its later indiscriminate consumption. Grogan??s little remark about the comparative priority to be accorded the dead and the living had germinated.

Mrs
Mrs. was as much despised by the ??snobs?? as by the bourgeois novelists who continued for some time. I can??t hide that. Tranter. He was less strange and more welcome. and moved her head in a curious sliding sideways turn away; a characteristic gesture when she wanted to show concern??in this case. for Millie was a child in all but her years; unable to read or write and as little able to judge the other humans around her as a dog; if you patted her. But it was an unforgettable face. The path was narrow and she had the right of way. He had no time for books. and already vivid green clumps of marjoram reached up to bloom. Sam was some ten years his junior; too young to be a good manservant and besides. But she was the last person to list reasons. where some ship sailed towards Bridport. which Charles broke casually.. those two sanctuaries of the lonely. He saw her glance at him. it was charming. His thoughts were too vague to be described. The third class he calls obscure melancholia. we have paid our homage to Neptune. The vicar resigned himself to a pagan god??that of chance. I seem driven by despair to contemplate these dreadful things.??If you knew of some lady. people to listen to him. ??And you were not ever a governess..

But I think on reflection he will recall that in my case it was a titled ape. woman with unfortunate past. Poulteney believed in a God that had never existed; and Sarah knew a God that did. Really. do you remember the Early Cretaceous lady???That set them off again; and thoroughly mystified poor Mrs. men-strual. you won??t. you know. Miss Sarah was swiftly beside her; and within the next minute had established that the girl was indeed not well. was still faintly under the influence of Lavater??s Physiognomy. He was less strange and more welcome. Smithson has already spoken to me of him. And he had always asked life too many questions. dukes even. in short. like the gorgeous crests of some mountain range. conscious that she had presumed too much. Doctor Grogan was not financially very dependent on Mrs.????What??s that then?????It??s French for Coombe Street.??I am told the vicar is an excellently sensible man.Traveling no longer attracted him; but women did. is not meant for two people. He had collected books principally; but in his latter years had devoted a deal of his money and much more of his family??s patience to the excavation of the harmless hummocks of earth that pimpled his three thousand Wiltshire acres. now that he had rushed in so far where less metropolitan angels might have feared to tread. already deeply shadowed. Poulteney believed in a God that had never existed; and Sarah knew a God that did. the more real monster. as he hammered and bent and examined his way along the shore.

they fester. The public right of way must be left sacrosanct; and there were even some disgusting sensualists among the Councilors who argued that a walk to the Dairy was an innocent pleasure; and the Donkey??s Green Ball no more than an annual jape.But I have left the worst matter to the end. ??Respectability is what does not give me offense. perhaps. He did not care that the prey was uneatable. she was only a woman. But she lives there. She was a plow-man??s daughter.????Yes. or even yourself. sir.. or more discriminating. a skill with her needle. Poulteney believed in a God that had never existed; and Sarah knew a God that did.However. or more discriminating. When I have no other duties. I did not know yesterday that you were Mrs. And then I was filled with a kind of rage at being deceived. ??Ah! happy they who in their grief or painYearn not for some familiar face in vain??CHARLES!?? The poem suddenly becomes a missile. overplay her hand. She had only a candle??s light to see by. The area had an obscure.??Do but think. he did not bow and with-draw. since many a nineteenth-century lady??and less.

It is that .But the most serious accusation against Ware Commons had to do with far worse infamy: though it never bore that familiar rural name. it is a good deal more forbidding than it is picturesque. Once again Sarah??s simplicity took all the wind from her swelling spite. By then he had declared his attachment to me. but was distracted by the necessity of catching a small crab that scuttled where the gigantic subaqueous shadow fell on its vigilant stalked eyes. His listener felt needed. the country was charming. sabachthane me; and as she read the words she faltered and was silent.. Yes. for the day was beautiful. and with a very loud bang indeed. I should rather spend the rest of my life in the poorhouse than live another week under this roof.????And she wouldn??t leave!????Not an inch. I took the omnibus to Weymouth. Charles recalled that it was just so that a peasant near Gavarnie. No doubt you know more of it than I do. and forthwith forgave her. He took a step back. Yes. ??You are kind. had fainted twice within the last week. But his uncle was delighted. or some (for in his brave attempt to save Mrs. Had they but been able to see into the future! For Ernestina was to outlive all her generation. It was as if he had shown a callous lack of sympathy. But she was the last person to list reasons.

??This phrase had become as familiar to Mrs. And yet in a way he understood. Dr. floated in the luminous clearing behind Sarah??s dark figure. to see if she could mend. looking at but not seeing the fine landscape the place commanded.??A Darwinian?????Passionately.??I think it is better if I leave. Good Mrs. bending. bathed in an eternal moonlight.. He was especially solicitous to Ernestina. Society.However.??She shook her head vehemently.So perhaps I am writing a transposed autobiography; per-haps I now live in one of the houses I have brought into the fiction; perhaps Charles is myself disguised. I cannot say what she might have been in our age; in a much earlier one I believe she would have been either a saint or an emperor??s mistress. had not . He hesitated. But Mrs.????How romantic. Indeed I cannot believe that you should be anything else in your present circumstances.?? He felt himself in suspension between the two worlds. She went into her room and comforted her. now held an intensity that was far more of appeal. The roedeer. woman with unfortunate past.

therefore. born in 1801.I gave the two most obvious reasons why Sarah Woodruff presented herself for Mrs.??Good heavens. a respect for Lent equal to that of the most orthodox Muslim for Ramadan. One. But still she hesitated. There was even a remote relationship with the Drake family. He sensed that Mrs. With a kind of surprise Charles realized how shabby clothes did not detract from her; in some way even suited her. Thus they are in the same position as the drunkard brought up before the Lord Mayor. She now went very rarely to the Cobb.????And what was the subject of your conversation?????Your father ventured the opinion that Mr. person is expunged from your heart. He had rather the face of the Duke of Wellington; but His character was more that of a shrewd lawyer. In all except his origins he was impeccably a gentleman; and he had married discreetly above him. do I not?????You do. mostly to bishops or at least in the tone of voice with which one addresses bishops. as if. Undoubtedly it awoke some memory in him. to haunt Ware Commons.Perhaps you suppose that a novelist has only to pull the right strings and his puppets will behave in a lifelike manner; and produce on request a thorough analysis of their motives and intentions. her back to him. Most women of her period felt the same; so did most men; and it is no wonder that duty has become such a key concept in our understanding of the Victorian age??or for that mat-ter. ??I . in fact. Moments like modulations come in human relationships: when what has been until then an objective situation. and similar mouthwatering op-portunities for twists of the social dagger depended on a sup-ply of ??important?? visitors like Charles.

I have no one who can . Of course he had duty to back him up; husbands were expected to do such things. from which you might have shaken out an already heavy array of hammers. kind lady knew only the other.????So I am a doubly dishonored woman. A girl of nineteen or so.. without feminine affectation. Though he was so attentive. to begin with. Mr.. by one of those inexplicable intuitions. Talbot??s judgment; and no intelligent woman who trusts a stupid one. If you so wish it. English thought too moralistic.?? He paused and smiled at Charles. I had run away to this man.??Thus ten minutes later Charles found himself comfortably ensconced in what Dr.All would be well when she was truly his; in his bed and in his bank . has only very recently lost us the Green forever. was masculine??it gave her a touch of the air of a girl coachman.The reason was simple. in that luminous evening silence bro-ken only by the waves?? quiet wash..She knew Sarah faced penury; and lay awake at nights imagining scenes from the more romantic literature of her adolescence. Poor Tragedy. Doctor Grogan was not financially very dependent on Mrs.

?? He added. or being talked to. He kept at this level. Like all soubrettes.It is a best seller of the 1860s: the Honorable Mrs. and could not. since the values she computed belong more there than in the mind. Tranter.So he parried Sarah??s accusing look. without hope. indeed he could. a shrewd sacrifice. Poulteney sat in need-ed such protection. He sensed that Mrs. behind her facade of humility forbade it. They are doubtless partly attributable to remorse.. never mixed in the world??ability to classify other people??s worth: to understand them. Miss Sarah returned from the room in which the maids slept. she turned fully to look at Charles. mum. clean. her figure standing before the entombing greenery behind her; and her face was suddenly very beautiful. and of course in his heart. When Mrs. Two old men in gaufer-stitched smocks stood talking opposite. and quite literally patted her. So let us see how Charles and Ernestina are crossing one particular such desert.

Charles??s distinguishing trait. All but two of the others were drowned. ever to inhabit nature again; and that made him sad. . It seemed to him that he had hardly arrived. Dr. Poulteney looked somewhat abashed then before the girl??s indignation. for she is one of the more celebrated younger English film actresses. very subtly but quite unmistakably..The mid-century had seen a quite new form of dandy appear on the English scene; the old upper-class variety. When Charles finally arrived in Broad Street. local residents. No words were needed. ??Doctor??s orders.. order.All except Sarah.????She has saved.?? As ??all the ostlers?? comprehended exactly two persons. she went on. dressed only in their piteous shifts. cradled to the afternoon sun.??Sam. of her behavior.????I am not quite clear what you intend. Let us return to it. people of some taste.

Mary had modestly listened; divined this other Sam and divined that she was honored to be given so quick a sight of it... But he had hardly taken a step when a black figure appeared out of the trees above the two men. It has also.. dumb. Yellow ribbons and daffodils. as well as outer. in the form of myxomatosis. Self-confidence in that way he did not lack??few Cockneys do. he most legibly had.?? He pressed her hand and moved towards the door. pray???Sam??s expression deepened to the impending outrage. sir. But I do not know how to tell it. Many younger men.. But it was not so in 1867.??And now Grogan. but to certain trivial things he had said at Aunt Tranter??s lunch. just con-ceivably. Thus it was that she slipped on a treacherous angle of the muddied path and fell to her knees.??The vicar felt snubbed; and wondered what would have happened had the Good Samaritan come upon Mrs. why should we deny to others what has made us both so happy? What if this wicked maid and my rascal Sam should fall in love? Are we to throw stones???She smiled up at him from her chair. Charles felt a great desire to reach out and take her shoul-ders and shake her; tragedy is all very well on the stage. Heaven help the maid seen out walking. am I???Charles laughed.

not through any desire on Sarah??s part to kill the subject but simply because of the innocent imposition of simplicity or common sense on some matter that thrived on the opposite qualities. dear aunt. in spite of Mrs. doctor of the time called it Our-Lordanum.??In such circumstances I know a . and the couple continued down the Cobb.?? She was silent a moment.. And with His infinite compassion He will??????But supposing He did not?????My dear Mrs. He smiled. the solemn young paterfamili-as; then smiled indulgently at his own faces and euphoria; poised. the cart track to the Dairy and beyond to the wooded common was a de facto Lover??s Lane. a thoroughly human moment in which Charles looked cautiously round. as if. Tranter??s called; but the bowl of milk shrieked . Having duly inscribed a label with the date and place of finding. but could not; would speak. and loves it. ??Doctor??s orders. I know where you stay. Her color was high. I had run away to this man. if you speak like this I shall have to reprimand you.. I fear the clergy have a tremendous battle on their hands. parturitional. It had three fires.?? She looked down at her hands.

she gave the faintest smile. whom she knew would be as congenial to Charles as castor oil to a healthy child. Besides he was a very good doctor. I cannot bear the thought. But since this tragic figure had successfully put up with his poor loneliness for sixty years or more. Speaker. as confirmed an old bachelor as Aunt Tranter a spinster.??From Mr. and there were many others??indeed there must have been. that the Poulteney con-tingent in Lyme objected merely to the frivolous architecture of the Assembly Rooms.??Miss Sarah was present at this conversation. it was to her a fact as rock-fundamental as that the world was round or that the Bishop of Exeter was Dr. she would find his behavior incomprehensible and be angry with him; at best. Is anyone else apprised of it?????If they knew. Poulteney??s that morning. she understood??if you kicked her. one foggy night in London. Did not see dearest Charles.????Get her away. yet a mutinous guilt. ??A very strange case. and disapproving frowns from a sad majority of educated women. and looked at it as if his lips might have left a sooty mark. Talbot knew French no better than he did English..??But Sarah fell silent then and her head bowed. Tranter would like??is most anxious to help you. I am afraid) and returning with pretty jokes about Cupid and hearts and Maid Marian.

Tests vary in shape. ??You will reply that it is troubled.Having duly admired the way he walked and especially the manner in which he raised his top hat to Aunt Tranter??s maid. and then by mutual accord they looked shyly away from each other. I know he would have wished??he wishes it so. He was more like some modern working-class man who thinks a keen knowledge of cars a sign of his social progress.??I have come to bid my adieux. In a moment he returned and handed a book to Charles. How for many years I had felt myself in some mysterious way condemned??and I knew not why??to solitude. Her eyes were anguished . the mind behind those eyes was directed by malice and resentment. Sun and clouds rapidly succeeded each other in proper April fashion.??Charles understood very imperfectly what she was trying to say in that last long speech. though whether that was as a result of the migraine or the doctor??s conversational Irish reel. in short. at the end. And then suddenly put a decade on his face: all gravity. and dropped it. One of her nicknames. All was supremely well. It took his mind off domestic affairs; it also allowed him to take an occasional woman into his bed. the celebrated Madame Bovary. ran to her at the door and kissed her on both cheeks.Charles did not know it. Poulteney to condemn severely the personal principles of the first and the political ones of the second);* then on to last Sunday??s sermon. Nothing in the house was allowed to be changed. humorous moue. Sam felt he was talking too much.

which came down to just above her ankles; a lady would have mounted behind.. the nightmare begins. and the vicar had been as frequent a visitor as the doctors who so repeatedly had to assure her that she was suffering from a trivial stomach upset and not the dreaded Oriental killer. without close relatives.?? said Charles. . between us is quite impossible in my present circumstances. did not revert into Charles??s hands for another two years. just as the simple primroses at Charles??s feet survived all the competition of exotic conserva-tory plants. if not appearance.??She looked up at him again then. and if mere morality had been her touchstone she would not have behaved as she did??the simple fact of the matter being that she had not lodged with a female cousin at Weymouth. Only the eyes were more intense: eyes without sun. An act of despair. and returned to Mrs. And there was her reserve.?? There was another silence.Forty minutes later. a kind of artless self-confidence. the difference in worth. was always also a delicate emanation of mothballs. dark eyes. In short. Come. In one place he had to push his way through a kind of tunnel of such foliage; at the far end there was a clearing. as if she saw Christ on the Cross before her. The big house in Belgravia was let.

bobbing a token curtsy. I told her so. He sensed that Mrs.????It is beyond my powers??the powers of far wiser men than myself??to help you here. Grogan??s tongue flickered wickedly out. I can??t hide that. and said in a lower voice. I knew that by the way my inquiry for him was answered.?? was the very reverse. with lips as chastely asexual as chil-dren??s. since the values she computed belong more there than in the mind. The world is only too literally too much with us now. ??Do not misunderstand me.??But Sarah fell silent then and her head bowed. He banned from his mind thoughts of the tests lying waiting to be discovered: and thoughts. and then to a compro-mise: a right of way was granted. especially from the back. but to certain trivial things he had said at Aunt Tranter??s lunch. rigidly disapproving; yet in his eyes a something that searched hers . Now he stared again at the two small objects in her hands.Dr. so to speak.??A crow floated close overhead. to Mrs. But it was an unforgettable face. he decided to call at Mrs. My hand has been several times asked in marriage. She stood pressed sideways against the sharp needles.

It was not only that she ceased abruptly to be the tacit favorite of the household when the young lady from London arrived; but the young lady from London came also with trunkfuls of the latest London and Paris fashions. Her weeping she hid. That is all.??So they began to cross the room together; but halfway to the Early Cretaceous lady. it is because I am writing in (just as I have assumed some of the vocabulary and ??voice?? of) a convention universally accepted at the time of my story: that the novelist stands next to God. I have known Mrs. We could not expect him to see what we are only just beginning??and with so much more knowledge and the lessons of existentialist philosophy at our disposal??to realize ourselves: that the desire to hold and the desire to enjoy are mutually destructive.An easterly is the most disagreeable wind in Lyme Bay?? Lyme Bay being that largest bite from the underside of England??s outstretched southwestern leg??and a person of curiosity could at once have deduced several strong probabili-ties about the pair who began to walk down the quay at Lyme Regis. For Charles. She left his home at her own request. He told me he was to be promoted captain of awine ship when he returned to France. His statement to himself should have been. Poulteney felt only irritation. I hope so; those visions of the contented country laborer and his brood made so fashionable by George Morland and his kind (Birket Foster was the arch criminal by 1867) were as stupid and pernicious a sentimentalization.. and the real Lymers will never see much more to it than a long claw of old gray wall that flexes itself against the sea. and saw the waves lapping the foot of a point a mile away. There was no artifice there.?? She stared out to sea. glanced at him with a smile. The vicar resigned himself to a pagan god??that of chance. and from which he could plainly orientate him-self. and Captain Talbot wishes me to suggest to you that a sailor??s life is not the best school of morals.Fairley.??So the vicar sat down again. He winked again; and then he went. ??I thank you. he spent a great deal of time traveling.

already been fore-stalled. now swinging to another tack. ??Do not misunderstand me. desolation??could have seemed so great. perhaps not untinged with shame. He unbuttoned his coat and took out his silver half hunter. He could not be angry with her. No one will see us. it was very unlikely that the case should have been put to the test. He was well aware.Charles called himself a Darwinist. but on foot this seemingly unimportant wilderness gains a strange extension. She must have heard the sound of his nailed boots on the flint that had worn through the chalk. touching tale of pain. with a quick and elastic step very different from his usual languid town stroll.?? ??The History of the NovelForm. I don??t give a fig for birth. the brave declaration qualified into cowardice... I understand you have excellent qualifications. but candlelight never did badly by any woman. In the winter (winter also of the fourth great cholera onslaught on Victori-an Britain) of that previous year Mrs.. Poulteney??s solemn warnings to that lady as to the foolhardiness of harboring such proven dissoluteness. stood like a mountainous shadow behind the period; but to many??and to Charles??the most significant thing about those distant rumblings had been their failure to erupt. the deficiencies of the local tradesmen and thence naturally back to servants. if Romeo had not mercifully appeared on the scene that previ-ous winter.

Lyell??s Principles of Geology.Now Ernestina had seen the mistake of her rivals: that no wife thrown at Charles??s head would ever touch his heart. The relations of one??s dependents can become so very tiresome. a withdrawnness.. She had given considerable sums to the church; but she knew they fell far short of the prescribed one-tenth to be parted with by serious candidates for paradise. You imagine perhaps that she would have swollen. for friends. as at the concert. since there are crevices and sudden falls that can bring disaster. of course.?? Still Sarah was silent. in fact. It was this that had provoked that smoth-ered laugh; and the slammed door.????I trust you??re using the adjective in its literal sense. He most wisely provided the girl with a better education than one would expect.????I had nothing better to do. The name of the place? The Dairy. black and white and coral-red. No doubt the Channel breezes did her some good. alone. of an intelligence beyond conven-tion. but her skin had a vigor. She. an added sweet. or address the young woman in the street. finally escorted the ladies back to their house. Tranter only a very short time.

her back to Sarah. You imagine perhaps that she would have swollen. ??Monsieur Varguennes was a person of consider-able charm. Be ??appier ??ere. However. but it would be most improper of me to . two others and the thumb under his chin.. Mrs. for loved ones; for vanity.????Do you contradict me. You must not think I speak of mere envy. Mrs. These characters I create never existed outside my own mind.?? The vicar stood.????How romantic. They could not conceal an intelligence.. and made his way back to where he had left his rucksack. as the poet says. for Sarah had begun to weep towards the end of her justification. and completely femi-nine; and the suppressed intensity of her eyes was matched by the suppressed sensuality of her mouth. unopened. I loved little Paul and Virginia.????But was he not a Catholic???Mrs. A strong nose. .?? He jerked his thumb at the window.

??I will not have French books in my house. Sam. A distant woodpecker drummed in the branches of some high tree. some possibility she symbolized. But thirty years had passed since Pickwick Papers first coruscated into the world. Miss Woodruff went to Weymouth in the belief that she was to marry.????Oh.??The doctor nodded vehemently. then bent to smell it. ??Permit me to insist??these matters are like wounds. Once there. she was born with a computer in her heart.. to work from half past six to eleven. Poulteney. battledore all the next morning. She should have known better. He retained her hand. It is true that the more republican citizens of Lyme rose in arms??if an axe is an arm. I have never been to France.The China-bound victim had in reality that evening to play host at a surprise planned by Ernestina and himself for Aunt Tranter.??Your future wife is a better judge than you are of such matters. Four years ago my father was declared bankrupt.??Such an anticlimax! Yet Mrs. Failure to be seen at church. but Ernestina would never allow that. stains. a dryness that pleased.

who sometimes went solitary to sleep. sir. the brave declaration qualified into cowardice. she was almost sure she would have mutinied. Disraeli was the type. passed hands. Sarah rose at once to leave the room. And then the color of those walls! They cried out for some light shade. Charles rose and looked out of the window.. Charles!????Very well. Charles was not pleased to note. And as if to prove it she raised her arms and unloosed her hair. ??I know Miss Freeman and her mother would be most happy to make inquiries in London. many years before. one morning only a few weeks after Miss Sarah had taken up her duties. And be more discreet in future. could drive her.. But there was a minute tilt at the corner of her eyelids. indeed he could. of her being unfairly outcast.?? which would have betrayed that he was playing the doctor as well as the gentleman: ??. I find this incomprehensible. Instead of chapter headings. and take her away with him. then said. But the great ashes reached their still bare branches over deserted woodland.

??No doubt such a letter can be obtained. very soon it would come back to him. like all land that has never been worked or lived on by man. The blame is not all his. Many who fought for the first Reform Bills of the 1830s fought against those of three decades later. a lesson.The door was opened by Mary; but Mrs. Grogan??s coming into his house one afternoon and this colleen??s walking towards the Cobb. who had wheedled Mrs. For a moment he was almost frightened; it seemed uncanny that she should appear so silently. that pinched the lips together in condign rejection of all that threatened her two life principles: the one being (I will borrow Treitschke??s sarcastic formulation) that ??Civilization is Soap?? and the other. He found himself like some boy who flashes a mirror??and one day does it to someone far too gentle to deserve such treatment.??Charles smiled back.It was this place. we have paid our homage to Neptune. the celebrated Madame Bovary.Charles suffered this sudden access of respect for his every wish with good humor. I un-derstand.But one day. ancestry??with one ear. There was an antediluvian tradition (much older than Shakespeare) that on Midsummer??s Night young people should go with lanterns. but to be free. That ??divilish bit better?? will be the ruin of this country.?? and again she was silent. miss. its black feathers gleaming. From Mama?????I know that something happened . that I had let a spar that might have saved me drift out of reach.

not specialization; and even if you could prove to me that the latter would have been better for Charles the ungifted scien-tist. who inspires sympathy in others. Her voice had a pent-up harshness. Charles was thus his only heir; heir not only to his father??s diminished fortune??the baccarat had in the end had its revenge on the railway boom??but eventually to his uncle??s very considerable one. but a little more gilt and fanciful. They had left shortly following the exchange described above. She frowned and stared at her deep-piled carpet.. ??Tis the way ??e speaks. Charles said nothing. Was not the supposedly converted Disraeli later heard. this figure evidently had a more banal mission. He sits up and murmurs. the sounds. ??Of course not. Having duly inscribed a label with the date and place of finding. sinking back gratefully into that masculine.Charles produced the piece of ammonitiferous rock he had brought for Ernestina. Charles said nothing. Poulteney should have been an inhabitant of the Victorian valley of the dolls we need not inquire. I did not then know that men can be both very brave and veryfalse. miss. Poulteney.

??and something decidedly too much like hard work and sustained concentration??in authorship. At the time of his wreck he said he was first officer.They saw in each other a superiority of intelligence. That is all. as you will have noticed. Her knell had rung; and Mrs.??He wished he could see her face. I cannot say what she might have been in our age; in a much earlier one I believe she would have been either a saint or an emperor??s mistress. its shadows. But it was better than nothing and thus encouraged. There was the pretext of a bowl of milk at the Dairy; and many inviting little paths. When I was your age .?? Mrs.The lady of the title is a sprightly French lord??s sprightly wife who has a crippling accident out hunting and devotes the rest of her excessively somber life to good works??more useful ones than Lady Cotton??s. exquisitely grave and yet full of an inner. Miss Woodruff. His father had died three months later. watching with a quiet reserve that goaded him. tinkering with crab and lobster pots. it was always with a tonic wit and the humanity of a man who had lived and learned. but did not turn. a darling man and a happy wife and four little brats like angels. Tranter and stored the resul-tant tape.

as he craned sideways down. I ain??t ??alf going to . I too have been looking for the right girl. should he take a step towards her. an oil painting done of Frederick only two years before he died in 1851. Were tiresome. the Dies Irae would have followed.????Since you refused it. since ??Thou shall not wear grenadine till May?? was one of the nine hundred and ninety-nine com-mandments her parents had tacked on to the statutory ten. The Death of a President She stood obliquely in the shadows at the tunnel of ivy??s other end. they seem almost to turn their backs on it. where the large ??family?? Bible??not what you may think of as a family Bible. and then collapse sobbing back onto the worn carpet of her room. to thank you . and even then she would not look at him; instead.????The new room is better?????Yes. nickname. Charles was thus his only heir; heir not only to his father??s diminished fortune??the baccarat had in the end had its revenge on the railway boom??but eventually to his uncle??s very considerable one. It is not only that he has begun to gain an autonomy;I must respect it. you perhaps despise him for his lack of specializa-tion. Charles noted the darns in the heels of her black stockings. Again she glanced up at Charles. whose great keystone.

and the woman who ladled the rich milk from a churn by the door into just what he had imagined. Come. Poulteney??s was pressed into establishing the correct balance of the sexes. His eyes are still closed. countless personal reasons why Charles was unfitted for the agreeable role of pessimist. who made more; for no young male ever set foot in the drawing room of the house overlooking Hyde Park who had not been as well vetted as any modern security department vets its atomic scientists.??But she was still looking up at him then; and his words tailed off into silence. that generous mouth. no hypocrisy. Half Harley Street had examined her. With those that secretly wanted to be bullied. there gravely??are not all declared lovers the world??s fool???to mount the stairs to his rooms and interrogate his good-looking face in the mirror.????Very probably. which communicated itself to him. she was a peasant; and peasants live much closer to real values than town helots. Then he got to his feet and taking the camphine lamp. Ernestina wanted a husband. too. All conspired. All our possessions were sold. Then he moved forward to the edge of the plateau. were very often the children of servants. I do this for your own good.

But the duenna was fast asleep in her Windsor chair in front of the opened fire of her range. and quotations from the Bible the angry raging teeth; but no less dour and relentless a battle. inclined almost to stop and wait for her. There is not a single cottage in the Undercliff now; in 1867 there were several. a dark shadow. I fear I addressed you in a most impolite manner. He smiled and pressed the gloved hand that was hooked lightly to his left arm. ??Let them see what they??ve done. . They served as a substitute for experience.It was an evening that Charles would normally have en-joyed; not least perhaps because the doctor permitted himself little freedoms of language and fact in some of his tales. But before he could ask her what was wrong. He saw that she was offended; again he had that unaccountable sensation of being lanced. something of the automaton about her.??I am most grateful. exquisitely grave and yet full of an inner. Forgive me. . no mask; and above all. by the mid-century. into love.However. but she did not turn.

On the other hand he might.She put the bonnet aside. one wonders. Poulteney. but the figure stood mo-tionless. and directed the words into him with pointed finger. Two poachers. people about him. and with a very loud bang indeed. Ernestina had certainly a much stronger will of her own than anyone about her had ever allowed for??and more than the age allowed for. He knew he would have been lying if he had dismissed those two encounters lightly; and silence seemed finally less a falsehood in that trivial room.For a while they said nothing. She gestured timidly towards the sunlight. But it went on and on. agreed with them. he pursued them ruthlessly; and his elder son pursued the portable trophies just as ruthlessly out of the house when he came into his inheritance. . Sarah appeared in the private drawing room for the evening Bible-reading. because. ??ee woulden want to go walkin?? out with me. But the only music from the deep that night was the murmur of the tide on the shingle; and somewhere much farther out. or the subsequent effects of its later indiscriminate consumption. Grogan??s little remark about the comparative priority to be accorded the dead and the living had germinated.