'Then you must go,' he said.
'But,' she began, with harsh petulance, 'I do not want to go down to
Cornwall with _Louisa and Olive_'--she accentuated the two names--'after
_this_,' she added.
'Then Louisa will have no holiday--and you have promised,' he said
gravely.
Helena looked at him. She saw he had decided that she should go.
'Is my promise so _very_ important?' she asked. She glanced angrily at
the three ladies who were hesitating in the doorway. Nevertheless, the
ladies entered, and seated themselves at the opposite end of the
carriage. Siegmund did not know whether he were displeased or relieved
by their intrusion. If they had stayed out, he might have held Helena in
his arms for still another hour. As it was, she could not harass him
with words. He tried not to look at her, but to think.
The train at last moved out of the station. As it passed through
Portsmouth, Siegmund remembered his coming down, on the Sunday. It
seemed an indefinite age ago. He was thankful that he sat on the side of
the carriage opposite from the one he had occupied five days before. The
afternoon of the flawless sky was ripening into evening. The chimneys
and the sides of the houses of Portsmouth took on that radiant
appearance which transfigures the end of day in town. A rich bloom of
light appears on the surfaces of brick and stone.
'It will go on,' thought Siegmund, 'being gay of an evening, for ever.
And I shall miss it all!' But as soon as the train moved into the gloom of the Town station, he
began again: 'Beatrice will be proud, and silent as steel when I get home. She will
say nothing, thank God--nor shall I. That will expedite matters: there
will be no interruptions....
'But we cannot continue together after this. Why should I discuss
reasons for and against? We cannot. She goes to a cottage in the
country. Already I have spoken of it to her. I allow her all I can of my
money, and on the rest I manage for myself in lodgings in London.
Very good.
'But when I am comparatively free I cannot live alone. I shall want
Helena; I shall remember the children. If I have the one, I shall be
damned by the thought of the other. This bruise on my mind will never
get better. Helena says she would never come to me; but she would, out
of pity for me. I know she would.
'But then, what then? Beatrice and the children in the country, and me
not looking after the children. Beatrice is thriftless. She would be in
endless difficulty. It would be a degradation to me. She would keep a
red sore inflamed against me; I should be a shameful thing in her mouth.
Besides, there would go all her strength. She would not make any
efforts. "He has brought it on us," she would say; "let him see what the
result is." And things would go from bad to worse with them. It would be
a gangrene of shame.