out at different degrees\nof thickness. Miss Allan had asked Rachel to come in out of kindness,\nthinking that she was waiting about with nothing to do. Moreover, she\nliked young women, for she had taught many of them, and having received\nso much hospitality from the Ambroses she was glad to be able to repay\na minute part of it. She looked about accordingly for something to\nshow her. The room did not provide much entertainment. She touched\nher manuscript. \"Age of Chaucer; Age of Elizabeth; Age of Dryden,\"\nshe reflected; \"I'm glad there aren't many more ages. I'm still in the\nmiddle of the eighteenth century. Won't you sit down, Miss Vinrace? The\nchair, though small, is firm. . . . Euphues. The germ of the English\nnovel,\" she continued, glancing at another page. \"Is that the kind of\nthing that interests you?\"\n\nShe looked at Rachel with great kindness and simplicity, as though\nshe would do her utmost to provide anything she wished to have. This\nexpression had a remarkable charm in a face otherwise much lined with\ncare and thought.\n\n\"Oh no, it's music with you, isn't it?\" she continued, recollecting,\n\"and I generally find that they don't go together. Sometimes of course\nwe have prodigies--\" She was looking about her for something and now saw\na jar on the mantelpiece which she reached down and gave to Rachel. \"If\nyou put your finger into this jar you may be able to extract a piece of\npreserved ginger. Are you a prodigy?\"\n\nBut the ginger was deep and could not be reached.\n\n\"Don't bother,\" she said, as Miss Allan looked about for some other\nimplement. \"I daresay I shouldn't like preserved ginger.\"\n\n\"You've never tried?\" enquired Miss Allan. \"Then I consider that it is\nyour duty to try now. Why, you may add a new pleasure to life, and as\nyou are still young--\" She wondered whether a button-hook would do. \"I\nmake it a rule to try everything,\" she said. \"Don't you think it\nwould be very annoying if you tasted ginger for the first time on your\ndeath-bed, and found you never liked anything so much? I should be\nso exceedingly annoyed that I think I should get well on that account\nalone.\"\n\nShe was now successful, and a lump of ginger emerged on the end of the\nbutton-hook. While she went to wipe the button-hook, Rachel bit the\nginger and at once cried, \"I must spit it out!\"\n\n\"Are you sure you have really tasted it?\" Miss Allan demanded.\n\nFor answer Rachel threw it out of the window.\n\n\"An experience anyhow,\" said Miss Allan calmly. \"Let me see--I have\nnothing else to offer you, unless you would like to taste this.\" A small\ncupboard hung above her bed, and she took out of it a slim elegant jar\nfilled with a bright green fluid.\n\n\"Creme de Menthe,\" she said. \"Liqueur, you know. It looks as if I drank,\ndoesn't it? As a matter of fact it goes to prove what an exceptionally\nabstemious person I am. I've had that jar for six-and-twenty years,\"\nshe added, looking at it with pride, as she tipped it over, and from\nthe height of the liquid it could be seen that the bottle was still\nuntouched.\n\n\"Twenty-six years?\" Rachel exclaimed.\n\nMiss Allan was gratified, for she had meant Rachel to be surprised.\n\n\"When I went to Dresden six-and-twenty years ago,\" she said, \"a certain\nfriend of mine announced her intention of making me a present. She\nthought that in the event of shipwreck or accident a stimulant might\nbe useful. However, as I had no occasion for it, I gave it back on my\nreturn. On the eve of any foreign journey the same bottle always makes\nits appearance, with the same note; on my return in safety it is always\nhanded back. I consider it a kind of charm against accidents. Though I\nwas once detained twenty-four hours by an accident to the train in front\nof me, I have never met with any accident myself. Yes,\" she continued,\nnow addressing the bottle, \"we have seen many climes and cupboards\ntogether, have we not? I intend one of these days to have a silver label\nmade with an inscription. It is a gentleman, as you may observe, and his\nname is Oliver. . . . I do not think I could forgive you, Miss Vinrace,\nif you broke my Oliver,\" she said, firmly taking the bottle out of\nRachel's hands and replacing it in the cupboard.\n\nRachel was swinging the bottle by the neck. She was interested by Miss\nAllan to the point of forgetting the bottle.\n\n\"Well,\" she exclaimed, \"I do think that odd; to have had a friend for\ntwenty-six years, and a bottle, and--to have made all those journeys.\"\n\n\"Not at all; I call it the reverse of odd,\" Miss Allan replied. \"I\nalways consider myself the most ordinary person I know. It's rather\ndistinguished to be as ordinary as I am. I forget--are you a prodigy, or\ndid you say you were not a prodigy?\"\n\nShe smiled at Rachel very kindly. She seemed to have known and\nexperienced so much, as she moved cumbrously about the room, that surely\nthere must be balm for all anguish in her words, could one induce her to\nhave recourse to them. But Miss Allan, who was now locking the cupboard\ndoor, showed no signs of breaking the reticence which had snowed her\nunder for years. An uncomfortable sensation kept Rachel silent; on the\none hand, she wished to whirl high and strike a spark out of the cool\npink flesh; on the other she perceived there was nothing to be done but\nto drift past each other in silence.\n\n\"I'm not a prodigy. I find it very difficult to say what I mean--\" she\nobserved at length.\n\n\"It's a matter of temperament, I believe,\" Miss Allan helped her. \"There\nare some people who have no difficulty; for myself I find there are a\ngreat many things I simply cannot say. But then I consider myself very\nslow. One of my colleagues now, knows whether she likes you or not--let\nme see, how does she do it?--by the way you say good-morning at\nbreakfast. It is sometimes a matter of years before I can make up my\nmind. But most young people seem to find it easy?\"\n\n\"Oh no,\" said Rachel. \"It's hard!\"\n\nMiss Allan looked at Rachel quietly, saying nothing; she suspected that\nthere were difficulties of some kind. Then she put her hand to the back\nof her head, and discovered that one of the grey coils of hair had come\nloose.\n\n\"I must ask you to be so kind as to excuse me,\" she said, rising, \"if\nI do my hair. I have never yet found a satisfactory type of hairpin.\nI must change my dress, too, for the matter of that; and I should be\nparticularly glad of your assistance, because there is a tiresome set of\nhooks which I _can_ fasten for myself, but it takes from ten to fifteen\nminutes; whereas with your help--\"\n\nShe slipped off her coat and skirt and blouse, and stood doing her hair\nbefore the glass, a massive homely figure, her petticoat being so short\nthat she stood on a pair of thick slate-grey legs.\n\n\"People say youth is pleasant; I myself find middle age far pleasanter,\"\nshe remarked, removing hair pins and combs, and taking up her brush.\nWhen it fell loose her hair only came down to her neck.\n\n\"When one was young,\" she continued, \"things could seem so very serious\nif one was made that way. . . . And now my dress.\"\n\nIn a wonderfully short space of time her hair had been reformed in its\nusual loops. The upper half of her body now became dark green with black\nstripes on it; the skirt, however, needed hooking at various angles, and\nRachel had to kneel on the floor, fitting the eyes to the hooks.\n\n\"Our Miss Johnson used to find life very unsatisfactory, I remember,\"\nMiss Allan continued. She turned her back to the light. \"And then she\ntook to breeding guinea-pigs for their spots, and became absorbed in\nthat. I have just heard that the yellow guinea-pig has had a black baby.\nWe had a bet of sixpence on about it. She will be very triumphant.\"\n\nThe skirt was fastened. She looked at herself in the glass with the\ncurious stiffening of her face generally caused by looking in the glass.\n\n\"Am I in a fit state to encounter my fellow-beings?\" she asked. \"I\nforget which way it is--but they find black animals very rarely have\ncoloured babies--it may be the other way round. I have had it so often\nexplained to me that it is very stupid of me to have forgotten again.\"\n\nShe moved about the room acquiring small objects with quiet force,\nand fixing them about her--a locket, a watch and chain, a heavy gold\nbracelet, and the parti-coloured button of a suffrage society. Finally,\ncompletely equipped for Sunday tea, she stood before Rachel, and smiled\nat her kindly. She was not an impulsive woman, and her life had schooled\nher to restrain her tongue. At the same time, she was possessed of an\namount of good-will towards others, and in particular towards the young,\nwhich often made her regret that speech was so difficult.\n\n\"Shall we descend?\" she said.\n\nShe put one hand upon Rachel's shoulder, and stooping, picked up a pair\nof walking-shoes with the other, and placed them neatly side by side\noutside her door. As they walked down the passage they passed many pairs\nof boots and shoes, some black and some brown, all side by side, and all\ndifferent, even to the way in which they lay together.\n\n\"I always think that people are so like their boots,\" said Miss Allan.\n\"That is Mrs. Paley's--\" but as she spoke the door opened, and Mrs.\nPaley rolled out in her chair, equipped also for tea.\n\nShe greeted Miss Allan and Rachel.\n\n\"I was just saying that people are so like their boots,\" said Miss\nAllan. Mrs. Paley did not hear. She repeated it more loudly still. Mrs.\nPaley did not hear. She repeated it a third time. Mrs. Paley heard, but\nshe did not understand. She was apparently about to repeat it for the\nfourth time, when Rachel suddenly said something inarticulate, and\ndisappeared down the corridor. This misunderstanding, which involved\na complete block in the passage, seemed to her unbearable. She walked\nquickly and blindly in the opposite direction, and found herself at the\nend of a _cul_ _de_ _sac_. There was a window, and a table and a chair\nin the window, and upon the table stood a rusty inkstand, an ashtray, an\nold copy of a French newspaper, and a pen with a broken nib. Rachel\nsat down, as if to study the French newspaper, but a tear fell on the\nblurred French print, raising a soft blot. She lifted her head sharply,\nexclaiming aloud, \"It's intolerable!\" Looking out of the window with\neyes that would have seen nothing even had they not been dazed by tears,\nshe indulged herself at last in violent abuse of the entire day. It had\nbeen miserable from start to finish; first, the service in the chapel;\nthen luncheon; then Evelyn; then Miss Allan; then old Mrs. Paley\nblocking up the passage. All day long she had been tantalized and put\noff. She had now reached one of those eminences, the result of\nsome crisis, from which the world is finally displayed in its\ntrue proportions. She disliked the look of it immensely--churches,\npoliticians, misfits, and huge impostures--men like Mr. Dalloway,\nmen like Mr. Bax, Evelyn and her chatter, Mrs. Paley blocking up the\npassage. Meanwhile the steady beat of her own pulse represented the hot\ncurrent of feeling that ran down beneath; beating, struggling, fretting.\nFor the time, her own body was the source of all the life in the world,\nwhich tried to burst forth here--there--and was repressed now by Mr.\nBax, now by Evelyn, now by the imposition of ponderous stupidity, the\nweight of the entire world. Thus tormented, she would twist her hands\ntogether, for all things were wrong, all people stupid. Vaguely seeing\nthat there were people down in the garden beneath she represented them\nas aimless masses of matter, floating hither and thither, without aim\nexcept to impede her. What were they doing, those other people in the\nworld?\n\n\"Nobody knows,\" she said. The force of her rage was beginning to spend\nitself, and the vision of the world which had been so vivid became dim.\n\n\"It's a dream,\" she murmured. She considered the rusty inkstand,\nthe pen, the ash-tray, and the old French newspaper. These small and\nworthless objects seemed to her to represent human lives.\n\n\"We're asleep and dreaming,\" she repeated. But the possibility which now\nsuggested itself that one of the shapes might be the shape of Terence\nroused her from her melancholy lethargy. She became as restless as she\nhad been before she sat down. She was no longer able to see the world\nas a town laid out beneath her. It was covered instead by a haze of\nfeverish red mist. She had returned to the state in which she had been\nall day. Thinking was no escape. Physical movement was the only refuge,\nin and out of rooms, in and out of people's minds, seeking she knew not\nwhat. Therefore she rose, pushed back the table, and went downstairs.\nShe went out of the hall door, and, turning the corner of the hotel,\nfound herself among the people whom she had seen from the window. But\nowing to the broad sunshine after shaded passages, and to the substance\nof living people after dreams, the group appeared with startling\nintensity, as though the dusty surface had been peeled off everything,\nleaving only the reality and the instant. It had the look of a vision\nprinted on the dark at night. White and grey and purple figures were\nscattered on the green, round wicker tables, in the middle the flame of\nthe tea-urn made the air waver like a faulty sheet of glass, a massive\ngreen tree stood over them as if it were a moving force held at rest.\nAs she approached, she could hear Evelyn's voice repeating monotonously,\n\"Here then--here--good doggie, come here\"; for a moment nothing seemed\nto happen; it all stood still, and then she realised that one of the\nfigures was Helen Ambrose; and the dust again began to settle.\n\nThe group indeed had come together in a miscellaneous way; one tea-table\njoining to another tea-table, and deck-chairs serving to connect two\ngroups. But even at a distance it could be seen that Mrs. Flushing,\nupright and imperious, dominated the party. She was talking vehemently\nto Helen across the table.\n\n\"Ten days under canvas,\" she was saying. \"No comforts. If you want\ncomforts, don't come. But I may tell you, if you don't come you'll\nregret it all your life. You say yes?\"\n\nAt this moment Mrs. Flushing caught sight of Rachel.\n\n\"Ah, there's your niece. She's promised. You're coming, aren't you?\"\nHaving adopted the plan, she pursued it with the energy of a child.\n\nRachel took her part with eagerness.\n\n\"Of course I'm coming. So are you, Helen. And Mr. Pepper too.\" As she\nsat she realised that she was surrounded by people she knew, but that\nTerence was not among them. From various angles people began saying what\nthey thought of the proposed expedition. According to some it would be\nhot, but the nights would be cold; according to others, the difficulties\nwould lie rather in getting a boat, and in speaking the language.\nMrs. Flushing disposed of all objections, whether due to man or due to\nnature, by announcing that her husband would settle all that.\n\nMeanwhile Mr. Flushing quietly explained to Helen that the expedition\nwas really a simple matter; it took five days at the outside; and the\nplace--a native village--was certainly well worth seeing before she\nreturned to England. Helen murmured ambiguously, and did not commit\nherself to one answer rather than to another.\n\nThe tea-party, however, included too many different kinds of people\nfor general conversation to flourish; and from Rachel's point of view\npossessed the great advantage that it was quite unnecessary for her to\ntalk. Over there Susan and Arthur were explaining to Mrs. Paley that an\nexpedition had been proposed; and Mrs. Paley having grasped the fact,\ngave the advice of an old traveller that they should take nice canned\nvegetables, fur cloaks, and insect powder. She leant over to Mrs.\nFlushing and whispered something which from the twinkle in her eyes\nprobably had reference to bugs. Then Helen was reciting \"Toll for the\nBrave\" to St. John Hirst, in order apparently to win a sixpence which\nlay upon the table; while Mr. Hughling Elliot imposed silence upon his\nsection of the audience by his fascinating anecdote of Lord Curzon and\nthe undergraduate's bicycle. Mrs. Thornbury was trying to remember the\nname of a man who might have been another Garibaldi, and had written a\nbook which they ought to read; and Mr. Thornbury recollected that he had\na pair of binoculars at anybody's service. Miss Allan meanwhile murmured\nwith the curious intimacy which a spinster often achieves with dogs, to\nthe fox-terrier which Evelyn had at last induced to come over to them.\nLittle particles of dust or blossom fell on the plates now and then when\nthe branches sighed above. Rachel seemed to see and hear a little of\neverything, much as a river feels the twigs that fall into it and sees\nthe sky above, but her eyes were too vague for Evelyn's liking. She came\nacross, and sat on the ground at Rachel's feet.\n\n\"Well?\" she asked suddenly. \"What are you thinking about?\"\n\n\"Miss Warrington,\" Rachel replied rashly, because she had to say\nsomething. She did indeed see Susan murmuring to Mrs. Elliot, while\nArthur stared at her with complete confidence in his own love. Both\nRachel and Evelyn then began to listen to what Susan was saying.\n\n\"There's the ordering and the dogs and the garden, and the children\ncoming to be taught,\" her voice proceeded rhythmically as if checking\nthe list, \"and my tennis, and the village, and letters to write for\nfather, and a thousand little things that don't sound much; but I never\nhave a moment to myself, and when I got to bed, I'm so sleepy I'm off\nbefore my head touches the pillow. Besides I like to be a great deal\nwith my Aunts--I'm a great bore, aren't I, Aunt Emma?\" (she smiled at\nold Mrs. Paley, who with head slightly drooped was regarding the cake\nwith speculative affection), \"and father has to be very careful about\nchills in winter which means a great deal of running about, because\nhe won't look after himself, any more than you will, Arthur! So it all\nmounts up!\"\n\nHer voice mounted too, in a mild ecstasy of satisfaction with her life\nand her own nature. Rachel suddenly took a violent dislike to Susan,\nignoring all that was kindly, modest, and even pathetic about her. She\nappeared insincere and cruel; she saw her grown stout and prolific, the\nkind blue eyes now shallow and watery, the bloom of the cheeks congealed\nto a network of dry red canals.\n\nHelen turned to her. \"Did you go to church?\" she asked. She had won her\nsixpence and seemed making ready to go.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Rachel. \"For the last time,\" she added.\n\nIn preparing to put on her gloves, Helen dropped one.\n\n\"You're not going?\" Evelyn asked, taking hold of one glove as if to keep\nthem.\n\n\"It's high time we went,\" said Helen. \"Don't you see how silent every\none's getting--?\"\n\nA silence had fallen upon them all, caused partly by one of the\naccidents of talk, and partly because they saw some one approaching.\nHelen could not see who it was, but keeping her eyes fixed upon Rachel\nobserved something which made her say to herself, \"So it's Hewet.\"\nShe drew on her gloves with a curious sense of the significance of the\nmoment. Then she rose, for Mrs. Flushing had seen Hewet too, and was\ndemanding information about rivers and boats which showed that the whole\nconversation would now come over again.\n\nRachel followed her, and they walked in silence down the avenue. In\nspite of what Helen had seen and understood, the feeling that was\nuppermost in her mind was now curiously perverse; if she went on this\nexpedition, she would not be able to have a bath, the effort appeared to\nher to be great and disagreeable.\n\n\"It's so unpleasant, being cooped up with people one hardly knows,\" she\nremarked. \"People who mind being seen naked.\"\n\n\"You don't mean to go?\" Rachel asked.\n\nThe intensity with which this was spoken irritated Mrs. Ambrose.\n\n\"I don't mean to go, and I don't mean not to go,\" she replied. She\nbecame more and more casual and indifferent.\n\n\"After all, I daresay we've seen all there is to be seen; and there's\nthe bother of getting there, and whatever they may say it's bound to be\nvilely uncomfortable.\"\n\nFor some time Rachel made no reply; but every sentence Helen spoke\nincreased her bitterness. At last she broke out--\n\n\"Thank God, Helen, I'm not like you! I sometimes think you don't think\nor feel or care to do anything but exist! You're like Mr. Hirst. You see\nthat things are bad, and you pride yourself on saying so. It's what\nyou call being honest; as a matter of fact it's being lazy, being dull,\nbeing nothing. You don't help; you put an end to things.\"\n\nHelen smiled as if she rather enjoyed the attack.\n\n\"Well?\" she enquired.\n\n\"It seems to me bad--that's all,\" Rachel replied.\n\n\"Quite likely,\" said Helen.\n\nAt any other time Rachel would probably have been silenced by her Aunt's\ncandour; but this afternoon she was not in the mood to be silenced by\nany one. A quarrel would be welcome.\n\n\"You're only half alive,\" she continued.\n\n\"Is that because I didn't accept Mr. Flushing's invitation?\" Helen\nasked, \"or do you always think that?\"\n\nAt the moment it appeared to Rachel that she had always seen the same\nfaults in Helen, from the very first night on board the _Euphrosyne_, in\nspite of her beauty, in spite of her magnanimity and their love.\n\n\"Oh, it's only what's the matter with every one!\" she exclaimed. \"No\none feels--no one does anything but hurt. I tell you, Helen, the world's\nbad. It's an agony, living, wanting--\"\n\nHere she tore a handful of leaves from a bush and crushed them to\ncontrol herself.\n\n\"The lives of these people,\" she tried to explain, the aimlessness, the\nway they live. \"One goes from one to another, and it's all the same. One\nnever gets what one wants out of any of them.\"\n\nHer emotional state and her confusion would have made her an easy prey\nif Helen had wished to argue or had wished to draw confidences. But\ninstead of talking she fell into a profound silence as they walked on.\nAimless, trivial, meaningless, oh no--what she had seen at tea made it\nimpossible for her to believe that. The little jokes, the chatter, the\ninanities of the afternoon had shrivelled up before her eyes. Underneath\nthe likings and spites, the comings together and partings, great things\nwere happening--terrible things, because they were so great. Her sense\nof safety was shaken, as if beneath twigs and dead leaves she had seen\nthe movement of a snake. It seemed to her that a moment's respite\nwas allowed, a moment's make-believe, and then again the profound and\nreasonless law asserted itself, moulding them all to its liking, making\nand destroying.\n\nShe looked at Rachel walking beside her, still crushing the leaves in\nher fingers and absorbed in her own thoughts. She was in love, and she\npitied her profoundly. But she roused herself from these thoughts\nand apologised. \"I'm very sorry,\" she said, \"but if I'm dull, it's my\nnature, and it can't be helped.\" If it was a natural defect, however,\nshe found an easy remedy, for she went on to say that she thought Mr.\nFlushing's scheme a very good one, only needing a little consideration,\nwhich it appeared she had given it by the time they reached home. By\nthat time they had settled that if anything more was said, they would\naccept the invitation.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XX\n\n\nWhen considered in detail by Mr. Flushing and Mrs. Ambrose the\nexpedition proved neither dangerous nor difficult. They found also that\nit was not even unusual. Every year at this season English people made\nparties which steamed a short way up the river, landed, and looked at\nthe native village, bought a certain number of things from the natives,\nand returned again without damage done to mind or body. When it was\ndiscovered that six people really wished the same thing the arrangements\nwere soon carried out.\n\nSince the time of Elizabeth very few people had seen the river, and\nnothing has been done to change its appearance from what it was to the\neyes of the Elizabethan voyagers. The time of Elizabeth was only distant\nfrom the present time by a moment of space compared with the ages which\nhad passed since the water had run between those banks, and the green\nthickets swarmed there, and the small trees had grown to huge wrinkled\ntrees in solitude. Changing only with the change of the sun and the\nclouds, the waving green mass had stood there for century after century,\nand the water had run between its banks ceaselessly, sometimes washing\naway earth and sometimes the branches of trees, while in other parts of\nthe world one town had risen upon the ruins of another town, and the men\nin the towns had become more and more articulate and unlike each other.\nA few miles of this river were visible from the top of the mountain\nwhere some weeks before the party from the hotel had picnicked. Susan\nand Arthur had seen it as they kissed each other, and Terence and Rachel\nas they sat talking about Richmond, and Evelyn and Perrott as they\nstrolled about, imagining that they were great captains sent to colonise\nthe world. They had seen the broad blue mark across the sand where it\nflowed into the sea, and the green cloud of trees mass themselves about\nit farther up, and finally hide its waters altogether from sight. At\nintervals for the first twenty miles or so houses were scattered on the\nbank; by degrees the houses became huts, and, later still, there was\nneither hut nor house, but trees and grass, which were seen only by\nhunters, explorers, or merchants, marching or sailing, but making no\nsettlement.\n\nBy leaving Santa Marina early in the morning, driving twenty miles\nand riding eight, the party, which was composed finally of six English\npeople, reached the river-side as the night fell. They came cantering\nthrough the trees--Mr. and Mrs. Flushing, Helen Ambrose, Rachel,\nTerence, and St. John. The tired little horses then stopped\nautomatically, and the English dismounted. Mrs. Flushing strode to the\nriver-bank in high spirits. The day had been long and hot, but she had\nenjoyed the speed and the open air; she had left the hotel which she\nhated, and she found the company to her liking. The river was swirling\npast in the darkness; they could just distinguish the smooth moving\nsurface of the water, and the air was full of the sound of it. They\nstood in an empty space in the midst of great tree-trunks, and out there\na little green light moving slightly up and down showed them where the\nsteamer lay in which they were to embark.\n\nWhen they all stood upon its deck they found that it was a very small\nboat which throbbed gently beneath them for a few minutes, and then\nshoved smoothly through the water. They seemed to be driving into the\nheart of the night, for the trees closed in front of them, and they\ncould hear all round them the rustling of leaves. The great darkness had\nthe usual effect of taking away all desire for communication by making\ntheir words sound thin and small; and, after walking round the deck\nthree or four times, they clustered together, yawning deeply, and\nlooking at the same spot of deep gloom on the banks. Murmuring very low\nin the rhythmical tone of one oppressed by the air, Mrs. Flushing began\nto wonder where they were to sleep, for they could not sleep downstairs,\nthey could not sleep in a doghole smelling of oil, they could not sleep\non deck, they could not sleep--She yawned profoundly. It was as Helen\nhad foreseen; the question of nakedness had risen already, although they\nwere half asleep, and almost invisible to each other. With St. John's\nhelp she stretched an awning, and persuaded Mrs. Flushing that she could\ntake off her clothes behind this, and that no one would notice if by\nchance some part of her which had been concealed for forty-five years\nwas laid bare to the human eye. Mattresses were thrown down, rugs\nprovided, and the three women lay near each other in the soft open air.\n\nThe gentlemen, having smoked a certain number of cigarettes, dropped\nthe glowing ends into the river, and looked for a time at the ripples\nwrinkling the black water beneath them, undressed too, and lay down at\nthe other end of the boat. They were very tired, and curtained from each\nother by the darkness. The light from one lantern fell upon a few ropes,\na few planks of the deck, and the rail of the boat, but beyond that\nthere was unbroken darkness, no light reached their faces, or the trees\nwhich were massed on the sides of the river.\n\nSoon Wilfrid Flushing slept, and Hirst slept. Hewet alone lay awake\nlooking straight up into the sky. The gentle motion and the black shapes\nthat were drawn ceaselessly across his eyes had the effect of making\nit impossible for him to think. Rachel's presence so near him lulled\nthought asleep. Being so near him, only a few paces off at the other end\nof the boat, she made it as impossible for him to think about her as it\nwould have been impossible to see her if she had stood quite close to\nhim, her forehead against his forehead. In some strange way the boat\nbecame identified with himself, and just as it would have been useless\nfor him to get up and steer the boat, so was it useless for him to\nstruggle any longer with the irresistible force of his own feelings. He\nwas drawn on and on away from all he knew, slipping over barriers and\npast landmarks into unknown waters as the boat glided over the\nsmooth surface of the river. In profound peace, enveloped in deeper\nunconsciousness than had been his for many nights, he lay on deck\nwatching the tree-tops change their position slightly against the sky,\nand arch themselves, and sink and tower huge, until he passed from\nseeing them into dreams where he lay beneath the shadow of the vast\ntrees, looking up into the sky.\n\nWhen they woke next morning they had gone a considerable way up the\nriver; on the right was a high yellow bank of sand tufted with trees, on\nthe left a swamp quivering with long reeds and tall bamboos on the top\nof which, swaying slightly, perched vivid green and yellow birds. The\nmorning was hot and still. After breakfast they drew chairs together and\nsat in an irregular semicircle in the bow. An awning above their heads\nprotected them from the heat of the sun, and the breeze which the boat\nmade aired them softly. Mrs. Flushing was already dotting and striping\nher canvas, her head jerking this way and that with the action of a bird\nnervously picking up grain; the others had books or pieces of paper\nor embroidery on their knees, at which they looked fitfully and again\nlooked at the river ahead. At one point Hewet read part of a poem aloud,\nbut the number of moving things entirely vanquished his words. He ceased\nto read, and no one spoke. They moved on under the shelter of the trees.\nThere was now a covey of red birds feeding on one of the little islets\nto the left, or again a blue-green parrot flew shrieking from tree to\ntree. As they moved on the country grew wilder and wilder. The trees and\nthe undergrowth seemed to be strangling each other near the ground in a\nmultitudinous wrestle; while here and there a splendid tree towered high\nabove the swarm, shaking its thin green umbrellas lightly in the upper\nair. Hewet looked at his books again. The morning was peaceful as the\nnight had been, only it was very strange because he could see it was\nlight, and he could see Rachel and hear her voice and be near to her.\nHe felt as if he were waiting, as if somehow he were stationary among\nthings that passed over him and around him, voices, people's bodies,\nbirds, only Rachel too was waiting with him. He looked at her sometimes\nas if she must know that they were waiting together, and being drawn on\ntogether, without being able to offer any resistance. Again he read from\nhis book:\n\n     Whoever you are holding me now in your hand,\n     Without one thing all will be useless.\n\nA bird gave a wild laugh, a monkey chuckled a malicious question, and,\nas fire fades in the hot sunshine, his words flickered and went out.\n\nBy degrees as the river narrowed, and the high sandbanks fell to level\nground thickly grown with trees, the sounds of the forest could be\nheard. It echoed like a hall. There were sudden cries; and then long\nspaces of silence, such as there are in a cathedral when a boy's voice\nhas ceased and the echo of it still seems to haunt about the remote\nplaces of the roof. Once Mr. Flushing rose and spoke to a sailor, and\neven announced that some time after luncheon the steamer would stop, and\nthey could walk a little way through the forest.\n\n\"There are tracks all through the trees there,\" he explained. \"We're no\ndistance from civilisation yet.\"\n\nHe scrutinised his wife's painting. Too polite to praise it openly,\nhe contented himself with cutting off one half of the picture with one\nhand, and giving a flourish in the air with the other.\n\n\"God!\" Hirst exclaimed, staring straight ahead. \"Don't you think it's\namazingly beautiful?\"\n\n\"Beautiful?\" Helen enquired. It seemed a strange little word, and Hirst\nand herself both so small that she forgot to answer him.\n\nHewet felt that he must speak.\n\n\"That's where the Elizabethans got their style,\" he mused, staring into\nthe profusion of leaves and blossoms and prodigious fruits.\n\n\"Shakespeare? I hate Shakespeare!\" Mrs. Flushing exclaimed; and Wilfrid\nreturned admiringly, \"I believe you're the only person who dares to say\nthat, Alice.\" But Mrs. Flushing went on painting. She did not appear\nto attach much value to her husband's compliment, and painted steadily,\nsometimes muttering a half-audible word or groan.\n\nThe morning was now very hot.\n\n\"Look at Hirst!\" Mr. Flushing whispered. His sheet of paper had slipped\non to the deck, his head lay back, and he drew a long snoring breath.\n\nTerence picked up the sheet of paper and spread it out before Rachel. It\nwas a continuation of the poem on God which he had begun in the chapel,\nand it was so indecent that Rachel did not understand half of it\nalthough she saw that it was indecent. Hewet began to fill in words\nwhere Hirst had left spaces, but he soon ceased; his pencil rolled on\ndeck. Gradually they approached nearer and nearer to the bank on the\nright-hand side, so that the light which covered them became definitely\ngreen, falling through a shade of green leaves, and Mrs. Flushing set\naside her sketch and stared ahead of her in silence. Hirst woke up; they\nwere then called to luncheon, and while they ate it, the steamer came\nto a standstill a little way out from the bank. The boat which was towed\nbehind them was brought to the side, and the ladies were helped into it.\n\nFor protection against boredom, Helen put a book of memoirs beneath her\narm, and Mrs. Flushing her paint-box, and, thus equipped, they allowed\nthemselves to be set on shore on the verge of the forest.\n\nThey had not strolled more than a few hundred yards along the track\nwhich ran parallel with the river before Helen professed to find it\nwas unbearably hot. The river breeze had ceased, and a hot steamy\natmosphere, thick with scents, came from the forest.\n\n\"I shall sit down here,\" she announced, pointing to the trunk of a\ntree which had fallen long ago and was now laced across and across\nby creepers and thong-like brambles. She seated herself, opened her\nparasol, and looked at the river which was barred by the stems of trees.\nShe turned her back to the trees which disappeared in black shadow\nbehind her.\n\n\"I quite agree,\" said Mrs. Flushing, and proceeded to undo her\npaint-box. Her husband strolled about to select an interesting point of\nview for her. Hirst cleared a space on the ground by Helen's side, and\nseated himself with great deliberation, as if he did not mean to move\nuntil he had talked to her for a long time. Terence and Rachel were left\nstanding by themselves without occupation. Terence saw that the time\nhad come as it was fated to come, but although he realised this he\nwas completely calm and master of himself. He chose to stand for a few\nmoments talking to Helen, and persuading her to leave her seat. Rachel\njoined him too in advising her to come with them.\n\n\"Of all the people I've ever met,\" he said, \"you're the least\nadventurous. You might be sitting on green chairs in Hyde Park. Are you\ngoing to sit there the whole afternoon? Aren't you going to walk?\"\n\n\"Oh, no,\" said Helen, \"one's only got to use one's eye. There's\neverything here--everything,\" she repeated in a drowsy tone of voice.\n\"What will you gain by walking?\"\n\n\"You'll be hot and disagreeable by tea-time, we shall be cool and\nsweet,\" put in Hirst. Into his eyes as he looked up at them had come\nyellow and green reflections from the sky and the branches, robbing them\nof their intentness, and he seemed to think what he did not say. It was\nthus taken for granted by them both that Terence and Rachel proposed to\nwalk into the woods together; with one look at each other they turned\naway.\n\n\"Good-bye!\" cried Rachel.\n\n\"Good-by. Beware of snakes,\" Hirst replied. He settled himself still\nmore comfortably under the shade of the fallen tree and Helen's figure.\nAs they went, Mr. Flushing called after them, \"We must start in an hour.\nHewet, please remember that. An hour.\"\n\nWhether made by man, or for some reason preserved by nature, there was\na wide pathway striking through the forest at right angles to the river.\nIt resembled a drive in an English forest, save that tropical bushes\nwith their sword-like leaves grew at the side, and the ground was\ncovered with an unmarked springy moss instead of grass, starred with\nlittle yellow flowers. As they passed into the depths of the forest the\nlight grew dimmer, and the noises of the ordinary world were replaced\nby those creaking and sighing sounds which suggest to the traveller in\na forest that he is walking at the bottom of the sea. The path narrowed\nand turned; it was hedged in by dense creepers which knotted tree to\ntree, and burst here and there into star-shaped crimson blossoms. The\nsighing and creaking up above were broken every now and then by the\njarring cry of some startled animal. The atmosphere was close and the\nair came at them in languid puffs of scent. The vast green light was\nbroken here and there by a round of pure yellow sunlight which fell\nthrough some gap in the immense umbrella of green above, and in these\nyellow spaces crimson and black butterflies were circling and settling.\nTerence and Rachel hardly spoke.\n\nNot only did the silence weigh upon them, but they were both unable to\nframe any thoughts. There was something between them which had to be\nspoken of. One of them had to begin, but which of them was it to be?\nThen Hewet picked up a red fruit and threw it as high as he could. When\nit dropped, he would speak. They heard the flapping of great wings; they\nheard the fruit go pattering through the leaves and eventually fall with\na thud. The silence was again profound.\n\n\"Does this frighten you?\" Terence asked when the sound of the fruit\nfalling had completely died away.\n\n\"No,\" she answered. \"I like it.\"\n\nShe repeated \"I like it.\" She was walking fast, and holding herself more\nerect than usual. There was another pause.\n\n\"You like being with me?\" Terence asked.\n\n\"Yes, with you,\" she replied.\n\nHe was silent for a moment. Silence seemed to have fallen upon the\nworld.\n\n\"That is what I have felt ever since I knew you,\" he replied. \"We are\nhappy together.\" He did not seem to be speaking, or she to be hearing.\n\n\"Very happy,\" she answered.\n\nThey continued to walk for some time in silence. Their steps\nunconsciously quickened.\n\n\"We love each other,\" Terence said.\n\n\"We love each other,\" she repeated.\n\nThe silence was then broken by their voices which joined in tones of\nstrange unfamiliar sound which formed no words. Faster and faster they\nwalked; simultaneously they stopped, clasped each other in their arms,\nthen releasing themselves, dropped to the earth. They sat side by\nside. Sounds stood out from the background making a bridge across their\nsilence; they heard the swish of the trees and some beast croaking in a\nremote world.\n\n\"We love each other,\" Terence repeated, searching into her face. Their\nfaces were both very pale and quiet, and they said nothing. He was\nafraid to kiss her again. By degrees she drew close to him, and rested\nagainst him. In this position they sat for some time. She said \"Terence\"\nonce; he answered \"Rachel.\"\n\n\"Terrible--terrible,\" she murmured after another pause, but in saying\nthis she was thinking as much of the persistent churning of the water as\nof her own feeling. On and on it went in the distance, the senseless and\ncruel churning of the water. She observed that the tears were running\ndown Terence's cheeks.\n\nThe next movement was on his part. A very long time seemed to have\npassed. He took out his watch.\n\n\"Flushing said an hour. We've been gone more than half an hour.\"\n\n\"And it takes that to get back,\" said Rachel. She raised herself very\nslowly. When she was standing up she stretched her arms and drew a deep\nbreath, half a sigh, half a yawn. She appeared to be very tired. Her\ncheeks were white. \"Which way?\" she asked.\n\n\"There,\" said Terence.\n\nThey began to walk back down the mossy path again. The sighing and\ncreaking continued far overhead, and the jarring cries of animals. The\nbutterflies were circling still in the patches of yellow sunlight.\nAt first Terence was certain of his way, but as they walked he became\ndoubtful. They had to stop to consider, and then to return and start\nonce more, for although he was certain of the direction of the river he\nwas not certain of striking the point where they had left the others.\nRachel followed him, stopping where he stopped, turning where he turned,\nignorant of the way, ignorant why he stopped or why he turned.\n\n\"I don't want to be late,\" he said, \"because--\" He put a flower into her\nhand and her fingers closed upon it quietly. \"We're so late--so\nlate--so horribly late,\" he repeated as if he were talking in his sleep.\n\"Ah--this is right. We turn here.\"\n\nThey found themselves again in the broad path, like the drive in the\nEnglish forest, where they had started when they left the others. They\nwalked on in silence as people walking in their sleep, and were oddly\nconscious now and again of the mass of their bodies. Then Rachel\nexclaimed suddenly, \"Helen!\"\n\nIn the sunny space at the edge of the forest they saw Helen still\nsitting on the tree-trunk, her dress showing very white in the sun,\nwith Hirst still propped on his elbow by her side. They stopped\ninstinctively. At the sight of other people they could not go on. They\nstood hand in hand for a minute or two in silence. They could not bear\nto face other people.\n\n\"But we must go on,\" Rachel insisted at last, in the curious dull tone\nof voice in which they had both been speaking, and with a great effort\nthey forced themselves to cover the short distance which lay between\nthem and the pair sitting on the tree-trunk.\n\nAs they approached, Helen turned round and looked at them. She looked at\nthem for some time without speaking, and when they were close to her she\nsaid quietly:\n\n\"Did you meet Mr. Flushing? He has gone to find you. He thought you must\nbe lost, though I told him you weren't lost.\"\n\nHirst half turned round and threw his head back so that he looked at the\nbranches crossing themselves in the air above him.\n\n\"Well, was it worth the effort?\" he enquired dreamily.\n\nHewet sat down on the grass by his side and began to fan himself.\n\nRachel had balanced herself near Helen on the end of the tree trunk.\n\n\"Very hot,\" she said.\n\n\"You look exhausted anyhow,\" said Hirst.\n\n\"It's fearfully close in those trees,\" Helen remarked, picking up her\nbook and shaking it free from the dried blades of grass which had fallen\nbetween the leaves. Then they were all silent, looking at the river\nswirling past in front of them between the trunks of the trees until Mr.\nFlushing interrupted them. He broke out of the trees a hundred yards to\nthe left, exclaiming sharply:\n\n\"Ah, so you found the way after all. But it's late--much later than we\narranged, Hewet.\"\n\nHe was slightly annoyed, and in his capacity as leader of the\nexpedition, inclined to be dictatorial. He spoke quickly, using\ncuriously sharp, meaningless words.\n\n\"Being late wouldn't matter normally, of course,\" he said, \"but when\nit's a question of keeping the men up to time--\"\n\nHe gathered them together and made them come down to the river-bank,\nwhere the boat was waiting to row them out to the steamer.\n\nThe heat of the day was going down, and over their cups of tea the\nFlushings tended to become communicative. It seemed to Terence as he\nlistened to them talking, that existence now went on in two different\nlayers. Here were the Flushings talking, talking somewhere high up in\nthe air above him, and he and Rachel had dropped to the bottom of\nthe world together. But with something of a child's directness, Mrs.\nFlushing had also the instinct which leads a child to suspect what its\nelders wish to keep hidden. She fixed Terence with her vivid blue eyes\nand addressed herself to him in particular. What would he do, she wanted\nto know, if the boat ran upon a rock and sank.\n\n\"Would you care for anythin' but savin' yourself? Should I? No, no,\" she\nlaughed, \"not one scrap--don't tell me. There's only two creatures the\nordinary woman cares about,\" she continued, \"her child and her dog;\nand I don't believe it's even two with men. One reads a lot about\nlove--that's why poetry's so dull. But what happens in real life, he? It\nain't love!\" she cried.\n\nTerence murmured something unintelligible. Mr. Flushing, however, had\nrecovered his urbanity. He was smoking a cigarette, and he now answered\nhis wife.\n\n\"You must always remember, Alice,\" he said, \"that your upbringing\nwas very unnatural--unusual, I should say. They had no mother,\" he\nexplained, dropping something of the formality of his tone; \"and a\nfather--he was a very delightful man, I've no doubt, but he cared only\nfor racehorses and Greek statues. Tell them about the bath, Alice.\"\n\n\"In the stable-yard,\" said Mrs. Flushing. \"Covered with ice in winter.\nWe had to get in; if we didn't, we were whipped. The strong ones\nlived--the others died. What you call survival of the fittest--a most\nexcellent plan, I daresay, if you've thirteen children!\"\n\n\"And all this going on in the heart of England, in the nineteenth\ncentury!\" Mr. Flushing exclaimed, turning to Helen.\n\n\"I'd treat my children just the same if I had any,\" said Mrs. Flushing.\n\nEvery word sounded quite distinctly in Terence's ears; but what were\nthey saying, and who were they talking to, and who were they, these\nfantastic people, detached somewhere high up in the air? Now that they\nhad drunk their tea, they rose and leant over the bow of the boat. The\nsun was going down, and the water was dark and crimson. The river had\nwidened again, and they were passing a little island set like a dark\nwedge in the middle of the stream. Two great white birds with red lights\non them stood there on stilt-like legs, and the beach of the island was\nunmarked, save by the skeleton print of birds' feet. The branches of\nthe trees on the bank looked more twisted and angular than ever, and the\ngreen of the leaves was lurid and splashed with gold. Then Hirst began\nto talk, leaning over the bow.\n\n\"It makes one awfully queer, don't you find?\" he complained. \"These\ntrees get on one's nerves--it's all so crazy. God's undoubtedly mad.\nWhat sane person could have conceived a wilderness like this, and\npeopled it with apes and alligators? I should go mad if I lived\nhere--raving mad.\"\n\nTerence attempted to answer him, but Mrs. Ambrose replied instead. She\nbade him look at the way things massed themselves--look at the amazing\ncolours, look at the shapes of the trees. She seemed to be protecting\nTerence from the approach of the others.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Mr. Flushing. \"And in my opinion,\" he continued, \"the\nabsence of population to which Hirst objects is precisely the\nsignificant touch. You must admit, Hirst, that a little Italian\ntown even would vulgarise the whole scene, would detract from the\nvastness--the sense of elemental grandeur.\" He swept his hands towards\nthe forest, and paused for a moment, looking at the great green mass,\nwhich was now falling silent. \"I own it makes us seem pretty small--us,\nnot them.\" He nodded his head at a sailor who leant over the side\nspitting into the river. \"And that, I think, is what my wife feels, the\nessential superiority of the peasant--\" Under cover of Mr. Flushing's\nwords, which continued now gently reasoning with St. John and persuading\nhim, Terence drew Rachel to the side, pointing ostensibly to a great\ngnarled tree-trunk which had fallen and lay half in the water. He\nwished, at any rate, to be near her, but he found that he could say\nnothing. They could hear Mr. Flushing flowing on, now about his wife,\nnow about art, now about the future of the country, little meaningless\nwords floating high in air. As it was becoming cold he began to pace\nthe deck with Hirst. Fragments of their talk came out distinctly as they\npassed--art, emotion, truth, reality.\n\n\"Is it true, or is it a dream?\" Rachel murmured, when they had passed.\n\n\"It's true, it's true,\" he replied.\n\nBut the breeze freshened, and there was a general desire for movement.\nWhen the party rearranged themselves under cover of rugs and cloaks,\nTerence and Rachel were at opposite ends of the circle, and could not\nspeak to each other. But as the dark descended, the words of the others\nseemed to curl up and vanish as the ashes of burnt paper, and left them\nsitting perfectly silent at the bottom of the world. Occasional starts\nof exquisite joy ran through them, and then they were peaceful again.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXI\n\n\nThanks to Mr. Flushing's discipline, the right stages of the river were\nreached at the right hours, and when next morning after breakfast the\nchairs were again drawn out in a semicircle in the bow, the launch\nwas within a few miles of the native camp which was the limit of the\njourney. Mr. Flushing, as he sat down, advised them to keep their eyes\nfixed on the left bank, where they would soon pass a clearing, and in\nthat clearing, was a hut where Mackenzie, the famous explorer, had\ndied of fever some ten years ago, almost within reach of\ncivilisation--Mackenzie, he repeated, the man who went farther inland\nthan any one's been yet. Their eyes turned that way obediently. The eyes\nof Rachel saw nothing. Yellow and green shapes did, it is true, pass\nbefore them, but she only knew that one was large and another small;\nshe did not know that they were trees. These directions to look here\nand there irritated her, as interruptions irritate a person absorbed in\nthought, although she was not thinking of anything. She was annoyed with\nall that was said, and with the aimless movements of people's bodies,\nbecause they seemed to interfere with her and to prevent her from\nspeaking to Terence. Very soon Helen saw her staring moodily at a coil\nof rope, and making no effort to listen. Mr. Flushing and St. John were\nengaged in more or less continuous conversation about the future of the\ncountry from a political point of view, and the degree to which it\nhad been explored; the others, with their legs stretched out, or chins\npoised on the hands, gazed in silence.\n\nMrs. Ambrose looked and listened obediently enough, but inwardly she\nwas prey to an uneasy mood not readily to be ascribed to any one cause.\nLooking on shore as Mr. Flushing bade her, she thought the country\nvery beautiful, but also sultry and alarming. She did not like to feel\nherself the victim of unclassified emotions, and certainly as the launch\nslipped on and on, in the hot morning sun, she felt herself unreasonably\nmoved. Whether the unfamiliarity of the forest was the cause of it,\nor something less definite, she could not determine. Her mind left the\nscene and occupied itself with anxieties for Ridley, for her children,\nfor far-off things, such as old age and poverty and death. Hirst, too,\nwas depressed. He had been looking forward to this expedition as to a\nholiday, for, once away from the hotel, surely wonderful things would\nhappen, instead of which nothing happened, and here they were as\nuncomfortable, as restrained, as self-conscious as ever. That, of\ncourse, was what came of looking forward to anything; one was always\ndisappointed. He blamed Wilfrid Flushing, who was so well dressed and so\nformal; he blamed Hewet and Rachel. Why didn't they talk? He looked at\nthem sitting silent and self-absorbed, and the sight annoyed him. He\nsupposed that they were engaged, or about to become engaged, but\ninstead of being in the least romantic or exciting, that was as dull as\neverything else; it annoyed him, too, to think that they were in love.\nHe drew close to Helen and began to tell her how uncomfortable his night\nhad been, lying on the deck, sometimes too hot, sometimes too cold, and\nthe stars so bright that he couldn't get to sleep. He had lain awake\nall night thinking, and when it was light enough to see, he had written\ntwenty lines of his poem on God, and the awful thing was that he'd\npractically proved the fact that God did not exist. He did not see that\nhe was teasing her, and he went on to wonder what would happen if God\ndid exist--\"an old gentleman in a beard and a long blue dressing gown,\nextremely testy and disagreeable as he's bound to be? Can you suggest a\nrhyme? God, rod, sod--all used; any others?\"\n\nAlthough he spoke much as usual, Helen could have seen, had she looked,\nthat he was also impatient and disturbed. But she was not called upon to\nanswer, for Mr. Flushing now exclaimed \"There!\" They looked at the hut\non the bank, a desolate place with a large rent in the roof, and the\nground round it yellow, scarred with fires and scattered with rusty open\ntins.\n\n\"Did they find his dead body there?\" Mrs. Flushing exclaimed, leaning\nforward in her eagerness to see the spot where the explorer had died.\n\n\"They found his body and his skins and a notebook,\" her husband replied.\nBut the boat had soon carried them on and left the place behind.\n\nIt was so hot that they scarcely moved, except now to change a foot, or,\nagain, to strike a match. Their eyes, concentrated upon the bank, were\nfull of the same green reflections, and their lips were slightly pressed\ntogether as though the sights they were passing gave rise to thoughts,\nsave that Hirst's lips moved intermittently as half consciously he\nsought rhymes for God. Whatever the thoughts of the others, no one said\nanything for a considerable space. They had grown so accustomed to the\nwall of trees on either side that they looked up with a start when the\nlight suddenly widened out and the trees came to an end.\n\n\"It almost reminds one of an English park,\" said Mr. Flushing.\n\nIndeed no change could have been greater. On both banks of the river lay\nan open lawn-like space, grass covered and planted, for the gentleness\nand order of the place suggested human care, with graceful trees on the\ntop of little mounds. As far as they could gaze, this lawn rose and sank\nwith the undulating motion of an old English park. The change of scene\nnaturally suggested a change of position, grateful to most of them. They\nrose and leant over the rail.\n\n\"It might be Arundel or Windsor,\" Mr. Flushing continued, \"if you cut\ndown that bush with the yellow flowers; and, by Jove, look!\"\n\nRows of brown backs paused for a moment and then leapt with a motion as\nif they were springing over waves out of sight. For a moment no one of\nthem could believe that they had really seen live animals in the open--a\nherd of wild deer, and the sight aroused a childlike excitement in them,\ndissipating their gloom.\n\n\"I've never in my life seen anything bigger than a hare!\" Hirst\nexclaimed with genuine excitement. \"What an ass I was not to bring my\nKodak!\"\n\nSoon afterwards the launch came gradually to a standstill, and the\ncaptain explained to Mr. Flushing that it would be pleasant for the\npassengers if they now went for a stroll on shore; if they chose to\nreturn within an hour, he would take them on to the village; if they\nchose to walk--it was only a mile or two farther on--he would meet them\nat the landing-place.\n\nThe matter being settled, they were once more put on shore: the sailors,\nproducing raisins and tobacco, leant upon the rail and watched the\nsix English, whose coats and dresses looked so strange upon the green,\nwander off. A joke that was by no means proper set them all laughing,\nand then they turned round and lay at their ease upon the deck.\n\nDirectly they landed, Terence and Rachel drew together slightly in\nadvance of the others.\n\n\"Thank God!\" Terence exclaimed, drawing a long breath. \"At last we're\nalone.\"\n\n\"And if we keep ahead we can talk,\" said Rachel.\n\nNevertheless, although their position some yards in advance of the\nothers made it possible for them to say anything they chose, they were\nboth silent.\n\n\"You love me?\" Terence asked at length, breaking the silence painfully.\nTo speak or to be silent was equally an effort, for when they were\nsilent they were keenly conscious of each other's presence, and yet\nwords were either too trivial or too large.\n\nShe murmured inarticulately, ending, \"And you?\"\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" he replied; but there were so many things to be said, and\nnow that they were alone it seemed necessary to bring themselves still\nmore near, and to surmount a barrier which had grown up since they had\nlast spoken. It was difficult, frightening even, oddly embarrassing. At\none moment he was clear-sighted, and, at the next, confused.\n\n\"Now I'm going to begin at the beginning,\" he said resolutely. \"I'm\ngoing to tell you what I ought to have told you before. In the first\nplace, I've never been in love with other women, but I've had other\nwomen. Then I've great faults. I'm very lazy, I'm moody--\" He persisted,\nin spite of her exclamation, \"You've got to know the worst of me. I'm\nlustful. I'm overcome by a sense of futility--incompetence. I ought\nnever to have asked you to marry me, I expect. I'm a bit of a snob; I'm\nambitious--\"\n\n\"Oh, our faults!\" she cried. \"What do they matter?\" Then she demanded,\n\"Am I in love--is this being in love--are we to marry each other?\"\n\nOvercome by the charm of her voice and her presence, he exclaimed, \"Oh,\nyou're free, Rachel. To you, time will make no difference, or marriage\nor--\"\n\nThe voices of the others behind them kept floating, now farther, now\nnearer, and Mrs. Flushing's laugh rose clearly by itself.\n\n\"Marriage?\" Rachel repeated.\n\nThe shouts were renewed behind, warning them that they were bearing too\nfar to the left. Improving their course, he continued, \"Yes, marriage.\"\nThe feeling that they could not be united until she knew all about him\nmade him again endeavour to explain.\n\n\"All that's been bad in me, the things I've put up with--the second\nbest--\"\n\nShe murmured, considered her own life, but could not describe how it\nlooked to her now.\n\n\"And the loneliness!\" he continued. A vision of walking with her through\nthe streets of London came before his eyes. \"We will go for walks\ntogether,\" he said. The simplicity of the idea relieved them, and for\nthe first time they laughed. They would have liked had they dared to\ntake each other by the hand, but the consciousness of eyes fixed on them\nfrom behind had not yet deserted them.\n\n\"Books, people, sights--Mrs. Nutt, Greeley, Hutchinson,\" Hewet murmured.\n\nWith every word the mist which had enveloped them, making them seem\nunreal to each other, since the previous afternoon melted a little\nfurther, and their contact became more and more natural. Up through the\nsultry southern landscape they saw the world they knew appear clearer\nand more vividly than it had ever appeared before. As upon that occasion\nat the hotel when she had sat in the window, the world once more\narranged itself beneath her gaze very vividly and in its true\nproportions. She glanced curiously at Terence from time to time,\nobserving his grey coat and his purple tie; observing the man with whom\nshe was to spend the rest of her life.\n\nAfter one of these glances she murmured, \"Yes, I'm in love. There's no\ndoubt; I'm in love with you.\"\n\nNevertheless, they remained uncomfortably apart; drawn so close\ntogether, as she spoke, that there seemed no division between them, and\nthe next moment separate and far away again. Feeling this painfully, she\nexclaimed, \"It will be a fight.\"\n\nBut as she looked at him she perceived from the shape of his eyes, the\nlines about his mouth, and other peculiarities that he pleased her, and\nshe added:\n\n\"Where I want to fight, you have compassion. You're finer than I am;\nyou're much finer.\"\n\nHe returned her glance and smiled, perceiving, much as she had done, the\nvery small individual things about her which made her delightful to\nhim. She was his for ever. This barrier being surmounted, innumerable\ndelights lay before them both.\n\n\"I'm not finer,\" he answered. \"I'm only older, lazier; a man, not a\nwoman.\"\n\n\"A man,\" she repeated, and a curious sense of possession coming over\nher, it struck her that she might now touch him; she put out her hand\nand lightly touched his cheek. His fingers followed where hers had been,\nand the touch of his hand upon his face brought back the overpowering\nsense of unreality. This body of his was unreal; the whole world was\nunreal.\n\n\"What's happened?\" he began. \"Why did I ask you to marry me? How did it\nhappen?\"\n\n\"Did you ask me to marry you?\" she wondered. They faded far away from\neach other, and neither of them could remember what had been said.\n\n\"We sat upon the ground,\" he recollected.\n\n\"We sat upon the ground,\" she confirmed him. The recollection of sitting\nupon the ground, such as it was, seemed to unite them again, and they\nwalked on in silence, their minds sometimes working with difficulty and\nsometimes ceasing to work, their eyes alone perceiving the things round\nthem. Now he would attempt again to tell her his faults, and why he\nloved her; and she would describe what she had felt at this time or at\nthat time, and together they would interpret her feeling. So beautiful\nwas the sound of their voices that by degrees they scarcely listened\nto the words they framed. Long silences came between their words,\nwhich were no longer silences of struggle and confusion but refreshing\nsilences, in which trivial thoughts moved easily. They began to speak\nnaturally of ordinary things, of the flowers and the trees, how they\ngrew there so red, like garden flowers at home, and there bent and\ncrooked like the arm of a twisted old man.\n\nVery gently and quietly, almost as if it were the blood singing in her\nveins, or the water of the stream running over stones, Rachel became\nconscious of a new feeling within her. She wondered for a moment what it\nwas, and then said to herself, with a little surprise at recognising in\nher own person so famous a thing:\n\n\"This is happiness, I suppose.\" And aloud to Terence she spoke, \"This is\nhappiness.\"\n\nOn the heels of her words he answered, \"This is happiness,\" upon which\nthey guessed that the feeling had sprung in both of them the same time.\nThey began therefore to describe how this felt and that felt, how like\nit was and yet how different; for they were very different.\n\nVoices crying behind them never reached through the waters in which\nthey were now sunk. The repetition of Hewet's name in short, dissevered\nsyllables was to them the crack of a dry branch or the laughter of a\nbird. The grasses and breezes sounding and murmuring all round them,\nthey never noticed that the swishing of the grasses grew louder and\nlouder, and did not cease with the lapse of the breeze. A hand dropped\nabrupt as iron on Rachel's shoulder; it might have been a bolt from\nheaven. She fell beneath it, and the grass whipped across her eyes and\nfilled her mouth and ears. Through the waving stems she saw a figure,\nlarge and shapeless against the sky. Helen was upon her. Rolled this\nway and that, now seeing only forests of green, and now the high blue\nheaven; she was speechless and almost without sense. At last she lay\nstill, all the grasses shaken round her and before her by her panting.\nOver her loomed two great heads, the heads of a man and woman, of\nTerence and Helen.\n\nBoth were flushed, both laughing, and the lips were moving; they came\ntogether and kissed in the air above her. Broken fragments of speech\ncame down to her on the ground. She thought she heard them speak of love\nand then of marriage. Raising herself and sitting up, she too realised\nHelen's soft body, the strong and hospitable arms, and happiness\nswelling and breaking in one vast wave. When this fell away, and the\ngrasses once more lay low, and the sky became horizontal, and the earth\nrolled out flat on each side, and the trees stood upright, she was the\nfirst to perceive a little row of human figures standing patiently in\nthe distance. For the moment she could not remember who they were.\n\n\"Who are they?\" she asked, and then recollected.\n\nFalling into line behind Mr. Flushing, they were careful to leave at\nleast three yards' distance between the toe of his boot and the rim of\nher skirt.\n\nHe led them across a stretch of green by the river-bank and then through\na grove of trees, and bade them remark the signs of human habitation,\nthe blackened grass, the charred tree-stumps, and there, through the\ntrees, strange wooden nests, drawn together in an arch where the trees\ndrew apart, the village which was the goal of their journey.\n\nStepping cautiously, they observed the women, who were squatting on the\nground in triangular shapes, moving their hands, either plaiting straw\nor in kneading something in bowls. But when they had looked for a moment\nundiscovered, they were seen, and Mr. Flushing, advancing into the\ncentre of the clearing, was engaged in talk with a lean majestic man,\nwhose bones and hollows at once made the shapes of the Englishman's body\nappear ugly and unnatural. The women took no notice of the strangers,\nexcept that their hands paused for a moment and their long narrow eyes\nslid round and fixed upon them with the motionless inexpensive gaze of\nthose removed from each other far far beyond the plunge of speech. Their\nhands moved again, but the stare continued. It followed them as they\nwalked, as they peered into the huts where they could distinguish guns\nleaning in the corner, and bowls upon the floor, and stacks of rushes;\nin the dusk the solemn eyes of babies regarded them, and old women\nstared out too. As they sauntered about, the stare followed them,\npassing over their legs, their bodies, their heads, curiously not\nwithout hostility, like the crawl of a winter fly. As she drew apart her\nshawl and uncovered her breast to the lips of her baby, the eyes of a\nwoman never left their faces, although they moved uneasily under her\nstare, and finally turned away, rather than stand there looking at her\nany longer. When sweetmeats were offered them, they put out great\nred hands to take them, and felt themselves treading cumbrously like\ntight-coated soldiers among these soft instinctive people. But soon the\nlife of the village took no notice of them; they had become absorbed\nin it. The women's hands became busy again with the straw; their eyes\ndropped. If they moved, it was to fetch something from the hut, or to\ncatch a straying child, or to cross the space with a jar balanced on\ntheir heads; if they spoke, it was to cry some harsh unintelligible\ncry. Voices rose when a child was beaten, and fell again; voices rose\nin song, which slid up a little way and down a little way, and settled\nagain upon the same low and melancholy note. Seeking each other, Terence\nand Rachel drew together under a tree. Peaceful, and even beautiful at\nfirst, the sight of the women, who had given up looking at them, made\nthem now feel very cold and melancholy.\n\n\"Well,\" Terence sighed at length, \"it makes us seem insignificant,\ndoesn't it?\"\n\nRachel agreed. So it would go on for ever and ever, she said, those\nwomen sitting under the trees, the trees and the river. They turned away\nand began to walk through the trees, leaning, without fear of discovery,\nupon each other's arms. They had not gone far before they began to\nassure each other once more that they were in love, were happy, were\ncontent; but why was it so painful being in love, why was there so much\npain in happiness?\n\nThe sight of the village indeed affected them all curiously though all\ndifferently. St. John had left the others and was walking slowly down to\nthe river, absorbed in his own thoughts, which were bitter and unhappy,\nfor he felt himself alone; and Helen, standing by herself in the sunny\nspace among the native women, was exposed to presentiments of disaster.\nThe cries of the senseless beasts rang in her ears high and low in\nthe air, as they ran from tree-trunk to tree-top. How small the little\nfigures looked wandering through the trees! She became acutely conscious\nof the little limbs, the thin veins, the delicate flesh of men and\nwomen, which breaks so easily and lets the life escape compared with\nthese great trees and deep waters. A falling branch, a foot that slips,\nand the earth has crushed them or the water drowned them. Thus thinking,\nshe kept her eyes anxiously fixed upon the lovers, as if by doing so she\ncould protect them from their fate. Turning, she found the Flushings by\nher side.\n\nThey were talking about the things they had bought and arguing whether\nthey were really old, and whether there were not signs here and there\nof European influence. Helen was appealed to. She was made to look at\na brooch, and then at a pair of ear-rings. But all the time she blamed\nthem for having come on this expedition, for having ventured too far and\nexposed themselves. Then she roused herself and tried to talk, but in a\nfew moments she caught herself seeing a picture of a boat upset on the\nriver in England, at midday. It was morbid, she knew, to imagine such\nthings; nevertheless she sought out the figures of the others between\nthe trees, and whenever she saw them she kept her eyes fixed on them, so\nthat she might be able to protect them from disaster.\n\nBut when the sun went down and the steamer turned and began to\nsteam back towards civilisation, again her fears were calmed. In the\nsemi-darkness the chairs on deck and the people sitting in them were\nangular shapes, the mouth being indicated by a tiny burning spot, and\nthe arm by the same spot moving up or down as the cigar or cigarette\nwas lifted to and from the lips. Words crossed the darkness, but, not\nknowing where they fell, seemed to lack energy and substance. Deep\nsights proceeded regularly, although with some attempt at suppression,\nfrom the large white mound which represented the person of Mrs.\nFlushing. The day had been long and very hot, and now that all the\ncolours were blotted out the cool night air seemed to press soft fingers\nupon the eyelids, sealing them down. Some philosophical remark directed,\napparently, at St. John Hirst missed its aim, and hung so long suspended\nin the air until it was engulfed by a yawn, that it was considered dead,\nand this gave the signal for stirring of legs and murmurs about sleep.\nThe white mound moved, finally lengthened itself and disappeared, and\nafter a few turns and paces St. John and Mr. Flushing withdrew, leaving\nthe three chairs still occupied by three silent bodies. The light which\ncame from a lamp high on the mast and a sky pale with stars left\nthem with shapes but without features; but even in this darkness the\nwithdrawal of the others made them feel each other very near, for they\nwere all thinking of the same thing. For some time no one spoke, then\nHelen said with a sigh, \"So you're both very happy?\"\n\nAs if washed by the air her voice sounded more spiritual and softer than\nusual. Voices at a little distance answered her, \"Yes.\"\n\nThrough the darkness she was looking at them both, and trying to\ndistinguish him. What was there for her to say? Rachel had passed beyond\nher guardianship. A voice might reach her ears, but never again would\nit carry as far as it had carried twenty-four hours ago. Nevertheless,\nspeech seemed to be due from her before she went to bed. She wished to\nspeak, but she felt strangely old and depressed.\n\n\"D'you realise what you're doing?\" she demanded. \"She's young, you're\nboth young; and marriage--\" Here she ceased. They begged her, however,\nto continue, with such earnestness in their voices, as if they only\ncraved advice, that she was led to add:\n\n\"Marriage! well, it's not easy.\"\n\n\"That's what we want to know,\" they answered, and she guessed that now\nthey were looking at each other.\n\n\"It depends on both of you,\" she stated. Her face was turned towards\nTerence, and although he could hardly see her, he believed that her\nwords really covered a genuine desire to know more about him. He raised\nhimself from his semi-recumbent position and proceeded to tell her what\nshe wanted to know. He spoke as lightly as he could in order to take\naway her depression.\n\n\"I'm twenty-seven, and I've about seven hundred a year,\" he began. \"My\ntemper is good on the whole, and health excellent, though Hirst detects\na gouty tendency. Well, then, I think I'm very intelligent.\" He paused\nas if for confirmation.\n\nHelen agreed.\n\n\"Though, unfortunately, rather lazy. I intend to allow Rachel to be a\nfool if she wants to, and--Do you find me on the whole satisfactory in\nother respects?\" he asked shyly.\n\n\"Yes, I like what I know of you,\" Helen replied.\n\n\"But then--one knows so little.\"\n\n\"We shall live in London,\" he continued, \"and--\" With one voice they\nsuddenly enquired whether she did not think them the happiest people\nthat she had ever known.\n\n\"Hush,\" she checked them, \"Mrs. Flushing, remember. She's behind us.\"\n\nThen they fell silent, and Terence and Rachel felt instinctively that\ntheir happiness had made her sad, and, while they were anxious to go on\ntalking about themselves, they did not like to.\n\n\"We've talked too much about ourselves,\" Terence said. \"Tell us--\"\n\n\"Yes, tell us--\" Rachel echoed. They were both in the mood to believe\nthat every one was capable of saying something very profound.\n\n\"What can I tell you?\" Helen reflected, speaking more to herself in a\nrambling style than as a prophetess delivering a message. She forced\nherself to speak.\n\n\"After all, though I scold Rachel, I'm not much wiser myself. I'm\nolder, of course, I'm half-way through, and you're just beginning. It's\npuzzling--sometimes, I think, disappointing; the great things aren't as\ngreat, perhaps, as one expects--but it's interesting--Oh, yes, you're\ncertain to find it interesting--And so it goes on,\" they became\nconscious here of the procession of dark trees into which, as far as\nthey could see, Helen was now looking, \"and there are pleasures where\none doesn't expect them (you must write to your father), and you'll be\nvery happy, I've no doubt. But I must go to bed, and if you are sensible\nyou will follow in ten minutes, and so,\" she rose and stood before them,\nalmost featureless and very large, \"Good-night.\" She passed behind the\ncurtain.\n\nAfter sitting in silence for the greater part of the ten minutes she\nallowed them, they rose and hung over the rail. Beneath them the\nsmooth black water slipped away very fast and silently. The spark of a\ncigarette vanished behind them. \"A beautiful voice,\" Terence murmured.\n\nRachel assented. Helen had a beautiful voice.\n\nAfter a silence she asked, looking up into the sky, \"Are we on the deck\nof a steamer on a river in South America? Am I Rachel, are you Terence?\"\n\nThe great black world lay round them. As they were drawn smoothly along\nit seemed possessed of immense thickness and endurance. They could\ndiscern pointed tree-tops and blunt rounded tree-tops. Raising their\neyes above the trees, they fixed them on the stars and the pale border\nof sky above the trees. The little points of frosty light infinitely far\naway drew their eyes and held them fixed, so that it seemed as if\nthey stayed a long time and fell a great distance when once more\nthey realised their hands grasping the rail and their separate bodies\nstanding side by side.\n\n\"You'd forgotten completely about me,\" Terence reproached her, taking\nher arm and beginning to pace the deck, \"and I never forget you.\"\n\n\"Oh, no,\" she whispered, she had not forgotten, only the stars--the\nnight--the dark--\n\n\"You're like a bird half asleep in its nest, Rachel. You're asleep.\nYou're talking in your sleep.\"\n\nHalf asleep, and murmuring broken words, they stood in the angle made by\nthe bow of the boat. It slipped on down the river. Now a bell struck on\nthe bridge, and they heard the lapping of water as it rippled away on\neither side, and once a bird startled in its sleep creaked, flew on to\nthe next tree, and was silent again. The darkness poured down profusely,\nand left them with scarcely any feeling of life, except that they were\nstanding there together in the darkness.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXII\n\n\nThe darkness fell, but rose again, and as each day spread widely over\nthe earth and parted them from the strange day in the forest when they\nhad been forced to tell each other what they wanted, this wish of theirs\nwas revealed to other people, and in the process became slightly strange\nto themselves. Apparently it was not anything unusual that had happened;\nit was that they had become engaged to marry each other. The world,\nwhich consisted for the most part of the hotel and the villa, expressed\nitself glad on the whole that two people should marry, and allowed them\nto see that they were not expected to take part in the work which has to\nbe done in order that the world shall go on, but might absent themselves\nfor a time. They were accordingly left alone until they felt the silence\nas if, playing in a vast church, the door had been shut on them. They\nwere driven to walk alone, and sit alone, to visit secret places where\nthe flowers had never been picked and the trees were solitary. In\nsolitude they could express those beautiful but too vast desires which\nwere so oddly uncomfortable to the ears of other men and women--desires\nfor a world, such as their own world which contained two people seemed\nto them to be, where people knew each other intimately and thus judged\neach other by what was good, and never quarrelled, because that was\nwaste of time.\n\nThey would talk of such questions among books, or out in the sun,\nor sitting in the shade of a tree undisturbed. They were no longer\nembarrassed, or half-choked with meaning which could not express itself;\nthey were not afraid of each other, or, like travellers down a twisting\nriver, dazzled with sudden beauties when the corner is turned; the\nunexpected happened, but even the ordinary was lovable, and in many\nways preferable to the ecstatic and mysterious, for it was refreshingly\nsolid, and called out effort, and effort under such circumstances was\nnot effort but delight.\n\nWhile Rachel played the piano, Terence sat near her, engaged, as far\nas the occasional writing of a word in pencil testified, in shaping\nthe world as it appeared to him now that he and Rachel were going to be\nmarried. It was different certainly. The book called _Silence_ would not\nnow be the same book that it would have been. He would then put down his\npencil and stare in front of him, and wonder in what respects the world\nwas different--it had, perhaps, more solidity, more coherence, more\nimportance, greater depth. Why, even the earth sometimes seemed to him\nvery deep; not carved into hills and cities and fields, but heaped in\ngreat masses. He would look out of the window for ten minutes at a time;\nbut no, he did not care for the earth swept of human beings. He liked\nhuman beings--he liked them, he suspected, better than Rachel did. There\nshe was, swaying enthusiastically over her music, quite forgetful of\nhim,--but he liked that quality in her. He liked the impersonality which\nit produced in her. At last, having written down a series of little\nsentences, with notes of interrogation attached to them, he observed\naloud, \"'Women--'under the heading Women I've written:\n\n\"'Not really vainer than men. Lack of self-confidence at the base of\nmost serious faults. Dislike of own sex traditional, or founded on fact?\nEvery woman not so much a rake at heart, as an optimist, because they\ndon't think.' What do you say, Rachel?\" He paused with his pencil in his\nhand and a sheet of paper on his knee.\n\nRachel said nothing. Up and up the steep spiral of a very late Beethoven\nsonata she climbed, like a person ascending a ruined staircase,\nenergetically at first, then more laboriously advancing her feet with\neffort until she could go no higher and returned with a run to begin at\nthe very bottom again.\n\n\"'Again, it's the fashion now to say that women are more practical and\nless idealistic than men, also that they have considerable organising\nability but no sense of honour'--query, what is meant by masculine term,\nhonour?--what corresponds to it in your sex? Eh?\"\n\nAttacking her staircase once more, Rachel again neglected this\nopportunity of revealing the secrets of her sex. She had, indeed,\nadvanced so far in the pursuit of wisdom that she allowed these secrets\nto rest undisturbed; it seemed to be reserved for a later generation to\ndiscuss them philosophically.\n\nCrashing down a final chord with her left hand, she exclaimed at last,\nswinging round upon him:\n\n\"No, Terence, it's no good; here am I, the best musician in South\nAmerica, not to speak of Europe and Asia, and I can't play a note\nbecause of you in the room interrupting me every other second.\"\n\n\"You don't seem to realise that that's what I've been aiming at for\nthe last half-hour,\" he remarked. \"I've no objection to nice simple\ntunes--indeed, I find them very helpful to my literary composition, but\nthat kind of thing is merely like an unfortunate old dog going round on\nits hind legs in the rain.\"\n\nHe began turning over the little sheets of note-paper which were\nscattered on the table, conveying the congratulations of their friends.\n\n\"'--all possible wishes for all possible happiness,'\" he read; \"correct,\nbut not very vivid, are they?\"\n\n\"They're sheer nonsense!\" Rachel exclaimed. \"Think of words compared\nwith sounds!\" she continued. \"Think of novels and plays and histories--\"\nPerched on the edge of the table, she stirred the red and yellow volumes\ncontemptuously. She seemed to herself to be in a position where she\ncould despise all human learning. Terence looked at them too.\n\n\"God, Rachel, you do read trash!\" he exclaimed. \"And you're behind\nthe times too, my dear. No one dreams of reading this kind of thing\nnow--antiquated problem plays, harrowing descriptions of life in the\neast end--oh, no, we've exploded all that. Read poetry, Rachel, poetry,\npoetry, poetry!\"\n\nPicking up one of the books, he began to read aloud, his intention being\nto satirise the short sharp bark of the writer's English; but she paid\nno attention, and after an interval of meditation exclaimed:\n\n\"Does it ever seem to you, Terence, that the world is composed entirely\nof vast blocks of matter, and that we're nothing but patches of light--\"\nshe looked at the soft spots of sun wavering over the carpet and up the\nwall--\"like that?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Terence, \"I feel solid; immensely solid; the legs of my chair\nmight be rooted in the bowels of the earth. But at Cambridge, I can\nremember, there were times when one fell into ridiculous states\nof semi-coma about five o'clock in the morning. Hirst does now, I\nexpect--oh, no, Hirst wouldn't.\"\n\nRachel continued, \"The day your note came, asking us to go on the\npicnic, I was sitting where you're sitting now, thinking that; I wonder\nif I could think that again? I wonder if the world's changed? and if so,\nwhen it'll stop changing, and which is the real world?\"\n\n\"When I first saw you,\" he began, \"I thought you were like a creature\nwho'd lived all its life among pearls and old bones. Your hands were\nwet, d'you remember, and you never said a word until I gave you a bit of\nbread, and then you said, 'Human Beings!'\"\n\n\"And I thought you--a prig,\" she recollected. \"No; that's not quite it.\nThere were the ants who stole the tongue, and I thought you and St. John\nwere like those ants--very big, very ugly, very energetic, with all your\nvirtues on your backs. However, when I talked to you I liked you--\"\n\n\"You fell in love with me,\" he corrected her. \"You were in love with me\nall the time, only you didn't know it.\"\n\n\"No, I never fell in love with you,\" she asserted.\n\n\"Rachel--what a lie--didn't you sit here looking at my window--didn't\nyou wander about the hotel like an owl in the sun--?\"\n\n\"No,\" she repeated, \"I never fell in love, if falling in love is what\npeople say it is, and it's the world that tells the lies and I tell the\ntruth. Oh, what lies--what lies!\"\n\nShe crumpled together a handful of letters from Evelyn M., from Mr.\nPepper, from Mrs. Thornbury and Miss Allan, and Susan Warrington. It\nwas strange, considering how very different these people were, that they\nused almost the same sentences when they wrote to congratulate her upon\nher engagement.\n\nThat any one of these people had ever felt what she felt, or could ever\nfeel it, or had even the right to pretend for a single second that they\nwere capable of feeling it, appalled her much as the church service\nhad done, much as the face of the hospital nurse had done; and if they\ndidn't feel a thing why did they go and pretend to? The simplicity and\narrogance and hardness of her youth, now concentrated into a single\nspark as it was by her love of him, puzzled Terence; being engaged had\nnot that effect on him; the world was different, but not in that way;\nhe still wanted the things he had always wanted, and in particular he\nwanted the companionship of other people more than ever perhaps. He took\nthe letters out of her hand, and protested:\n\n\"Of course they're absurd, Rachel; of course they say things just\nbecause other people say them, but even so, what a nice woman Miss Allan\nis; you can't deny that; and Mrs. Thornbury too; she's got too many\nchildren I grant you, but if half-a-dozen of them had gone to the bad\ninstead of rising infallibly to the tops of their trees--hasn't she a\nkind of beauty--of elemental simplicity as Flushing would say? Isn't\nshe rather like a large old tree murmuring in the moonlight, or a river\ngoing on and on and on? By the way, Ralph's been made governor of the\nCarroway Islands--the youngest governor in the service; very good, isn't\nit?\"\n\nBut Rachel was at present unable to conceive that the vast majority of\nthe affairs of the world went on unconnected by a single thread with her\nown destiny.\n\n\"I won't have eleven children,\" she asserted; \"I won't have the eyes of\nan old woman. She looks at one up and down, up and down, as if one were\na horse.\"\n\n\"We must have a son and we must have a daughter,\" said Terence, putting\ndown the letters, \"because, let alone the inestimable advantage of being\nour children, they'd be so well brought up.\" They went on to sketch an\noutline of the ideal education--how their daughter should be required\nfrom infancy to gaze at a large square of cardboard painted blue, to\nsuggest thoughts of infinity, for women were grown too practical;\nand their son--he should be taught to laugh at great men, that is, at\ndistinguished successful men, at men who wore ribands and rose to the\ntops of their trees. He should in no way resemble (Rachel added) St.\nJohn Hirst.\n\nAt this Terence professed the greatest admiration for St. John Hirst.\nDwelling upon his good qualities he became seriously convinced of them;\nhe had a mind like a torpedo, he declared, aimed at falsehood. Where\nshould we all be without him and his like? Choked in weeds; Christians,\nbigots,--why, Rachel herself, would be a slave with a fan to sing songs\nto men when they felt drowsy.\n\n\"But you'll never see it!\" he exclaimed; \"because with all your virtues\nyou don't, and you never will, care with every fibre of your being\nfor the pursuit of truth! You've no respect for facts, Rachel; you're\nessentially feminine.\" She did not trouble to deny it, nor did she think\ngood to produce the one unanswerable argument against the merits which\nTerence admired. St. John Hirst said that she was in love with him; she\nwould never forgive that; but the argument was not one to appeal to a\nman.\n\n\"But I like him,\" she said, and she thought to herself that she also\npitied him, as one pities those unfortunate people who are outside the\nwarm mysterious globe full of changes and miracles in which we ourselves\nmove about; she thought that it must be very dull to be St. John Hirst.\n\nShe summed up what she felt about him by saying that she would not kiss\nhim supposing he wished it, which was not likely.\n\nAs if some apology were due to Hirst for the kiss which she then\nbestowed upon him, Terence protested:\n\n\"And compared with Hirst I'm a perfect Zany.\"\n\nThe clock here struck twelve instead of eleven.\n\n\"We're wasting the morning--I ought to be writing my book, and you ought\nto be answering these.\"\n\n\"We've only got twenty-one whole mornings left,\" said Rachel. \"And my\nfather'll be here in a day or two.\"\n\nHowever, she drew a pen and paper towards her and began to write\nlaboriously,\n\n\"My dear Evelyn--\"\n\nTerence, meanwhile, read a novel which some one else had written, a\nprocess which he found essential to the composition of his own. For a\nconsiderable time nothing was to be heard but the ticking of the clock\nand the fitful scratch of Rachel's pen, as she produced phrases which\nbore a considerable likeness to those which she had condemned. She was\nstruck by it herself, for she stopped writing and looked up; looked\nat Terence deep in the arm-chair, looked at the different pieces of\nfurniture, at her bed in the corner, at the window-pane which showed the\nbranches of a tree filled in with sky, heard the clock ticking, and was\namazed at the gulf which lay between all that and her sheet of paper.\nWould there ever be a time when the world was one and indivisible? Even\nwith Terence himself--how far apart they could be, how little she knew\nwhat was passing in his brain now! She then finished her sentence, which\nwas awkward and ugly, and stated that they were \"both very happy, and\ngoing to be married in the autumn probably and hope to live in London,\nwhere we hope you will come and see us when we get back.\" Choosing\n\"affectionately,\" after some further speculation, rather than sincerely,\nshe signed the letter and was doggedly beginning on another when Terence\nremarked, quoting from his book:\n\n\"Listen to this, Rachel. 'It is probable that Hugh' (he's the hero, a\nliterary man), 'had not realised at the time of his marriage, any more\nthan the young man of parts and imagination usually does realise, the\nnature of the gulf which separates the needs and desires of the male\nfrom the needs and desires of the female. . . . At first they had been\nvery happy. The walking tour in Switzerland had been a time of jolly\ncompanionship and stimulating revelations for both of them. Betty had\nproved herself the ideal comrade. . . . They had shouted _Love_ _in_\n_the_ _Valley_ to each other across the snowy slopes of the Riffelhorn'\n(and so on, and so on--I'll skip the descriptions). . . . 'But in\nLondon, after the boy's birth, all was changed. Betty was an admirable\nmother; but it did not take her long to find out that motherhood, as\nthat function is understood by the mother of the upper middle classes,\ndid not absorb the whole of her energies. She was young and strong, with\nhealthy limbs and a body and brain that called urgently for exercise.\n. . .' (In short she began to give tea-parties.) . . . 'Coming in late\nfrom this singular talk with old Bob Murphy in his smoky, book-lined\nroom, where the two men had each unloosened his soul to the other, with\nthe sound of the traffic humming in his ears, and the foggy London sky\nslung tragically across his mind . . . he found women's hats dotted\nabout among his papers. Women's wraps and absurd little feminine shoes\nand umbrellas were in the hall. . . . Then the bills began to come in.\n. . . He tried to speak frankly to her. He found her lying on the great\npolar-bear skin in their bedroom, half-undressed, for they were dining\nwith the Greens in Wilton Crescent, the ruddy firelight making the\ndiamonds wink and twinkle on her bare arms and in the delicious curve of\nher breast--a vision of adorable femininity. He forgave her all.' (Well,\nthis goes from bad to worse, and finally about fifty pages later, Hugh\ntakes a week-end ticket to Swanage and 'has it out with himself on the\ndowns above Corfe.' . . . Here there's fifteen pages or so which we'll\nskip. The conclusion is . . .) 'They were different. Perhaps, in the far\nfuture, when generations of men had struggled and failed as he must now\nstruggle and fail, woman would be, indeed, what she now made a pretence\nof being--the friend and companion--not the enemy and parasite of man.'\n\n\"The end of it is, you see, Hugh went back to his wife, poor fellow. It\nwas his duty, as a married man. Lord, Rachel,\" he concluded, \"will it be\nlike that when we're married?\"\n\nInstead of answering him she asked,\n\n\"Why don't people write about the things they do feel?\"\n\n\"Ah, that's the difficulty!\" he sighed, tossing the book away.\n\n\"Well, then, what will it be like when we're married? What are the\nthings people do feel?\"\n\nShe seemed doubtful.\n\n\"Sit on the floor and let me look at you,\" he commanded. Resting her\nchin on his knee, she looked straight at him.\n\nHe examined her curiously.\n\n\"You're not beautiful,\" he began, \"but I like your face. I like the\nway your hair grows down in a point, and your eyes too--they never see\nanything. Your mouth's too big, and your cheeks would be better if they\nhad more colour in them. But what I like about your face is that it\nmakes one wonder what the devil you're thinking about--it makes me want\nto do that--\" He clenched his fist and shook it so near her that she\nstarted back, \"because now you look as if you'd blow my brains out.\nThere are moments,\" he continued, \"when, if we stood on a rock together,\nyou'd throw me into the sea.\"\n\nHypnotised by the force of his eyes in hers, she repeated, \"If we stood\non a rock together--\"\n\nTo be flung into the sea, to be washed hither and thither, and driven\nabout the roots of the world--the idea was incoherently delightful. She\nsprang up, and began moving about the room, bending and thrusting aside\nthe chairs and tables as if she were indeed striking through the waters.\nHe watched her with pleasure; she seemed to be cleaving a passage for\nherself, and dealing triumphantly with the obstacles which would hinder\ntheir passage through life.\n\n\"It does seem possible!\" he exclaimed, \"though I've always thought it\nthe most unlikely thing in the world--I shall be in love with you all my\nlife, and our marriage will be the most exciting thing that's ever been\ndone! We'll never have a moment's peace--\" He caught her in his arms as\nshe passed him, and they fought for mastery, imagining a rock, and the\nsea heaving beneath them. At last she was thrown to the floor, where she\nlay gasping, and crying for mercy.\n\n\"I'm a mermaid! I can swim,\" she cried, \"so the game's up.\" Her dress\nwas torn across, and peace being established, she fetched a needle and\nthread and began to mend the tear.\n\n\"And now,\" she said, \"be quiet and tell me about the world; tell me\nabout everything that's ever happened, and I'll tell you--let me see,\nwhat can I tell you?--I'll tell you about Miss Montgomerie and the river\nparty. She was left, you see, with one foot in the boat, and the other\non shore.\"\n\nThey had spent much time already in thus filling out for the other the\ncourse of their past lives, and the characters of their friends and\nrelations, so that very soon Terence knew not only what Rachel's\naunts might be expected to say upon every occasion, but also how their\nbedrooms were furnished, and what kind of bonnets they wore. He could\nsustain a conversation between Mrs. Hunt and Rachel, and carry on a\ntea-party including the Rev. William Johnson and Miss Macquoid, the\nChristian Scientists, with remarkable likeness to the truth. But he had\nknown many more people, and was far more highly skilled in the art of\nnarrative than Rachel was, whose experiences were, for the most part,\nof a curiously childlike and humorous kind, so that it generally fell to\nher lot to listen and ask questions.\n\nHe told her not only what had happened, but what he had thought and\nfelt, and sketched for her portraits which fascinated her of what other\nmen and women might be supposed to be thinking and feeling, so that she\nbecame very anxious to go back to England, which was full of people,\nwhere she could merely stand in the streets and look at them. According\nto him, too, there was an order, a pattern which made life reasonable,\nor if that word was foolish, made it of deep interest anyhow, for\nsometimes it seemed possible to understand why things happened as they\ndid. Nor were people so solitary and uncommunicative as she believed.\nShe should look for vanity--for vanity was a common quality--first in\nherself, and then in Helen, in Ridley, in St. John, they all had their\nshare of it--and she would find it in ten people out of every twelve she\nmet; and once linked together by one such tie she would find them not\nseparate and formidable, but practically indistinguishable, and she\nwould come to love them when she found that they were like herself.\n\nIf she denied this, she must defend her belief that human beings were as\nvarious as the beasts at the Zoo, which had stripes and manes, and\nhorns and humps; and so, wrestling over the entire list of their\nacquaintances, and diverging into anecdote and theory and speculation,\nthey came to know each other. The hours passed quickly, and seemed to\nthem full to leaking-point. After a night's solitude they were always\nready to begin again.\n\nThe virtues which Mrs. Ambrose had once believed to exist in free talk\nbetween men and women did in truth exist for both of them, although not\nquite in the measure she prescribed. Far more than upon the nature of\nsex they dwelt upon the nature of poetry, but it was true that talk\nwhich had no boundaries deepened and enlarged the strangely small bright\nview of a girl. In return for what he could tell her she brought him\nsuch curiosity and sensitiveness of perception, that he was led to doubt\nwhether any gift bestowed by much reading and living was quite the equal\nof that for pleasure and pain. What would experience give her after all,\nexcept a kind of ridiculous formal balance, like that of a drilled dog\nin the street? He looked at her face and wondered how it would look\nin twenty years' time, when the eyes had dulled, and the forehead wore\nthose little persistent wrinkles which seem to show that the middle-aged\nare facing something hard which the young do not see? What would the\nhard thing be for them, he wondered? Then his thoughts turned to their\nlife in England.\n\nThe thought of England was delightful, for together they would see the\nold things freshly; it would be England in June, and there would be June\nnights in the country; and the nightingales singing in the lanes,\ninto which they could steal when the room grew hot; and there would be\nEnglish meadows gleaming with water and set with stolid cows, and clouds\ndipping low and trailing across the green hills. As he sat in the room\nwith her, he wished very often to be back again in the thick of life,\ndoing things with Rachel.\n\nHe crossed to the window and exclaimed, \"Lord, how good it is to think\nof lanes, muddy lanes, with brambles and nettles, you know, and real\ngrass fields, and farmyards with pigs and cows, and men walking beside\ncarts with pitchforks--there's nothing to compare with that here--look\nat the stony red earth, and the bright blue sea, and the glaring white\nhouses--how tired one gets of it! And the air, without a stain or a\nwrinkle. I'd give anything for a sea mist.\"\n\nRachel, too, had been thinking of the English country: the flat land\nrolling away to the sea, and the woods and the long straight roads,\nwhere one can walk for miles without seeing any one, and the great\nchurch towers and the curious houses clustered in the valleys, and the\nbirds, and the dusk, and the rain falling against the windows.\n\n\"But London, London's the place,\" Terence continued. They looked\ntogether at the carpet, as though London itself were to be seen there\nlying on the floor, with all its spires and pinnacles pricking through\nthe smoke.\n\n\"On the whole, what I should like best at this moment,\" Terence\npondered, \"would be to find myself walking down Kingsway, by those big\nplacards, you know, and turning into the Strand. Perhaps I might go and\nlook over Waterloo Bridge for a moment. Then I'd go along the Strand\npast the shops with all the new books in them, and through the little\narchway into the Temple. I always like the quiet after the uproar. You\nhear your own footsteps suddenly quite loud. The Temple's very pleasant.\nI think I should go and see if I could find dear old Hodgkin--the man\nwho writes books about Van Eyck, you know. When I left England he was\nvery sad about his tame magpie. He suspected that a man had poisoned it.\nAnd then Russell lives on the next staircase. I think you'd like him.\nHe's a passion for Handel. Well, Rachel,\" he concluded, dismissing the\nvision of London, \"we shall be doing that together in six weeks' time,\nand it'll be the middle of June then--and June in London--my God! how\npleasant it all is!\"\n\n\"And we're certain to have it too,\" she said. \"It isn't as if we were\nexpecting a great deal--only to walk about and look at things.\"\n\n\"Only a thousand a year and perfect freedom,\" he replied. \"How many\npeople in London d'you think have that?\"\n\n\"And now you've spoilt it,\" she complained. \"Now we've got to think of\nthe horrors.\" She looked grudgingly at the novel which had once caused\nher perhaps an hour's discomfort, so that she had never opened it\nagain, but kept it on her table, and looked at it occasionally, as some\nmedieval monk kept a skull, or a crucifix to remind him of the frailty\nof the body.\n\n\"Is it true, Terence,\" she demanded, \"that women die with bugs crawling\nacross their faces?\"\n\n\"I think it's very probable,\" he said. \"But you must admit, Rachel, that\nwe so seldom think of anything but ourselves that an occasional twinge\nis really rather pleasant.\"\n\nAccusing him of an affection of cynicism which was just as bad as\nsentimentality itself, she left her position by his side and knelt upon\nthe window sill, twisting the curtain tassels between her fingers. A\nvague sense of dissatisfaction filled her.\n\n\"What's so detestable in this country,\" she exclaimed, \"is the\nblue--always blue sky and blue sea. It's like a curtain--all the things\none wants are on the other side of that. I want to know what's going on\nbehind it. I hate these divisions, don't you, Terence? One person all\nin the dark about another person. Now I liked the Dalloways,\" she\ncontinued, \"and they're gone. I shall never see them again. Just by\ngoing on a ship we cut ourselves off entirely from the rest of\nthe world. I want to see England there--London there--all sorts of\npeople--why shouldn't one? why should one be shut up all by oneself in a\nroom?\"\n\nWhile she spoke thus half to herself and with increasing vagueness,\nbecause her eye was caught by a ship that had just come into the bay,\nshe did not see that Terence had ceased to stare contentedly in front of\nhim, and was looking at her keenly and with dissatisfaction. She seemed\nto be able to cut herself adrift from him, and to pass away to unknown\nplaces where she had no need of him. The thought roused his jealousy.\n\n\"I sometimes think you're not in love with me and never will be,\" he\nsaid energetically. She started and turned round at his words.\n\n\"I don't satisfy you in the way you satisfy me,\" he continued. \"There's\nsomething I can't get hold of in you. You don't want me as I want\nyou--you're always wanting something else.\"\n\nHe began pacing up and down the room.\n\n\"Perhaps I ask too much,\" he went on. \"Perhaps it isn't really possible\nto have what I want. Men and women are too different. You can't\nunderstand--you don't understand--\"\n\nHe came up to where she stood looking at him in silence.\n\nIt seemed to her now that what he was saying was perfectly true, and\nthat she wanted many more things than the love of one human being--the\nsea, the sky. She turned again the looked at the distant blue, which was\nso smooth and serene where the sky met the sea; she could not possibly\nwant only one human being.\n\n\"Or is it only this damnable engagement?\" he continued. \"Let's be\nmarried here, before we go back--or is it too great a risk? Are we sure\nwe want to marry each other?\"\n\nThey began pacing up and down the room, but although they came very near\neach other in their pacing, they took care not to touch each other. The\nhopelessness of their position overcame them both. They were impotent;\nthey could never love each other sufficiently to overcome all these\nbarriers, and they could never be satisfied with less. Realising this\nwith intolerable keenness she stopped in front of him and exclaimed:\n\n\"Let's break it off, then.\"\n\nThe words did more to unite them than any amount of argument. As if they\nstood on the edge of a precipice they clung together. They knew that\nthey could not separate; painful and terrible it might be, but they\nwere joined for ever. They lapsed into silence, and after a time crept\ntogether in silence. Merely to be so close soothed them, and sitting\nside by side the divisions disappeared, and it seemed as if the world\nwere once more solid and entire, and as if, in some strange way, they\nhad grown larger and stronger.\n\nIt was long before they moved, and when they moved it was with great\nreluctance. They stood together in front of the looking-glass, and\nwith a brush tried to make themselves look as if they had been feeling\nnothing all the morning, neither pain nor happiness. But it chilled\nthem to see themselves in the glass, for instead of being vast and\nindivisible they were really very small and separate, the size of the\nglass leaving a large space for the reflection of other things.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXIII\n\n\nBut no brush was able to efface completely the expression of happiness,\nso that Mrs. Ambrose could not treat them when they came downstairs\nas if they had spent the morning in a way that could be discussed\nnaturally. This being so, she joined in the world's conspiracy to\nconsider them for the time incapacitated from the business of life,\nstruck by their intensity of feeling into enmity against life, and\nalmost succeeded in dismissing them from her thoughts.\n\nShe reflected that she had done all that it was necessary to do in\npractical matters. She had written a great many letters, and had\nobtained Willoughby's consent. She had dwelt so often upon Mr. Hewet's\nprospects, his profession, his birth, appearance, and temperament, that\nshe had almost forgotten what he was really like. When she refreshed\nherself by a look at him, she used to wonder again what he was like, and\nthen, concluding that they were happy at any rate, thought no more about\nit.\n\nShe might more profitably consider what would happen in three years'\ntime, or what might have happened if Rachel had been left to explore the\nworld under her father's guidance. The result, she was honest enough\nto own, might have been better--who knows? She did not disguise from\nherself that Terence had faults. She was inclined to think him too easy\nand tolerant, just as he was inclined to think her perhaps a trifle\nhard--no, it was rather that she was uncompromising. In some ways she\nfound St. John preferable; but then, of course, he would never have\nsuited Rachel. Her friendship with St. John was established, for\nalthough she fluctuated between irritation and interest in a way that\ndid credit to the candour of her disposition, she liked his company on\nthe whole. He took her outside this little world of love and emotion.\nHe had a grasp of facts. Supposing, for instance, that England made a\nsudden move towards some unknown port on the coast of Morocco, St.\nJohn knew what was at the back of it, and to hear him engaged with her\nhusband in argument about finance and the balance of power, gave her\nan odd sense of stability. She respected their arguments without always\nlistening to them, much as she respected a solid brick wall, or one\nof those immense municipal buildings which, although they compose the\ngreater part of our cities, have been built day after day and year after\nyear by unknown hands. She liked to sit and listen, and even felt a\nlittle elated when the engaged couple, after showing their profound lack\nof interest, slipped from the room, and were seen pulling flowers to\npieces in the garden. It was not that she was jealous of them, but she\ndid undoubtedly envy them their great unknown future that lay before\nthem. Slipping from one such thought to another, she was at the\ndining-room with fruit in her hands. Sometimes she stopped to straighten\na candle stooping with the heat, or disturbed some too rigid arrangement\nof the chairs. She had reason to suspect that Chailey had been balancing\nherself on the top of a ladder with a wet duster during their absence,\nand the room had never been quite like itself since. Returning from the\ndining-room for the third time, she perceived that one of the arm-chairs\nwas now occupied by St. John. He lay back in it, with his eyes half\nshut, looking, as he always did, curiously buttoned up in a neat grey\nsuit and fenced against the exuberance of a foreign climate which might\nat any moment proceed to take liberties with him. Her eyes rested on\nhim gently and then passed on over his head. Finally she took the chair\nopposite.\n\n\"I didn't want to come here,\" he said at last, \"but I was positively\ndriven to it. . . . Evelyn M.,\" he groaned.\n\nHe sat up, and began to explain with mock solemnity how the detestable\nwoman was set upon marrying him.\n\n\"She pursues me about the place. This morning she appeared in the\nsmoking-room. All I could do was to seize my hat and fly. I didn't want\nto come, but I couldn't stay and face another meal with her.\"\n\n\"Well, we must make the best of it,\" Helen replied philosophically. It\nwas very hot, and they were indifferent to any amount of silence, so\nthat they lay back in their chairs waiting for something to happen. The\nbell rang for luncheon, but there was no sound of movement in the house.\nWas there any news? Helen asked; anything in the papers? St. John shook\nhis head. O yes, he had a letter from home, a letter from his mother,\ndescribing the suicide of the parlour-maid. She was called Susan Jane,\nand she came into the kitchen one afternoon, and said that she wanted\ncook to keep her money for her; she had twenty pounds in gold. Then she\nwent out to buy herself a hat. She came in at half-past five and said\nthat she had taken poison. They had only just time to get her into bed\nand call a doctor before she died.\n\n\"Well?\" Helen enquired.\n\n\"There'll have to be an inquest,\" said St. John.\n\nWhy had she done it? He shrugged his shoulders. Why do people kill\nthemselves? Why do the lower orders do any of the things they do do?\nNobody knows. They sat in silence.\n\n\"The bell's run fifteen minutes and they're not down,\" said Helen at\nlength.\n\nWhen they appeared, St. John explained why it had been necessary for\nhim to come to luncheon. He imitated Evelyn's enthusiastic tone as she\nconfronted him in the smoking-room. \"She thinks there can be nothing\n_quite_ so thrilling as mathematics, so I've lent her a large work in\ntwo volumes. It'll be interesting to see what she makes of it.\"\n\nRachel could now afford to laugh at him. She reminded him of Gibbon;\nshe had the first volume somewhere still; if he were undertaking the\neducation of Evelyn, that surely was the test; or she had heard that\nBurke, upon the American Rebellion--Evelyn ought to read them both\nsimultaneously. When St. John had disposed of her argument and had\nsatisfied his hunger, he proceeded to tell them that the hotel was\nseething with scandals, some of the most appalling kind, which had\nhappened in their absence; he was indeed much given to the study of his\nkind.\n\n\"Evelyn M., for example--but that was told me in confidence.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" Terence interposed.\n\n\"You've heard about poor Sinclair, too?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, I've heard about Sinclair. He's retired to his mine with a\nrevolver. He writes to Evelyn daily that he's thinking of committing\nsuicide. I've assured her that he's never been so happy in his life,\nand, on the whole, she's inclined to agree with me.\"\n\n\"But then she's entangled herself with Perrott,\" St. John continued;\n\"and I have reason to think, from something I saw in the passage, that\neverything isn't as it should be between Arthur and Susan. There's a\nyoung female lately arrived from Manchester. A very good thing if it\nwere broken off, in my opinion. Their married life is something too\nhorrible to contemplate. Oh, and I distinctly heard old Mrs. Paley\nrapping out the most fearful oaths as I passed her bedroom door. It's\nsupposed that she tortures her maid in private--it's practically certain\nshe does. One can tell it from the look in her eyes.\"\n\n\"When you're eighty and the gout tweezes you, you'll be swearing like\na trooper,\" Terence remarked. \"You'll be very fat, very testy, very\ndisagreeable. Can't you imagine him--bald as a coot, with a pair of\nsponge-bag trousers, a little spotted tie, and a corporation?\"\n\nAfter a pause Hirst remarked that the worst infamy had still to be told.\nHe addressed himself to Helen.\n\n\"They've hoofed out the prostitute. One night while we were away that\nold numskull Thornbury was doddering about the passages very late.\n(Nobody seems to have asked him what _he_ was up to.) He saw the Signora\nLola Mendoza, as she calls herself, cross the passage in her nightgown.\nHe communicated his suspicions next morning to Elliot, with the result\nthat Rodriguez went to the woman and gave her twenty-four hours in which\nto clear out of the place. No one seems to have enquired into the truth\nof the story, or to have asked Thornbury and Elliot what business it was\nof theirs; they had it entirely their own way. I propose that we should\nall sign a Round Robin, go to Rodriguez in a body, and insist upon a\nfull enquiry. Something's got to be done, don't you agree?\"\n\nHewet remarked that there could be no doubt as to the lady's profession.\n\n\"Still,\" he added, \"it's a great shame, poor woman; only I don't see\nwhat's to be done--\"\n\n\"I quite agree with you, St. John,\" Helen burst out. \"It's monstrous.\nThe hypocritical smugness of the English makes my blood boil. A man\nwho's made a fortune in trade as Mr. Thornbury has is bound to be twice\nas bad as any prostitute.\"\n\nShe respected St. John's morality, which she took far more seriously\nthan any one else did, and now entered into a discussion with him as to\nthe steps that were to be taken to enforce their peculiar view of what\nwas right. The argument led to some profoundly gloomy statements of a\ngeneral nature. Who were they, after all--what authority had they--what\npower against the mass of superstition and ignorance? It was the\nEnglish, of course; there must be something wrong in the English blood.\nDirectly you met an English person, of the middle classes, you were\nconscious of an indefinable sensation of loathing; directly you saw the\nbrown crescent of houses above Dover, the same thing came over you. But\nunfortunately St. John added, you couldn't trust these foreigners--\n\nThey were interrupted by sounds of strife at the further end of the\ntable. Rachel appealed to her aunt.\n\n\"Terence says we must go to tea with Mrs. Thornbury because she's been\nso kind, but I don't see it; in fact, I'd rather have my right hand sawn\nin pieces--just imagine! the eyes of all those women!\"\n\n\"Fiddlesticks, Rachel,\" Terence replied. \"Who wants to look at you?\nYou're consumed with vanity! You're a monster of conceit! Surely, Helen,\nyou ought to have taught her by this time that she's a person of no\nconceivable importance whatever--not beautiful, or well dressed, or\nconspicuous for elegance or intellect, or deportment. A more ordinary\nsight than you are,\" he concluded, \"except for the tear across your\ndress has never been seen. However, stay at home if you want to. I'm\ngoing.\"\n\nShe appealed again to her aunt. It wasn't the being looked at, she\nexplained, but the things people were sure to say. The women in\nparticular. She liked women, but where emotion was concerned they were\nas flies on a lump of sugar. They would be certain to ask her questions.\nEvelyn M. would say: \"Are you in love? Is it nice being in love?\"\nAnd Mrs. Thornbury--her eyes would go up and down, up and down--she\nshuddered at the thought of it. Indeed, the retirement of their life\nsince their engagement had made her so sensitive, that she was not\nexaggerating her case.\n\nShe found an ally in Helen, who proceeded to expound her views of the\nhuman race, as she regarded with complacency the pyramid of variegated\nfruits in the centre of the table. It wasn't that they were cruel, or\nmeant to hurt, or even stupid exactly; but she had always found that the\nordinary person had so little emotion in his own life that the scent of\nit in the lives of others was like the scent of blood in the nostrils of\na bloodhound. Warming to the theme, she continued:\n\n\"Directly anything happens--it may be a marriage, or a birth, or a\ndeath--on the whole they prefer it to be a death--every one wants to see\nyou. They insist upon seeing you. They've got nothing to say; they\ndon't care a rap for you; but you've got to go to lunch or to tea or to\ndinner, and if you don't you're damned. It's the smell of blood,\" she\ncontinued; \"I don't blame 'em; only they shan't have mind if I know it!\"\n\nShe looked about her as if she had called up a legion of human beings,\nall hostile and all disagreeable, who encircled the table, with mouths\ngaping for blood, and made it appear a little island of neutral country\nin the midst of the enemy's country.\n\nHer words roused her husband, who had been muttering rhythmically to\nhimself, surveying his guests and his food and his wife with eyes that\nwere now melancholy and now fierce, according to the fortunes of the\nlady in his ballad. He cut Helen short with a protest. He hated even\nthe semblance of cynicism in women. \"Nonsense, nonsense,\" he remarked\nabruptly.\n\nTerence and Rachel glanced at each other across the table, which\nmeant that when they were married they would not behave like that. The\nentrance of Ridley into the conversation had a strange effect. It became\nat once more formal and more polite. It would have been impossible to\ntalk quite easily of anything that came into their heads, and to say the\nword prostitute as simply as any other word. The talk now turned upon\nliterature and politics, and Ridley told stories of the distinguished\npeople he had known in his youth. Such talk was of the nature of an art,\nand the personalities and informalities of the young were silenced. As\nthey rose to go, Helen stopped for a moment, leaning her elbows on the\ntable.\n\n\"You've all been sitting here,\" she said, \"for almost an hour, and\nyou haven't noticed my figs, or my flowers, or the way the light comes\nthrough, or anything. I haven't been listening, because I've been\nlooking at you. You looked very beautiful; I wish you'd go on sitting\nfor ever.\"\n\nShe led the way to the drawing-room, where she took up her embroidery,\nand began again to dissuade Terence from walking down to the hotel in\nthis heat. But the more she dissuaded, the more he was determined to go.\nHe became irritated and obstinate. There were moments when they almost\ndisliked each other. He wanted other people; he wanted Rachel, to see\nthem with him. He suspected that Mrs. Ambrose would now try to dissuade\nher from going. He was annoyed by all this space and shade and beauty,\nand Hirst, recumbent, drooping a magazine from his wrist.\n\n\"I'm going,\" he repeated. \"Rachel needn't come unless she wants to.\"\n\n\"If you go, Hewet, I wish you'd make enquiries about the prostitute,\"\nsaid Hirst. \"Look here,\" he added, \"I'll walk half the way with you.\"\n\nGreatly to their surprise he raised himself, looked at his watch, and\nremarked that, as it was now half an hour since luncheon, the gastric\njuices had had sufficient time to secrete; he was trying a system, he\nexplained, which involved short spells of exercise interspaced by longer\nintervals of rest.\n\n\"I shall be back at four,\" he remarked to Helen, \"when I shall lie down\non the sofa and relax all my muscles completely.\"\n\n\"So you're going, Rachel?\" Helen asked. \"You won't stay with me?\"\n\nShe smiled, but she might have been sad.\n\nWas she sad, or was she really laughing? Rachel could not tell, and she\nfelt for the moment very uncomfortable between Helen and Terence.\nThen she turned away, saying merely that she would go with Terence, on\ncondition that he did all the talking.\n\nA narrow border of shadow ran along the road, which was broad enough for\ntwo, but not broad enough for three. St. John therefore dropped a little\nbehind the pair, and the distance between them increased by degrees.\nWalking with a view to digestion, and with one eye upon his watch, he\nlooked from time to time at the pair in front of him. They seemed to be\nso happy, so intimate, although they were walking side by side much as\nother people walk. They turned slightly toward each other now and then,\nand said something which he thought must be something very private. They\nwere really disputing about Helen's character, and Terence was trying to\nexplain why it was that she annoyed him so much sometimes. But St. John\nthought that they were saying things which they did not want him to\nhear, and was led to think of his own isolation. These people were\nhappy, and in some ways he despised them for being made happy so simply,\nand in other ways he envied them. He was much more remarkable than they\nwere, but he was not happy. People never liked him; he doubted sometimes\nwhether even Helen liked him. To be simple, to be able to say simply\nwhat one felt, without the terrific self-consciousness which possessed\nhim, and showed him his own face and words perpetually in a mirror, that\nwould be worth almost any other gift, for it made one happy. Happiness,\nhappiness, what was happiness? He was never happy. He saw too clearly\nthe little vices and deceits and flaws of life, and, seeing them, it\nseemed to him honest to take notice of them. That was the reason, no\ndoubt, why people generally disliked him, and complained that he was\nheartless and bitter. Certainly they never told him the things he wanted\nto be told, that he was nice and kind, and that they liked him. But it\nwas true that half the sharp things that he said about them were said\nbecause he was unhappy or hurt himself. But he admitted that he had\nvery seldom told any one that he cared for them, and when he had been\ndemonstrative, he had generally regretted it afterwards. His feelings\nabout Terence and Rachel were so complicated that he had never yet been\nable to bring himself to say that he was glad that they were going to\nbe married. He saw their faults so clearly, and the inferior nature of\na great deal of their feeling for each other, and he expected that their\nlove would not last. He looked at them again, and, very strangely, for\nhe was so used to thinking that he seldom saw anything, the look of them\nfilled him with a simple emotion of affection in which there were some\ntraces of pity also. What, after all, did people's faults matter in\ncomparison with what was good in them? He resolved that he would now\ntell them what he felt. He quickened his pace and came up with them just\nas they reached the corner where the lane joined the main road. They\nstood still and began to laugh at him, and to ask him whether the\ngastric juices--but he stopped them and began to speak very quickly and\nstiffly.\n\n\"D'you remember the morning after the dance?\" he demanded. \"It was here\nwe sat, and you talked nonsense, and Rachel made little heaps of stones.\nI, on the other hand, had the whole meaning of life revealed to me in\na flash.\" He paused for a second, and drew his lips together in a tight\nlittle purse. \"Love,\" he said. \"It seems to me to explain everything.\nSo, on the whole, I'm very glad that you two are going to be married.\"\nHe then turned round abruptly, without looking at them, and walked back\nto the villa. He felt both exalted and ashamed of himself for having\nthus said what he felt. Probably they were laughing at him, probably\nthey thought him a fool, and, after all, had he really said what he\nfelt?\n\nIt was true that they laughed when he was gone; but the dispute about\nHelen which had become rather sharp, ceased, and they became peaceful\nand friendly.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXIV\n\n\nThey reached the hotel rather early in the afternoon, so that most\npeople were still lying down, or sitting speechless in their bedrooms,\nand Mrs. Thornbury, although she had asked them to tea, was nowhere to\nbe seen. They sat down, therefore, in the shady hall, which was almost\nempty, and full of the light swishing sounds of air going to and fro in\na large empty space. Yes, this arm-chair was the same arm-chair in which\nRachel had sat that afternoon when Evelyn came up, and this was the\nmagazine she had been looking at, and this the very picture, a picture\nof New York by lamplight. How odd it seemed--nothing had changed.\n\nBy degrees a certain number of people began to come down the stairs and\nto pass through the hall, and in this dim light their figures possessed\na sort of grace and beauty, although they were all unknown people.\nSometimes they went straight through and out into the garden by the\nswing door, sometimes they stopped for a few minutes and bent over the\ntables and began turning over the newspapers. Terence and Rachel sat\nwatching them through their half-closed eyelids--the Johnsons,\nthe Parkers, the Baileys, the Simmons', the Lees, the Morleys, the\nCampbells, the Gardiners. Some were dressed in white flannels and were\ncarrying racquets under their arms, some were short, some tall, some\nwere only children, and some perhaps were servants, but they all had\ntheir standing, their reason for following each other through the hall,\ntheir money, their position, whatever it might be. Terence soon gave up\nlooking at them, for he was tired; and, closing his eyes, he fell half\nasleep in his chair. Rachel watched the people for some time longer; she\nwas fascinated by the certainty and the grace of their movements, and by\nthe inevitable way in which they seemed to follow each other, and loiter\nand pass on and disappear. But after a time her thoughts wandered, and\nshe began to think of the dance, which had been held in this room, only\nthen the room itself looked quite different. Glancing round, she could\nhardly believe that it was the same room. It had looked so bare and\nso bright and formal on that night when they came into it out of the\ndarkness; it had been filled, too, with little red, excited faces,\nalways moving, and people so brightly dressed and so animated that they\ndid not seem in the least like real people, nor did you feel that you\ncould talk to them. And now the room was dim and quiet, and beautiful\nsilent people passed through it, to whom you could go and say anything\nyou liked. She felt herself amazingly secure as she sat in her\narm-chair, and able to review not only the night of the dance, but the\nentire past, tenderly and humorously, as if she had been turning in a\nfog for a long time, and could now see exactly where she had turned. For\nthe methods by which she had reached her present position, seemed to her\nvery strange, and the strangest thing about them was that she had not\nknown where they were leading her. That was the strange thing, that\none did not know where one was going, or what one wanted, and followed\nblindly, suffering so much in secret, always unprepared and amazed and\nknowing nothing; but one thing led to another and by degrees something\nhad formed itself out of nothing, and so one reached at last this calm,\nthis quiet, this certainty, and it was this process that people called\nliving. Perhaps, then, every one really knew as she knew now where they\nwere going; and things formed themselves into a pattern not only for\nher, but for them, and in that pattern lay satisfaction and meaning.\nWhen she looked back she could see that a meaning of some kind was\napparent in the lives of her aunts, and in the brief visit of the\nDalloways whom she would never see again, and in the life of her father.\n\nThe sound of Terence, breathing deep in his slumber, confirmed her in\nher calm. She was not sleepy although she did not see anything very\ndistinctly, but although the figures passing through the hall became\nvaguer and vaguer, she believed that they all knew exactly where they\nwere going, and the sense of their certainty filled her with comfort.\nFor the moment she was as detached and disinterested as if she had\nno longer any lot in life, and she thought that she could now accept\nanything that came to her without being perplexed by the form in which\nit appeared. What was there to frighten or to perplex in the prospect\nof life? Why should this insight ever again desert her? The world was in\ntruth so large, so hospitable, and after all it was so simple. \"Love,\"\nSt. John had said, \"that seems to explain it all.\" Yes, but it was not\nthe love of man for woman, of Terence for Rachel. Although they sat so\nclose together, they had ceased to be little separate bodies; they had\nceased to struggle and desire one another. There seemed to be peace\nbetween them. It might be love, but it was not the love of man for\nwoman.\n\nThrough her half-closed eyelids she watched Terence lying back in his\nchair, and she smiled as she saw how big his mouth was, and his chin\nso small, and his nose curved like a switchback with a knob at the end.\nNaturally, looking like that he was lazy, and ambitious, and full of\nmoods and faults. She remembered their quarrels, and in particular\nhow they had been quarreling about Helen that very afternoon, and she\nthought how often they would quarrel in the thirty, or forty, or fifty\nyears in which they would be living in the same house together, catching\ntrains together, and getting annoyed because they were so different. But\nall this was superficial, and had nothing to do with the life that\nwent on beneath the eyes and the mouth and the chin, for that life was\nindependent of her, and independent of everything else. So too, although\nshe was going to marry him and to live with him for thirty, or forty,\nor fifty years, and to quarrel, and to be so close to him, she\nwas independent of him; she was independent of everything else.\nNevertheless, as St. John said, it was love that made her understand\nthis, for she had never felt this independence, this calm, and this\ncertainty until she fell in love with him, and perhaps this too was\nlove. She wanted nothing else.\n\nFor perhaps two minutes Miss Allan had been standing at a little\ndistance looking at the couple lying back so peacefully in their\narm-chairs. She could not make up her mind whether to disturb them or\nnot, and then, seeming to recollect something, she came across the hall.\nThe sound of her approach woke Terence, who sat up and rubbed his eyes.\nHe heard Miss Allan talking to Rachel.\n\n\"Well,\" she was saying, \"this is very nice. It is very nice indeed.\nGetting engaged seems to be quite the fashion. It cannot often happen\nthat two couples who have never seen each other before meet in the same\nhotel and decide to get married.\" Then she paused and smiled, and seemed\nto have nothing more to say, so that Terence rose and asked her whether\nit was true that she had finished her book. Some one had said that\nshe had really finished it. Her face lit up; she turned to him with a\nlivelier expression than usual.\n\n\"Yes, I think I can fairly say I have finished it,\" she said. \"That\nis, omitting Swinburne--Beowulf to Browning--I rather like the two B's\nmyself. Beowulf to Browning,\" she repeated, \"I think that is the kind of\ntitle which might catch one's eye on a railway book-stall.\"\n\nShe was indeed very proud that she had finished her book, for no one\nknew what an amount of determination had gone to the making of it. Also\nshe thought that it was a good piece of work, and, considering what\nanxiety she had been in about her brother while she wrote it, she could\nnot resist telling them a little more about it.\n\n\"I must confess,\" she continued, \"that if I had known how many classics\nthere are in English literature, and how verbose the best of them\ncontrive to be, I should never have undertaken the work. They only allow\none seventy thousand words, you see.\"\n\n\"Only seventy thousand words!\" Terence exclaimed.\n\n\"Yes, and one has to say something about everybody,\" Miss Allan added.\n\"That is what I find so difficult, saying something different about\neverybody.\" Then she thought that she had said enough about herself, and\nshe asked whether they had come down to join the tennis tournament. \"The\nyoung people are very keen about it. It begins again in half an hour.\"\n\nHer gaze rested benevolently upon them both, and, after a momentary\npause, she remarked, looking at Rachel as if she had remembered\nsomething that would serve to keep her distinct from other people.\n\n\"You're the remarkable person who doesn't like ginger.\" But the kindness\nof the smile in her rather worn and courageous face made them feel that\nalthough she would scarcely remember them as individuals, she had laid\nupon them the burden of the new generation.\n\n\"And in that I quite agree with her,\" said a voice behind; Mrs.\nThornbury had overheard the last few words about not liking ginger.\n\"It's associated in my mind with a horrid old aunt of ours (poor thing,\nshe suffered dreadfully, so it isn't fair to call her horrid) who used\nto give it to us when we were small, and we never had the courage\nto tell her we didn't like it. We just had to put it out in the\nshrubbery--she had a big house near Bath.\"\n\nThey began moving slowly across the hall, when they were stopped by the\nimpact of Evelyn, who dashed into them, as though in running downstairs\nto catch them her legs had got beyond her control.\n\n\"Well,\" she exclaimed, with her usual enthusiasm, seizing Rachel by the\narm, \"I call this splendid! I guessed it was going to happen from the\nvery beginning! I saw you two were made for each other. Now you've just\ngot to tell me all about it--when's it to be, where are you going to\nlive--are you both tremendously happy?\"\n\nBut the attention of the group was diverted to Mrs. Elliot, who was\npassing them with her eager but uncertain movement, carrying in her\nhands a plate and an empty hot-water bottle. She would have passed them,\nbut Mrs. Thornbury went up and stopped her.\n\n\"Thank you, Hughling's better,\" she replied, in answer to Mrs.\nThornbury's enquiry, \"but he's not an easy patient. He wants to know\nwhat his temperature is, and if I tell him he gets anxious, and if I\ndon't tell him he suspects. You know what men are when they're ill! And\nof course there are none of the proper appliances, and, though he\nseems very willing and anxious to help\" (here she lowered her voice\nmysteriously), \"one can't feel that Dr. Rodriguez is the same as a\nproper doctor. If you would come and see him, Mr. Hewet,\" she added,\n\"I know it would cheer him up--lying there in bed all day--and the\nflies--But I must go and find Angelo--the food here--of course, with an\ninvalid, one wants things particularly nice.\" And she hurried past them\nin search of the head waiter. The worry of nursing her husband had fixed\na plaintive frown upon her forehead; she was pale and looked unhappy and\nmore than usually inefficient, and her eyes wandered more vaguely than\never from point to point.\n\n\"Poor thing!\" Mrs. Thornbury exclaimed. She told them that for some\ndays Hughling Elliot had been ill, and the only doctor available was the\nbrother of the proprietor, or so the proprietor said, whose right to the\ntitle of doctor was not above suspicion.\n\n\"I know how wretched it is to be ill in a hotel,\" Mrs. Thornbury\nremarked, once more leading the way with Rachel to the garden. \"I spent\nsix weeks on my honeymoon in having typhoid at Venice,\" she continued.\n\"But even so, I look back upon them as some of the happiest weeks in my\nlife. Ah, yes,\" she said, taking Rachel's arm, \"you think yourself happy\nnow, but it's nothing to the happiness that comes afterwards. And I\nassure you I could find it in my heart to envy you young people! You've\na much better time than we had, I may tell you. When I look back upon\nit, I can hardly believe how things have changed. When we were engaged\nI wasn't allowed to go for walks with William alone--some one had always\nto be in the room with us--I really believe I had to show my parents all\nhis letters!--though they were very fond of him too. Indeed, I may say\nthey looked upon him as their own son. It amuses me,\" she continued,\n\"to think how strict they were to us, when I see how they spoil their\ngrand-children!\"\n\nThe table was laid under the tree again, and taking her place before\nthe teacups, Mrs. Thornbury beckoned and nodded until she had collected\nquite a number of people, Susan and Arthur and Mr. Pepper, who were\nstrolling about, waiting for the tournament to begin. A murmuring tree,\na river brimming in the moonlight, Terence's words came back to Rachel\nas she sat drinking the tea and listening to the words which flowed on\nso lightly, so kindly, and with such silvery smoothness. This long life\nand all these children had left her very smooth; they seemed to have\nrubbed away the marks of individuality, and to have left only what was\nold and maternal.\n\n\"And the things you young people are going to see!\" Mrs. Thornbury\ncontinued. She included them all in her forecast, she included them all\nin her maternity, although the party comprised William Pepper and Miss\nAllan, both of whom might have been supposed to have seen a fair share\nof the panorama. \"When I see how the world has changed in my lifetime,\"\nshe went on, \"I can set no limit to what may happen in the next fifty\nyears. Ah, no, Mr. Pepper, I don't agree with you in the least,\" she\nlaughed, interrupting his gloomy remark about things going steadily from\nbad to worse. \"I know I ought to feel that, but I don't, I'm afraid.\nThey're going to be much better people than we were. Surely everything\ngoes to prove that. All round me I see women, young women, women with\nhousehold cares of every sort, going out and doing things that we should\nnot have thought it possible to do.\"\n\nMr. Pepper thought her sentimental and irrational like all old women,\nbut her manner of treating him as if he were a cross old baby baffled\nhim and charmed him, and he could only reply to her with a curious\ngrimace which was more a smile than a frown.\n\n\"And they remain women,\" Mrs. Thornbury added. \"They give a great deal\nto their children.\"\n\nAs she said this she smiled slightly in the direction of Susan and\nRachel. They did not like to be included in the same lot, but they both\nsmiled a little self-consciously, and Arthur and Terence glanced at\neach other too. She made them feel that they were all in the same boat\ntogether, and they looked at the women they were going to marry and\ncompared them. It was inexplicable how any one could wish to marry\nRachel, incredible that any one should be ready to spend his life with\nSusan; but singular though the other's taste must be, they bore each\nother no ill-will on account of it; indeed, they liked each other rather\nthe better for the eccentricity of their choice.\n\n\"I really must congratulate you,\" Susan remarked, as she leant across\nthe table for the jam.\n\nThere seemed to be no foundation for St. John's gossip about Arthur and\nSusan. Sunburnt and vigorous they sat side by side, with their racquets\nacross their knees, not saying much but smiling slightly all the time.\nThrough the thin white clothes which they wore, it was possible to\nsee the lines of their bodies and legs, the beautiful curves of their\nmuscles, his leanness and her flesh, and it was natural to think of the\nfirm-fleshed sturdy children that would be theirs. Their faces had too\nlittle shape in them to be beautiful, but they had clear eyes and an\nappearance of great health and power of endurance, for it seemed as if\nthe blood would never cease to run in his veins, or to lie deeply and\ncalmly in her cheeks. Their eyes at the present moment were brighter\nthan usual, and wore the peculiar expression of pleasure and\nself-confidence which is seen in the eyes of athletes, for they had been\nplaying tennis, and they were both first-rate at the game.\n\nEvelyn had not spoken, but she had been looking from Susan to Rachel.\nWell--they had both made up their minds very easily, they had done in a\nvery few weeks what it sometimes seemed to her that she would never be\nable to do. Although they were so different, she thought that she could\nsee in each the same look of satisfaction and completion, the same\ncalmness of manner, and the same slowness of movement. It was that\nslowness, that confidence, that content which she hated, she thought to\nherself. They moved so slowly because they were not single but double,\nand Susan was attached to Arthur, and Rachel to Terence, and for the\nsake of this one man they had renounced all other men, and movement, and\nthe real things of life. Love was all very well, and those snug domestic\nhouses, with the kitchen below and the nursery above, which were so\nsecluded and self-contained, like little islands in the torrents of the\nworld; but the real things were surely the things that happened, the\ncauses, the wars, the ideals, which happened in the great world outside,\nand went so independently of these women, turning so quietly and\nbeautifully towards the men. She looked at them sharply. Of course\nthey were happy and content, but there must be better things than that.\nSurely one could get nearer to life, one could get more out of life,\none could enjoy more and feel more than they would ever do. Rachel in\nparticular looked so young--what could she know of life? She became\nrestless, and getting up, crossed over to sit beside Rachel. She\nreminded her that she had promised to join her club.\n\n\"The bother is,\" she went on, \"that I mayn't be able to start work\nseriously till October. I've just had a letter from a friend of mine\nwhose brother is in business in Moscow. They want me to stay with them,\nand as they're in the thick of all the conspiracies and anarchists, I've\na good mind to stop on my way home. It sounds too thrilling.\" She wanted\nto make Rachel see how thrilling it was. \"My friend knows a girl of\nfifteen who's been sent to Siberia for life merely because they caught\nher addressing a letter to an anarchist. And the letter wasn't from her,\neither. I'd give all I have in the world to help on a revolution against\nthe Russian government, and it's bound to come.\"\n\nShe looked from Rachel to Terence. They were both a little touched by\nthe sight of her remembering how lately they had been listening to evil\nwords about her, and Terence asked her what her scheme was, and she\nexplained that she was going to found a club--a club for doing things,\nreally doing them. She became very animated, as she talked on and on,\nfor she professed herself certain that if once twenty people--no, ten\nwould be enough if they were keen--set about doing things instead of\ntalking about doing them, they could abolish almost every evil that\nexists. It was brains that were needed. If only people with brains--of\ncourse they would want a room, a nice room, in Bloomsbury preferably,\nwhere they could meet once a week. . . .\n\nAs she talked Terence could see the traces of fading youth in her face,\nthe lines that were being drawn by talk and excitement round her mouth\nand eyes, but he did not pity her; looking into those bright, rather\nhard, and very courageous eyes, he saw that she did not pity herself,\nor feel any desire to exchange her own life for the more refined and\norderly lives of people like himself and St. John, although, as the\nyears went by, the fight would become harder and harder. Perhaps,\nthough, she would settle down; perhaps, after all, she would marry\nPerrott. While his mind was half occupied with what she was saying,\nhe thought of her probable destiny, the light clouds of tobacco smoke\nserving to obscure his face from her eyes.\n\nTerence smoked and Arthur smoked and Evelyn smoked, so that the air was\nfull of the mist and fragrance of good tobacco. In the intervals when\nno one spoke, they heard far off the low murmur of the sea, as the waves\nquietly broke and spread the beach with a film of water, and withdrew to\nbreak again. The cool green light fell through the leaves of the tree,\nand there were soft crescents and diamonds of sunshine upon the plates\nand the tablecloth. Mrs. Thornbury, after watching them all for a time\nin silence, began to ask Rachel kindly questions--When did they all\ngo back? Oh, they expected her father. She must want to see her\nfather--there would be a great deal to tell him, and (she looked\nsympathetically at Terence) he would be so happy, she felt sure. Years\nago, she continued, it might have been ten or twenty years ago, she\nremembered meeting Mr. Vinrace at a party, and, being so much struck\nby his face, which was so unlike the ordinary face one sees at a party,\nthat she had asked who he was, and she was told that it was Mr. Vinrace,\nand she had always remembered the name,--an uncommon name,--and he had\na lady with him, a very sweet-looking woman, but it was one of those\ndreadful London crushes, where you don't talk,--you only look at each\nother,--and although she had shaken hands with Mr. Vinrace, she didn't\nthink they had said anything. She sighed very slightly, remembering the\npast.\n\nThen she turned to Mr. Pepper, who had become very dependent on her,\nso that he always chose a seat near her, and attended to what she was\nsaying, although he did not often make any remark of his own.\n\n\"You who know everything, Mr. Pepper,\" she said, \"tell us how did those\nwonderful French ladies manage their salons? Did we ever do anything of\nthe same kind in England, or do you think that there is some reason why\nwe cannot do it in England?\"\n\nMr. Pepper was pleased to explain very accurately why there has never\nbeen an English salon. There were three reasons, and they were very\ngood ones, he said. As for himself, when he went to a party, as one was\nsometimes obliged to, from a wish not to give offence--his niece, for\nexample, had been married the other day--he walked into the middle of\nthe room, said \"Ha! ha!\" as loud as ever he could, considered that he\nhad done his duty, and walked away again. Mrs. Thornbury protested. She\nwas going to give a party directly she got back, and they were all to be\ninvited, and she should set people to watch Mr. Pepper, and if she\nheard that he had been caught saying \"Ha! ha!\" she would--she would do\nsomething very dreadful indeed to him. Arthur Venning suggested that\nwhat she must do was to rig up something in the nature of a surprise--a\nportrait, for example, of a nice old lady in a lace cap, concealing a\nbath of cold water, which at a signal could be sprung on Pepper's head;\nor they'd have a chair which shot him twenty feet high directly he sat\non it.\n\nSusan laughed. She had done her tea; she was feeling very well\ncontented, partly because she had been playing tennis brilliantly, and\nthen every one was so nice; she was beginning to find it so much easier\nto talk, and to hold her own even with quite clever people, for somehow\nclever people did not frighten her any more. Even Mr. Hirst, whom she\nhad disliked when she first met him, really wasn't disagreeable; and,\npoor man, he always looked so ill; perhaps he was in love; perhaps he\nhad been in love with Rachel--she really shouldn't wonder; or perhaps it\nwas Evelyn--she was of course very attractive to men. Leaning forward,\nshe went on with the conversation. She said that she thought that the\nreason why parties were so dull was mainly because gentlemen will not\ndress: even in London, she stated, it struck her very much how people\ndon't think it necessary to dress in the evening, and of course if they\ndon't dress in London they won't dress in the country. It was really\nquite a treat at Christmas-time when there were the Hunt balls, and the\ngentlemen wore nice red coats, but Arthur didn't care for dancing, so\nshe supposed that they wouldn't go even to the ball in their little\ncountry town. She didn't think that people who were fond of one sport\noften care for another, although her father was an exception. But then\nhe was an exception in every way--such a gardener, and he knew all about\nbirds and animals, and of course he was simply adored by all the old\nwomen in the village, and at the same time what he really liked best was\na book. You always knew where to find him if he were wanted; he would be\nin his study with a book. Very likely it would be an old, old book, some\nfusty old thing that no one else would dream of reading. She used to\ntell him that he would have made a first-rate old bookworm if only he\nhadn't had a family of six to support, and six children, she added,\ncharmingly confident of universal sympathy, didn't leave one much time\nfor being a bookworm.\n\nStill talking about her father, of whom she was very proud, she rose,\nfor Arthur upon looking at his watch found that it was time they went\nback again to the tennis court. The others did not move.\n\n\"They're very happy!\" said Mrs. Thornbury, looking benignantly after\nthem. Rachel agreed; they seemed to be so certain of themselves; they\nseemed to know exactly what they wanted.\n\n\"D'you think they _are_ happy?\" Evelyn murmured to Terence in an\nundertone, and she hoped that he would say that he did not think them\nhappy; but, instead, he said that they must go too--go home, for they\nwere always being late for meals, and Mrs. Ambrose, who was very stern\nand particular, didn't like that. Evelyn laid hold of Rachel's skirt and\nprotested. Why should they go? It was still early, and she had so many\nthings to say to them. \"No,\" said Terence, \"we must go, because we walk\nso slowly. We stop and look at things, and we talk.\"\n\n\"What d'you talk about?\" Evelyn enquired, upon which he laughed and said\nthat they talked about everything.\n\nMrs. Thornbury went with them to the gate, trailing very slowly and\ngracefully across the grass and the gravel, and talking all the time\nabout flowers and birds. She told them that she had taken up the study\nof botany since her daughter married, and it was wonderful what a number\nof flowers there were which she had never seen, although she had lived\nin the country all her life and she was now seventy-two. It was a good\nthing to have some occupation which was quite independent of other\npeople, she said, when one got old. But the odd thing was that one never\nfelt old. She always felt that she was twenty-five, not a day more or a\nday less, but, of course, one couldn't expect other people to agree to\nthat.\n\n\"It must be very wonderful to be twenty-five, and not merely to imagine\nthat you're twenty-five,\" she said, looking from one to the other with\nher smooth, bright glance. \"It must be very wonderful, very wonderful\nindeed.\" She stood talking to them at the gate for a long time; she\nseemed reluctant that they should go.\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXV\n\n\nThe afternoon was very hot, so hot that the breaking of the waves on\nthe shore sounded like the repeated sigh of some exhausted creature,\nand even on the terrace under an awning the bricks were hot, and the\nair danced perpetually over the short dry grass. The red flowers in the\nstone basins were drooping with the heat, and the white blossoms which\nhad been so smooth and thick only a few weeks ago were now dry, and\ntheir edges were curled and yellow. Only the stiff and hostile plants\nof the south, whose fleshy leaves seemed to be grown upon spines, still\nremained standing upright and defied the sun to beat them down. It\nwas too hot to talk, and it was not easy to find any book that would\nwithstand the power of the sun. Many books had been tried and then let\nfall, and now Terence was reading Milton aloud, because he said the\nwords of Milton had substance and shape, so that it was not necessary to\nunderstand what he was saying; one could merely listen to his words; one\ncould almost handle them.\n\nThere is a gentle nymph not far from hence,\n\nhe read,\n\n     That with moist curb sways the smooth Severn stream.\n       Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure;\n     Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine,\n       That had the sceptre from his father Brute.\n\nThe words, in spite of what Terence had said, seemed to be laden with\nmeaning, and perhaps it was for this reason that it was painful to\nlisten to them; they sounded strange; they meant different things from\nwhat they usually meant. Rachel at any rate could not keep her attention\nfixed upon them, but went off upon curious trains of thought suggested\nby words such as \"curb\" and \"Locrine\" and \"Brute,\" which brought\nunpleasant sights before her eyes, independently of their meaning. Owing\nto the heat and the dancing air the garden too looked strange--the trees\nwere either too near or too far, and her head almost certainly ached.\nShe was not quite certain, and therefore she did not know, whether to\ntell Terence now, or to let him go on reading. She decided that she\nwould wait until he came to the end of a stanza, and if by that time she\nhad turned her head this way and that, and it ached in every position\nundoubtedly, she would say very calmly that her head ached.\n\n     Sabrina fair,\n       Listen where thou art sitting\n     Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,\n       In twisted braids of lilies knitting\n     The loose train of thy amber dropping hair,\n       Listen for dear honour's sake,\n     Goddess of the silver lake,\n       Listen and save!\n\nBut her head ached; it ached whichever way she turned it.\n\nShe sat up and said as she had determined, \"My head aches so that\nI shall go indoors.\" He was half-way through the next verse, but he\ndropped the book instantly.\n\n\"Your head aches?\" he repeated.\n\nFor a few moments they sat looking at one another in silence, holding\neach other's hands. During this time his sense of dismay and catastrophe\nwere almost physically painful; all round him he seemed to hear the\nshiver of broken glass which, as it fell to earth, left him sitting in\nthe open air. But at the end of two minutes, noticing that she was not\nsharing his dismay, but was only rather more languid and heavy-eyed than\nusual, he recovered, fetched Helen, and asked her to tell him what they\nhad better do, for Rachel had a headache.\n\nMrs. Ambrose was not discomposed, but advised that she should go to bed,\nand added that she must expect her head to ache if she sat up to all\nhours and went out in the heat, but a few hours in bed would cure it\ncompletely. Terence was unreasonably reassured by her words, as he had\nbeen unreasonably depressed the moment before. Helen's sense seemed\nto have much in common with the ruthless good sense of nature, which\navenged rashness by a headache, and, like nature's good sense, might be\ndepended upon.\n\nRachel went to bed; she lay in the dark, it seemed to her, for a very\nlong time, but at length, waking from a transparent kind of sleep, she\nsaw the windows white in front of her, and recollected that some time\nbefore she had gone to bed with a headache, and that Helen had said it\nwould be gone when she woke. She supposed, therefore, that she was now\nquite well again. At the same time the wall of her room was painfully\nwhite, and curved slightly, instead of being straight and flat. Turning\nher eyes to the window, she was not reassured by what she saw there. The\nmovement of the blind as it filled with air and blew slowly out, drawing\nthe cord with a little trailing sound along the floor, seemed to her\nterrifying, as if it were the movement of an animal in the room. She\nshut her eyes, and the pulse in her head beat so strongly that each\nthump seemed to tread upon a nerve, piercing her forehead with a little\nstab of pain. It might not be the same headache, but she certainly had a\nheadache. She turned from side to side, in the hope that the coolness\nof the sheets would cure her, and that when she next opened her eyes\nto look the room would be as usual. After a considerable number of vain\nexperiments, she resolved to put the matter beyond a doubt. She got out\nof bed and stood upright, holding on to the brass ball at the end of the\nbedstead. Ice-cold at first, it soon became as hot as the palm of her\nhand, and as the pains in her head and body and the instability of the\nfloor proved that it would be far more intolerable to stand and walk\nthan to lie in bed, she got into bed again; but though the change was\nrefreshing at first, the discomfort of bed was soon as great as the\ndiscomfort of standing up. She accepted the idea that she would have\nto stay in bed all day long, and as she laid her head on the pillow,\nrelinquished the happiness of the day.\n\nWhen Helen came in an hour or two later, suddenly stopped her cheerful\nwords, looked startled for a second and then unnaturally calm, the fact\nthat she was ill was put beyond a doubt. It was confirmed when the whole\nhousehold knew of it, when the song that some one was singing in the\ngarden stopped suddenly, and when Maria, as she brought water, slipped\npast the bed with averted eyes. There was all the morning to get\nthrough, and then all the afternoon, and at intervals she made an effort\nto cross over into the ordinary world, but she found that her heat and\ndiscomfort had put a gulf between her world and the ordinary world which\nshe could not bridge. At one point the door opened, and Helen came in\nwith a little dark man who had--it was the chief thing she noticed about\nhim--very hairy hands. She was drowsy and intolerably hot, and as he\nseemed shy and obsequious she scarcely troubled to answer him, although\nshe understood that he was a doctor. At another point the door opened\nand Terence came in very gently, smiling too steadily, as she realised,\nfor it to be natural. He sat down and talked to her, stroking her hands\nuntil it became irksome to her to lie any more in the same position and\nshe turned round, and when she looked up again Helen was beside her and\nTerence had gone. It did not matter; she would see him to-morrow when\nthings would be ordinary again. Her chief occupation during the day was\nto try to remember how the lines went:\n\n     Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,\n     In twisted braids of lilies knitting\n       The loose train of thy amber dropping hair;\n\nand the effort worried her because the adjectives persisted in getting\ninto the wrong places.\n\nThe second day did not differ very much from the first day, except that\nher bed had become very important, and the world outside, when she\ntried to think of it, appeared distinctly further off. The glassy, cool,\ntranslucent wave was almost visible before her, curling up at the end\nof the bed, and as it was refreshingly cool she tried to keep her\nmind fixed upon it. Helen was here, and Helen was there all day long;\nsometimes she said that it was lunchtime, and sometimes that it was\nteatime; but by the next day all landmarks were obliterated, and the\nouter world was so far away that the different sounds, such as the\nsounds of people moving overhead, could only be ascribed to their cause\nby a great effort of memory. The recollection of what she had felt, or\nof what she had been doing and thinking three days before, had faded\nentirely. On the other hand, every object in the room, and the bed\nitself, and her own body with its various limbs and their different\nsensations were more and more important each day. She was completely\ncut off, and unable to communicate with the rest of the world, isolated\nalone with her body.\n\nHours and hours would pass thus, without getting any further through the\nmorning, or again a few minutes would lead from broad daylight to the\ndepths of the night. One evening when the room appeared very dim, either\nbecause it was evening or because the blinds were drawn, Helen said to\nher, \"Some one is going to sit here to-night. You won't mind?\"\n\nOpening her eyes, Rachel saw not only Helen but a nurse in spectacles,\nwhose face vaguely recalled something that she had once seen. She had\nseen her in the chapel. \"Nurse McInnis,\" said Helen, and the nurse\nsmiled steadily as they all did, and said that she did not find many\npeople who were frightened of her. After waiting for a moment they both\ndisappeared, and having turned on her pillow Rachel woke to find herself\nin the midst of one of those interminable nights which do not end at\ntwelve, but go on into the double figures--thirteen, fourteen, and so\non until they reach the twenties, and then the thirties, and then the\nforties. She realised that there is nothing to prevent nights from doing\nthis if they choose. At a great distance an elderly woman sat with her\nhead bent down; Rachel raised herself slightly and saw with dismay that\nshe was playing cards by the light of a candle which stood in the hollow\nof a newspaper. The sight had something inexplicably sinister about it,\nand she was terrified and cried out, upon which the woman laid down\nher cards and came across the room, shading the candle with her hands.\nComing nearer and nearer across the great space of the room, she stood\nat last above Rachel's head and said, \"Not asleep? Let me make you\ncomfortable.\"\n\nShe put down the candle and began to arrange the bedclothes. It struck\nRachel that a woman who sat playing cards in a cavern all night long\nwould have very cold hands, and she shrunk from the touch of them.\n\n\"Why, there's a toe all the way down there!\" the woman said, proceeding\nto tuck in the bedclothes. Rachel did not realise that the toe was hers.\n\n\"You must try and lie still,\" she proceeded, \"because if you lie still\nyou will be less hot, and if you toss about you will make yourself more\nhot, and we don't want you to be any hotter than you are.\" She stood\nlooking down upon Rachel for an enormous length of time.\n\n\"And the quieter you lie the sooner you will be well,\" she repeated.\n\nRachel kept her eyes fixed upon the peaked shadow on the ceiling, and\nall her energy was concentrated upon the desire that this shadow should\nmove. But the shadow and the woman seemed to be eternally fixed above\nher. She shut her eyes. When she opened them again several more hours\nhad passed, but the night still lasted interminably. The woman was still\nplaying cards, only she sat now in a tunnel under a river, and the light\nstood in a little archway in the wall above her. She cried \"Terence!\"\nand the peaked shadow again moved across the ceiling, as the woman with\nan enormous slow movement rose, and they both stood still above her.\n\n\"It's just as difficult to keep you in bed as it was to keep Mr. Forrest\nin bed,\" the woman said, \"and he was such a tall gentleman.\"\n\nIn order to get rid of this terrible stationary sight Rachel again shut\nher eyes, and found herself walking through a tunnel under the Thames,\nwhere there were little deformed women sitting in archways playing\ncards, while the bricks of which the wall was made oozed with damp,\nwhich collected into drops and slid down the wall. But the little old\nwomen became Helen and Nurse McInnis after a time, standing in the\nwindow together whispering, whispering incessantly.\n\nMeanwhile outside her room the sounds, the movements, and the lives of\nthe other people in the house went on in the ordinary light of the sun,\nthroughout the usual succession of hours. When, on the first day of her\nillness, it became clear that she would not be absolutely well, for her\ntemperature was very high, until Friday, that day being Tuesday, Terence\nwas filled with resentment, not against her, but against the force\noutside them which was separating them. He counted up the number of days\nthat would almost certainly be spoilt for them. He realised, with an odd\nmixture of pleasure and annoyance, that, for the first time in his life,\nhe was so dependent upon another person that his happiness was in her\nkeeping. The days were completely wasted upon trifling, immaterial\nthings, for after three weeks of such intimacy and intensity all the\nusual occupations were unbearably flat and beside the point. The least\nintolerable occupation was to talk to St. John about Rachel's illness,\nand to discuss every symptom and its meaning, and, when this subject was\nexhausted, to discuss illness of all kinds, and what caused them, and\nwhat cured them.\n\nTwice every day he went in to sit with Rachel, and twice every day the\nsame thing happened. On going into her room, which was not very dark,\nwhere the music was lying about as usual, and her books and letters, his\nspirits rose instantly. When he saw her he felt completely reassured.\nShe did not look very ill. Sitting by her side he would tell her what\nhe had been doing, using his natural voice to speak to her, only a few\ntones lower down than usual; but by the time he had sat there for five\nminutes he was plunged into the deepest gloom. She was not the same;\nhe could not bring them back to their old relationship; but although he\nknew that it was foolish he could not prevent himself from endeavouring\nto bring her back, to make her remember, and when this failed he was in\ndespair. He always concluded as he left her room that it was worse to\nsee her than not to see her, but by degrees, as the day wore on, the\ndesire to see her returned and became almost too great to be borne.\n\nOn Thursday morning when Terence went into her room he felt the usual\nincrease of confidence. She turned round and made an effort to remember\ncertain facts from the world that was so many millions of miles away.\n\n\"You have come up from the hotel?\" she asked.\n\n\"No; I'm staying here for the present,\" he said. \"We've just had\nluncheon,\" he continued, \"and the mail has come in. There's a bundle of\nletters for you--letters from England.\"\n\nInstead of saying, as he meant her to say, that she wished to see them,\nshe said nothing for some time.\n\n\"You see, there they go, rolling off the edge of the hill,\" she said\nsuddenly.\n\n\"Rolling, Rachel? What do you see rolling? There's nothing rolling.\"\n\n\"The old woman with the knife,\" she replied, not speaking to Terence\nin particular, and looking past him. As she appeared to be looking at a\nvase on the shelf opposite, he rose and took it down.\n\n\"Now they can't roll any more,\" he said cheerfully. Nevertheless she lay\ngazing at the same spot, and paid him no further attention although he\nspoke to her. He became so profoundly wretched that he could not endure\nto sit with her, but wandered about until he found St. John, who was\nreading _The_ _Times_ in the verandah. He laid it aside patiently, and\nheard all that Terence had to say about delirium. He was very patient\nwith Terence. He treated him like a child.\n\nBy Friday it could not be denied that the illness was no longer an\nattack that would pass off in a day or two; it was a real illness that\nrequired a good deal of organisation, and engrossed the attention of\nat least five people, but there was no reason to be anxious. Instead\nof lasting five days it was going to last ten days. Rodriguez was\nunderstood to say that there were well-known varieties of this illness.\nRodriguez appeared to think that they were treating the illness with\nundue anxiety. His visits were always marked by the same show of\nconfidence, and in his interviews with Terence he always waved aside\nhis anxious and minute questions with a kind of flourish which seemed\nto indicate that they were all taking it much too seriously. He seemed\ncuriously unwilling to sit down.\n\n\"A high temperature,\" he said, looking furtively about the room,\nand appearing to be more interested in the furniture and in Helen's\nembroidery than in anything else. \"In this climate you must expect a\nhigh temperature. You need not be alarmed by that. It is the pulse we\ngo by\" (he tapped his own hairy wrist), \"and the pulse continues\nexcellent.\"\n\nThereupon he bowed and slipped out. The interview was conducted\nlaboriously upon both sides in French, and this, together with the\nfact that he was optimistic, and that Terence respected the medical\nprofession from hearsay, made him less critical than he would have been\nhad he encountered the doctor in any other capacity. Unconsciously\nhe took Rodriguez' side against Helen, who seemed to have taken an\nunreasonable prejudice against him.\n\nWhen Saturday came it was evident that the hours of the day must be more\nstrictly organised than they had been. St. John offered his services; he\nsaid that he had nothing to do, and that he might as well spend the\nday at the villa if he could be of use. As if they were starting on a\ndifficult expedition together, they parcelled out their duties between\nthem, writing out an elaborate scheme of hours upon a large sheet of\npaper which was pinned to the drawing-room door. Their distance from\nthe town, and the difficulty of procuring rare things with unknown\nnames from the most unexpected places, made it necessary to think very\ncarefully, and they found it unexpectedly difficult to do the simple\nbut practical things that were required of them, as if they, being very\ntall, were asked to stoop down and arrange minute grains of sand in a\npattern on the ground.\n\nIt was St. John's duty to fetch what was needed from the town, so\nthat Terence would sit all through the long hot hours alone in the\ndrawing-room, near the open door, listening for any movement upstairs,\nor call from Helen. He always forgot to pull down the blinds, so that he\nsat in bright sunshine, which worried him without his knowing what was\nthe cause of it. The room was terribly stiff and uncomfortable. There\nwere hats in the chairs, and medicine bottles among the books. He tried\nto read, but good books were too good, and bad books were too bad, and\nthe only thing he could tolerate was the newspaper, which with its\nnews of London, and the movements of real people who were giving\ndinner-parties and making speeches, seemed to give a little background\nof reality to what was otherwise mere nightmare. Then, just as his\nattention was fixed on the print, a soft call would come from Helen, or\nMrs. Chailey would bring in something which was wanted upstairs, and he\nwould run up very quietly in his socks, and put the jug on the little\ntable which stood crowded with jugs and cups outside the bedroom door;\nor if he could catch Helen for a moment he would ask, \"How is she?\"\n\n\"Rather restless. . . . On the whole, quieter, I think.\"\n\nThe answer would be one or the other.\n\nAs usual she seemed to reserve something which she did not say, and\nTerence was conscious that they disagreed, and, without saying it\naloud, were arguing against each other. But she was too hurried and\npre-occupied to talk.\n\nThe strain of listening and the effort of making practical arrangements\nand seeing that things worked smoothly, absorbed all Terence's power.\nInvolved in this long dreary nightmare, he did not attempt to think what\nit amounted to. Rachel was ill; that was all; he must see that there\nwas medicine and milk, and that things were ready when they were wanted.\nThought had ceased; life itself had come to a standstill. Sunday was\nrather worse than Saturday had been, simply because the strain was\na little greater every day, although nothing else had changed. The\nseparate feelings of pleasure, interest, and pain, which combine to make\nup the ordinary day, were merged in one long-drawn sensation of sordid\nmisery and profound boredom. He had never been so bored since he was\nshut up in the nursery alone as a child. The vision of Rachel as she was\nnow, confused and heedless, had almost obliterated the vision of her as\nshe had been once long ago; he could hardly believe that they had ever\nbeen happy, or engaged to be married, for what were feelings, what\nwas there to be felt? Confusion covered every sight and person, and he\nseemed to see St. John, Ridley, and the stray people who came up now and\nthen from the hotel to enquire, through a mist; the only people who were\nnot hidden in this mist were Helen and Rodriguez, because they could\ntell him something definite about Rachel.\n\nNevertheless the day followed the usual forms. At certain hours they\nwent into the dining-room, and when they sat round the table they talked\nabout indifferent things. St. John usually made it his business to start\nthe talk and to keep it from dying out.\n\n\"I've discovered the way to get Sancho past the white house,\" said St.\nJohn on Sunday at luncheon. \"You crackle a piece of paper in his ear,\nthen he bolts for about a hundred yards, but he goes on quite well after\nthat.\"\n\n\"Yes, but he wants corn. You should see that he has corn.\"\n\n\"I don't think much of the stuff they give him; and Angelo seems a dirty\nlittle rascal.\"\n\nThere was then a long silence. Ridley murmured a few lines of poetry\nunder his breath, and remarked, as if to conceal the fact that he had\ndone so, \"Very hot to-day.\"\n\n\"Two degrees higher than it was yesterday,\" said St. John. \"I wonder\nwhere these nuts come from,\" he observed, taking a nut out of the plate,\nturning it over in his fingers, and looking at it curiously.\n\n\"London, I should think,\" said Terence, looking at the nut too.\n\n\"A competent man of business could make a fortune here in no time,\" St.\nJohn continued. \"I suppose the heat does something funny to people's\nbrains. Even the English go a little queer. Anyhow they're hopeless\npeople to deal with. They kept me three-quarters of an hour waiting at\nthe chemist's this morning, for no reason whatever.\"\n\nThere was another long pause. Then Ridley enquired, \"Rodriguez seems\nsatisfied?\"\n\n\"Quite,\" said Terence with decision. \"It's just got to run its course.\"\nWhereupon Ridley heaved a deep sigh. He was genuinely sorry for every\none, but at the same time he missed Helen considerably, and was a little\naggrieved by the constant presence of the two young men.\n\nThey moved back into the drawing-room.\n\n\"Look here, Hirst,\" said Terence, \"there's nothing to be done for two\nhours.\" He consulted the sheet pinned to the door. \"You go and lie down.\nI'll wait here. Chailey sits with Rachel while Helen has her luncheon.\"\n\nIt was asking a good deal of Hirst to tell him to go without waiting for\na sight of Helen. These little glimpses of Helen were the only respites\nfrom strain and boredom, and very often they seemed to make up for the\ndiscomfort of the day, although she might not have anything to tell\nthem. However, as they were on an expedition together, he had made up\nhis mind to obey.\n\nHelen was very late in coming down. She looked like a person who has\nbeen sitting for a long time in the dark. She was pale and thinner,\nand the expression of her eyes was harassed but determined. She ate\nher luncheon quickly, and seemed indifferent to what she was doing. She\nbrushed aside Terence's enquiries, and at last, as if he had not spoken,\nshe looked at him with a slight frown and said:\n\n\"We can't go on like this, Terence. Either you've got to find another\ndoctor, or you must tell Rodriguez to stop coming, and I'll manage\nfor myself. It's no use for him to say that Rachel's better; she's not\nbetter; she's worse.\"\n\nTerence suffered a terrific shock, like that which he had suffered when\nRachel said, \"My head aches.\" He stilled it by reflecting that Helen was\noverwrought, and he was upheld in this opinion by his obstinate sense\nthat she was opposed to him in the argument.\n\n\"Do you think she's in danger?\" he asked.\n\n\"No one can go on being as ill as that day after day--\" Helen replied.\nShe looked at him, and spoke as if she felt some indignation with\nsomebody.\n\n\"Very well, I'll talk to Rodriguez this afternoon,\" he replied.\n\nHelen went upstairs at once.\n\nNothing now could assuage Terence's anxiety. He could not read, nor\ncould he sit still, and his sense of security was shaken, in spite of\nthe fact that he was determined that Helen was exaggerating, and that\nRachel was not very ill. But he wanted a third person to confirm him in\nhis belief.\n\nDirectly Rodriguez came down he demanded, \"Well, how is she? Do you\nthink her worse?\"\n\n\"There is no reason for anxiety, I tell you--none,\" Rodriguez replied in\nhis execrable French, smiling uneasily, and making little movements all\nthe time as if to get away.\n\nHewet stood firmly between him and the door. He was determined to see\nfor himself what kind of man he was. His confidence in the man vanished\nas he looked at him and saw his insignificance, his dirty appearance,\nhis shiftiness, and his unintelligent, hairy face. It was strange that\nhe had never seen this before.\n\n\"You won't object, of course, if we ask you to consult another doctor?\"\nhe continued.\n\nAt this the little man became openly incensed.\n\n\"Ah!\" he cried. \"You have not confidence in me? You object to my\ntreatment? You wish me to give up the case?\"\n\n\"Not at all,\" Terence replied, \"but in serious illness of this kind--\"\n\nRodriguez shrugged his shoulders.\n\n\"It is not serious, I assure you. You are overanxious. The young lady is\nnot seriously ill, and I am a doctor. The lady of course is frightened,\"\nhe sneered. \"I understand that perfectly.\"\n\n\"The name and address of the doctor is--?\" Terence continued.\n\n\"There is no other doctor,\" Rodriguez replied sullenly. \"Every one has\nconfidence in me. Look! I will show you.\"\n\nHe took out a packet of old letters and began turning them over as if in\nsearch of one that would confute Terence's suspicions. As he searched,\nhe began to tell a story about an English lord who had trusted him--a\ngreat English lord, whose name he had, unfortunately, forgotten.\n\n\"There is no other doctor in the place,\" he concluded, still turning\nover the letters.\n\n\"Never mind,\" said Terence shortly. \"I will make enquiries for myself.\"\nRodriguez put the letters back in his pocket.\n\n\"Very well,\" he remarked. \"I have no objection.\"\n\nHe lifted his eyebrows, shrugged his shoulders, as if to repeat that\nthey took the illness much too seriously and that there was no other\ndoctor, and slipped out, leaving behind him an impression that he was\nconscious that he was distrusted, and that his malice was aroused.\n\nAfter this Terence could no longer stay downstairs. He went up, knocked\nat Rachel's door, and asked Helen whether he might see her for a few\nminutes. He had not seen her yesterday. She made no objection, and went\nand sat at a table in the window.\n\nTerence sat down by the bedside. Rachel's face was changed. She looked\nas though she were entirely concentrated upon the effort of keeping\nalive. Her lips were drawn, and her cheeks were sunken and flushed,\nthough without colour. Her eyes were not entirely shut, the lower half\nof the white part showing, not as if she saw, but as if they remained\nopen because she was too much exhausted to close them. She opened them\ncompletely when he kissed her. But she only saw an old woman slicing a\nman's head off with a knife.\n\n\"There it falls!\" she murmured. She then turned to Terence and asked\nhim anxiously some question about a man with mules, which he could not\nunderstand. \"Why doesn't he come? Why doesn't he come?\" she repeated. He\nwas appalled to think of the dirty little man downstairs in connection\nwith illness like this, and turning instinctively to Helen, but she was\ndoing something at a table in the window, and did not seem to realise\nhow great the shock to him must be. He rose to go, for he could not\nendure to listen any longer; his heart beat quickly and painfully with\nanger and misery. As he passed Helen she asked him in the same weary,\nunnatural, but determined voice to fetch her more ice, and to have the\njug outside filled with fresh milk.\n\nWhen he had done these errands he went to find Hirst. Exhausted and very\nhot, St. John had fallen asleep on a bed, but Terence woke him without\nscruple.\n\n\"Helen thinks she's worse,\" he said. \"There's no doubt she's frightfully\nill. Rodriguez is useless. We must get another doctor.\"\n\n\"But there is no other doctor,\" said Hirst drowsily, sitting up and\nrubbing his eyes.\n\n\"Don't be a damned fool!\" Terence exclaimed. \"Of course there's another\ndoctor, and, if there isn't, you've got to find one. It ought to have\nbeen done days ago. I'm going down to saddle the horse.\" He could not\nstay still in one place.\n\nIn less than ten minutes St. John was riding to the town in the\nscorching heat in search of a doctor, his orders being to find one and\nbring him back if he had to be fetched in a special train.\n\n\"We ought to have done it days ago,\" Hewet repeated angrily.\n\nWhen he went back into the drawing-room he found that Mrs. Flushing was\nthere, standing very erect in the middle of the room, having arrived,\nas people did in these days, by the kitchen or through the garden\nunannounced.\n\n\"She's better?\" Mrs. Flushing enquired abruptly; they did not attempt to\nshake hands.\n\n\"No,\" said Terence. \"If anything, they think she's worse.\"\n\nMrs. Flushing seemed to consider for a moment or two, looking straight\nat Terence all the time.\n\n\"Let me tell you,\" she said, speaking in nervous jerks, \"it's always\nabout the seventh day one begins to get anxious. I daresay you've been\nsittin' here worryin' by yourself. You think she's bad, but any one\ncomin' with a fresh eye would see she was better. Mr. Elliot's had\nfever; he's all right now,\" she threw out. \"It wasn't anythin' she\ncaught on the expedition. What's it matter--a few days' fever? My\nbrother had fever for twenty-six days once. And in a week or two he was\nup and about. We gave him nothin' but milk and arrowroot--\"\n\nHere Mrs. Chailey came in with a message.\n\n\"I'm wanted upstairs,\" said Terence.\n\n\"You see--she'll be better,\" Mrs. Flushing jerked out as he left the\nroom. Her anxiety to persuade Terence was very great, and when he left\nher without saying anything she felt dissatisfied and restless; she did\nnot like to stay, but she could not bear to go. She wandered from room\nto room looking for some one to talk to, but all the rooms were empty.\n\nTerence went upstairs, stood inside the door to take Helen's directions,\nlooked over at Rachel, but did not attempt to speak to her. She appeared\nvaguely conscious of his presence, but it seemed to disturb her, and she\nturned, so that she lay with her back to him.\n\nFor six days indeed she had been oblivious of the world outside, because\nit needed all her attention to follow the hot, red, quick sights which\npassed incessantly before her eyes. She knew that it was of enormous\nimportance that she should attend to these sights and grasp their\nmeaning, but she was always being just too late to hear or see something\nwhich would explain it all. For this reason, the faces,--Helen's\nface, the nurse's, Terence's, the doctor's,--which occasionally forced\nthemselves very close to her, were worrying because they distracted her\nattention and she might miss the clue. However, on the fourth afternoon\nshe was suddenly unable to keep Helen's face distinct from the sights\nthemselves; her lips widened as she bent down over the bed, and she\nbegan to gabble unintelligibly like the rest. The sights were all\nconcerned in some plot, some adventure, some escape. The nature of what\nthey were doing changed incessantly, although there was always a reason\nbehind it, which she must endeavour to grasp. Now they were among trees\nand savages, now they were on the sea, now they were on the tops of high\ntowers; now they jumped; now they flew. But just as the crisis was about\nto happen, something invariably slipped in her brain, so that the whole\neffort had to begin over again. The heat was suffocating. At last the\nfaces went further away; she fell into a deep pool of sticky water,\nwhich eventually closed over her head. She saw nothing and heard nothing\nbut a faint booming sound, which was the sound of the sea rolling over\nher head. While all her tormentors thought that she was dead, she\nwas not dead, but curled up at the bottom of the sea. There she lay,\nsometimes seeing darkness, sometimes light, while every now and then\nsome one turned her over at the bottom of the sea.\n\nAfter St. John had spent some hours in the heat of the sun wrangling\nwith evasive and very garrulous natives, he extracted the information\nthat there was a doctor, a French doctor, who was at present away on\na holiday in the hills. It was quite impossible, so they said, to find\nhim. With his experience of the country, St. John thought it unlikely\nthat a telegram would either be sent or received; but having reduced the\ndistance of the hill town, in which he was staying, from a hundred miles\nto thirty miles, and having hired a carriage and horses, he started\nat once to fetch the doctor himself. He succeeded in finding him, and\neventually forced the unwilling man to leave his young wife and return\nforthwith. They reached the villa at midday on Tuesday.\n\nTerence came out to receive them, and St. John was struck by the fact\nthat he had grown perceptibly thinner in the interval; he was white too;\nhis eyes looked strange. But the curt speech and the sulky masterful\nmanner of Dr. Lesage impressed them both favourably, although at the\nsame time it was obvious that he was very much annoyed at the whole\naffair. Coming downstairs he gave his directions emphatically, but it\nnever occurred to him to give an opinion either because of the presence\nof Rodriguez who was now obsequious as well as malicious, or because he\ntook it for granted that they knew already what was to be known.\n\n\"Of course,\" he said with a shrug of his shoulders, when Terence asked\nhim, \"Is she very ill?\"\n\nThey were both conscious of a certain sense of relief when Dr. Lesage\nwas gone, leaving explicit directions, and promising another visit in a\nfew hours' time; but, unfortunately, the rise of their spirits led them\nto talk more than usual, and in talking they quarrelled. They quarrelled\nabout a road, the Portsmouth Road. St. John said that it is macadamised\nwhere it passes Hindhead, and Terence knew as well as he knew his own\nname that it is not macadamised at that point. In the course of the\nargument they said some very sharp things to each other, and the rest\nof the dinner was eaten in silence, save for an occasional half-stifled\nreflection from Ridley.\n\nWhen it grew dark and the lamps were brought in, Terence felt unable to\ncontrol his irritation any longer. St. John went to bed in a state\nof complete exhaustion, bidding Terence good-night with rather more\naffection than usual because of their quarrel, and Ridley retired to his\nbooks. Left alone, Terence walked up and down the room; he stood at the\nopen window.\n\nThe lights were coming out one after another in the town beneath, and it\nwas very peaceful and cool in the garden, so that he stepped out on to\nthe terrace. As he stood there in the darkness, able only to see the\nshapes of trees through the fine grey light, he was overcome by a desire\nto escape, to have done with this suffering, to forget that Rachel was\nill. He allowed himself to lapse into forgetfulness of everything. As if\na wind that had been raging incessantly suddenly fell asleep, the fret\nand strain and anxiety which had been pressing on him passed away.\nHe seemed to stand in an unvexed space of air, on a little island by\nhimself; he was free and immune from pain. It did not matter whether\nRachel was well or ill; it did not matter whether they were apart or\ntogether; nothing mattered--nothing mattered. The waves beat on the\nshore far away, and the soft wind passed through the branches of the\ntrees, seeming to encircle him with peace and security, with dark and\nnothingness. Surely the world of strife and fret and anxiety was not the\nreal world, but this was the real world, the world that lay beneath the\nsuperficial world, so that, whatever happened, one was secure. The quiet\nand peace seemed to lap his body in a fine cool sheet, soothing every\nnerve; his mind seemed once more to expand, and become natural.\n\nBut when he had stood thus for a time a noise in the house roused him;\nhe turned instinctively and went into the drawing-room. The sight of the\nlamp-lit room brought back so abruptly all that he had forgotten that he\nstood for a moment unable to move. He remembered everything, the hour,\nthe minute even, what point they had reached, and what was to come.\nHe cursed himself for making believe for a minute that things were\ndifferent from what they are. The night was now harder to face than\never.\n\nUnable to stay in the empty drawing-room, he wandered out and sat on the\nstairs half-way up to Rachel's room. He longed for some one to talk\nto, but Hirst was asleep, and Ridley was asleep; there was no sound\nin Rachel's room. The only sound in the house was the sound of Chailey\nmoving in the kitchen. At last there was a rustling on the stairs\noverhead, and Nurse McInnis came down fastening the links in her cuffs,\nin preparation for the night's watch. Terence rose and stopped her. He\nhad scarcely spoken to her, but it was possible that she might confirm\nhim in the belief which still persisted in his own mind that Rachel was\nnot seriously ill. He told her in a whisper that Dr. Lesage had been and\nwhat he had said.\n\n\"Now, Nurse,\" he whispered, \"please tell me your opinion. Do you\nconsider that she is very seriously ill? Is she in any danger?\"\n\n\"The doctor has said--\" she began.\n\n\"Yes, but I want your opinion. You have had experience of many cases\nlike this?\"\n\n\"I could not tell you more than Dr. Lesage, Mr. Hewet,\" she replied\ncautiously, as though her words might be used against her. \"The case is\nserious, but you may feel quite certain that we are doing all we can for\nMiss Vinrace.\" She spoke with some professional self-approbation. But\nshe realised perhaps that she did not satisfy the young man, who still\nblocked her way, for she shifted her feet slightly upon the stair and\nlooked out of the window where they could see the moon over the sea.\n\n\"If you ask me,\" she began in a curiously stealthy tone, \"I never like\nMay for my patients.\"\n\n\"May?\" Terence repeated.\n\n\"It may be a fancy, but I don't like to see anybody fall ill in May,\"\nshe continued. \"Things seem to go wrong in May. Perhaps it's the moon.\nThey say the moon affects the brain, don't they, Sir?\"\n\nHe looked at her but he could not answer her; like all the others, when\none looked at her she seemed to shrivel beneath one's eyes and become\nworthless, malicious, and untrustworthy.\n\nShe slipped past him and disappeared.\n\nThough he went to his room he was unable even to take his clothes off.\nFor a long time he paced up and down, and then leaning out of the window\ngazed at the earth which lay so dark against the paler blue of the sky.\nWith a mixture of fear and loathing he looked at the slim black cypress\ntrees which were still visible in the garden, and heard the unfamiliar\ncreaking and grating sounds which show that the earth is still hot.\nAll these sights and sounds appeared sinister and full of hostility and\nforeboding; together with the natives and the nurse and the doctor and\nthe terrible force of the illness itself they seemed to be in conspiracy\nagainst him. They seemed to join together in their effort to extract the\ngreatest possible amount of suffering from him. He could not get used to\nhis pain, it was a revelation to him. He had never realised before that\nunderneath every action, underneath the life of every day, pain lies,\nquiescent, but ready to devour; he seemed to be able to see suffering,\nas if it were a fire, curling up over the edges of all action, eating\naway the lives of men and women. He thought for the first time with\nunderstanding of words which had before seemed to him empty: the\nstruggle of life; the hardness of life. Now he knew for himself that\nlife is hard and full of suffering. He looked at the scattered lights in\nthe town beneath, and thought of Arthur and Susan, or Evelyn and Perrott\nventuring out unwittingly, and by their happiness laying themselves\nopen to suffering such as this. How did they dare to love each other, he\nwondered; how had he himself dared to live as he had lived, rapidly and\ncarelessly, passing from one thing to another, loving Rachel as he had\nloved her? Never again would he feel secure; he would never believe in\nthe stability of life, or forget what depths of pain lie beneath small\nhappiness and feelings of content and safety. It seemed to him as he\nlooked back that their happiness had never been so great as his pain\nwas now. There had always been something imperfect in their happiness,\nsomething they had wanted and had not been able to get. It had been\nfragmentary and incomplete, because they were so young and had not known\nwhat they were doing.\n\nThe light of his candle flickered over the boughs of a tree outside the\nwindow, and as the branch swayed in the darkness there came before his\nmind a picture of all the world that lay outside his window; he thought\nof the immense river and the immense forest, the vast stretches of dry\nearth and the plains of the sea that encircled the earth; from the sea\nthe sky rose steep and enormous, and the air washed profoundly between\nthe sky and the sea. How vast and dark it must be tonight, lying exposed\nto the wind; and in all this great space it was curious to think how\nfew the towns were, and how small little rings of light, or single\nglow-worms he figured them, scattered here and there, among the swelling\nuncultivated folds of the world. And in those towns were little men and\nwomen, tiny men and women. Oh, it was absurd, when one thought of it,\nto sit here in a little room suffering and caring. What did anything\nmatter? Rachel, a tiny creature, lay ill beneath him, and here in his\nlittle room he suffered on her account. The nearness of their bodies in\nthis vast universe, and the minuteness of their bodies, seemed to him\nabsurd and laughable. Nothing mattered, he repeated; they had no power,\nno hope. He leant on the window-sill, thinking, until he almost forgot\nthe time and the place. Nevertheless, although he was convinced that\nit was absurd and laughable, and that they were small and hopeless, he\nnever lost the sense that these thoughts somehow formed part of a life\nwhich he and Rachel would live together.\n\nOwing perhaps to the change of doctor, Rachel appeared to be rather\nbetter next day. Terribly pale and worn though Helen looked, there was a\nslight lifting of the cloud which had hung all these days in her eyes.\n\n\"She talked to me,\" she said voluntarily. \"She asked me what day of the\nweek it was, like herself.\"\n\nThen suddenly, without any warning or any apparent reason, the tears\nformed in her eyes and rolled steadily down her cheeks. She cried\nwith scarcely any attempt at movement of her features, and without any\nattempt to stop herself, as if she did not know that she was crying. In\nspite of the relief which her words gave him, Terence was dismayed by\nthe sight; had everything given way? Were there no limits to the power\nof this illness? Would everything go down before it? Helen had always\nseemed to him strong and determined, and now she was like a child. He\ntook her in his arms, and she clung to him like a child, crying softly\nand quietly upon his shoulder. Then she roused herself and wiped her\ntears away; it was silly to behave like that, she said; very silly, she\nrepeated, when there could be no doubt that Rachel was better. She asked\nTerence to forgive her for her folly. She stopped at the door and came\nback and kissed him without saying anything.\n\nOn this day indeed Rachel was conscious of what went on round her. She\nhad come to the surface of the dark, sticky pool, and a wave seemed to\nbear her up and down with it; she had ceased to have any will of her\nown; she lay on the top of the wave conscious of some pain, but chiefly\nof weakness. The wave was replaced by the side of a mountain. Her body\nbecame a drift of melting snow, above which her knees rose in huge\npeaked mountains of bare bone. It was true that she saw Helen and saw\nher room, but everything had become very pale and semi-transparent.\nSometimes she could see through the wall in front of her. Sometimes when\nHelen went away she seemed to go so far that Rachel's eyes could hardly\nfollow her. The room also had an odd power of expanding, and though she\npushed her voice out as far as possible until sometimes it became a\nbird and flew away, she thought it doubtful whether it ever reached the\nperson she was talking to. There were immense intervals or chasms, for\nthings still had the power to appear visibly before her, between one\nmoment and the next; it sometimes took an hour for Helen to raise her\narm, pausing long between each jerky movement, and pour out medicine.\nHelen's form stooping to raise her in bed appeared of gigantic size, and\ncame down upon her like the ceiling falling. But for long spaces of time\nshe would merely lie conscious of her body floating on the top of the\nbed and her mind driven to some remote corner of her body, or escaped\nand gone flitting round the room. All sights were something of an\neffort, but the sight of Terence was the greatest effort, because he\nforced her to join mind to body in the desire to remember something. She\ndid not wish to remember; it troubled her when people tried to disturb\nher loneliness; she wished to be alone. She wished for nothing else in\nthe world.\n\nAlthough she had cried, Terence observed Helen's greater hopefulness\nwith something like triumph; in the argument between them she had made\nthe first sign of admitting herself in the wrong. He waited for Dr.\nLesage to come down that afternoon with considerable anxiety, but with\nthe same certainty at the back of his mind that he would in time force\nthem all to admit that they were in the wrong.\n\nAs usual, Dr. Lesage was sulky in his manner and very short in his\nanswers. To Terence's demand, \"She seems to be better?\" he replied,\nlooking at him in an odd way, \"She has a chance of life.\"\n\nThe door shut and Terence walked across to the window. He leant his\nforehead against the pane.\n\n\"Rachel,\" he repeated to himself. \"She has a chance of life. Rachel.\"\n\nHow could they say these things of Rachel? Had any one yesterday\nseriously believed that Rachel was dying? They had been engaged for four\nweeks. A fortnight ago she had been perfectly well. What could fourteen\ndays have done to bring her from that state to this? To realise what\nthey meant by saying that she had a chance of life was beyond him,\nknowing as he did that they were engaged. He turned, still enveloped in\nthe same dreary mist, and walked towards the door. Suddenly he saw it\nall. He saw the room and the garden, and the trees moving in the air,\nthey could go on without her; she could die. For the first time since\nshe fell ill he remembered exactly what she looked like and the way in\nwhich they cared for each other. The immense happiness of feeling her\nclose to him mingled with a more intense anxiety than he had felt yet.\nHe could not let her die; he could not live without her. But after a\nmomentary struggle, the curtain fell again, and he saw nothing and felt\nnothing clearly. It was all going on--going on still, in the same way as\nbefore. Save for a physical pain when his heart beat, and the fact that\nhis fingers were icy cold, he did not realise that he was anxious about\nanything. Within his mind he seemed to feel nothing about Rachel or\nabout any one or anything in the world. He went on giving orders,\narranging with Mrs. Chailey, writing out lists, and every now and then\nhe went upstairs and put something quietly on the table outside Rachel's\ndoor. That night Dr. Lesage seemed to be less sulky than usual. He\nstayed voluntarily for a few moments, and, addressing St. John and\nTerence equally, as if he did not remember which of them was engaged to\nthe young lady, said, \"I consider that her condition to-night is very\ngrave.\"\n\nNeither of them went to bed or suggested that the other should go to\nbed. They sat in the drawing-room playing picquet with the door open.\nSt. John made up a bed upon the sofa, and when it was ready insisted\nthat Terence should lie upon it. They began to quarrel as to who should\nlie on the sofa and who should lie upon a couple of chairs covered with\nrugs. St. John forced Terence at last to lie down upon the sofa.\n\n\"Don't be a fool, Terence,\" he said. \"You'll only get ill if you don't\nsleep.\"\n\n\"Old fellow,\" he began, as Terence still refused, and stopped abruptly,\nfearing sentimentality; he found that he was on the verge of tears.\n\nHe began to say what he had long been wanting to say, that he was sorry\nfor Terence, that he cared for him, that he cared for Rachel. Did she\nknow how much he cared for her--had she said anything, asked perhaps? He\nwas very anxious to say this, but he refrained, thinking that it was a\nselfish question after all, and what was the use of bothering Terence to\ntalk about such things? He was already half asleep. But St. John could\nnot sleep at once. If only, he thought to himself, as he lay in the\ndarkness, something would happen--if only this strain would come to an\nend. He did not mind what happened, so long as the succession of these\nhard and dreary days was broken; he did not mind if she died. He felt\nhimself disloyal in not minding it, but it seemed to him that he had no\nfeelings left.\n\nAll night long there was no call or movement, except the opening and\nshutting of the bedroom door once. By degrees the light returned into\nthe untidy room. At six the servants began to move; at seven they crept\ndownstairs into the kitchen; and half an hour later the day began again.\n\nNevertheless it was not the same as the days that had gone before,\nalthough it would have been hard to say in what the difference\nconsisted. Perhaps it was that they seemed to be waiting for something.\nThere were certainly fewer things to be done than usual. People drifted\nthrough the drawing-room--Mr. Flushing, Mr. and Mrs. Thornbury. They\nspoke very apologetically in low tones, refusing to sit down, but\nremaining for a considerable time standing up, although the only thing\nthey had to say was, \"Is there anything we can do?\" and there was\nnothing they could do.\n\nFeeling oddly detached from it all, Terence remembered how Helen had\nsaid that whenever anything happened to you this was how people behaved.\nWas she right, or was she wrong? He was too little interested to frame\nan opinion of his own. He put things away in his mind, as if one of\nthese days he would think about them, but not now. The mist of unreality\nhad deepened and deepened until it had produced a feeling of numbness\nall over his body. Was it his body? Were those really his own hands?\n\nThis morning also for the first time Ridley found it impossible to sit\nalone in his room. He was very uncomfortable downstairs, and, as he\ndid not know what was going on, constantly in the way; but he would not\nleave the drawing-room. Too restless to read, and having nothing to do,\nhe began to pace up and down reciting poetry in an undertone. Occupied\nin various ways--now in undoing parcels, now in uncorking bottles, now\nin writing directions, the sound of Ridley's song and the beat of his\npacing worked into the minds of Terence and St. John all the morning as\na half comprehended refrain.\n\n     They wrestled up, they wrestled down,\n       They wrestled sore and still:\n     The fiend who blinds the eyes of men,\n       That night he had his will.\n\n     Like stags full spent, among the bent\n       They dropped awhile to rest--\n\n\"Oh, it's intolerable!\" Hirst exclaimed, and then checked himself, as if\nit were a breach of their agreement. Again and again Terence would creep\nhalf-way up the stairs in case he might be able to glean news of Rachel.\nBut the only news now was of a very fragmentary kind; she had drunk\nsomething; she had slept a little; she seemed quieter. In the same way,\nDr. Lesage confined himself to talking about details, save once when\nhe volunteered the information that he had just been called in to\nascertain, by severing a vein in the wrist, that an old lady of\neighty-five was really dead. She had a horror of being buried alive.\n\n\"It is a horror,\" he remarked, \"that we generally find in the very old,\nand seldom in the young.\" They both expressed their interest in what he\ntold them; it seemed to them very strange. Another strange thing about\nthe day was that the luncheon was forgotten by all of them until it was\nlate in the afternoon, and then Mrs. Chailey waited on them, and looked\nstrange too, because she wore a stiff print dress, and her sleeves were\nrolled up above her elbows. She seemed as oblivious of her appearance,\nhowever, as if she had been called out of her bed by a midnight alarm\nof fire, and she had forgotten, too, her reserve and her composure; she\ntalked to them quite familiarly as if she had nursed them and held them\nnaked on her knee. She assured them over and over again that it was\ntheir duty to eat.\n\nThe afternoon, being thus shortened, passed more quickly than they\nexpected. Once Mrs. Flushing opened the door, but on seeing them shut it\nagain quickly; once Helen came down to fetch something, but she stopped\nas she left the room to look at a letter addressed to her. She stood for\na moment turning it over, and the extraordinary and mournful beauty\nof her attitude struck Terence in the way things struck him now--as\nsomething to be put away in his mind and to be thought about afterwards.\nThey scarcely spoke, the argument between them seeming to be suspended\nor forgotten.\n\nNow that the afternoon sun had left the front of the house, Ridley paced\nup and down the terrace repeating stanzas of a long poem, in a subdued\nbut suddenly sonorous voice. Fragments of the poem were wafted in at the\nopen window as he passed and repassed.\n\n     Peor and Baalim\n       Forsake their Temples dim,\n     With that twice batter'd God of Palestine\n       And mooned Astaroth--\n\nThe sound of these words were strangely discomforting to both the young\nmen, but they had to be borne. As the evening drew on and the red\nlight of the sunset glittered far away on the sea, the same sense of\ndesperation attacked both Terence and St. John at the thought that the\nday was nearly over, and that another night was at hand. The appearance\nof one light after another in the town beneath them produced in Hirst a\nrepetition of his terrible and disgusting desire to break down and sob.\nThen the lamps were brought in by Chailey. She explained that Maria, in\nopening a bottle, had been so foolish as to cut her arm badly, but she\nhad bound it up; it was unfortunate when there was so much work to be\ndone. Chailey herself limped because of the rheumatism in her feet, but\nit appeared to her mere waste of time to take any notice of the unruly\nflesh of servants. The evening went on. Dr. Lesage arrived unexpectedly,\nand stayed upstairs a very long time. He came down once and drank a cup\nof coffee.\n\n\"She is very ill,\" he said in answer to Ridley's question. All the\nannoyance had by this time left his manner, he was grave and formal, but\nat the same time it was full of consideration, which had not marked\nit before. He went upstairs again. The three men sat together in the\ndrawing-room. Ridley was quite quiet now, and his attention seemed to\nbe thoroughly awakened. Save for little half-voluntary movements and\nexclamations that were stifled at once, they waited in complete silence.\nIt seemed as if they were at last brought together face to face with\nsomething definite.\n\nIt was nearly eleven o'clock when Dr. Lesage again appeared in the room.\nHe approached them very slowly, and did not speak at once. He looked\nfirst at St. John and then at Terence, and said to Terence, \"Mr. Hewet,\nI think you should go upstairs now.\"\n\nTerence rose immediately, leaving the others seated with Dr. Lesage\nstanding motionless between them.\n\nChailey was in the passage outside, repeating over and over again, \"It's\nwicked--it's wicked.\"\n\nTerence paid her no attention; he heard what she was saying, but it\nconveyed no meaning to his mind. All the way upstairs he kept saying to\nhimself, \"This has not happened to me. It is not possible that this has\nhappened to me.\"\n\nHe looked curiously at his own hand on the banisters. The stairs were\nvery steep, and it seemed to take him a long time to surmount them.\nInstead of feeling keenly, as he knew that he ought to feel, he felt\nnothing at all. When he opened the door he saw Helen sitting by the\nbedside. There were shaded lights on the table, and the room, though\nit seemed to be full of a great many things, was very tidy. There was a\nfaint and not unpleasant smell of disinfectants. Helen rose and gave up\nher chair to him in silence. As they passed each other their eyes met in\na peculiar level glance, he wondered at the extraordinary clearness of\nhis eyes, and at the deep calm and sadness that dwelt in them. He sat\ndown by the bedside, and a moment afterwards heard the door shut gently\nbehind her. He was alone with Rachel, and a faint reflection of the\nsense of relief that they used to feel when they were left alone\npossessed him. He looked at her. He expected to find some terrible\nchange in her, but there was none. She looked indeed very thin, and, as\nfar as he could see, very tired, but she was the same as she had always\nbeen. Moreover, she saw him and knew him. She smiled at him and said,\n\"Hullo, Terence.\"\n\nThe curtain which had been drawn between them for so long vanished\nimmediately.\n\n\"Well, Rachel,\" he replied in his usual voice, upon which she opened her\neyes quite widely and smiled with her familiar smile. He kissed her and\ntook her hand.\n\n\"It's been wretched without you,\" he said.\n\nShe still looked at him and smiled, but soon a slight look of fatigue or\nperplexity came into her eyes and she shut them again.\n\n\"But when we're together we're perfectly happy,\" he said. He continued\nto hold her hand.\n\nThe light being dim, it was impossible to see any change in her face.\nAn immense feeling of peace came over Terence, so that he had no wish\nto move or to speak. The terrible torture and unreality of the last days\nwere over, and he had come out now into perfect certainty and peace. His\nmind began to work naturally again and with great ease. The longer he\nsat there the more profoundly was he conscious of the peace invading\nevery corner of his soul. Once he held his breath and listened acutely;\nshe was still breathing; he went on thinking for some time; they seemed\nto be thinking together; he seemed to be Rachel as well as himself;\nand then he listened again; no, she had ceased to breathe. So much the\nbetter--this was death. It was nothing; it was to cease to breathe.\nIt was happiness, it was perfect happiness. They had now what they had\nalways wanted to have, the union which had been impossible while they\nlived. Unconscious whether he thought the words or spoke them aloud, he\nsaid, \"No two people have ever been so happy as we have been. No one has\never loved as we have loved.\"\n\nIt seemed to him that their complete union and happiness filled the room\nwith rings eddying more and more widely. He had no wish in the world\nleft unfulfilled. They possessed what could never be taken from them.\n\nHe was not conscious that any one had come into the room, but later,\nmoments later, or hours later perhaps, he felt an arm behind him. The\narms were round him. He did not want to have arms round him, and the\nmysterious whispering voices annoyed him. He laid Rachel's hand, which\nwas now cold, upon the counterpane, and rose from his chair, and walked\nacross to the window. The windows were uncurtained, and showed the moon,\nand a long silver pathway upon the surface of the waves.\n\n\"Why,\" he said, in his ordinary tone of voice, \"look at the moon.\nThere's a halo round the moon. We shall have rain to-morrow.\"\n\nThe arms, whether they were the arms of man or of woman, were round him\nagain; they were pushing him gently towards the door. He turned of his\nown accord and walked steadily in advance of the arms, conscious of\na little amusement at the strange way in which people behaved merely\nbecause some one was dead. He would go if they wished it, but nothing\nthey could do would disturb his happiness.\n\nAs he saw the passage outside the room, and the table with the cups and\nthe plates, it suddenly came over him that here was a world in which he\nwould never see Rachel again.\n\n\"Rachel! Rachel!\" he shrieked, trying to rush back to her. But they\nprevented him, and pushed him down the passage and into a bedroom far\nfrom her room. Downstairs they could hear the thud of his feet on the\nfloor, as he struggled to break free; and twice they heard him shout,\n\"Rachel, Rachel!\"\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXVI\n\n\nFor two or three hours longer the moon poured its light through the\nempty air. Unbroken by clouds it fell straightly, and lay almost like\na chill white frost over the sea and the earth. During these hours the\nsilence was not broken, and the only movement was caused by the movement\nof trees and branches which stirred slightly, and then the shadows that\nlay across the white spaces of the land moved too. In this profound\nsilence one sound only was audible, the sound of a slight but continuous\nbreathing which never ceased, although it never rose and never fell. It\ncontinued after the birds had begun to flutter from branch to branch,\nand could be heard behind the first thin notes of their voices. It\ncontinued all through the hours when the east whitened, and grew red,\nand a faint blue tinged the sky, but when the sun rose it ceased, and\ngave place to other sounds.\n\nThe first sounds that were heard were little inarticulate cries, the\ncries, it seemed, of children or of the very poor, of people who were\nvery weak or in pain. But when the sun was above the horizon, the air\nwhich had been thin and pale grew every moment richer and warmer, and\nthe sounds of life became bolder and more full of courage and authority.\nBy degrees the smoke began to ascend in wavering breaths over the\nhouses, and these slowly thickened, until they were as round and\nstraight as columns, and instead of striking upon pale white blinds, the\nsun shone upon dark windows, beyond which there was depth and space.\n\nThe sun had been up for many hours, and the great dome of air was warmed\nthrough and glittering with thin gold threads of sunlight, before any\none moved in the hotel. White and massive it stood in the early light,\nhalf asleep with its blinds down.\n\nAt about half-past nine Miss Allan came very slowly into the hall, and\nwalked very slowly to the table where the morning papers were laid, but\nshe did not put out her hand to take one; she stood still, thinking,\nwith her head a little sunk upon her shoulders. She looked curiously\nold, and from the way in which she stood, a little hunched together and\nvery massive, you could see what she would be like when she was really\nold, how she would sit day after day in her chair looking placidly in\nfront of her. Other people began to come into the room, and to pass her,\nbut she did not speak to any of them or even look at them, and at last,\nas if it were necessary to do something, she sat down in a chair, and\nlooked quietly and fixedly in front of her. She felt very old this\nmorning, and useless too, as if her life had been a failure, as if it\nhad been hard and laborious to no purpose. She did not want to go on\nliving, and yet she knew that she would. She was so strong that she\nwould live to be a very old woman. She would probably live to be eighty,\nand as she was now fifty, that left thirty years more for her to\nlive. She turned her hands over and over in her lap and looked at them\ncuriously; her old hands, that had done so much work for her. There did\nnot seem to be much point in it all; one went on, of course one went\non. . . . She looked up to see Mrs. Thornbury standing beside her, with\nlines drawn upon her forehead, and her lips parted as if she were about\nto ask a question.\n\nMiss Allan anticipated her.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said. \"She died this morning, very early, about three\no'clock.\"\n\nMrs. Thornbury made a little exclamation, drew her lips together, and\nthe tears rose in her eyes. Through them she looked at the hall which\nwas now laid with great breadths of sunlight, and at the careless,\ncasual groups of people who were standing beside the solid arm-chairs\nand tables. They looked to her unreal, or as people look who remain\nunconscious that some great explosion is about to take place beside\nthem. But there was no explosion, and they went on standing by\nthe chairs and the tables. Mrs. Thornbury no longer saw them, but,\npenetrating through them as though they were without substance, she saw\nthe house, the people in the house, the room, the bed in the room, and\nthe figure of the dead lying still in the dark beneath the sheets.\nShe could almost see the dead. She could almost hear the voices of the\nmourners.\n\n\"They expected it?\" she asked at length.\n\nMiss Allan could only shake her head.\n\n\"I know nothing,\" she replied, \"except what Mrs. Flushing's maid told\nme. She died early this morning.\"\n\nThe two women looked at each other with a quiet significant gaze, and\nthen, feeling oddly dazed, and seeking she did not know exactly what,\nMrs. Thornbury went slowly upstairs and walked quietly along the\npassages, touching the wall with her fingers as if to guide herself.\nHousemaids were passing briskly from room to room, but Mrs. Thornbury\navoided them; she hardly saw them; they seemed to her to be in another\nworld. She did not even look up directly when Evelyn stopped her. It\nwas evident that Evelyn had been lately in tears, and when she looked\nat Mrs. Thornbury she began to cry again. Together they drew into the\nhollow of a window, and stood there in silence. Broken words formed\nthemselves at last among Evelyn's sobs. \"It was wicked,\" she sobbed, \"it\nwas cruel--they were so happy.\"\n\nMrs. Thornbury patted her on the shoulder.\n\n\"It seems hard--very hard,\" she said. She paused and looked out over the\nslope of the hill at the Ambroses' villa; the windows were blazing in\nthe sun, and she thought how the soul of the dead had passed from those\nwindows. Something had passed from the world. It seemed to her strangely\nempty.\n\n\"And yet the older one grows,\" she continued, her eyes regaining more\nthan their usual brightness, \"the more certain one becomes that there is\na reason. How could one go on if there were no reason?\" she asked.\n\nShe asked the question of some one, but she did not ask it of Evelyn.\nEvelyn's sobs were becoming quieter. \"There must be a reason,\" she said.\n\"It can't only be an accident. For it was an accident--it need never\nhave happened.\"\n\nMrs. Thornbury sighed deeply.\n\n\"But we must not let ourselves think of that,\" she added, \"and let us\nhope that they don't either. Whatever they had done it might have been\nthe same. These terrible illnesses--\"\n\n\"There's no reason--I don't believe there's any reason at all!\" Evelyn\nbroke out, pulling the blind down and letting it fly back with a little\nsnap.\n\n\"Why should these things happen? Why should people suffer? I honestly\nbelieve,\" she went on, lowering her voice slightly, \"that Rachel's in\nHeaven, but Terence. . . .\"\n\n\"What's the good of it all?\" she demanded.\n\nMrs. Thornbury shook her head slightly but made no reply, and pressing\nEvelyn's hand she went on down the passage. Impelled by a strong desire\nto hear something, although she did not know exactly what there was to\nhear, she was making her way to the Flushings' room. As she opened their\ndoor she felt that she had interrupted some argument between husband\nand wife. Mrs. Flushing was sitting with her back to the light, and Mr.\nFlushing was standing near her, arguing and trying to persuade her of\nsomething.\n\n\"Ah, here is Mrs. Thornbury,\" he began with some relief in his voice.\n\"You have heard, of course. My wife feels that she was in some way\nresponsible. She urged poor Miss Vinrace to come on the expedition. I'm\nsure you will agree with me that it is most unreasonable to feel that.\nWe don't even know--in fact I think it most unlikely--that she caught\nher illness there. These diseases--Besides, she was set on going. She\nwould have gone whether you asked her or not, Alice.\"\n\n\"Don't, Wilfrid,\" said Mrs. Flushing, neither moving nor taking her eyes\noff the spot on the floor upon which they rested. \"What's the use of\ntalking? What's the use--?\" She ceased.\n\n\"I was coming to ask you,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, addressing Wilfrid, for\nit was useless to speak to his wife. \"Is there anything you think that\none could do? Has the father arrived? Could one go and see?\"\n\nThe strongest wish in her being at this moment was to be able to do\nsomething for the unhappy people--to see them--to assure them--to help\nthem. It was dreadful to be so far away from them. But Mr. Flushing\nshook his head; he did not think that now--later perhaps one might be\nable to help. Here Mrs. Flushing rose stiffly, turned her back to them,\nand walked to the dressing-room opposite. As she walked, they could see\nher breast slowly rise and slowly fall. But her grief was silent. She\nshut the door behind her.\n\nWhen she was alone by herself she clenched her fists together, and began\nbeating the back of a chair with them. She was like a wounded animal.\nShe hated death; she was furious, outraged, indignant with death, as\nif it were a living creature. She refused to relinquish her friends to\ndeath. She would not submit to dark and nothingness. She began to pace\nup and down, clenching her hands, and making no attempt to stop the\nquick tears which raced down her cheeks. She sat still at last, but she\ndid not submit. She looked stubborn and strong when she had ceased to\ncry.\n\nIn the next room, meanwhile, Wilfrid was talking to Mrs. Thornbury with\ngreater freedom now that his wife was not sitting there.\n\n\"That's the worst of these places,\" he said. \"People will behave as\nthough they were in England, and they're not. I've no doubt myself that\nMiss Vinrace caught the infection up at the villa itself. She probably\nran risks a dozen times a day that might have given her the illness.\nIt's absurd to say she caught it with us.\"\n\nIf he had not been sincerely sorry for them he would have been annoyed.\n\"Pepper tells me,\" he continued, \"that he left the house because he\nthought them so careless. He says they never washed their vegetables\nproperly. Poor people! It's a fearful price to pay. But it's only what\nI've seen over and over again--people seem to forget that these things\nhappen, and then they do happen, and they're surprised.\"\n\nMrs. Thornbury agreed with him that they had been very careless, and\nthat there was no reason whatever to think that she had caught the fever\non the expedition; and after talking about other things for a short\ntime, she left him and went sadly along the passage to her own room.\nThere must be some reason why such things happen, she thought to\nherself, as she shut the door. Only at first it was not easy to\nunderstand what it was. It seemed so strange--so unbelievable. Why, only\nthree weeks ago--only a fortnight ago, she had seen Rachel; when she\nshut her eyes she could almost see her now, the quiet, shy girl who was\ngoing to be married. She thought of all that she would have missed\nhad she died at Rachel's age, the children, the married life, the\nunimaginable depths and miracles that seemed to her, as she looked back,\nto have lain about her, day after day, and year after year. The stunned\nfeeling, which had been making it difficult for her to think, gradually\ngave way to a feeling of the opposite nature; she thought very quickly\nand very clearly, and, looking back over all her experiences, tried to\nfit them into a kind of order. There was undoubtedly much suffering,\nmuch struggling, but, on the whole, surely there was a balance of\nhappiness--surely order did prevail. Nor were the deaths of young people\nreally the saddest things in life--they were saved so much; they kept\nso much. The dead--she called to mind those who had died early,\naccidentally--were beautiful; she often dreamt of the dead. And in\ntime Terence himself would come to feel--She got up and began to wander\nrestlessly about the room.\n\nFor an old woman of her age she was very restless, and for one of her\nclear, quick mind she was unusually perplexed. She could not settle to\nanything, so that she was relieved when the door opened. She went up\nto her husband, took him in her arms, and kissed him with unusual\nintensity, and then as they sat down together she began to pat him and\nquestion him as if he were a baby, an old, tired, querulous baby. She\ndid not tell him about Miss Vinrace's death, for that would only disturb\nhim, and he was put out already. She tried to discover why he was\nuneasy. Politics again? What were those horrid people doing? She spent\nthe whole morning in discussing politics with her husband, and by\ndegrees she became deeply interested in what they were saying. But every\nnow and then what she was saying seemed to her oddly empty of meaning.\n\nAt luncheon it was remarked by several people that the visitors at the\nhotel were beginning to leave; there were fewer every day. There were\nonly forty people at luncheon, instead of the sixty that there had been.\nSo old Mrs. Paley computed, gazing about her with her faded eyes, as\nshe took her seat at her own table in the window. Her party generally\nconsisted of Mr. Perrott as well as Arthur and Susan, and to-day Evelyn\nwas lunching with them also.\n\nShe was unusually subdued. Having noticed that her eyes were red, and\nguessing the reason, the others took pains to keep up an elaborate\nconversation between themselves. She suffered it to go on for a\nfew minutes, leaning both elbows on the table, and leaving her soup\nuntouched, when she exclaimed suddenly, \"I don't know how you feel, but\nI can simply think of nothing else!\"\n\nThe gentlemen murmured sympathetically, and looked grave.\n\nSusan replied, \"Yes--isn't it perfectly awful? When you think what\na nice girl she was--only just engaged, and this need never have\nhappened--it seems too tragic.\" She looked at Arthur as though he might\nbe able to help her with something more suitable.\n\n\"Hard lines,\" said Arthur briefly. \"But it was a foolish thing to do--to\ngo up that river.\" He shook his head. \"They should have known better.\nYou can't expect Englishwomen to stand roughing it as the natives do\nwho've been acclimatised. I'd half a mind to warn them at tea that\nday when it was being discussed. But it's no good saying these sort of\nthings--it only puts people's backs up--it never makes any difference.\"\n\nOld Mrs. Paley, hitherto contented with her soup, here intimated, by\nraising one hand to her ear, that she wished to know what was being\nsaid.\n\n\"You heard, Aunt Emma, that poor Miss Vinrace has died of the fever,\"\nSusan informed her gently. She could not speak of death loudly or even\nin her usual voice, so that Mrs. Paley did not catch a word. Arthur came\nto the rescue.\n\n\"Miss Vinrace is dead,\" he said very distinctly.\n\nMrs. Paley merely bent a little towards him and asked, \"Eh?\"\n\n\"Miss Vinrace is dead,\" he repeated. It was only by stiffening all the\nmuscles round his mouth that he could prevent himself from bursting\ninto laughter, and forced himself to repeat for the third time, \"Miss\nVinrace. . . . She's dead.\"\n\nLet alone the difficulty of hearing the exact words, facts that were\noutside her daily experience took some time to reach Mrs. Paley's\nconsciousness. A weight seemed to rest upon her brain, impeding, though\nnot damaging its action. She sat vague-eyed for at least a minute before\nshe realised what Arthur meant.\n\n\"Dead?\" she said vaguely. \"Miss Vinrace dead? Dear me . . . that's very\nsad. But I don't at the moment remember which she was. We seem to have\nmade so many new acquaintances here.\" She looked at Susan for help. \"A\ntall dark girl, who just missed being handsome, with a high colour?\"\n\n\"No,\" Susan interposed. \"She was--\" then she gave it up in despair.\nThere was no use in explaining that Mrs. Paley was thinking of the wrong\nperson.\n\n\"She ought not to have died,\" Mrs. Paley continued. \"She looked so\nstrong. But people will drink the water. I can never make out why. It\nseems such a simple thing to tell them to put a bottle of Seltzer water\nin your bedroom. That's all the precaution I've ever taken, and I've\nbeen in every part of the world, I may say--Italy a dozen times over.\n. . . But young people always think they know better, and then they pay\nthe penalty. Poor thing--I am very sorry for her.\" But the difficulty\nof peering into a dish of potatoes and helping herself engrossed her\nattention.\n\nArthur and Susan both secretly hoped that the subject was now disposed\nof, for there seemed to them something unpleasant in this discussion.\nBut Evelyn was not ready to let it drop. Why would people never talk\nabout the things that mattered?\n\n\"I don't believe you care a bit!\" she said, turning savagely upon Mr.\nPerrott, who had sat all this time in silence.\n\n\"I? Oh, yes, I do,\" he answered awkwardly, but with obvious sincerity.\nEvelyn's questions made him too feel uncomfortable.\n\n\"It seems so inexplicable,\" Evelyn continued. \"Death, I mean. Why should\nshe be dead, and not you or I? It was only a fortnight ago that she\nwas here with the rest of us. What d'you believe?\" she demanded of\nmr. Perrott. \"D'you believe that things go on, that she's still\nsomewhere--or d'you think it's simply a game--we crumble up to nothing\nwhen we die? I'm positive Rachel's not dead.\"\n\nMr. Perrott would have said almost anything that Evelyn wanted him to\nsay, but to assert that he believed in the immortality of the soul\nwas not in his power. He sat silent, more deeply wrinkled than usual,\ncrumbling his bread.\n\nLest Evelyn should next ask him what he believed, Arthur, after making a\npause equivalent to a full stop, started a completely different topic.\n\n\"Supposing,\" he said, \"a man were to write and tell you that he wanted\nfive pounds because he had known your grandfather, what would you do? It\nwas this way. My grandfather--\"\n\n\"Invented a stove,\" said Evelyn. \"I know all about that. We had one in\nthe conservatory to keep the plants warm.\"\n\n\"Didn't know I was so famous,\" said Arthur. \"Well,\" he continued,\ndetermined at all costs to spin his story out at length, \"the old chap,\nbeing about the second best inventor of his day, and a capable lawyer\ntoo, died, as they always do, without making a will. Now Fielding, his\nclerk, with how much justice I don't know, always claimed that he meant\nto do something for him. The poor old boy's come down in the world\nthrough trying inventions on his own account, lives in Penge over a\ntobacconist's shop. I've been to see him there. The question is--must\nI stump up or not? What does the abstract spirit of justice require,\nPerrott? Remember, I didn't benefit under my grandfather's will, and\nI've no way of testing the truth of the story.\"\n\n\"I don't know much about the abstract spirit of justice,\" said Susan,\nsmiling complacently at the others, \"but I'm certain of one thing--he'll\nget his five pounds!\"\n\nAs Mr. Perrott proceeded to deliver an opinion, and Evelyn insisted that\nhe was much too stingy, like all lawyers, thinking of the letter and not\nof the spirit, while Mrs. Paley required to be kept informed between\nthe courses as to what they were all saying, the luncheon passed with no\ninterval of silence, and Arthur congratulated himself upon the tact with\nwhich the discussion had been smoothed over.\n\nAs they left the room it happened that Mrs. Paley's wheeled chair ran\ninto the Elliots, who were coming through the door, as she was going\nout. Brought thus to a standstill for a moment, Arthur and Susan\ncongratulated Hughling Elliot upon his convalescence,--he was down,\ncadaverous enough, for the first time,--and Mr. Perrott took occasion to\nsay a few words in private to Evelyn.\n\n\"Would there be any chance of seeing you this afternoon, about\nthree-thirty say? I shall be in the garden, by the fountain.\"\n\nThe block dissolved before Evelyn answered. But as she left them in the\nhall, she looked at him brightly and said, \"Half-past three, did you\nsay? That'll suit me.\"\n\nShe ran upstairs with the feeling of spiritual exaltation and quickened\nlife which the prospect of an emotional scene always aroused in her.\nThat Mr. Perrott was again about to propose to her, she had no doubt,\nand she was aware that on this occasion she ought to be prepared with\na definite answer, for she was going away in three days' time. But\nshe could not bring her mind to bear upon the question. To come to a\ndecision was very difficult to her, because she had a natural dislike of\nanything final and done with; she liked to go on and on--always on and\non. She was leaving, and, therefore, she occupied herself in laying her\nclothes out side by side upon the bed. She observed that some were very\nshabby. She took the photograph of her father and mother, and, before\nshe laid it away in her box, she held it for a minute in her hand.\nRachel had looked at it. Suddenly the keen feeling of some one's\npersonality, which things that they have owned or handled sometimes\npreserves, overcame her; she felt Rachel in the room with her; it was as\nif she were on a ship at sea, and the life of the day was as unreal\nas the land in the distance. But by degrees the feeling of Rachel's\npresence passed away, and she could no longer realise her, for she had\nscarcely known her. But this momentary sensation left her depressed and\nfatigued. What had she done with her life? What future was there before\nher? What was make-believe, and what was real? Were these proposals and\nintimacies and adventures real, or was the contentment which she had\nseen on the faces of Susan and Rachel more real than anything she had\never felt?\n\nShe made herself ready to go downstairs, absentmindedly, but her fingers\nwere so well trained that they did the work of preparing her almost of\ntheir own accord. When she was actually on the way downstairs, the blood\nbegan to circle through her body of its own accord too, for her mind\nfelt very dull.\n\nMr. Perrott was waiting for her. Indeed, he had gone straight into the\ngarden after luncheon, and had been walking up and down the path for\nmore than half an hour, in a state of acute suspense.\n\n\"I'm late as usual!\" she exclaimed, as she caught sight of him. \"Well,\nyou must forgive me; I had to pack up. . . . My word! It looks stormy!\nAnd that's a new steamer in the bay, isn't it?\"\n\nShe looked at the bay, in which a steamer was just dropping anchor, the\nsmoke still hanging about it, while a swift black shudder ran through\nthe waves. \"One's quite forgotten what rain looks like,\" she added.\n\nBut Mr. Perrott paid no attention to the steamer or to the weather.\n\n\"Miss Murgatroyd,\" he began with his usual formality, \"I asked you to\ncome here from a very selfish motive, I fear. I do not think you need to\nbe assured once more of my feelings; but, as you are leaving so soon, I\nfelt that I could not let you go without asking you to tell me--have I\nany reason to hope that you will ever come to care for me?\"\n\nHe was very pale, and seemed unable to say any more.\n\nThe little gush of vitality which had come into Evelyn as she ran\ndownstairs had left her, and she felt herself impotent. There was\nnothing for her to say; she felt nothing. Now that he was actually\nasking her, in his elderly gentle words, to marry him, she felt less for\nhim than she had ever felt before.\n\n\"Let's sit down and talk it over,\" she said rather unsteadily.\n\nMr. Perrott followed her to a curved green seat under a tree. They\nlooked at the fountain in front of them, which had long ceased to play.\nEvelyn kept looking at the fountain instead of thinking of what she was\nsaying; the fountain without any water seemed to be the type of her own\nbeing.\n\n\"Of course I care for you,\" she began, rushing her words out in a hurry;\n\"I should be a brute if I didn't. I think you're quite one of the nicest\npeople I've ever known, and one of the finest too. But I wish . . . I\nwish you didn't care for me in that way. Are you sure you do?\" For the\nmoment she honestly desired that he should say no.\n\n\"Quite sure,\" said Mr. Perrott.\n\n\"You see, I'm not as simple as most women,\" Evelyn continued. \"I think I\nwant more. I don't know exactly what I feel.\"\n\nHe sat by her, watching her and refraining from speech.\n\n\"I sometimes think I haven't got it in me to care very much for one\nperson only. Some one else would make you a better wife. I can imagine\nyou very happy with some one else.\"\n\n\"If you think that there is any chance that you will come to care for\nme, I am quite content to wait,\" said Mr. Perrott.\n\n\"Well--there's no hurry, is there?\" said Evelyn. \"Suppose I thought it\nover and wrote and told you when I get back? I'm going to Moscow; I'll\nwrite from Moscow.\"\n\nBut Mr. Perrott persisted.\n\n\"You cannot give me any kind of idea. I do not ask for a date . . . that\nwould be most unreasonable.\" He paused, looking down at the gravel path.\n\nAs she did not immediately answer, he went on.\n\n\"I know very well that I am not--that I have not much to offer you\neither in myself or in my circumstances. And I forget; it cannot seem\nthe miracle to you that it does to me. Until I met you I had gone on in\nmy own quiet way--we are both very quiet people, my sister and I--quite\ncontent with my lot. My friendship with Arthur was the most important\nthing in my life. Now that I know you, all that has changed. You seem\nto put such a spirit into everything. Life seems to hold so many\npossibilities that I had never dreamt of.\"\n\n\"That's splendid!\" Evelyn exclaimed, grasping his hand. \"Now you'll go\nback and start all kinds of things and make a great name in the world;\nand we'll go on being friends, whatever happens . . . we'll be great\nfriends, won't we?\"\n\n\"Evelyn!\" he moaned suddenly, and took her in his arms, and kissed her.\nShe did not resent it, although it made little impression on her.\n\nAs she sat upright again, she said, \"I never see why one shouldn't go\non being friends--though some people do. And friendships do make a\ndifference, don't they? They are the kind of things that matter in one's\nlife?\"\n\nHe looked at her with a bewildered expression as if he did not really\nunderstand what she was saying. With a considerable effort he collected\nhimself, stood up, and said, \"Now I think I have told you what I feel,\nand I will only add that I can wait as long as ever you wish.\"\n\nLeft alone, Evelyn walked up and down the path. What did matter than?\nWhat was the meaning of it all?\n\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXVII\n\n\nAll that evening the clouds gathered, until they closed entirely over\nthe blue of the sky. They seemed to narrow the space between earth and\nheaven, so that there was no room for the air to move in freely; and\nthe waves, too, lay flat, and yet rigid, as if they were restrained. The\nleaves on the bushes and trees in the garden hung closely together,\nand the feeling of pressure and restraint was increased by the short\nchirping sounds which came from birds and insects.\n\nSo strange were the lights and the silence that the busy hum of voices\nwhich usually filled the dining-room at meal times had distinct gaps\nin it, and during these silences the clatter of the knives upon plates\nbecame audible. The first roll of thunder and the first heavy drop\nstriking the pane caused a little stir.\n\n\"It's coming!\" was said simultaneously in many different languages.\n\nThere was then a profound silence, as if the thunder had withdrawn into\nitself. People had just begun to eat again, when a gust of cold air\ncame through the open windows, lifting tablecloths and skirts, a light\nflashed, and was instantly followed by a clap of thunder right over the\nhotel. The rain swished with it, and immediately there were all\nthose sounds of windows being shut and doors slamming violently which\naccompany a storm.\n\nThe room grew suddenly several degrees darker, for the wind seemed to be\ndriving waves of darkness across the earth. No one attempted to eat for\na time, but sat looking out at the garden, with their forks in the air.\nThe flashes now came frequently, lighting up faces as if they were going\nto be photographed, surprising them in tense and unnatural expressions.\nThe clap followed close and violently upon them. Several women half\nrose from their chairs and then sat down again, but dinner was continued\nuneasily with eyes upon the garden. The bushes outside were ruffled and\nwhitened, and the wind pressed upon them so that they seemed to stoop to\nthe ground. The waiters had to press dishes upon the diners' notice;\nand the diners had to draw the attention of waiters, for they were all\nabsorbed in looking at the storm. As the thunder showed no signs of\nwithdrawing, but seemed massed right overhead, while the lightning aimed\nstraight at the garden every time, an uneasy gloom replaced the first\nexcitement.\n\nFinishing the meal very quickly, people congregated in the hall, where\nthey felt more secure than in any other place because they could retreat\nfar from the windows, and although they heard the thunder, they could\nnot see anything. A little boy was carried away sobbing in the arms of\nhis mother.\n\nWhile the storm continued, no one seemed inclined to sit down, but they\ncollected in little groups under the central skylight, where they stood\nin a yellow atmosphere, looking upwards. Now and again their faces\nbecame white, as the lightning flashed, and finally a terrific crash\ncame, making the panes of the skylight lift at the joints.\n\n\"Ah!\" several voices exclaimed at the same moment.\n\n\"Something struck,\" said a man's voice.\n\nThe rain rushed down. The rain seemed now to extinguish the lightning\nand the thunder, and the hall became almost dark.\n\nAfter a minute or two, when nothing was heard but the rattle of water\nupon the glass, there was a perceptible slackening of the sound, and\nthen the atmosphere became lighter.\n\n\"It's over,\" said another voice.\n\nAt a touch, all the electric lights were turned on, and revealed a crowd\nof people all standing, all looking with rather strained faces up at\nthe skylight, but when they saw each other in the artificial light\nthey turned at once and began to move away. For some minutes the rain\ncontinued to rattle upon the skylight, and the thunder gave another\nshake or two; but it was evident from the clearing of the darkness and\nthe light drumming of the rain upon the roof, that the great confused\nocean of air was travelling away from them, and passing high over head\nwith its clouds and its rods of fire, out to sea. The building, which\nhad seemed so small in the tumult of the storm, now became as square and\nspacious as usual.\n\nAs the storm drew away, the people in the hall of the hotel sat down;\nand with a comfortable sense of relief, began to tell each other stories\nabout great storms, and produced in many cases their occupations for\nthe evening. The chess-board was brought out, and Mr. Elliot, who wore a\nstock instead of a collar as a sign of convalescence, but was otherwise\nmuch as usual, challenged Mr. Pepper to a final contest. Round them\ngathered a group of ladies with pieces of needlework, or in default of\nneedlework, with novels, to superintend the game, much as if they were\nin charge of two small boys playing marbles. Every now and then they\nlooked at the board and made some encouraging remark to the gentlemen.\n\nMrs. Paley just round the corner had her cards arranged in long ladders\nbefore her, with Susan sitting near to sympathise but not to correct,\nand the merchants and the miscellaneous people who had never been\ndiscovered to possess names were stretched in their arm-chairs with\ntheir newspapers on their knees. The conversation in these circumstances\nwas very gentle, fragmentary, and intermittent, but the room was full of\nthe indescribable stir of life. Every now and then the moth, which was\nnow grey of wing and shiny of thorax, whizzed over their heads, and hit\nthe lamps with a thud.\n\nA young woman put down her needlework and exclaimed, \"Poor creature! it\nwould be kinder to kill it.\" But nobody seemed disposed to rouse himself\nin order to kill the moth. They watched it dash from lamp to lamp,\nbecause they were comfortable, and had nothing to do.\n\nOn the sofa, beside the chess-players, Mrs. Elliot was imparting a new\nstitch in knitting to Mrs. Thornbury, so that their heads came very near\ntogether, and were only to be distinguished by the old lace cap which\nMrs. Thornbury wore in the evening. Mrs. Elliot was an expert at\nknitting, and disclaimed a compliment to that effect with evident pride.\n\n\"I suppose we're all proud of something,\" she said, \"and I'm proud of my\nknitting. I think things like that run in families. We all knit well. I\nhad an uncle who knitted his own socks to the day of his death--and\nhe did it better than any of his daughters, dear old gentleman. Now I\nwonder that you, Miss Allan, who use your eyes so much, don't take\nup knitting in the evenings. You'd find it such a relief, I should\nsay--such a rest to the eyes--and the bazaars are so glad of things.\"\nHer voice dropped into the smooth half-conscious tone of the expert\nknitter; the words came gently one after another. \"As much as I do I\ncan always dispose of, which is a comfort, for then I feel that I am not\nwasting my time--\"\n\nMiss Allan, being thus addressed, shut her novel and observed the others\nplacidly for a time. At last she said, \"It is surely not natural to\nleave your wife because she happens to be in love with you. But that--as\nfar as I can make out--is what the gentleman in my story does.\"\n\n\"Tut, tut, that doesn't sound good--no, that doesn't sound at all\nnatural,\" murmured the knitters in their absorbed voices.\n\n\"Still, it's the kind of book people call very clever,\" Miss Allan\nadded.\n\n\"_Maternity_--by Michael Jessop--I presume,\" Mr. Elliot put in, for he\ncould never resist the temptation of talking while he played chess.\n\n\"D'you know,\" said Mrs. Elliot, after a moment, \"I don't think people\n_do_ write good novels now--not as good as they used to, anyhow.\"\n\nNo one took the trouble to agree with her or to disagree with her.\nArthur Venning who was strolling about, sometimes looking at the game,\nsometimes reading a page of a magazine, looked at Miss Allan, who was\nhalf asleep, and said humorously, \"A penny for your thoughts, Miss\nAllan.\"\n\nThe others looked up. They were glad that he had not spoken to them.\nBut Miss Allan replied without any hesitation, \"I was thinking of\nmy imaginary uncle. Hasn't every one got an imaginary uncle?\" she\ncontinued. \"I have one--a most delightful old gentleman. He's always\ngiving me things. Sometimes it's a gold watch; sometimes it's a carriage\nand pair; sometimes it's a beautiful little cottage in the New Forest;\nsometimes it's a ticket to the place I most want to see.\"\n\nShe set them all thinking vaguely of the things they wanted. Mrs. Elliot\nknew exactly what she wanted; she wanted a child; and the usual little\npucker deepened on her brow.\n\n\"We're such lucky people,\" she said, looking at her husband. \"We really\nhave no wants.\" She was apt to say this, partly in order to convince\nherself, and partly in order to convince other people. But she was\nprevented from wondering how far she carried conviction by the entrance\nof Mr. and Mrs. Flushing, who came through the hall and stopped by the\nchess-board. Mrs. Flushing looked wilder than ever. A great strand of\nblack hair looped down across her brow, her cheeks were whipped a dark\nblood red, and drops of rain made wet marks upon them.\n\nMr. Flushing explained that they had been on the roof watching the\nstorm.\n\n\"It was a wonderful sight,\" he said. \"The lightning went right out over\nthe sea, and lit up the waves and the ships far away. You can't think\nhow wonderful the mountains looked too, with the lights on them, and the\ngreat masses of shadow. It's all over now.\"\n\nHe slid down into a chair, becoming interested in the final struggle of\nthe game.\n\n\"And you go back to-morrow?\" said Mrs. Thornbury, looking at Mrs.\nFlushing.\n\n\"Yes,\" she replied.\n\n\"And indeed one is not sorry to go back,\" said Mrs. Elliot, assuming an\nair of mournful anxiety, \"after all this illness.\"\n\n\"Are you afraid of dyin'?\" Mrs. Flushing demanded scornfully.\n\n\"I think we are all afraid of that,\" said Mrs. Elliot with dignity.\n\n\"I suppose we're all cowards when it comes to the point,\" said Mrs.\nFlushing, rubbing her cheek against the back of the chair. \"I'm sure I\nam.\"\n\n\"Not a bit of it!\" said Mr. Flushing, turning round, for Mr. Pepper took\na very long time to consider his move. \"It's not cowardly to wish to\nlive, Alice. It's the very reverse of cowardly. Personally, I'd like to\ngo on for a hundred years--granted, of course, that I had the full use\nof my faculties. Think of all the things that are bound to happen!\"\n\"That is what I feel,\" Mrs. Thornbury rejoined. \"The changes, the\nimprovements, the inventions--and beauty. D'you know I feel sometimes\nthat I couldn't bear to die and cease to see beautiful things about me?\"\n\n\"It would certainly be very dull to die before they have discovered\nwhether there is life in Mars,\" Miss Allan added.\n\n\"Do you really believe there's life in Mars?\" asked Mrs. Flushing,\nturning to her for the first time with keen interest. \"Who tells you\nthat? Some one who knows? D'you know a man called--?\"\n\nHere Mrs. Thornbury laid down her knitting, and a look of extreme\nsolicitude came into her eyes.\n\n\"There is Mr. Hirst,\" she said quietly.\n\nSt. John had just come through the swing door. He was rather blown\nabout by the wind, and his cheeks looked terribly pale, unshorn, and\ncavernous. After taking off his coat he was going to pass straight\nthrough the hall and up to his room, but he could not ignore the\npresence of so many people he knew, especially as Mrs. Thornbury rose\nand went up to him, holding out her hand. But the shock of the warm\nlamp-lit room, together with the sight of so many cheerful human beings\nsitting together at their ease, after the dark walk in the rain, and the\nlong days of strain and horror, overcame him completely. He looked at\nMrs. Thornbury and could not speak.\n\nEvery one was silent. Mr. Pepper's hand stayed upon his Knight. Mrs.\nThornbury somehow moved him to a chair, sat herself beside him, and with\ntears in her own eyes said gently, \"You have done everything for your\nfriend.\"\n\nHer action set them all talking again as if they had never stopped, and\nMr. Pepper finished the move with his Knight.\n\n\"There was nothing to be done,\" said St. John. He spoke very slowly. \"It\nseems impossible--\"\n\nHe drew his hand across his eyes as if some dream came between him and\nthe others and prevented him from seeing where he was.\n\n\"And that poor fellow,\" said Mrs. Thornbury, the tears falling again\ndown her cheeks.\n\n\"Impossible,\" St. John repeated.\n\n\"Did he have the consolation of knowing--?\" Mrs. Thornbury began very\ntentatively.\n\nBut St. John made no reply. He lay back in his chair, half-seeing the\nothers, half-hearing what they said. He was terribly tired, and the\nlight and warmth, the movements of the hands, and the soft communicative\nvoices soothed him; they gave him a strange sense of quiet and relief.\nAs he sat there, motionless, this feeling of relief became a feeling\nof profound happiness. Without any sense of disloyalty to Terence and\nRachel he ceased to think about either of them. The movements and the\nvoices seemed to draw together from different parts of the room, and to\ncombine themselves into a pattern before his eyes; he was content to sit\nsilently watching the pattern build itself up, looking at what he hardly\nsaw.\n\nThe game was really a good one, and Mr. Pepper and Mr. Elliot were\nbecoming more and more set upon the struggle. Mrs. Thornbury, seeing\nthat St. John did not wish to talk, resumed her knitting.\n\n\"Lightning again!\" Mrs. Flushing suddenly exclaimed. A yellow light\nflashed across the blue window, and for a second they saw the green\ntrees outside. She strode to the door, pushed it open, and stood half\nout in the open air.\n\nBut the light was only the reflection of the storm which was over. The\nrain had ceased, the heavy clouds were blown away, and the air was thin\nand clear, although vapourish mists were being driven swiftly across the\nmoon. The sky was once more a deep and solemn blue, and the shape of the\nearth was visible at the bottom of the air, enormous, dark, and solid,\nrising into the tapering mass of the mountain, and pricked here and\nthere on the slopes by the tiny lights of villas. The driving air, the\ndrone of the trees, and the flashing light which now and again spread a\nbroad illumination over the earth filled Mrs. Flushing with exultation.\nHer breasts rose and fell.\n\n\"Splendid! Splendid!\" she muttered to herself. Then she turned back into\nthe hall and exclaimed in a peremptory voice, \"Come outside and see,\nWilfrid; it's wonderful.\"\n\nSome half-stirred; some rose; some dropped their balls of wool and began\nto stoop to look for them.\n\n\"To bed--to bed,\" said Miss Allan.\n\n\"It was the move with your Queen that gave it away, Pepper,\" exclaimed\nMr. Elliot triumphantly, sweeping the pieces together and standing up.\nHe had won the game.\n\n\"What? Pepper beaten at last? I congratulate you!\" said Arthur Venning,\nwho was wheeling old Mrs. Paley to bed.\n\nAll these voices sounded gratefully in St. John's ears as he lay\nhalf-asleep, and yet vividly conscious of everything around him. Across\nhis eyes passed a procession of objects, black and indistinct, the\nfigures of people picking up their books, their cards, their balls of\nwool, their work-baskets, and passing him one after another on their way\nto bed."