How he must have liked and admired. It must have amazed him; a woman setting forth and putting straight the muddles of his own mind. “Powerful,” he probably said. It was a half jealous keeping to himself of a fine, good thing. If he could have known that it would have been, just at that very moment, the answer to my worry about Christ he would have been jealous and angry quite as much as surprised and pleased and sympathetic … he was afraid himself of the idea that anyone can give up the idea of the divinity of Christ and still remain religious and good. He ought to have let me read it. … If he could have stated it himself as well, that day by the gate he would have done so … “a very reasonable dilemma my dear.” He knew I was thinking about things. But he had not read Robert Elsmere then. He was jealous of a thunderbolt flung by a woman. …
And now I’ve got beyond Robert Elsmere. … That’s Mrs. Humphry Ward and Robert Elsmere; that’s gone. There’s no answering science. One must choose. Either science or religion. They can’t both be true. This is the same as Literature and Dogma. … Only in Literature and Dogma there is that thing that is perfectly true—that thing—what is it? What was that idea in Literature and Dogma?
I wonder if I’ve strained my heart. This funny feeling of sinking through the bed. Never mind. I’ve done the ride. I’m alive and alone in a strange place. Everything’s alive all round me in a new way. Nearer. As the flame of the candle had swelled and gone out under her blowing she had noticed the bareness of everything in the room—a room for chance travellers, nothing that anyone could carry away. She could still see it as it was when she moved and blew out the candle, a whole room swaying sideways into darkness. The more she relinquished the idea of harm and danger, the nearer and more intimate the room became. … No one can prevent my being alone in a strange place, near to things and loving them. It’s more than worth half killing yourself. It makes you ready to die. I’m not going to die, even if I have strained my heart. “Damaged myself for life.” I am going to sleep. The dawn will come, no one knowing where I am. Because I have no money I must go on and stay with these people. But I have been alive here. There’s hardly any time. I must go to sleep.
XXVII
Being really happy or really miserable makes people like you and like being with you. They need not know the cause. Someone will speak now, in a moment. … Miriam tried to return to the falling rain, the soft light in it, the soft light on the greenery, the intense green glow everywhere … misty green glow. But her eyes fell and her thoughts went on. They would have seen. Her face must be speaking of their niceness in coming out on the dull day so that she might drive about once more in Lord Lansdowne’s estate. Someone will speak. Perhaps they had not found forgetfulness in the green through the rain under the grey. Moments came suddenly in the lanes between the hedges, like that moment that always came where the lane ran up and turned and the fields spread out in the distance. But usually you could not forget the chaise and the donkey and the people. In here amongst the green something always came at once and stayed. Perhaps they did not find it so, or did not know they found it, because of their thoughts about the “fine estate.” They seemed quite easy driving in the lanes, as easy as they ever seemed when one could not forget them. What were they doing when one forgot them? They knew one liked some things better than others; or suddenly liked everything very much indeed … she said you were apathetic … what does that mean … what did she mean … with her one could see nothing and sat waiting … I said I don’t think so, I don’t think she is apathetic at all. Then they understood when one sat in a heap. … They had been pleased this morning because of one’s misery at going away. They did not know of the wild happiness in the garden before breakfast nor that the garden had been so lovely because the strain of the visit was over, and London was coming. They did not know that the happiness of being in amongst the greenery today, pouring out one’s heart in farewell to the great trees had grown so intense because the feeling of London and freedom was there. They could not see the long rich winter, the lectures and books, out of which something was coming. …
“It’s a pity the rain came.”
Ah no, that is not rain. It is not raining. What is “raining”? What do people think when they say these things?
“We are like daisies, drenched in dew.” She pursed up her face towards the sky.
They laughed and silence came again. Heavy and happy.
“I’m glad you came up. I want to ask you what is to be done about Hendie.”
Miriam looked about the boudoir. Mrs. Green had hardly looked at her. She was smiling at her fancy work. But if one did not say something soon she would speak again, going on into things from her point of view. Doctor and medicine. Eve liked it all. She liked Mrs. Green’s clever
