Claire came and sat down on the arm of his chair. He moved convulsively, but he stayed where he was.
“Fool!” said Subconscious Self.
Claire took hold of his hand and patted it. He quivered, but remained.
“Ass!” hissed Subconscious Self.
Claire stopped patting his hand and began to stroke it. Mr. Pickering breathed heavily.
“Dudley, dear,” said Claire softly, “I’ve been an awful fool, and I’m dreadfully, dreadfully sorry, and you’re going to be the nicest, kindest, sweetest man on earth and tell me you’ve forgiven me. Aren’t you?”
Mr. Pickering’s lips moved silently. Claire kissed the thinning summit of his head. There was a pause.
“Where is it?” she asked.
Mr. Pickering started.
“Eh?”
“Where is it? Where did you put it? The ring, silly!”
Mr. Pickering became aware that Subconscious Self was addressing him. The occasion was tense and Subconscious Self did not mince its words.
“You poor, maudlin, sentimental, doddering chunk of imbecility,” it said; “are there no limits to your insanity? After all I said to you just now, are you deliberately going to start the old idiocy all over again?”
“She’s so beautiful,” pleaded Mr. Pickering. “Look at her eyes!”
“Ass! Don’t you remember what I said about beauty?”
“Yes, I know, but—”
“She’s as hard as nails.”
“I’m sure you’re wrong.”
“I’m not wrong.”
“But she loves me.”
“Forget it!”
Claire jogged his shoulders.
“Dudley, dear, what are you sitting there dreaming for? Where did you put the ring?”
Mr. Pickering fumbled for it, located it, produced it. Claire examined it fondly.
“Did she throw it at him and nearly break his heart!” she said.
“Bolt!” urged Subconscious Self. “Fly! Go to Japan!”
Mr. Pickering did not go to Japan. He was staring worshipingly at Claire. With rapturous gaze he noted the gray glory of her eyes, the delicate curve of her cheek, the grace of her neck. He had no time to listen to pessimistic warnings from any Gloomy Gus of a Subconscious Self. He was ashamed that he had ever even for a moment allowed himself to be persuaded that Claire was not all that was perfect. No more doubts and hesitations for Dudley Pickering. He was under the influence.
“There!” said Claire, and slipped the ring on her finger.
She kissed the top of his head once more.
“So there we are!” she said.
“There we are!” gurgled the infatuated Dudley.
“Happy now?”
“Ur-r!”
“Then kiss me.”
Mr. Pickering kissed her.
“Dudley, darling,” said Claire, “we’re going to be awfully, awfully happy, aren’t we?”
“You bet we are!” said Mr. Pickering.
Subconscious Self said nothing, being beyond speech.
XXI
For some minutes after Claire had left him Bill remained where he was, motionless. He felt physically incapable of moving. All the strength that was in him he was using to throw off the insidious poison of her parting speech, and it became plainer to him with each succeeding moment that he would have need of strength.
It is part of the general irony of things that in life’s crises a man’s good qualities are often the ones that help him least, if indeed they do not actually turn treacherously and fight against him. It was so with Bill. Modesty, if one may trust to the verdict of the mass of mankind, is a good quality. It sweetens the soul and makes for a kindly understanding of one’s fellows. But arrogance would have served Bill better now. It was his fatal habit of self-depreciation that was making Claire’s words so specious, as he stood there trying to cast them from his mind. Who was he, after all, that he should imagine that he had won on his personal merits a girl like Elizabeth Boyd?
He had never been able to look on himself, after the manner of many of the men he knew, as a tremendous fellow, the center of a wondering world, Nature’s supreme handiwork. He was conscious—too conscious—of his shortcomings. From boyhood the sort of man he had admired was the capable, dashing, quick-witted, debonair fellow, the man you could never take without his answer, whether you attacked him with a sword or with an epigram, and the realization of the gulf that separated himself from this ideal male had engendered humility, increasing with the years. He had the not very common type of mind that perceives the merit in others more readily than their faults and in himself the faults more readily than the merit. Time and the society of a great number of men of different ranks and natures had rid him of the outer symbol of this type of mind, which is shyness, but it had left him still unconvinced that he amounted to anything very much as an individual.
This was the thought that met him every time he tried to persuade himself that what Claire had said was ridiculous, the mere parting shaft of an angry woman. With this thought as an ally her words took on a plausibility hard to withstand. Plausible! That was the devil of it. By no effort could he blind himself to the fact that they were that. In the light of Claire’s insinuations what had seemed coincidences took on a more sinister character. It had seemed to him an odd and lucky chance that Nutty Boyd should have come to the rooms which he was occupying that night, seeking a companion. Had it been chance? Even at the time he had thought it strange that, on the strength of a single evening spent together, Nutty should have invited a total stranger to make an indefinite visit at his home. Had there been design behind the invitation?
Bill began to walk slowly to the house. He felt tired and unhappy. He meant to go to bed and try to sleep away these wretched doubts and questionings. Daylight would bring relief.
As he reached the open front door he caught the sound of voices,
