I wonder, how long it will take for my little love to come voluntarily into my arms?——?
XIX
Saturday:
I wonder how long I shall go on writing in this Journal? I suppose once I should be happy it would not be necessary; well the moment has not yet come, in spite of my being the fiancé of the woman I desire.
At ten o'clock I was waiting for her in the sitting-room, and I was thinking of that other time when I waited in anxiety, in case she did not return at all. I was very excited, but it was more the exhilaration I used to feel when we were going to have some stunning marauding expeditions over No-Man's Land. The old zest was in my veins.
I heard Alathea's ring, and after she had taken off her hat she came into the room. I believed that her anxieties must be assuaged because George Harcourt had telephoned late on Thursday night to say that he had been successful, and that he had four thousand francs to hand back to me, the affair having been concluded for twenty-six thousand. So what was my surprise to see Alathea's face below her glasses more woebegone than ever! At first it gave me a stab of pain. Does she really hate me so? She did not mention the money, so I wonder if it is that she does not yet know her father is cleared? I bowed as coldly as I used always to do, and she asked me if I had a chapter ready for her to type? I answered that I had not, because I had been too busy with other things to have composed anything.
"I think we had better discuss the necessary arrangements for our marriage before we can settle down to our old work," I said.
"Very well."