"Certainly, if you like. I don't really imagine that she'll have any use for it, though."
"We'll see." He dismissed the subject with a smile. It pleased him to be quite brief and businesslike. As the party broke up and the guests dispersed he was busy, in a half-conscious sort of way, constructing a vision of him and his whole future life on this scheme; irretrievably blighted in his own career he would devote himself to doing helpful little services for people he liked, without thought of other reward than the satisfaction of performing them.
Sustained by this vision he embarked quite fearlessly and efficiently on a tête-à-tête with Beatrice before going to bed that night. He made the suggestion to her that he had told Madge he would make, and was pleased to find that Beatrice welcomed it warmly.
Once in bed, with the light turned out and absolute quiet reigning throughout the house, of course disturbing things did force their way into his brain. It was bound to be that way, of course; had it not been that way for the past ten months? Fears, pains, doubts, memories, regrets—all passed in their accustomed procession before his mind's eye, gradually growing dimmer and fewer as drowsiness came on and at last dwindling to occasional mental pictures, as of a characteristic gesture, a look, a smile. A humorous little smile, for instance, suggestive of mutual understanding....
Jove, that was a funny thing! He sat up in bed, shaking off his sleepiness and subjecting his mental vision to the test of conscious reason. That was Madge's smile that he had just seen, not Beatrice's; it was all there, the different position, the eyes, the hair and everything; all complete and unmistakable. Well, it was strange what a heavy dinner could do to a man—that, and a glass of champagne!
CHAPTER V
A SCHÖNE SEELE ON PISGAH
More than four years have elapsed before we see James Wimbourne again.
Time has dealt easily with him, as far as appearances are concerned. No periods of searching care have imprinted their lines upon his face; no rending sorrow has dimmed the sweetness of its expression. No one could even be tempted to say that he had begun to grow stout. And if his face is a trifle thinner and more firmly molded than of old, if he has a more settled manner of sinking back in to a club chair, if he takes rather more time to get through the evening newspaper, or if, after the manner of many ex-athletes, he is inclined to become fidgety and bilious unless he has exactly the proper amount of physical exercise—well, who ever reaches his late twenties without showing similar preliminary symptoms of age; not so much the first stages of the process of ageing as indications of what the process will be like when it begins in earnest?