'Thorley,' observed Holden, 'you or I are going to have one or two things to talk about But that can wait Until we all go down to Caswall tomorrow.'
Thorley, too, was pale. Not once had Celia glanced in his direction.
'Until we go down to Caswall tomorrow?' Thorley repeated.
'Yes. You say you want to sell Caswall. Have you found a purchaser for it?' 'No. Not yet. But . . .'
'I'll buy the place,' snarled Holden. He became aware that he was shouting. 'In the excitement of the moment I forgot to tell you that the report about an inheritance wasn't a part of the joke. It was true.'
And he followed Celia out of the room.
Without speaking, in the same void, emotionally blind and helpless, moving like sleepwalkers, these two went toward the front door. They did not speak because they had too much to say. There was no starting point A light in a cut-glass globe, hanging from the lofty ceiling in the hall, shone on the tall full-length portrait of a Regency gentleman with wind-blown hair and a cutaway coat under which was a little brass plate engraved Edward Agnew Devereux, Esq., by Sir H. Raeburn.
Vaguely he noticed that Celia, who was trembling, glanced at this portrait as though she were remembering something.
He wanted to tell her . . .
Yes! He wanted to tell her he had sent a telegram, but that Thorley hadn't opened it Why hadn't Thorley opened it? Telegrams convey a sense of urgency. You open them, as a rule, the instant they are received. If you don't it is because something of overpowering interest distracts your attention at the same time. The telegram had arrived at the same time as small but vigorously grown-up Doris Locke.
Stop! Instead of being the first of a million explanations, this was only leading thoughts into a blind alley.
They were outside the house now, in warm and kindly darkness. They slowly crossed the little curve of the drive, out to the pavement of the main road where the white, clear-glowing street lamps showed a deserted road and trees on the other side.
'We cross here,' said Celia.
'Oh?'
'Yes,' Celia explained very carefully. 'To the other side. About fifty yards up there's a side entrance into the park. This is where we cross.'
Celia's nerves, he was thinking, were magnificent. Flighty, eh? There probably wasn't another woman anywhere who could have received such unexpected news with no more than a change of color or a turn of the eyes. It hadn't affected her at all. He thought so, that is, until—without any warning, when they were partway across the road'—Celia's knees gave way; she would have fallen if he had not caught her.
'Celia!' he cried.
But she only sobbed and clung to him, while he held her very tightly.
The lights of a motorcar, moving rapidly, sprang up from the direction of Regent's Park Crescent and hummed straight toward them: yellow-blazing eyes which swallowed up the road as the car bore down. It is a sober fact that Holden did not even notice this.
He never realized it until the car—with a whush of air at their elbows, and a scream of curses from the driver—swerved violently past them within a foot's clearance. Then he picked Celia up, carried her back to the curb, set her on her feet under a street lamp, and, while she held him just as tightly, he kissed her mouth for a very long time.
Presently Celia spoke.
'Do you know, she said, with her head against his shoulder, still crying, 'that's the first time you ever kissed me?'
'In times gone by, Celia, I was twenty-eight years old and the biggest bloody fool in recorded history.'
'No, you weren't! You were only ...'
'I was about to point out, anyway, that we have a great deal of lost time to make up for. Shall we continue?'
'No!' said Celia. Her soft body tightened in his arms. She ran her hands over his shoulders, as though to make sure of his reality. She threw her head back and looked up at him: her lips smiling, the imaginative fine- drawn face tear stained, the shining wet gray eyes searching his face—searching it, and searching it again, with intensity—under the white pallor of the street lamp.
'I mean,' she added, 'not here! Not now! I want to think about you. I want to get used to you.'
'I love you, Celia. I always have.' 'Are we in love?'
Don Holden felt lightheaded with happiness.
'My dear Celia,' he began oracularly, 'consider indisputable proof in this matter. Did you hear what the driver of that car said when he roared past?'
She looked puzzled. 'He—he swore at us.'
'Yes. To be exact, he said 'god-damnedest thing I ever saw.' The remark, though inelegantly phrased, contains a deep philosophical truth. Shall we search the story of famous lovers ... of Daphnis and Chloe, of Hero and Leander, of Pyramus and Thisbe, of (to be more prosaic about it) Victoria and Albert... for many instances of two persons standing locked in each other's arms in the middle of a main motor road?'
'I love you when you talk like that,' Celia said seriously. 'It's not exactly romantic; but it seems to make everything so much more fun. Where have you been, Don? It was rather awful. Where have you been?'
He tried to explain a little of it, and somewhat incoherently.
'You—you got Scharfuhrer von Steuben? That Dachau man who said he'd never be taken alive?'
'He had to be taken alive. They're hanging him this month.'
'But—what happened?' (He felt her shudder) 'Well, it took some time to run him down. Then there was a dust-up.' 'Please, Don. What happened?'
'He'd got himself up disguised as a priest. We shot it out in a churchyard about three miles from Rome. I nicked him through the kneecap, and it was so painful he just rolled over and screeched. The funny thing was ...'
'Yes, Don?' she pressed him more tightly.
'Do you remember that time we met, in Caswall churchyard, under the trees, after the wedding? And I made such a bash of things? Weill Once or twice when I saw Steuben's dial, under the broad-brimmed priest
There was a pause, and a sudden odd change in her mood.
'Do you know,' cried Celia, suddenly looking up and around as though she had just realized it, 'we're standing under a street lamp? And there'll probably be a policeman along at any minute? Lets go across to the park, Don. Please!'
They crossed the road hurriedly. Some fifty yards up, as Celia had said, there was a side entrance. (They did not see the immense dark shadow, apparently too huge to be real, which, as soon as they were gone, seemed to materialize from behind the trees guarding the little crescent of Gloucester Gate, and stretch out after them. No; they did not see it.)
The night fragrance of the park enclosed them. A broad path, of fine-crushed brown gravel, stretched away into dimness through lines of thick-leaved dwarf chestnut trees like the alley of a formal garden. Once into the shadow of the trees, they became aware of moonlight: clear moonlight, of soap-bubble luminousness, making images even more unreal. Celia, in her white dress, might have seemed insubstantial if he had not held her tightly.
Celia spoke in a small, troubled voice.
'Don. I want to tell you something. I feel I'm partly— becoming myself again.'
'How do you mean?'
'When I thought you were dead . . .'
'Don't! That’s all over now!'
'No. - Please let me finish.' She stopped and faced him. 'When I thought you were dead, I didn't seem to care about anything. Then, at Christmas, Margot died. Did Thorley tell you?'
'Yes”
