Once, indeed, during
the evening, when he had played for her, the veil had lifted and for the
drowsy ache he had the sunlit, stabbing pang; but, as he left, the veil
dropped again, and he let himself into the big, mute house, sorry that
he had left it. In the same way, too, his music was in abeyance: he
could not concentrate himself or find it worth while to make the effort
to absorb himself in it, and he knew that short of that, there was
neither profit nor pleasure for him in his piano. Everything seemed
remote compared with the immediate foreground: there was a gap, a gulf
between it and all the rest of the world.
His father wrote to him from time to time, laying stress on the extreme
importance of all he was doing in the country, and giving no hint of his
coming up to town at present. But he faintly adumbrated the time when
in the natural course of events he would have to attend to his national
duties in the House of Lords, and wondered whether it would not (about
then) be good for his wife to have a change, and enjoy the country
when the weather became more propitious. Michael, with an excusable
unfilialness, did not answer these amazing epistles; but, having basked
in their unconscious humour, sent them on to Aunt Barbara.
Pages:
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301