The letter said exactly this: "Everything is all right and settled. I
had no trouble at all. But I should like to speak to you this
afternoon. Will you meet me on the West Pier at six?--H.C." No form of
greeting! No thanks! The bare words necessary to convey a wish! On
leaving her in the morning no arrangement had been made for a further
interview. She had said nothing, and he had been too proud to ask--the
terrible pride of the benefactor! It was only by chance that it had
even occurred to him to say: "By the way, I am staying at the Royal
Sussex." She had shown no curiosity whatever about him, his doings, his
movements. She had not put to him a single question. He had intended
to call at Preston Street on the Monday morning. And now a letter from
her! Her handwriting had scarcely changed. He was to meet her on the
pier. At her own request he now had a rendezvous with her on the pier!
Why not at her house? Perhaps she was afraid of his power over her in
the house. (Curious, how she, and she almost alone, roused the
masculine force in him!) Perhaps she wanted to thank him in
surroundings which would compel both of them to be calm. That would be
like her! Essentially modest, restrained! And did she not know how to
be meek, she who was so headstrong and independent!
He looked at the clock. The hour was not yet five. Nevertheless he
felt obliged to go out, to bestir himself. On the misty, crowded,
darkening promenade he abandoned himself afresh to indulgence in the
souvenance of the great critical scene of the morning. Yes, he had done
marvels; and fate was astoundingly kind to him also. But there was one
aspect of the affair that intrigued and puzzled him, and weakened his
self-satisfaction. She had been defeated, yet he was baffled by her.
She was a mystery within folds of mysteries. He was no nearer--he
secretly felt--to the essential Her than he had been before the short
struggle and his spectacular triumph. He wanted to reconstruct in his
fancy all her emotional existence; he wanted to get _at_ her,--to possess
her intimate mind,--and lo! he could not even recall the expressions of
her face from minute to minute during the battle. She hid herself from
him. She eluded him... Strange creature! The polishing of the
door-plate in the night! That volume of Crashaw--on the floor! Her
cold, almost daemonic smile! Her sobs! Her sudden retreats! What was
at the back of it all? He remembered her divine gesture over the fond
Shushions. He remembered the ecstatic quality of her surrender in the
shop. He remembered her first love-letter: "Every bit of me is
absolutely yours." And yet the ground seemed to be unsure beneath his
feet, and he wondered whether he had ever in reality known her, ever
grasped firmly the secret of her personality, even for an instant.
He said to himself that he would be seeing her face to face in an hour,
and that then he would, by the ardour of his gaze, get behind those
enigmatic features to the arcana they concealed.
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