“We might,” she said reluctantly. She didn’t want to wait. But what Victoria had told her of Mullumbimby, the township on the South Coast, so appealed to her that she decided to abide by her opportunity.
And then curiously enough, for the next week the neighbours hardly saw one another. It was as if the same wave of revulsion had passed over both sides of the fence. They had fleeting glimpses of Victoria as she went about the house. And when he could, Jack put in an hour at his garden in the evening, tidying it up finally for the winter. But the weather was bad, it rained a good deal; there were fogs in the morning, and foghorns on the harbour; and the Somers kept their doors continually blank and shut.
Somers went round to the shipping agents and found out about boats to San Francisco, and talked of sailing in July, and of stopping at Tahiti or at Fiji on the way, and of cabling for money for the fares. He figured it all out. And Harriet mildly agreed. Her revulsion from Australia had passed quicker than his, now that she saw herself escaping from town and from neighbours to the quiet of a house by the sea, alone with him. Still she let him talk. Verbal agreement and silent opposition is perhaps the best weapon on such occasions.
Harriet would look at him sometimes wistfully, as he sat with his brow clouded. She had a real instinctive mistrust of other people—all other people. In her heart of hearts she said she wanted to live alone with Somers, and know nobody, all the rest of her life. In Australia, where one can be lonely, and where the land almost calls to one to be lonely—and then drives one back again on one’s fellow-men in a kind of frenzy. Harriet would be quite happy, by the sea, with a house and a little garden and as much space to herself as possible, knowing nobody, but having Lovat always there. And he could write, and it would be perfect.
But he wouldn’t be happy—and he said so—and she knew it. She saw it like a doom on his brow.
“And why couldn’t we be happy in this wonderful new country, living to ourselves. We could have a cow, and chickens—and then the Pacific, and this marvellous new country. Surely that is enough for any man. Why must you have more?”
“Because I feel I must fight out something with mankind yet. I haven’t finished with my fellow-men. I’ve got a struggle with them yet.”
“But what struggle? What’s the good? What’s the point of your struggle? And what’s your struggle for?”
“I don’t know. But it’s inside me, and I haven’t finished yet. To make some kind of an opening—some kind of a way for the afterwards.”
“Ha, the afterwards will make its own way, it won’t wait for you. It’s a kind of nervous obstinacy and self-importance in you. You don’t like people. You always turn away from them and hate them. Yet like a dog to his vomit you always turn back. And it will be the same old game here again as everywhere else. What are these people after all? Quite nice, but just common and—and not in your line at all. But there you are. You stick your head into a bush like an ostrich, and think you’re doing wonders.”