Other young men he knew had difficulties with their fathers, but to have a father suddenly materialize out of thin air and step back with exasperating ease into a relationship which a part of his family at least had forgotten, was too critical for the mind to bear. René had been priding himself on the fact that at last he was to be as other young men, a wage-earner, a reputable citizen, a prop to his mother, a credit to his family and his own aspirations. And here suddenly he was to begin all over again. His painful emotions were akin to those of a small boy on the arrival of a new baby in his home, or to those of a tit on finding a cuckoo’s monstrous egg in its nest, and, being of a cultivated intelligence, he could not immediately and robustly draw on his instinct to adjust himself to the new circumstances.
He called on George. The Nest was in darkness. He went on hammering at the door until the window above it was thrown open.
“Who’s there?” snarled George. “If it’s the police, the window’s left open for the cat, and I’m damned if I shut it.”
“It’s me—René!”
“What the hell do you want at this time of night?”
“I must see you. Something has happened.”
“What?”
“Come down and let me in.”
He was filled with a cold and shuddering feeling of being ridiculous as he waited. He wanted to run away, but that would have been even more absurd. The chain of the door rattled, the bolts rapped back, and George said:
“Come in. You’ve wakened Elsie, and she’s not at all well.”