"By God! I've had a stroke!" and he got out of his chair to test his legs. . . . But he hadn't had a stroke. It must then, he thought, be that the pain of his last consideration must be too great for his mind to register, as certain great physical pains go unperceived. Nerves, like weighing machines, can't register more than a certain amount, then they go out of action. A tramp who had had his leg cut off by a train had told him that he had tried to get up, feeling nothing at all. . . . The pain comes back though . . .
He said to Mrs. Wannop, who was still talking:
"I beg your pardon. I really missed what you said."
Mrs. Wannop said:
"I was saying that that's the best thing I can do for you."
He said:
"I'm really very sorry: it was that that I missed. I'm a little in trouble you know."
She said:
"I know: I know. The mind wanders; but I wish you'd listen. I've got to go to work, so have you. I said: after tea you and Valentine will walk into Rye to fetch your luggage."
Straining his intelligence, for, in his mind, he felt a sudden strong pleasure: sunlight on pyramidal red roof in the distance: themselves descending in a long diagonal, a green hill: God, yes, he wanted open air. Tietjens said: