Night and Day
doubt her beauty itself would not stand examination. He had the means
of settling this point at least. He possessed a book of photographs
from the Greek statues; the head of a goddess, if the lower part were
concealed, had often given him the ecstasy of being in Katharine’s
presence. He took it down from the shelf and found the picture. To this
he added a note from her, bidding him meet her at the Zoo. He had a
flower which he had picked at Kew to teach her botany. Such were his
relics. He placed them before him, and set himself to visualize her so
clearly that no deception or delusion was possible. In a second he
could see her, with the sun slanting across her dress, coming towards
him down the green walk at Kew. He made her sit upon the seat beside
him. He heard her voice, so low and yet so decided in its tone; she
spoke reasonably of indifferent matters. He could see her faults, and
analyze her virtues. His pulse became quieter, and his brain increased
in clarity. This time she could not escape him. The illusion of her
presence became more and more complete. They seemed to pass in and out
of each other’s minds, questioning and answering. The utmost fullness
of communion seemed to be theirs. Thus united, he felt himself raised
to an eminence, exalted, and filled with a power of achievement such as
he had never known in singleness. Once more he told over
conscientiously her faults, both of face and character; they were
clearly known to him; but they merged themselves in the flawless union
that was born of their association. They surveyed life to its uttermost
limits. How deep it was when looked at from this height! How sublime!
How the commonest things moved him almost to tears! Thus, he forgot the
inevitable limitations; he forgot her absence, he thought it of no
account whether she married him or another; nothing mattered, save that
she should exist, and that he should love her. Some words of these
reflections were uttered aloud, and it happened that among them were
the words, “I love her.” It was the first time that he had used the
word “love” to describe his feeling; madness, romance, hallucination—he
had called it by these names before; but having, apparently by
accident, stumbled upon the word “love,” he repeated it again and again
with a sense of revelation.
“But I’m in love with you!” he exclaimed, with something like dismay.
He leant against the window-sill, looking over the city as she had
looked. Everything had become miraculously different and completely
distinct. His feelings were justified and needed no further
explanation. But he must impart them to some one, because his discovery
was so important that it concerned other people too. Shutting the book
of Greek photographs, and hiding his relics, he ran downstairs,
snatched his coat, and passed out of doors.
The lamps were being lit, but the streets were dark enough and empty
enough to let him walk his fastest, and to talk aloud as he walked. He
had no doubt where he was going. He was going to find Mary Datchet. The
desire to share what he felt, with some one who understood it, was so
imperious that he did not question it. He was soon in her street. He
ran up the stairs leading to her flat two steps at a time, and it never
crossed his mind that she might not be at home. As he rang her bell, he
seemed to himself to be announcing the presence of something wonderful
that was separate from himself, and gave him power and authority over
all other people. Mary came to the door after a moment’s pause. He was
perfectly silent, and in the dusk his face looked completely white. He
followed her into her room.
“Do you know each other?” she said, to his extreme surprise, for he had
counted on finding her alone. A young man rose, and said that he knew
Ralph by sight.
“We were just going through some papers,” said Mary. “Mr. Basnett has
to help me, because I don’t know much about my work yet. It’s the new
society,” she explained. “I’m the secretary. I’m no longer at Russell
Square.”
The voice in which she gave this information was so constrained as to
sound almost harsh.
“What are your aims?” said Ralph. He looked neither at Mary nor at Mr.
Basnett. Mr. Basnett thought he had seldom seen a more disagreeable or
formidable man than this friend of Mary’s, this sarcastic-looking,
white-faced Mr. Denham, who seemed to demand, as if by right, an
account of their proposals, and to criticize them before he had heard
them. Nevertheless, he explained his projects as clearly as he could,
and knew that he wished Mr. Denham to think well of them.
“I see,” said Ralph, when he had done. “D’you know, Mary,” he suddenly
remarked, “I believe I’m in for a cold. Have you any quinine?” The look
which he cast at her frightened her; it expressed mutely, perhaps
without his own consciousness, something deep, wild, and passionate.
She left the room at once. Her heart beat fast at the knowledge of
Ralph’s presence; but it beat with pain, and with an extraordinary
fear. She stood listening for a moment to the voices in the next room.
“Of course, I agree with you,” she heard Ralph say, in this strange
voice, to Mr. Basnett. “But there’s more that might be done. Have you
seen Judson, for instance? You should make a point of getting him.”
Mary returned with the quinine.
“Judson’s address?” Mr. Basnett inquired, pulling out his notebook and
preparing to write. For twenty minutes, perhaps, he wrote down names,
addresses, and other suggestions that Ralph dictated to him. Then, when
Ralph fell silent, Mr. Basnett felt that his presence was not desired,
and thanking Ralph for his help, with a sense that he was very young
and ignorant compared with him, he said good-bye.
“Mary,” said Ralph, directly Mr. Basnett had shut the door and they
were alone together. “Mary,” he repeated. But the old difficulty of
speaking to Mary without reserve prevented him from continuing. His
desire to proclaim his love for Katharine was still strong in him, but
he had felt, directly he saw Mary, that he could not share it with her.
The feeling increased as he sat talking to Mr. Basnett. And yet all the
time he was thinking of Katharine, and marveling at his love. The tone
in which he spoke Mary’s name was harsh.
“What is it, Ralph?” she asked, startled by his tone. She looked at him
anxiously, and her little frown showed that she was trying painfully to
understand him, and was puzzled. He could feel her groping for his
meaning, and he was annoyed with her, and thought how he had always
found her slow, painstaking, and clumsy. He had behaved badly to her,
too, which made his irritation the more acute. Without waiting for him
to answer, she rose as if his answer were indifferent to her, and began
to put in order some papers that Mr. Basnett had left on the table. She
hummed a scrap of a tune under her breath, and moved about the room as
if she were occupied in making things tidy, and had no other concern.
“You’ll stay and dine?” she said casually, returning to her seat.
“No,” Ralph replied. She did not press him further. They sat side by
side without speaking, and Mary reached her hand for her work basket,
and took out her sewing and threaded a needle.
“That’s a clever young man,” Ralph observed, referring to Mr. Basnett.
“I’m glad you thought so. It’s tremendously interesting work, and
considering everything, I think we’ve done very well. But I’m inclined
to agree with you; we ought to try to be more conciliatory. We’re
absurdly strict. It’s difficult to see that there may be sense in what
one’s opponents say, though they are one’s opponents. Horace Basnett is
certainly too uncompromising. I mustn’t forget to see that he writes
that letter to Judson. You’re too busy, I suppose, to come on to our
committee?” She spoke in the most impersonal manner.
“I may be out of town,” Ralph replied, with equal distance of manner.
“Our executive meets every week, of course,” she observed. “But some of
our members don’t come more than once a month. Members of Parliament
are the worst; it was a mistake, I think, to ask them.”
She went on sewing in silence.
“You’ve not taken your quinine,” she said, looking up and seeing the
tabloids upon the mantelpiece.
“I don’t want it,” said Ralph shortly.
“Well, you know best,” she replied tranquilly.
“Mary, I’m a brute!” he exclaimed. “Here I come and waste your time,
and do nothing but make myself disagreeable.”
“A cold coming on does make one feel wretched,” she replied.
“I’ve not got a cold. That was a lie. There’s nothing the matter with
me. I’m mad, I suppose. I ought to have had the decency to keep away.
But I wanted to see you—I wanted to tell you—I’m in love, Mary.” He
spoke the word, but, as he spoke it, it seemed robbed of substance.
“In love, are you?” she said quietly. “I’m glad, Ralph.”
“I suppose I’m in love. Anyhow, I’m out of my mind. I can’t think, I
can’t work, I don’t care a hang for anything in the world. Good
Heavens, Mary! I’m in torment! One moment I’m happy; next I’m
miserable. I hate her for half an hour; then I’d give my whole life to
be with her for ten minutes; all the time I don’t know what I feel, or
why I feel it; it’s insanity, and yet it’s perfectly reasonable. Can
you make any sense of it? Can you see what’s happened? I’m raving, I
know; don’t listen, Mary; go on with your work.”
He rose and began, as usual, to pace up and down the room. He knew that
what he had just said bore very little resemblance to what he felt, for
Mary’s presence acted upon him like a very strong magnet, drawing from
him certain expressions which were not those he made use of when he
spoke to himself, nor did they represent his deepest feelings. He felt
a little contempt for himself at having spoken thus; but somehow he had
been forced into speech.
“Do sit down,” said Mary suddenly. “You make me so—” She spoke with
unusual irritability, and Ralph, noticing it with surprise, sat down at
once.
“You haven’t told me her name—you’d rather not, I suppose?”
“Her name? Katharine Hilbery.”
“But she’s engaged—”
“To Rodney. They’re to be married in September.”
“I see,” said Mary. But in truth the calm of his manner, now that he
was sitting down once more, wrapt her in the presence of something
which she felt to be so strong, so mysterious, so incalculable, that
she scarcely dared to attempt to intercept it by any word or question
that she was able to frame. She looked at Ralph blankly, with a kind of
awe in her face, her lips slightly parted, and her brows raised. He was
apparently quite unconscious of her gaze. Then, as if she could look no
longer, she leant back in her chair, and half closed her eyes. The
distance between them hurt her terribly; one thing after another came
into her mind, tempting her to assail Ralph with questions, to force
him to confide in her, and to enjoy once more his intimacy. But she
rejected every impulse, for she could not speak without doing violence
to some reserve which had grown between them, putting them a little far
from each other, so that he seemed to her dignified and remote, like a
person she no longer knew well.
“Is there anything that I could do for you?” she asked gently, and even
with courtesy, at length.
“You could see her—no, that’s not what I want; you mustn’t bother about
me, Mary.” He, too, spoke very gently.
“I’m afraid no third person can do anything to help,” she added.
“No,” he shook his head. “Katharine was saying to-day how lonely we
are.” She saw the effort with which he spoke Katharine’s name, and
believed that he forced himself to make amends now for his concealment
in the past. At any rate, she was conscious of no anger against him;
but rather of a deep pity for one condemned to suffer as she had