In death nor life, nor in dream or deed.
Algernon Charles Swinburne: “The Triumph of Time.”
Ivy always appeared so punctually that, on the morning after their return from Croxton, Eric was first surprised and then disquieted when nine o’clock, half-past nine and ten struck and there was still no sign of her. His hand was stretched to the telephone, when she came in breathless and apologetic.
“I couldn’t get here before. Don’t be angry with me, Eric,” she begged, as she took off her gloves and hat.
“I was only getting rather anxious,” he answered. “There’s nothing the matter, is there, Ivy?”
“No. Yes. No... I ran into Johnnie opposite Buckingham Palace, and he insisted on walking across the Park with me. That’s what made me late. We sat and talked. I thought it best to thresh the thing out once and for all and to have done with it.”
The brisk voice and businesslike manner were not wholly convincing; as she smoothed her hair, Eric saw that she was flushed and still out of breath.
“What did he say?,” he asked.
“Oh, he told me he could explain everything, and I’d promised to marry him, and he wanted to marry me, and I’d got to marry him... He was frightfully in earnest. He said I was the only girl he’d ever cared for in the least; and I hadn’t been reasonable, wanting to marry when he hadn’t anything to marry on and then making a quarrel out of it. He vowed that he’d never have looked at that woman or at any other woman, if I hadn’t refused to see him. I did, you know; I wanted to punish him, so I wouldn’t have him near me for a month; it was during that time that I found out... He said that, after all we’d been to each other, I must marry him, I couldn’t marry any one else, I was practically married to him already... I said I couldn’t discuss it with him. But I wish he didn’t take it so seriously... Let’s get to work, Eric; I don’t want to think about it.”
She shivered slightly and took her note-book and pencil from a drawer. Eric turned to his letters without saying anything more. She had grown suddenly pale, and her hands were trembling; obviously unfit for work, she was still less fit for sitting still and brooding... Since Gaymer had clearly contrived this meeting, he meant business; there was nothing more likely than that he would contrive a second and third. Eric stopped in the middle of a letter and looked out of the window, but the street was empty.