In his bedroom, after tea, Edwin fought against the gloomy influence,
but uselessly. The inherent and appalling sadness of existence
enveloped and chilled him. He gazed at the rows of his books. He had
done no regular reading of late. Why read? He gazed at the screen in
front of his bed, covered with neat memoranda. How futile! Why go to
London? He would only have to come back from London! And then he said
resistingly, "I _will_ go to London." But as he said it aloud, he knew
well that he would not go. His conscience would not allow him to
depart. He could not leave Maggie alone with his father. He yielded to
his conscience unkindly, reluctantly, with no warm gust of
unselfishness; he yielded because he could not outrage his abstract
sense of justice.
From the window he perceived Maggie and Janet Orgreave talking together
over the low separating wall. And he remembered a word of Janet's to
the effect that she and Maggie were becoming quite friendly and that
Maggie was splendid. Suddenly he went downstairs into the garden. They
were talking in attitudes of intimacy; and both were grave and mature,
and both had a little cleft under the chin. Their pale frocks
harmonised in the evening light. As he approached, Maggie burst into a
girlish laugh. "Not really?" she murmured, with the vivacity of a young
girl. He knew not what they were discussing, nor did he care. What
interested him, what startled him, was the youthful gesture and tone of
Maggie. It pleased and touched him to discover another Maggie in the
Maggie of the household. Those two women had put on for a moment the
charming, chattering silliness of schoolgirls. He joined them. On the
lawn of the Orgreaves, Alicia was battling fiercely at tennis with an
elegant young man whose name he did not know. Croquet was deposed;
tennis reigned.
Even Alicia's occasional shrill cry had a mournful quality in the
languishing beauty of the evening.
"I wish you'd tell your father I shan't be able to go to-morrow," Edwin
said to Janet.
"But he's told all of us you _are_ going!" Janet exclaimed.
"Shan't you go?" Maggie questioned, low.
"No," he murmured. Glancing at Janet, he added, "It won't do for me to
go."
"What a pity!" Janet breathed.
Maggie did not say, "Oh! But you ought to! There's no reason whatever
why you shouldn't!" By her silence she contradicted the philosophic
nonchalance of her demeanour during the latter part of the meal.