‘No, thank you, Judith. I feel I don’t want any lunch. I’d rather go straight on and perhaps have a cup of tea later.’
‘Mabel, you’re to come with me.’
She came. But as often as not she laid down her fork after one mouthful and sat and stared in front of her; then crept back to the library.
The copper bowl was filled this term with golden tulips or with dark brown wallflowers.
Where was Jennifer?
Examination week. The sky was fiercely blue all day; the air breathless, heavy. To walk into the town was to walk into a steam bath, where footsteps moved ever more languidly, and the dogs lay panting on the pavement, and the clocks seemed to collect themselves with a vast effort for their chiming.
This week there was nothing in your mind save the machine which obeyed you smoothly, turning out dates and biographies, contrasting, discussing, theorizing.
Judith walked in a dream among the pale examination faces that flowed to their doom. Already at nine o’clock the heat struck up from the streets, rolled downwards from the roofs. By midday it would be extremely unpleasant in Cambridge.
This was the great examination hall. Girls were filing in, each carrying a glass of water, and searching in a sort of panic for her place. Here was a white ticket labelled Earle, J. So Judith Earle really was expected, an integral part of this grotesque organized unreality. No hope now.
The bench was hard. Beside her sat a kind broad cow-like creature with sandy hair and lashes. Her ruminative and prominent eyes shed pity and encouragement. She was a good omen.