Coming up Trafalgar Road at twenty minutes past nine in the bright,
astringent morning, Edwin carried by a string a little round parcel
which for him contained the inspiring symbol of his new life. By mere
accident he had wakened and had risen early, arriving at the shop before
half-past seven. He had deliberately lifted on to his shoulders the
whole burden of the shop and the printing business, and as soon as he
felt its weight securely lodged he became extraordinarily animated and
vigorous; even gay. He had worked with a most agreeable sense of energy
until nearly nine o'clock; and then, having first called at the
ironmonger's, had stepped into the bank at the top of Saint Luke's
Square a moment after its doors opened, and had five minutes' exciting
conversation with the manager. After which, with righteous hunger in
his belly and the symbol in his hand, he had come home to breakfast.
The symbol was such as could be obtained at any ironmonger's: an alarm
clock. Mrs Nixon had grown less reliable than formerly as an alarm
clock; machinery was now supplanting her.
Dr Heve came out of the house, and Dr Heve too seemed gay with fine
resolutions. The two met on the doorstep, each full of a justifiable
self-satisfaction. The doctor explained that he had come thus early
because Mr Clayhanger was one of those cases upon which he could look
in casually at any time. In the sunshine they talked under the porch of
early rising, as men who understood the value of that art. Edwin could
see that Dr Heve's life was a series of little habits which would never
allow themselves to be interfered with by any large interest, and he
despised the man's womanish smile. Nevertheless his new respect for him
did not weaken; he decided that he was a very decent fellow in his way,
and he was more impressed than he would admit by the amount of work that
the doctor had for years been doing in the morning before his
intellectual superiors had sat up in bed. And he imagined that it might
be even more agreeable to read in the fresh stillness of the morning
than in the solitary night.
Then they returned to the case of Darius. The doctor was more
communicative, and they were both cheerfully matter-of-fact concerning
it. There it was, to be made the best of! And that Darius could never
handle business again, and that in about two years his doom would be
accomplished--these were basic facts, axiomatic. The doctor had seen
his patient in the garden, and he suggested that if Darius could be
persuaded to interest himself in gardening... They discussed his
medicine, his meals, his digestion, and the great, impossible dream of
`taking him away,' `out of it all.' And every now and then Dr Heve
dropped some little hint as to the management of Darius.
The ticking parcel drew the discreet attention of the doctor. The
machine was one guaranteed to go in any position, and was much more
difficult to stop than to start.
"It's only an alarm," said Edwin, not without self-consciousness.
The doctor went, tripping neatly and optimistically, off towards his own
breakfast. He got up earlier than his horse.
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