This done, he got to his feet (I could hear his heavy breathing), lingered only a moment, then returned to his room, leaving his door ajar.
I came on up the stairs then, walking as heavily as possible, and let myself into my own room here.
I kept silent for quite a time until I heard Sir Robert's door shut. Then I tapped on Heloise's door. Again and again I tapped there, but she would not reply. She is avoiding me, and that is disturbing. Her light went out soon after that.
On looking back, I see that I have spoken of her as sleeping. Since then I have thought, on two occasions, that I have heard her tiptoeing about her room; but for the most part it has been unusually still there. I have wondered if she is out on her balcony; but I dare not look. I shrink from it. For she is avoiding me. She would not answer my tapping on her door—the light, nervous tapping that she knows so well. And one thought stands out in all the dreadful, turbulent confusion of this hour. It is that I must not try to see her if she does not wish to see me.
It is just two o'clock.
I shall not sleep. I shall not even undress. This is not wise of me, I suppose. But it is the way I feel. And I am a creature of feeling now. It would help to pass these dreadful hours if I could go on writing—or if I could read. But she will know it if I do not put out my light. Perhaps she would worry.
So I shall sit here in the dark. Or walk to the window and look out at the sleeping city—at this rich old capital of a peaceful people, who smile languidly at the turbulent West from which I spring (like Crocker and his sorry kind)—who turn from the miseries of actual life to the philosophy of their ancient seers.
Though, come to think of it, I am wrong here. Even gentle, contemplative old China has been drawn from her slumber of the ages into the whirlpool of modern life. I was thinking of the past. I had forgotten. They are carving out a republic here now. Their hands are stained with blood. And the sometimes violent bankers of the Western world sit coldly over them while they struggle.
There is no peace. There is no clear thought. There is only life. Only life.