He was standing in profile, listening, with his head inclined; like a person suffering from deafness; and pointing towards her his upheld questioning finger; a German classmaster.
“I don’t know.”
“Then you will. That’s settled?” She murmured a speculative promise, lazily, a comment on his taut, strung-up bearing. What, to him, if she did or didn’t?
“That’s agreed then. You camp here,” he dropped neatly into the chair between hers and Miss Prout’s, his face hidden behind the frill of its canopy, “for the morning.” He looked out and round at her, flushed and grinning. “I want you to,” he murmured, “now don’t you go and forget.”
“All right,” she beamed ... the hours he was wasting spinning out his mysterious drama ... “wild horses shan’t move me.” He did not want her society. But it was miles more than wildly interesting enough that he wished to avoid being alone with Miss Prout. But then why not dump her as he always did guests he had run through, on to Alma? He left her a moment for reflections, wound them up with a husky chuckle and began on one of his improvisations; paying her in advance ... putting in time.... She listened withheld, drawing the weft of his words through the surrounding picture, watching it enlivened, with fresher colours and stronger outlines ... a pause, the familiar lifting tone and the drop, into a single italic phrase; one of his destructive conclusions. His voice went on, but she had seized the hard glittering thread, rending it, and watched the developing bright pattern coldly, her opposition ready phrased for the next break. She could stay forever like this, watching his thought; thrusting in remarks, making him reconsider. But Miss Prout was coming. There would be a morning of improvisations with no chance of arresting him. It was only when they were alone that he would take opposition seriously, not turning it into materials for spirals of wit, where nobody could stand against him. The whole morning, hearing him and Miss Prout chant their duet about people ... helped out no doubt by the presence of an apparently uncritical audience.... I’m hanged if I will....
“I must have a book or something. I’ll get a book,” she said, rising. He peeped out, as if weighing her suggestion.
“All right.... Get a book.... But come back?”
“Eurasians are different,” she said. “Have you ever known any; really well.”
“Never known anybody, Miriam. Take back everything I ever said. Get your book and come out with it.”
On her way back she heard his voice, high; words broken and carried along by a squeal of laughter. They were at it already, reducing everything to absurdity. Turning the corner she found them engrossed, sitting close at right angles, Miss Prout leaning forward, her embroidery neglected on her knee. It was monstrous to break in.... She wandered up and down the terrace, staring at the various views, catching his eye upon her as she went to and fro; almost deciding to depart and leave him to his fate. If he was engrossed he was engrossed. If not, he shouldn’t pretend to be. When she was at a distance their voices fell, low short sentences, sounding set and colourless; but intimate.