Somewhere down the street a gramophone was jigging out a lively tune, and Dodo stole forth, making a pretext to herself that she wanted to observe the stars of which there was a great number to-night, but she knew that she longed to be near human movement again. A rhythmical thump accompanied the gramophone's shrillness, and she wondered if there might happen to be a little dancing going on. She soon localised the sound; there was a room facing the street with curtains discreetly drawn, so as to conform with the lighting order, but the thump of feet went gaily on inside. She forgot about the stars; they belonged to that steadfast imperishable thing called Nature that could be appealed to when you were tired. A dance to the wheezings of a gramophone, with the handsome girls of the village and the boys back on leave from France had become far more enthralling than Bleichroder's "Birds" lying open on her table in the inn, or the wheeling heavens above her. There she lingered, rather like the Ancient Mariner without a wedding-guest to whom she might soliloquise.
Jack arrived on Saturday night, and next morning Dodo seemed to feel that what she called a "picnic-service" on the beach would be rather a treat instead of going to church. Accordingly they took out a Bible and Prayer Book, and Dodo, whose bent was not strictly ecclesiastical, read a quantity of chapters out of Ecclesiastes for a first lesson and for a second lesson the chapter out of Corinthians which the Church had mistakenly appointed for Quinquagesima. Then she read the twenty-third Psalm, and rapidly turned over the next leaves.
"There's at least one more," she said, "and I can't find it. It's about the House of Defence and the satisfaction of a long life."
"Try the ninety-first," said Jack.
"Darling, how clever of you. I never had a head for numbers. After that we'll talk; I'm beginning to want to talk dreadfully."
Dodo read her psalms quite beautifully, and lay back on the warm shingle.
"Oh, Jack, I feel so clean and washed," she said. "These weeks which I've had quite alone have been like a lovely cold bath on a hot day, or, if you like, a lovely hot bath after a cold day. I'm beginning to see what they have done for me, besides resting me. I think people and things are meant to cure each other."
"How?" asked Jack.
"Well, take my case. I was absolutely Fed Up with people, human beings, when I came here. You see, ill human beings are concentrated human beings. All the material side of them is exaggerated; you only think of them as bones to be mended and flesh to be healed. My soul got so sick of them, and when I came here I wanted never to see anybody again. Nor did I want to think any more; that I suppose was mere fatigue. The whole caboodle—living, I mean—wasn't worth the bother it gave one. Are you following, darling, or are you only thinking about those pebbles which you are piling so beautifully on the top of each other?"