I couldn't--I couldn't see anything for a while; it had all happened too
suddenly.... And then, when I began to realize, it was too late; arguing
was no use. Of the countless reasons why he shouldn't go, not one was
apparent to him; he spoke of going as a sinner might speak of his
conversion. "Somehow or other," he said, "I shall be able to help." He
was certain of it. And with the certainty came, once again, optimism--a
childish optimism that made him hope that Severn wasn't badly hurt
(although the report most distinctly stated that he was), and that all
would be well in some vague and shadowy future. Of course I raised
objections; in fact, the more I thought of it, the more monstrous it
seemed that he, of all people, and then, of all times, should meet
Helen. What good, I asked him, did he think he could achieve by seeing
her? He repeated that he could _help_. But how? Was it likely that she
would fail her husband in such an emergency, and wasn't it far more
likely that she would be insulted at the mere suggestion of such a
thing?
He said that I hadn't understood him. He paused for a while, and I could
almost see him struggling physically to put what he felt into words.
Then victory came to him like a sharp explosion; he went on, with
staccato excitement: "You see--I've made such a terrible hash of
everything--right from the beginning. It's all led up to this--just one
mistake after another.... I began it, and I've got to end it. I tell
you, I've _got_ to end it. Nobody can end it but me.... We were all
friends once, and we've all got to be friends again--whatever happens.
It doesn't work--to put people outside your life. You can't do it, even
when you try, and you daren't do it, even if you could...."
"So it all amounts to this--that you're going to put Helen back into
your life?"
Helen _and_ Severn, he replied. And also even _I_ was involved, because
of my quarrel with Helen. _That_ had to come to an end. We were all
going to be friends again, and he would show Helen that true affection
wasn't narrow and personal, but something that--that--something that....
In fact, to put the whole matter a good deal more plainly than he did,
everything that was not perfect was to be summarily abolished, and the
reign of universal love to begin forthwith. He was once more the eager
missionary; the pendulum of his mood had swung again, and it was the
future now that he saw, perfectly obliterating the imperfect past.
V
But everything that night that I shall never forget belongs to Mizzi
more than to him. I went to see her in blank despondency and told her
what had happened; I expected her to be at least as anxious as I was
that Terry shouldn't meet Helen. But she wasn't; she merely nodded her
head and remarked, at the end of it all: "So I had better reserve for
you two berths in the _wagon-lit_ to-night, is it not?"
"Good heavens, no!" I cried, just in time to keep her away from the
telephone. And then I asked her if she really supposed that we _could_
go.