‘That is kind of Maud—I have been horrid about Maud’—but even
so, I was glad when she went away.
I was glad to leave that place. London was much better than that.
We came home in September.
I went to see Grandmother at Campden Hill Square. She was away
and there was a new maid who did not know me.
Mrs. Woodruffe was in the country, she said. She was expected
back next month.
I knew she had been at Yearsly. I had hoped that she was back.
The maid did not offer me tea, and I did not ask her for it.
I felt disappointed to an absurd degree. I walked across Campden
Hill to Kensington Church, and thought of my wedding there four
years before. I took a bus from there down to Chelsea and walked
past Mollie’s flat. The blinds were down and there were no flowers
in the window-boxes. That was natural, of course, with Mollie
far away. I turned back again towards the bridge. I went into
the little tea shop where we used to have meals very often. Here
too the waitress was new, everything was changed; different and
strange. It seemed as though I had been away for years and years.
And then as I sat and waited for some tea, I caught sight of
my own face in a looking-glass that was hanging on the wall;
and I realized suddenly with a shock that my own face was changed.
I looked so shabby, so provincial, somehow, and dull. I had not
realized before that I looked like that now. I had hardly thought
of my own appearance for so long.