Nevertheless she insisted on writing at once. And Amy had to bring the writing materials.
“Mr. Cyril is coming down on Wednesday,” she said to Amy with great dignity.
Amy’s stony calmness was shaken, for Mr. Cyril was a great deal to Amy. Amy wondered how she would be able to look Mr. Cyril in the face when he knew that she had given notice.
In the middle of writing, on her knee, Constance looked up at Sophia, and said, as though defending herself against an accusation: “I didn’t write to him yesterday, you know, or today.”
“No,” Sophia murmured assentingly.
Constance rang the bell yet again, and Amy was sent out to the post.
Soon afterwards the bell was rung for a fourth time, and not answered.
“I suppose she hasn’t come back yet. But I thought I heard the door. What a long time she is!”
“What do you want?” Sophia asked.
“I just want to speak to her,” said Constance.
When the bell had been rung seven or eight times, Amy at length reappeared, somewhat breathless.
“Amy,” said Constance, “let me examine those sheets, will you?”
“Yes’m,” said Amy, apparently knowing what sheets, of all the various and multitudinous sheets in that house.
“And the pillowcases,” Constance added as Amy left the room.
So it continued. The next day the fever heightened. Constance was up early, before Sophia, and trotting about the house like a girl. Immediately after breakfast Cyril’s bedroom was invested and revolutionized; not till evening was order restored in that chamber. And on the Wednesday morning it had to be dusted afresh. Sophia watched the preparations, and the increasing agitation of Constance’s demeanour, with an astonishment which she had real difficulty in concealing. “Is the woman absolutely mad?” she asked herself. The spectacle was ludicrous: or it seemed so to Sophia, whose career had not embraced much experience of mothers. It was not as if the manifestations of Constance’s anxiety were dignified or original or splendid. They were just silly, ordinary fussinesses; they had no sense in them. Sophia was very careful to make no observation. She felt that before she and Constance were very much older she had a very great deal to do, and that a subtle diplomacy and wary tactics would be necessary. Moreover, Constance’s angelic temper was slightly affected by the strain of expectation. She had a tendency to rasp. After the high-tea was set she suddenly sprang on to the sofa and lifted down the “Stag at Eve” engraving. The dust on the top of the frame incensed her.
“What are you going to do?” Sophia asked, in a final marvel.
“I’m going to change it with that one,” said Constance, pointing to another engraving opposite the fireplace. “He said the effect would be very much better if they were changed. And his lordship is very particular.”
Constance did not go to Bursley station to meet her son. She explained that it upset her to do so, and that also Cyril preferred her not to come.
“Suppose I go to meet him,” said Sophia, at half-past five. The idea had visited her suddenly. She thought: “Then I could talk to him before anyone else.”
“Oh, do!” Constance agreed.
Sophia put her things on with remarkable expedition. She arrived at the station a minute before the train came in. Only a few persons emerged from the train, and Cyril was not among them. A porter said that there was not supposed to be any connection between the Loop Line trains and the main line expresses, and that probably the express had missed the Loop. She waited thirty-five minutes for the next Loop, and Cyril did not emerge from that train either.
Constance opened the front door to her, and showed a telegram—
Sorry prevented last moment. Writing.
Cyril.
Sophia had known it. Somehow she had known that it was useless to wait for the second train. Constance was silent and calm; Sophia also.
“What a shame! What a shame!” thumped Sophia’s heart.
It was the most ordinary episode. But beneath her calm she was furious against her favourite. She hesitated.
“I’m just going out a minute,” she said.
“Where?” asked Constance. “Hadn’t we better have tea? I suppose we must have tea.”
“I shan’t be long. I want to buy something.”
Sophia went to the post-office and despatched a telegram. Then, partially eased, she returned to the arid and painful desolation of the house.
IV
The next evening Cyril sat at the tea-table in the parlour with his mother and his aunt. To Constance his presence there had something of the miraculous in it. He had come, after all! Sophia was in a rich robe, and for ornament wore an old silver-gilt neck-chain, which was clasped at the throat, and fell in double to her waist, where it was caught in her belt. This chain interested Cyril. He referred to it once or twice, and then he said: “Just let me have a look at that chain,” and put out his hand; and Sophia leaned forward so that he could handle it. His fingers played with it thus for some seconds; the picture strikingly affected Constance. At length he dropped it, and said: “H’m!” After a pause he said: “Louis Sixteenth, eh?” and Sophia said:
“They told me so. But it’s nothing; it only cost thirty francs, you know.” And Cyril took her up sharply:
“What does that matter?” Then after another pause he asked: “How often do you break a link of it?”
“Oh, often,” she said. “It’s always getting shorter.”
And he murmured mysteriously: “H’m!”
He was still mysterious, withdrawn within himself extraordinarily uninterested in his physical surroundings. But that evening he talked more than he usually did. He was benevolent, and showed a particular benevolence towards his mother, apparently exerting himself to answer her questions with fullness and heartiness, as though admitting frankly her right to be curious. He praised the tea; he seemed to notice what he was eating. He took Spot on his knee, and gazed in admiration at Fossette.
“By Jove!” he
