i
Patricia undressed, still trembling, still with a set face and a false air of coolness. Only when she was in bed was she hysterically filled with anger for herself, and contempt, almost with self-horror. She could not comprehend herself or her own stupidity, so great was her longing for love and understanding.
"Love—yes; but understanding!" He could understand her in happiness—now, at dinner, at the dance. But as she grew older, as she needed guidance and wisdom? Never! That was her thought of Harry, the first wild sweep of anger at his deficiency. "He'd never understand me—never!" And then again she demanded of the silence, striking the pillow with her vehemence: "Why—why—why?" Why had she so shrunk from love? Excuses poured into her mind, the more vehement because she felt them to be invalid. It had been a mood, this rejection of his love. She wasn't accountable for her moods. She said definite things without knowing them to be definite—without meaning them to be definite. It wasn't final. It wasn't. Then self-anger again grew uppermost. "You fool! You little fool!" she cried aloud. Then again: "I'm not ready. I don't know what love is. I only want to be loved. I don't want to love and be loved—not finally, like this; not give myself up to it. Only like a little girl. I don't love him. I felt it. I've just been playing ... I can't love him! If I did, I should be sure. I shouldn't think ... of all this ... of his not ... of my growing out of him.... I should be proud—overwhelmed. I'm not proud. Not overwhelmed. He's only selfish. I could tell. Anybody could have told. The feeling was all wrong. It was.... He's kissed other girls. They were proud—willing.... He wants love in his way—not mine. He can't have it. I'm not sure. I've got to be sure. It's for life. He must give me time. I felt he wouldn't.... And yet I do love him so.... Harry! My dear!" She pressed her lips to her own fingers, kissing them sweetly. "I wanted him to kiss me. I liked it. I wanted it. I wouldn't let him.... How could I be so beastly—so beastly! I couldn't have kissed him. I've thought of it—liked the idea of it. It's the reality—cowardice. Oh, I'm afraid of life. It's all very well to play and dream—lovesick girl. When a man really.... It wouldn't have been right. It wouldn't have been true. It can't be right to feel like this! I'm sophisticated. I want love, and not love,—love and friendship and wisdom and understanding—somebody to understand me; somebody delicate and wise ... beautiful.... I want too much. You can't ask...."
With a mind distraught, she turned upon the pillow, until it grew hot and seemed to rasp her cheeks; and her head ached and her eyes and lips burned and the room seemed overpoweringly full of stale air. She could see the darkness out of doors, and hear the wind tearing and pressing in wild gusts out of doors, and soot whispering down the chimney, like mice foraging in a newspaper. The wooden rod at the foot of the hanging linen blind knocked against the casement until she was frenzied; and she rose passionately to draw the blind to its full height, out of the draught. Standing there in the darkness she could feel the cold air upon her raised arm and her breast, and in a moment through her thin nightgown. And all the time her lips were drawn back and down in this great distress and self-blame which had come suddenly into her blithe days. And she realised that it had all been implicit in her blitheness, that only a young girl could have supposed that the postponement could go on for as long as her delight in it was maintained.
"If only I had something to drink I should feel better!" cried Patricia, on an impulse. She went to the washstand, and the carafe was empty. The water-jug was empty. Lucy had forgotten to fill it. Even here the catastrophe was a futility, a humiliation, a further exasperation. She was maddened. She was shaken and jangled. Rage swept her. "Oh, damn!" she cried. "Everything! It's awful!"
With her hands in her mouth, Patricia turned back towards the bed, and leant against the foot of it; and sobs shook her body, so bitterly that she was afraid her crying would be overheard, and crept back to bed to cover herself and stifle the noise. It was the great strong dreadful crying of a little girl who had been disappointed of some dearest wish. It was not a woman's crying at all. It was the result of shock and self-contempt; but it was not the heartbreaking sorrow of the hopeless woman. Patricia would yet laugh again—would laugh, perhaps even at herself. But now she could see only her own cowardice, and she was in despair.
Presently the crying ceased, and Patricia began to talk to herself, very softly, as a little girl who has been desperately unhappy will sometimes do; and because there was nobody in the world to comfort her she began to try and comfort herself, speaking between small spasmodic sobs, and explaining and cheering, as the mother she could not remember might have done. It was poor cheer; but it gradually began to soothe her. And at last, lingeringly, in pity for herself at having nobody to console her for ignorance and uncertainty, Patricia began refreshingly to cry. Long afterwards, while it was still dark, she fell asleep.