The Painted Veil

to his vanity: she vaguely realised that this is the hardest of all wounds to heal. It was singular that men attached so much importance to their wives’ faithfulness; when first she had gone with Charlie she had expected to feel quite different, a changed woman; but she had seemed to herself exactly the same, she had experienced only well-being and a greater vitality. She wished now that she had been able to tell Walter that the child was his; the lie would have meant so little to her, and the assurance would have been so great a comfort to him. And after all it might not be a lie; it was funny, that something in her heart which had prevented her from giving herself the benefit of the doubt. How silly men were! Their part in procreation was so unimportant; it was the woman who carried the child through long months of uneasiness and bore it with pain, and yet a man because of his momentary connection made such preposterous claims. Why should that make any difference to him in his feeling towards the child? Then Kitty’s thoughts wandered to the child which she herself would bear; she thought of it not with emotion nor with a passion of maternity, but with an idle curiosity.

“I daresay you’d like to think it over a little,” said Walter, breaking the long silence.

“Think what?”

He turned a little as if he were surprised.

“About when you want to go?”

“But I don’t want to go.”

“Why not?”

“I like my work at the convent. I think I’m making myself useful. I should prefer to stay as long as you do.”

“I think I should tell you that in your present condition you are probably more liable to catch any infection that happens to be about.”

“I like the discreet way you put it,” she smiled ironically.

“You’re not staying for my sake?”

She hesitated. He little knew that now the strongest emotion he excited in her, and the most unexpected, was pity.

“No. You don’t love me. I often think I rather bore you.”

“I shouldn’t have thought you were the sort of person to put yourself out for a few stuffy nuns and a parcel of Chinese brats.”

Her lips outlined a smile.

“I think it’s rather unfair to despise me so much because you made such a mistake in your judgment of me. It’s not my fault that you were such an ass.”

“If you’re determined to stay you are of course at liberty to do so.”

“I’m sorry I can’t give you the opportunity of being magnanimous.” She found it strangely hard to be quite serious with him. “As a matter of fact you’re quite right, it’s not only for the orphans that I’m staying: you see, I’m in the peculiar position that I haven’t got a soul in the world that I can go to. I know no one who wouldn’t think me a nuisance. I know no one who cares a row of pins if I’m alive or dead.”

He frowned. But he did not frown in anger.

“We have made a dreadful hash of things, haven’t we?” he said.

“Do you still want to divorce me? I don’t think I care any more.”

“You must know that by bringing you here I’ve condoned the offence.”

“I didn’t know. You see, I haven’t made a study of infidelity. What are we going to do then when we leave here? Are we going on living together?”

“Oh, don’t you think we can let the future take care of itself?”

There was the weariness of death in his voice.

LVIII

Two or three days later Waddington fetched Kitty from the convent (for her restlessness had induced her immediately to resume her work) and took her to drink the promised cup of tea with his mistress. Kitty had on more than one occasion dined at Waddington’s house. It was a square, white and pretentious building, such as the Customs build for their officials all over China; and the dining-room in which they ate, the drawing-room in which they sat, were furnished with prim and solid furniture. They had the appearance of being partly offices and partly hotel; there was nothing homelike in them and you understood that these houses were merely places of haphazard sojourn to their successive occupants. It would never have occurred to you that on an upper floor mystery and perhaps romance dwelt shrouded. They ascended a flight of stairs and Waddington opened a door. Kitty went into a large, bare room with whitewashed walls on which hung scrolls in various calligraphies. At a square table, on a stiff armchair, both of blackwood and heavily carved, sat the Manchu. She rose as Kitty and Waddington entered, but made no step forward.

“Here she is,” said Waddington, and added something in Chinese.

Kitty shook hands with her. She was slim in her long embroidered gown and somewhat taller than Kitty, used to the Southern people, had expected. She wore a jacket of pale green silk with tight sleeves that came over her wrists and on her black hair, elaborately dressed, was the headdress of the Manchu women. Her face was coated with powder and her cheeks from the eyes to the mouth heavily rouged; her plucked eyebrows were a thin dark line and her mouth was scarlet. From this mask her black, slightly slanting, large eyes burned like lakes of liquid jet. She seemed more like an idol than a woman. Her movements were slow and assured. Kitty had the impression that she was slightly shy but very curious. She nodded her head two or three times, looking at Kitty, while Waddington spoke of her. Kitty noticed her hands; they were preternaturally long, very slender, of the colour of ivory; and the exquisite nails were painted. Kitty thought she had never seen anything so lovely as those languid and elegant hands. They suggested the breeding of uncounted centuries.

She spoke a little, in a high voice, like the twittering of birds in an orchard, and Waddington, translating, told Kitty that she