At Kensington Gardens she descended. If she could get her legs to ache, perhaps her heart would not. And she walked fast between the flowers and the nursemaids, the old ladies and the old gentlemen. But her legs were strong, and Hyde Park Corner came too soon for all but one old Gentleman who had tried to keep pace with her because, at his age, it did him good to be attracted. She crossed to the Green Park and held on. And she despised herself while she walked. She despised herself. She – to whom the heart was such vieux jeu; who had learned, as she thought, to control or outspeed emotions!
She reached home, and it was empty – Michael not in. She went upstairs, ordered herself some Turkish coffee, got into a hot bath, and lay there smoking cigarettes. She experienced some alleviation. Among her friends the recipe had long been recognised. When she could steep herself no more, she put on a wrapper and went to Michael’s study. There was her Golden Apple – very nicely framed. The fruit looked to her extraordinarily uneatable at that moment. The smile in Jon’s eyes, answering that girl’s smile! Another woman’s leavings! The fruit was not worth eating. Sour apples – sour apples ! Even the white monkey would refuse fruit like that. And for some minutes she stood staring instead at the eyes of the ape in that Chinese painting – those almost human eyes that yet were not human because their owner had no sense of continuity. A modern painter could not have painted eyes like that. The Chinese artist of all those centuries ago had continuity and tradition in his blood; he had seen the creature’s restlessness at a sharper angle than people could see it now, and stamped it there for ever.
And Fleur – charming in her jade-green wrapper – tucked a corner of her lip behind a tooth, and went back to her room to finish dressing. She put on her prettiest frock. If she could not have the wish of her heart – the wish that she felt would give her calm and continuity – let her at least have pleasure, speed, distraction, grasp it with both hands, eat it with full lips. And she sat down before her glass to make herself as perfect as she could. She manicured her hands, titivated her hair, scented her eyebrows, smoothed her lips, put on rouge, and the merest dusting of powder, save where the seaside sun had stained her neck.
Michael found her still seated there – a modern masterpiece – almost too perfect to touch.
‘Fleur!’ he said, and nothing more; but any more would have spoiled it.
‘I thought I deserved a night out. Dress quickly, Michael, and let’s dine somewhere amusing, and do a theatre and a club afterwards. You needn’t go to the House this evening, need you?’
He had meant to go but there was in her voice what would have stopped him from affairs even more serious.
Inhaling her, he said:
‘Delicious! I’ve been in the slums. Shan’t be a jiff, darling!’ and he fled.
During the jiffy she thought of him and how good he was; and while she thought, she saw the eyes and the hair and the smile of Jon.
The ‘somewhere amusing’ was a little restaurant full of theatrical folk. Fleur and Michael knew many of them, and they came up, as they passed out to their theatres, and said:
‘How delightful to see you!’ and looked as if they meant it – so strange! But then, theatre folk were like that! They looked things so easily. And they kept saying: ‘Have you seen our show? Oh! You must. It’s just too frightful!’ or, ‘It’s a marvellous play!’ And then, over the other shoulder they would see somebody else, and call out: ‘Ha! How delightful to see you!’ There was no boring continuity about them. Fleur drank a Cocktail and two glasses of champagne. She went out with her cheeks slightly flushed. ‘Dat Lubly Lady’ had been in progress over half an hour before they reached her; but this did not seem to matter, for what they saw conveyed to them no more than what they had not seen. The house was very full, and people were saying that the thing would ‘run for years’. It had a tune which had taken the town by storm, a male dancer whose legs could form the most acute angles, and no continuity whatever. Michael and Fleur went out humming the tune, and took a taxi to the dancing club to which they belonged because it was the thing, rather than because they ever went there. It was a select club, and contained among its members a Cabinet Minister who had considered it his duty. They found a Charleston in progress, seven couples wobbling weak knees at each other in various corners of the room.
‘Gawd!’ said Michael. ‘I do think it’s the limit of vacuity! What’s its attraction?’
‘Vacuity, my dear, this is a vacuous age – didn’t you know?’