But Ted's notion of morality was a question Audrey had no time to go into. A violent ring at the front-door bell recalled her to herself, and made her glance at the clock. It was a quarter-past three. She had wasted half an hour in fruitless discussion with Ted, and it left her ill-prepared for the stormy interview to follow. Her nerve gave way before the prospect of that hour with Hardy. She might have escaped it if it had not been for Ted, for she had meant to call early on her uncle and aunt, and bring them back with her to Chelsea, so that it would be impossible for Vincent to see her alone. Ted's coming had made that scheme useless. She listened. Yes, it was Vincent; she had heard his voice in the hall.
"I told him between three and four. Anybody else would have known that meant half-past four."
She spent ten minutes after Hardy was announced gathering herself together to meet him. She would have thought of sending for Miss Craven, an old device of hers when she wanted to avoid explanations; but Miss Craven was away. Her only hope was in some casual caller.
Meanwhile Hardy was striding up and down the drawing-room, waiting impatiently for Audrey. He was a little hurt at being shown into an empty room; he had expected to find the small thing sitting there to welcome him. That ten minutes was the longest he had ever spent,—it was the meeting-point in time for two eternities. As his thought leaped forward to the future it was thrown back upon the past. Then, as he gazed about him half mechanically, he was aware that his eyes were looking for the things they had been used to, and could not find them. Everything was changed in that room he had run in and out of as a boy. The familiar furniture, the signs and tokens of Audrey's daily presence, the old-fashioned knick-knacks which had delighted her mother's heart, all were gone. His aunt's portrait was no longer there; in its place hung the photogravure of the Madonna di San Sisto. Instead of the cosy corner where he had lain at Audrey's feet his last night in England, there stood a polished rosewood secretary, thrown open, showing its empty pigeon-holes. Everywhere he looked it was the same; there were new things all around him. If he could have read their secret he would have seen that that room was the picture of Audrey's soul; the persons who had by turns taken possession of it had left there each one the traces of his power. If you could have cut a vertical section through Audrey's soul, you would have found it built up in successive layers of soul. When you had dug through Wyndham, you came to Ted; when you had got through Ted, you came upon Hardy, the oldest formation of all. The room was instructive as a museum filled with the records of these changes. But the specimens were badly arranged, recent deposits lying side by side with relics of an earlier period: thus the floor was covered with the bearskin given by Hardy and the Persian rugs laid down during the Art age. The rosewood secretary and a little revolving book-case by Audrey's chair marked the change wrought by Wyndham. They were part of modern history and the memory of man. Hardy, in the midst of these curiosities of natural science, was like a lay visitor without a guide: he admired, he wondered, he recognised an object here and there, but of what it all meant he had not the ghost of an idea.
He left off wondering, and waited, listening for the feet that used to fall so lightly on the stairs.
At last the door opened softly, and Audrey stood before him. But she stood still, looking at him as if uncertain whether to go or stay.
"Audrey!" His face lit up with joy, his heart bounded.
"How do you do, Vincent?"
He held out his arms, and she came to him slowly, without a word. She let him hold her for an instant, closing her eyes to hide the fear in them; let him lift her veil and kiss her cheeks and mouth. Then she turned her face away, put out her hands against his chest, and pushed him from her.
"Audrey! What have I done?"