“Nor I,” he said.
He looked away. His sudden, flaring hope sank again.
“What are you doing in town?” he asked.
“I'm staying at Cousin Anne's.”
“Ha! For long?”
“No; only till to-morrow.”
“Must you go straight home?”
She looked at him, then hid her face under her hat-brim.
“No,” she said—“no; it's not necessary.”
He turned away, and she went with him. They threaded through the throng of church people. The organ was still sounding in St. Mary's. Dark figures came through the lighted doors; people were coming down the steps. The large coloured windows glowed up in the night. The church was like a great lantern suspended. They went down Hollow Stone, and he took the car for the Bridges.
“You will just have supper with me,” he said: “then I'll bring you back.”
“Very well,” she replied, low and husky.
They scarcely spoke while they were on the car. The Trent ran dark and full under the bridge. Away towards Colwick all was black night. He lived down Holme Road, on the naked edge of the town, facing across the river meadows towards Sneinton Hermitage and the steep scrap of Colwick Wood. The floods were out. The silent water and the darkness spread away on their left. Almost afraid, they hurried along by the houses.
Supper was laid. He swung the curtain over the window. There was a bowl of freesias and scarlet anemones on the table. She bent to them. Still touching them with her finger-tips, she looked up at him, saying:
“Aren't they beautiful?”
“Yes,” he said. “What will you drink—coffee?”
“I should like it,” she said.
“Then excuse me a moment.”
He went out to the kitchen.
Miriam took off her things and looked round. It was a bare, severe room. Her photo, Clara's, Annie's, were on the wall. She looked on the drawing-board to see what he was doing. There were only a few meaningless lines. She looked to see what books he was reading. Evidently just an ordinary novel. The letters in the rack she saw were from Annie, Arthur, and from some man or other she did not know. Everything he had touched, everything that was in the least personal to him, she examined with lingering absorption. He had been gone from her for so long, she wanted to rediscover him, his position, what he was now. But there was not much in the room to help her. It only made her feel rather sad, it was so hard and comfortless.
She was curiously examining a sketch-book when he returned with the coffee.
“There's nothing new in it,” he said, “and nothing very interesting.”
He put down the tray, and went to look over her shoulder. She turned the pages slowly, intent on examining everything.
“H'm!” he said, as she paused at a sketch. “I'd forgotten that. It's not bad, is it?”
“No,” she said. “I don't quite understand it.”
He took the book from her and went through it. Again he made a curious sound of surprise and pleasure.
“There's some not bad stuff in there,” he said.
“Not at all bad,” she answered gravely.
He felt again her interest in his work. Or was it for himself? Why was she always most interested in him as he appeared in his work?
They sat down to supper.
“By the way,” he said, “didn't I hear something about your earning your own living?”
“Yes,” she replied, bowing her dark head over her cup. “And what of it?”
“I'm merely going to the farming college at Broughton for three months, and I shall probably be kept on as a teacher there.”
“I say—that sounds all right for you! You always wanted to be independent.”
“Yes.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“I only knew last week.”
“But I heard a month ago,” he said.
“Yes; but nothing was settled then.”
“I should have thought,” he said, “you'd have told me you were trying.”
She ate her food in the deliberate, constrained way, almost as if she recoiled a little from doing anything so publicly, that he knew so well.
“I suppose you're glad,” he said.
“Very glad.”
“Yes—it will be something.”
He was rather disappointed.
“I think it will be a great deal,” she said, almost haughtily, resentfully.
He laughed shortly.
“Why do you think it won't?” she asked.
“Oh, I don't think it won't be a great deal. Only you'll find earning your own living isn't everything.”
“No,” she said, swallowing with difficulty; “I don't suppose it is.”
“I suppose work CAN be nearly everything to a man,” he said, “though it isn't to me. But a woman only works with a part of herself. The real and vital part is covered up.”
“But a man can give ALL himself to work?” she asked.
“Yes, practically.”
“And a woman only the unimportant part of herself?”
“That's it.”
She looked up at him, and her eyes dilated with anger.
“Then,” she said, “if it's true, it's a great shame.”
“It is. But I don't know everything,” he answered.
After supper they drew up to the fire. He swung her a chair facing him, and they sat down. She was wearing a dress of dark claret colour, that suited her dark complexion and her large features. Still, the curls were fine and free, but her face was much older, the brown throat much thinner. She seemed old to him, older than Clara. Her bloom of youth had quickly gone. A sort of stiffness, almost of woodenness, had come upon her. She meditated a little while, then looked at him.
“And how are things with you?” she asked.
“About all right,” he answered.
She looked at him, waiting.
“Nay,” she said, very low.
Her brown, nervous hands were clasped over her knee. They had still the lack of confidence or repose, the almost hysterical look. He winced as he saw them. Then he laughed mirthlessly. She put her fingers between her lips. His slim, black, tortured body lay quite still in the chair. She suddenly took her finger from her mouth and looked at him.
“And you have broken off with Clara?”
“Yes.”
His body lay like an abandoned thing, strewn in the chair.
“You know,” she said, “I think we ought to be married.”
He opened his eyes for the first time since many months, and attended to her with respect.
“Why?” he said.
“See,” she said, “how you waste yourself! You might be ill, you might die, and I never know—be no more then than if I had never known you.”
“And if we married?” he asked.
“At