She could not understand it, and she felt as if she had been inconsistent with her constant professions of wariness in self-revelation.
‘It is an illusion, nevertheless—an illusion of the senses. It is difficult to make what I mean clear, because insight is not possible beyond a certain point, and clearness does not come until penetration is complete and what we acquire is brought into a line with other acquisitions. It constantly happens that we are arrested short of this point, but it would be wrong to suppose that our conclusions, if we may call them so, are of no value.’
She was silent, and he did not go on. At last he said,—
‘The illusion lies in supposing that number, quantity and terms of that kind are applicable to any other than sensuous objects, but I cannot go further, at least not now. After all, it is possible here in London for one atom to be of eternal importance to another.’
They had gone quite round Bedford Square without entering Great Russell Street, which was the way eastwards. A drunken man was holding on by the railings of the Square. He had apparently been hesitating for some time whether he could reach the road, and, just as Baruch and Clara came up to him, he made a lurch towards it, and nearly fell over them. Clara instinctively seized Baruch’s arm in order to avoid the poor, staggering mortal; they went once more to the right, and began to complete another circuit. Somehow her arm had been drawn into Baruch’s, and there it remained.
‘Have you any friends in London?’ said Baruch.
‘There are Mrs Caffyn, her son and daughter, and there is Mr A. J. Scott. He was a friend of my father.’
‘You mean the Mr Scott who was Irving’s assistant?’
‘Yes.’
‘An addition—’ he was about to say, ‘an additional bond’ but he corrected himself. ‘A bond between us; I know Mr Scott.’