He walked with her as far as the door of her own house. There she gave him the key of Clytie's secretaire. Mrs. Gurkins kept the room key. He left her and turned homewards, striding along rather fast, eager to execute Clytie's commission. He was filled with a foolish pleasure at her impulsive telegram; touched also at Winifred's implicit obedience and confidence.
“She's a queen among women!”
The silly phrase passed through his mind and he caught himself repeating it with his lips, half aloud.
“Bosh!” he added with some impatience. And he stopped to look in at a shop-window to divert his mind. It was a boot-shop. He ran his eye mechanically over the rows of commonplace, cheap boots, and then it fell upon a little pair of tan shoes, with broad silk laces. Before he realised how his mind was working, a picture rose before him of Clytie wearing a similar pair during the summer trip abroad. He remembered bending down one day when a knot had slipped and retying it for her.
“I am becoming a positive ass!” he said to himself, with an angry jerk away from the window. Then he redoubled his pace, as if in defiance, but the silly phrase rang in his ears:
“She's a queen among women!”
He obtained the key from Mrs. Gurkins, and entered the tenantless room. The blinds were down, the curtains undrawn. It was just dark. He lit the piano candles and looked about him. How dreary the room seemed! The fireless grate, the coverless table (the cloth had been thriftily put away by Mrs. Gurkins), the absence of the feminine litter with which Clytie was wont to strew the room—all made his heart sink for a moment beneath the weight of a great longing. He remembered, too, the room by that dim light—on the evening of Clytie's submission. He saw her again lift her arms to unpin her hat from behind, the proud young figure standing out free as she looked at him half playfully, half seriously, her ripe, full lips parted in a smile. His breath came quickly as a flood of self-knowledge swept over him. He had felt puzzled then—at vague inarticulate desires. Now they were gathering a terribly real, objective shape. He grew dizzy, hot and cold, half terrified at himself.
With shaking fingers he fitted the key in the lock of the secretaire. In the drawer was a heterogeneous collection of odds and ends—letters, keys, ball-programmes, receipted bills—which he had to thrust aside so as to withdraw the little japanned cash-box. As he lifted it out a handkerchief came with it, caught by its lace edge, and after dangling a little fell at his feet. He picked it up, kept it in his hand, soothed at the softness. A faint odour of perfume rose from it, subtle and delicate—the well-known perfume that Clytie always used. It was like an emanation from herself. It grew over his highly strung senses like a breath of her own personality, sweet, intoxicating, overpowering. His brain swam. With a kind of groan he staggered to the sofa, threw himself upon it, burying his face in the little handkerchief, kissing it madly.
Now all was clear, waves of lightning flashing the truth through him. He loved her, passionately, desired her with a passion all the fiercer for its long restraint. Yet he could not think coherently. One thought, one utter realisation, overpowered all others. At last this great surging sex-tumult was sweeping through his veins.
“Oh, my God, I love her! Oh, my God, I love her!” That was all that he could groan out as he lay upon the sofa.