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had sunk into one of those dreamy states which took no account
whatever of his existence. Ralph was roused by his passionate attempts
to attract her attention to the fact that he was standing in the
middle of his little private room in Lincoln’s Inn Fields at a
considerable distance from Chelsea. The physical distance increased
his desperation. He began pacing in circles until the process sickened
him, and then took a sheet of paper for the composition of a letter
which, he vowed before he began it, should be sent that same evening.
It was a difficult matter to put into words; poetry would have done it
better justice, but he must abstain from poetry. In an infinite number
of half-obliterated scratches he tried to convey to her the
possibility that although human beings are woefully ill-adapted for
communication, still, such communion is the best we know; moreover,
they make it possible for each to have access to another world
independent of personal affairs, a world of law, of philosophy, or
more strangely a world such as he had had a glimpse of the other
evening when together they seemed to be sharing something, creating
something, an ideal—a vision flung out in advance of our actual
circumstances. If this golden rim were quenched, if life were no
longer circled by an illusion (but was it an illusion after all?),
then it would be too dismal an affair to carry to an end; so he wrote
with a sudden spurt of conviction which made clear way for a space and
left at least one sentence standing whole. Making every allowance for
other desires, on the whole this conclusion appeared to him to justify
their relationship. But the conclusion was mystical; it plunged him
into thought. The difficulty with which even this amount was written,
the inadequacy of the words, and the need of writing under them and
over them others which, after all, did no better, led him to leave off
before he was at ail satisfied with his production, and unable to
resist the conviction that such rambling would never be fit for
Katharine’s eye. He felt himself more cut off from her than ever. In
idleness, and because he could do nothing further with words, he began
to draw little figures in the blank spaces, heads meant to resemble
her head, blots fringed with flames meant to represent—perhaps the
entire universe. From this occupation he was roused by the message
that a lady wished to speak to him. He had scarcely time to run his
hands through his hair in order to look as much like a solicitor as
possible, and to cram his papers into his pocket, already overcome
with shame that another eye should behold them, when he realized that
his preparations were needless. The lady was Mrs. Hilbery.
“I hope you’re not disposing of somebody’s fortune in a hurry,” she
remarked, gazing at the documents on his table, “or cutting off an
entail at one blow, because I want to ask you to do me a favor. And
Anderson won’t keep his horse waiting. (Anderson is a perfect tyrant,
but he drove my dear father to the Abbey the day they buried him.) I
made bold to come to you, Mr. Denham, not exactly in search of legal
assistance (though I don’t know who I’d rather come to, if I were in
trouble), but in order to ask your help in settling some tiresome
little domestic affairs that have arisen in my absence. I’ve been to
Stratford-on-Avon (I must tell you all about that one of these days),
and there I got a letter from my sister-in-law, a dear kind goose who
likes interfering with other people’s children because she’s got none
of her own. (We’re dreadfully afraid that she’s going to lose the
sight of one of her eyes, and I always feel that our physical ailments
are so apt to turn into mental ailments. I think Matthew Arnold says
something of the same kind about Lord Byron.) But that’s neither here
nor there.”
The effect of these parentheses, whether they were introduced for that
purpose or represented a natural instinct on Mrs. Hilbery’s part to
embellish the bareness of her discourse, gave Ralph time to perceive
that she possessed all the facts of their situation and was come,
somehow, in the capacity of ambassador.
“I didn’t come here to talk about Lord Byron,” Mrs. Hilbery continued,
with a little laugh, “though I know that both you and Katharine,
unlike other young people of your generation, still find him worth
reading.” She paused. “I’m so glad you’ve made Katharine read poetry,
Mr. Denham!” she exclaimed, “and feel poetry, and look poetry! She
can’t talk it yet, but she will—oh, she will!”
Ralph, whose hand was grasped and whose tongue almost refused to
articulate, somehow contrived to say that there were moments when he
felt hopeless, utterly hopeless, though he gave no reason for this
statement on his part.
“But you care for her?” Mrs. Hilbery inquired.
“Good God!” he exclaimed, with a vehemence which admitted of no
question.
“It’s the Church of England service you both object to?” Mrs. Hilbery
inquired innocently.
“I don’t care a damn what service it is,” Ralph replied.
“You would marry her in Westminster Abbey if the worst came to the
worst?” Mrs. Hilbery inquired.
“I would marry her in St. Paul’s Cathedral,” Ralph replied. His doubts
upon this point, which were always roused by Katharine’s presence, had
vanished completely, and his strongest wish in the world was to be
with her immediately, since every second he was away from her he
imagined her slipping farther and farther from him into one of those
states of mind in which he was unrepresented. He wished to dominate
her, to possess her.
“Thank God!” exclaimed Mrs. Hilbery. She thanked Him for a variety of
blessings: for the conviction with which the young man spoke; and not
least for the prospect that on her daughter’s wedding-day the noble
cadences, the stately periods, the ancient eloquence of the marriage
service would resound over the heads of a distinguished congregation
gathered together near the very spot where her father lay quiescent
with the other poets of England. The tears filled her eyes; but she
remembered simultaneously that her carriage was waiting, and with dim
eyes she walked to the door. Denham followed her downstairs.
It was a strange drive. For Denham it was without exception the most
unpleasant he had ever taken. His only wish was to go as straightly
and quickly as possible to Cheyne Walk; but it soon appeared that Mrs.
Hilbery either ignored or thought fit to baffle this desire by
interposing various errands of her own. She stopped the carriage at
post-offices, and coffee-shops, and shops of inscrutable dignity where
the aged attendants had to be greeted as old friends; and, catching
sight of the dome of St. Paul’s above the irregular spires of Ludgate
Hill, she pulled the cord impulsively, and gave directions that
Anderson should drive them there. But Anderson had reasons of his own
for discouraging afternoon worship, and kept his horse’s nose
obstinately towards the west. After some minutes, Mrs. Hilbery
realized the situation, and accepted it good-humoredly, apologizing to
Ralph for his disappointment.
“Never mind,” she said, “we’ll go to St. Paul’s another day, and it
may turn out, though I can’t promise that it WILL, that he’ll take us
past Westminster Abbey, which would be even better.”
Ralph was scarcely aware of what she went on to say. Her mind and body
both seemed to have floated into another region of quick-sailing
clouds rapidly passing across each other and enveloping everything in
a vaporous indistinctness. Meanwhile he remained conscious of his own
concentrated desire, his impotence to bring about anything he wished,
and his increasing agony of impatience.
Suddenly Mrs. Hilbery pulled the cord with such decision that even
Anderson had to listen to the order which she leant out of the window
to give him. The carriage pulled up abruptly in the middle of
Whitehall before a large building dedicated to one of our Government
offices. In a second Mrs. Hilbery was mounting the steps, and Ralph
was left in too acute an irritation by this further delay even to
speculate what errand took her now to the Board of Education. He was
about to jump from the carriage and take a cab, when Mrs. Hilbery
reappeared talking genially to a figure who remained hidden behind
her.
“There’s plenty of room for us all,” she was saying. “Plenty of room.
We could find space for FOUR of you, William,” she added, opening the
door, and Ralph found that Rodney had now joined their company. The
two men glanced at each other. If distress, shame, discomfort in its
most acute form were ever visible upon a human face, Ralph could read
them all expressed beyond the eloquence of words upon the face of his
unfortunate companion. But Mrs. Hilbery was either completely unseeing
or determined to appear so. She went on talking; she talked, it seemed
to both the young men, to some one outside, up in the air. She talked
about Shakespeare, she apostrophized the human race, she proclaimed
the virtues of divine poetry, she began to recite verses which broke
down in the middle. The great advantage of her discourse was that it
was self-supporting. It nourished itself until Cheyne Walk was reached
upon half a dozen grunts and murmurs.
“Now,” she said, alighting briskly at her door, “here we are!”
There was something airy and ironical in her voice and expression as
she turned upon the doorstep and looked at them, which filled both
Rodney and Denham with the same misgivings at having trusted their
fortunes to such an ambassador; and Rodney actually hesitated upon the
threshold and murmured to Denham:
“You go in, Denham. I …” He was turning tail, but the door opening
and the familiar look of the house asserting its charm, he bolted in
on the wake of the others, and the door shut upon his escape. Mrs.
Hilbery led the way upstairs. She took them to the drawing-room. The
fire burnt as usual, the little tables were laid with china and
silver. There was nobody there.
“Ah,” she said, “Katharine’s not here. She must be upstairs in her
room. You have something to say to her, I know, Mr. Denham. You can
find your way?” she vaguely indicated the ceiling with a gesture of
her hand. She had become suddenly serious and composed, mistress in
her own house. The gesture with which she dismissed him had a dignity
that Ralph never forgot. She seemed to make him free with a wave of
her hand to all that she possessed. He left the room.
The Hilberys’ house was tall, possessing many stories and passages
with closed doors, all, once he had passed the drawing-room floor,
unknown to Ralph. He mounted as high as he could and knocked at the
first door he came to.
“May I come in?” he asked.
A voice from within answered “Yes.”
He was conscious of a large window, full of light, of a bare table,
and of a long looking-glass. Katharine had risen, and was standing
with some white papers in her hand, which slowly fluttered to the
ground as she saw her visitor. The explanation was a short one. The
sounds were inarticulate; no one could have understood the meaning
save themselves. As if the forces of the world were all at work to
tear them asunder they sat, clasping hands, near enough to be taken
even by the malicious eye of Time himself for a united couple, an
indivisible unit.
“Don’t move, don’t
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