Mr. Pellew was selecting a cigar--why does one prefer smoking the best one first?--and was too absorbed to think of anything but "Dessay!" as an answer. His choice completed, he could and did postpone actually striking a match to ask briefly:--"Think anything'll come of it?"
Miss Dickenson, being a lady and non-smoker, could converse consecutively, as usual. "Come of what, Mr. Pellew? Do you mean come of sending Gwen to London to be out of the young man's way, or come of ...
come of the ... the love-affair?"
"Well--whichever you like! Either--both!" The cigar, being lighted, drew well, and the smoker was able to give serious attention. "What do you suppose will be the upshot?"
"Impossible to say! Just look at all the circumstances. She sees him first of all for five minutes in the Park, and then he gets shot. Then she sees him when he's supposed to be dead, just long enough to find out that he's alive. Then she doesn't see him for a fortnight--or was it three weeks? Then she sees him and finds out that his eyesight is destroyed...."
"That's not certain."
"Perhaps not. We'll hope not. She finds out--what she finds out, suppose we say! Then they get left alone at the piano the whole of the afternoon, and ..."
"And all the fat was in the fire?"
"What a coarse and unfeeling way of putting it, Mr. Pellew!"
"Well--_I_ saw it was, the moment I came into the room. So did you, Miss Dickenson! Don't deny it."
"I certainly had an impression they had been precipitate."
"Exactly. Cut along!"
"And then, you know, he was to have gone home next day, and didn't. He was really here four days after that; and, of course, all that time it got worse."
"_They_ got worse?"
"I was referring to their infatuation. It comes to the same thing.
Anyhow, there was plenty of time for it, or for them--which ever one calls it--to get up to fever-heat. Four days is plenty, at their time of life. But the question is, will it last?"
"I should say no!... Well, no--I should say yes!"
"Which?"
"H'm--well, perhaps _no!_ Yes--_no!_ At the same time, the parties are peculiar. He'll last--there's no doubt of that!... And I don't see any changed conditions ahead.... Unless...."
"Unless what?"
"Unless he gets his eyesight again."
"Do you mean that Gwen will put him off, if he sees her?"
"No--come now--I say, Miss Dickenson--hang it all!"
"Well, I didn't know! How was I to?"
Some mysterious change in the conditions of the conversation came about unaccountably, causing a laugh both joined in with undisguised cordiality; they might almost be said to have hob-nobbed over a unanimous appreciation of Gwen. Its effect was towards a mellower familiarity--an expurgation of starch, which might even hold good until one of them wrote an order for some more. For this lady and gentleman, however much an interview might soften them, had always hitherto restiffened for the next one. At this exact moment, Mr. Pellew entered on an explanation of his meaning in a lower key, for seriousness; and walked perceptibly nearer the lady. Because a dropped voice called for proximity.
"What I meant to say was, that pity for the poor chap's misfortune may have more to do with Gwen's feelings towards him--you understand?--than she herself thinks."
"I quite understand. Go on."
"If he were to recover his sight outright there would be nothing left to pity him for. Is it not conceivable that she might change altogether?"
"She would not admit it, even to herself."
"That is very likely--pride and _amour propre_, and that sort of thing!
But suppose that he suspected a change?"
"I see what you mean."
"These affairs are so confoundedly ... ticklish. Heaven only knows sometimes which way the cat is going to jump! It certainly seems to me, though, that the peculiar conditions of this case supply an element of insecurity, of possible disintegration, that does not exist in ordinary everyday life. You must admit that the circumstances are ... are abnormal."
"Very. But don't you think, Mr. Pellew, that circumstances very often _are_ abnormal?--more often than not, I should have said. Perhaps that's the wrong way of putting it, but you know what I mean." Mr. Pellew didn't. But he said he did. He recognised this way of looking at the unusual as profound and perspicuous. She continued, reinforced by his approval:--"What I was driving at was that when two young folks are very--as the phrase goes--spooney, they won't admit that peculiar conditions have anything to do with it. They have always been destined for one another by Fate."
"How does that apply to Gwen and Torrens?"
"Merely that when Mr. Torrens's sight comes back.... What?"
"Nothing. I only said I was glad to hear you say _when_, not _if_. Go on."
"When his sight comes back--unless it comes back very quickly--they will be so convinced they were intended for one another from the beginning of Time, that they won't credit the accident with any share in the business."
"Except as an Agent of Destiny. I think that quite likely. It supplies a reason, though, for not getting his sight back in too great a hurry. How long should you say would be safe?"
"I should imagine that in six months, if it is not broken off, it will have become chronic. At present they are rather ... rather ..."
"Rather underdone. I see. Well--I don't understand that anyone wants to take them off the hob...."
"I think her mother does."
"Not exactly. She only wishes them to stand on separate hobs for three months. They will hear each other simmer. My own belief is that they will be worked up to a sort of frenzy, compared to which those two parties in Dante ... you know which I mean?..."
"Paolo and Francesca?"
Mr. Pellew thought to himself how well enformed Miss Dickenson was. He said aloud:--"Yes, them. Paolo and Francesca would be quite lukewarm--sort of negus!--compared to our young friends. Correspondence is the doose. Not so bad in this case, p'r'aps, because he can't read her letters himself.... I don't know, though--that might make it worse.... Couldn't say!" And he seemed to find that cigar very good, and, indeed, to be enjoying himself thoroughly.
Had Aunt Constance any sub-intent in her next remark? Had it any hinterland of discussion of the ethics of Love, provocative of practical application to the lives of old maids and old bachelors--if the one, then the other, in this case--strolling in a leisurely way through bracken and beechmast, fancy-free, no doubt? If she had, and her companion suspected it, he was not seriously alarmed, this time. But then he was off to London in a couple of hours.
Her remark was:--"You seem to be quite an authority on the subject, Mr.
Pellew."
"No--you don't mean that? Does me a lot of credit, though! Guessin', I am, all through. No experience--honour bright!"
"You don't expect me to believe that, Mr. Pellew?"
"Needn't believe it, unless you like, Miss Dickenson. But it's true, for all that. Never was in love in my life!"
"You must have found life very dull, Mr. Pellew. How a man can contrive to exist without.... Isn't that wheels?" It didn't matter whether it was or not, but the lady's speech had stumbled into a pitfall--she was exploring a district full of them--and she thought the wheels might rescue her.