He was then in his right company—explorers one and all. Whereas here?—Now? Had he ever been happy at The Roundabout except during the first year, and afterwards when Stephen came? And was not that, too, the explanation of young Stephen's happiness upon the arrival of Mr. Zanti and Brant? Did he not recognise them for what they were, explorers? He being a young explorer himself.
On the other side Mrs. Rossiter, Clare, Cards, old Bobby who in spite of his affection never understood half the things that Peter did or said, the Galleons, old Mrs. Galleon and Percival and his sister?... Had Henry Galleon known that dividing-line and suffered under it all his life, and borne it and perhaps conquered it?
And Peter suddenly, standing at his window watching London caught by the evening light, saw for an instant his work in front of him again. London with her towers, her roofs and chimneys—smoke and mist and haze weaving a web—and then beneath it, humming, buzzing, turning, all the lives, all the comedies, all the tragedies—Kings and princes, guttersnipes and duchesses, politicians and newsboys, criminals and saints—
Waiting, that golden top, for some hand to set it humming.
In that moment Peter Westcott, aged twenty-nine, with a book just behind him that had been counted on every side the most dismal of failures, saw himself the English Balzac, saw London open like a book at his feet, saw heaven and all its glories... himself the one and only begetter of a thousand masterpieces!
But the sun set—the towers and roofs and chimneys were coldly grey, a ragged wind rose through the branches of the orchard, dark clouds hid the risen moon, newsboys were crying a murder in Whitechapel.
“I hate this house,” Peter said, turning away from the window, into a room crowded now with dusk.
III
It was the first of May, and the day before Clare's birthday. It was one of the most beautiful days of the year, with a hint of summer in its light and shadow, a shimmer of golden sun shaking through the trees in the orchard, flung from there on to the windows of The Roundabout, to dance in twisting lines along the floors and across the walls.
All doors and windows seemed to be open; the scent of flowers—a prophecy of pinks and roses where as yet there were none—flooded the little Chelsea streets.