She must show surprise if he expected it.An immense joy came over her.It was indescribable.It had nothing to do with humanity,and most resembled the all-pervading happiness of fine weather.Fine weather is due to the sun,but Margaret could think of no central radiance here.She stood in his drawing-room happy,and longing to give happiness.
On leaving him she realized that the central radiance had been love.
"You aren't offended,Miss Schlegel?"
"How could I be offended?"
There was a moment's pause.He was anxious to get rid of her,and she knew it.She had too much intuition to look at him as he struggled for possessions that money cannot buy.
He desired comradeship and affection,but he feared them,and she,who had taught herself only to desire,and could have clothed the struggle with beauty,held back,and hesitated with him.
"Good-bye,"she continued."You will have a letter from me--I am going back to Swanage tomorrow.
"Thank you."
"Good-bye,and it's you I thank."
"I may order the motor round,mayn't I?"
"That would be most kind."
"I wish I had written instead.Ought I to have written?""Not at all."
"There's just one question--"
She shook her head.He looked a little bewildered,and they parted.
They parted without shaking hands:she had kept the interview,for his sake,in tints of the quietest grey.Yet she thrilled with happiness ere she reached her own house.Others had loved her in the past,if one may apply to their brief desires so grave a word,but those others had been "ninnies"--young men who had nothing to do,old men who could find nobody better.And she had often "loved,"too,but only so far as the facts of sex demanded:mere yearnings for the masculine,to be dismissed for what they were worth,with a smile.
Never before had her personality been touched.She was not young or very rich,and it amazed her that a man of any standing should take her seriously.As she sat trying to do accounts in her empty house,amidst beautiful pictures and noble books,waves of emotion broke,as if a tide of passion was flowing through the night air.She shook her head,tried to concentrate her attention,and failed.In vain did she repeat:"But I've been through this sort of thing before."She had never been through it;the big machinery,as opposed to the little,had been set in motion,and the idea that Mr.Wilcox loved,obsessed her before she came to love him in return.
She would come to no decision yet."Oh,sir,this is so sudden"--that prudish phrase exactly expressed her when her time came.Premonitions are not preparation.She must examine more closely her own nature and his;she must talk it over judicially with Helen.It had been a strange love-scene--the central radiance unacknowledged from first to last.She,in his place,would have said "Ich liebe dich,"but perhaps it was not his habit to open the heart.He might have done it if she had pressed him--as a matter of duty,perhaps;England expects every man to open his heart once;but the effort would have jarred him,and never,if she could avoid it,should he lose those defences that he had chosen to raise against the world.He must never be bothered with emotional talk,or with a display of sympathy.He was an elderly man now,and it would be futile and impudent to correct him.
Mrs.Wilcox strayed in and out,ever a welcome ghost;surveying the scene,thought Margaret,without one hint of bitterness.
