"No. He was with the volunteers, farther south." He looked at her and her
eyes dropped.
"Which is north and which is south?"
The walking-stick indicated the points of the compass.
"I see. And you were there in that great splodge in the middle. Go on.
What did you do then?"
The walking-stick staggered in a wavering line eastwards. But before it
could join the Nile, Mrs. Nevill Tyson had rubbed out the map, campaign
and all, with the tips of her shoes.
"There's a park-keeper coming," said she, "he'll wonder why we're making
such a mess of his nice gravel-walk."
The park-keeper came, he looked at the gravel and frowned, he looked at
Mrs. Nevill Tyson, smiled benignly, and passed on. Perhaps he wondered.
They got up and walked as far as the Corner, where they looked at the
Achilles statue. Under the shadow of the pedestal Mrs. Nevill Tyson took
a bunch of violets from her waistband.
"What are you going to do with that?" said Louis.
"I'm going to stick it in Achilles' buttonhole. Oh, I see, Achilles
hasn't got a buttonhole. I must put it in yours then."
She put it in.
Louis's dark face flushed. "Why did you do that?"
"I did that--Because you are a brave man, and I like brave men."
Still under the shadow of the pedestal, he took her by both hands and
looked into her eyes. "What are you going to do now?" said he.
"Nothing. We must go back. We have gone too far," said she.
"Too far?" He dropped her hands.
She smiled in the old ambiguous, maddening way. "Yes; much too far. We
shall be late for dinner."
They turned back by the way they had come. Near the Marble Arch a small
crowd was gathered round a poor street preacher with a raucous voice.
They could hear him as they passed.
"We're all sinners," shouted the preacher. (They stopped and looked at
each other with a faint smile. All sinners--that was what Nevill used to
say, all sinners--or fools.) "We're all sinners, you and me, but Jesus
can save us. 'E loves sinners. 'E bears their sins; your sins an' my
sins, dear brethren; 'e bears the sins of the 'ole world. Why, that's
wot 'e came inter the world for--to save sinners. Ter save 'em from death
an' everlasting 'ell! That's wot Jesus does for sinners."
Oh, Molly, Molly, what has he done for fools?
He took her to Ridgmount Gardens, and left her at the door of the flat.
She was incomprehensible, this little Mrs. Tyson. But up till now his
own state of mind had been plain. He knew where he was drifting; he had
always known. But where she was drifting, or whether she was drifting at
all, he did not know; that is to say, he was not sure. And up till now he
had not tried very hard to make sure. He was a person of infinite tact,
and could boast with some truth that he had never done an abrupt or
clumsy thing. By this time his attitude of doubt had given a sort of
metaphysical character to this interest of the senses; he was almost
content to wait and let the world come round to him. It was to be
supposed that Mrs. Nevill Tyson, being Mrs. Nevill Tyson, would have
fathomed him long ago if he had been of the same clay as her engaging
husband. He was of clay, no doubt, but it was not the same clay; and it
was impossible to say how much she knew or had divined; other women were
no rule for her, or else--No. One thing was certain, he would never have
betrayed Tyson until Tyson had betrayed her. As it was, his relations
with her were sufficiently abnormal to be exciting; it was not passion,
it was a rush of minute sensations, swarming and swirling like a dance of
fire-flies--an endless approach and flight.