you did or not,there is nothing more certain than that Michael would."
"I am sure he would. But by so doing he would certainly quarrelirrevocably with his people. Even Aunt Barbara, who, after all, is veryliberally minded, sees that. They can none of them, not even she, whoare born to a certain tradition imagine that there are other traditionsquite as stiff-necked. Michael, it is true, was born to one tradition,but he has got the other, as he has shown very clearly by refusing todisobey it. He will certainly, as you say, insist on my endorsing theresolution he has made for himself. What it comes to is this, that Ican't marry him without his father's complete consent to all that I havetold you. I can't have my career disregarded, covered up with awkwardsilences, alluded to as a painful subject; and, as I say, even AuntBarbara seemed to take it for granted that if I became Lady Comber Ishould cease to be Miss Falbe. Well, there she's wrong, my dear; I shallcontinue to be Miss Falbe whether I'm Lady Comber, or Lady Ashbridge,or the Duchess of anything you please. And--here the difficulty reallycomes in--they must all see how right I am. Difficulty, did I say? It'smore like an impossibility."
Hermann threw the end of his cigarette into the ashes of the dying fire.
"It's clear, then," he said, "you have made up your mind not to marryhim."
She shook her head.
"Oh, Hermann, you fail me," she said. "If I had made up my mind not to Ishouldn't have kept you up an hour talking about it."
He stretched his hands out towards the embers already coated with greyash.
"Then it's like that with you," he said, pointing. "If there is the firein you, it is covered up with ashes."
She did not reply for a moment.
"I think you've hit it there," she said. "I believe there is the fire;when, as I said, he plays for me I know there is. But the ashes? Whatare they? And who shall disperse them for me?"
She stood up swiftly, drawing herself to her full height and stretchingher arms out.
"There's something bigger than we know coming," she said. "Whether it'sstorm or sunshine I have no idea. But there will be something that shallutterly sever Michael and me or utterly unite us."
"Do you care which it is?" he asked.
"Yes, I care," said she.
He held out his hands to her, and she pulled him up to his feet.
"What are you going to say, then, when he asks you?" he said.
"Tell him he must wait."
He went round the room putting out the electric lamps and opening thebig skylight in the roof. There was a curtain in front of this, which hepulled aside, and from the frosty cloudless heavens the starshine of athousand constellations filtered down.
"That's a lot to ask of any man," he said. "If you care, you care."
"And if you were a girl you would know exactly what I mean," she said."They may know they care, but, unless they are marrying for perfectlydifferent reasons, they have to feel to the end of their fingers thatthey care before they can say 'Yes.'"
He opened the door for her to pass out, and they walked up the passagetogether arm-in-arm.
"Well, perhaps Michael won't ask you," he said, "in which case allbother will be saved, and we shall have sat up talking till--Sylvia, didyou know it is nearly three--sat up talking for nothing!"
Sylvia considered this.
"Fiddlesticks!" she said.
And Hermann was inclined to agree with her.
This view of the case found confirmation next day, for Michael, afterhis music lesson, lingered so firmly and determinedly when the threechatted together over the fire that in the end Hermann found nothingto do but to leave them together. Sylvia had given him no sign as towhether she wished him to absent himself or not, and he concluded,since she did not put an end to things by going away herself, that sheintended Michael to have his say.
The latter rose as the door closed behind Hermann, and came and stoodin front of her. And at the moment Sylvia could notice nothing of himexcept his heaviness, his plainness, all the things that she had toldherself before did not really matter. Now her sensation contradictedthat; she was conscious that the ash somehow had vastly accumulatedover her fire, that all her affection and regard for him were suddenlyeclipsed. This was a complete surprise to her; for the moment she foundMichael's presence and his proximity to her simply distasteful.
"I thought Hermann was never going," he said.
For a second or two she did not reply; it was clearly no use to continuethe ordinary banter of conversation, to suggest that as the room wasHermann's he might conceivably be conceded the right to stop there if hechose. There was no transition possible between the affairs of every dayand the affair for which Michael had stopped to speak. She gave up allattempt to make one; instead, she just helped him.
"What is it, Michael?" she asked.
Then to her, at any rate, Michael's face completely changed. Thereburned in it all of a sudden the full glow of that of which she had onlyseen glimpses.
"You know," he said.
His shyness, his awkwardness, had all vanished; the time had come forhim to offer to her all that he had to offer, and he did it with thecharm of perfect manliness and simplicity.
"Whether you can accept me or not," he said, "I have just to tell youthat I am entirely yours. Is there any chance for me, Sylvia?"
He stood quite still, making no movement towards her. She, on her side,found all her distaste of him suddenly vanished in the mere solemnity ofthe occasion. His very quietness told her better than any protestationscould have done of the quality of what he offered, and that qualityvastly transcended all that she had known or guessed of him.
"I don't know, Michael," she said at length.
She came a step forward, and without any sense of embarrassmentfound that she, without conscious intention, had put her hands on hisshoulders. The moment that was done she was conscious of the impulsethat made her do it. It expressed what she felt.
"Yes, I feel like that to you," she said. "You're a dear. I expect youknow how fond I am of you, and if you don't I assure you of it now. ButI have got to give you more than that."
Michael looked up at her.
"Yes, Sylvia," he said, "much more than that."
A few minutes ago only she had not liked him at all; now she liked himimmensely.
"But how, Michael?" she asked. "How can I find it?"
"Oh, it's I who have got to find it for you," he said. "That is to say,if you want it to be found. Do you?"
She looked at him gravely, without the tremor of a smile in her eyes.
"What does that mean exactly?" she said.
"It is very simple. Do you want to love me?"
She did not move her hands; they still rested on his shoulders likethings at ease, like things at home.
"Yes, I suppose I want to," she said.
"And is that the most you can do for me at present?" he asked.
That reached her again; all the time the plain words, the plain face,the quiet of him stabbed her with daggers of which he had no idea.She was dismayed at the recollection of her talk with her brother theevening before, of the ease and certitude with which she had laid downher conditions, of not giving up her career, of remaining the famousMiss Falbe, of refusing to take a dishonoured place in the sacredcircle of the Combers. Now, when she was face to face with his love, soineloquently expressed, so radically a part of him, she knew that therewas nothing in the world, external to him and her, that could enter intotheir reckonings; but into their reckonings there had not entered theone thing essential. She gave him sympathy, liking, friendliness, butshe did not want him with her blood. And though it was not humanlypossible that she could want him with more than that, it was notpossible that she could take him with less.
"Yes, that is the most I can do for you at present," she said.
Still quite quietly he moved away from her, so that he stood free of herhands.
"I have been constantly here all these last months," he said. "Now thatyou know what I have told you, do you want not to see me?"
That stabbed her again.
"Have I implied that?" she asked.
"Not directly. But I can easily understand its being a bore to you. Idon't want to bore you. That would be a very stupid way of trying tomake you care for me. As I said, that is my job. I haven't accomplishedit as yet. But I mean to. I only ask you for a hint."
She understood her own feeling better than he. She understood at leastthat she was dealing with things that were necessarily incalculable.
"I can't give you a hint," she said. "I can't make any plans about it.If you were a woman perhaps you would understand. Love is, or it isn't.That is all I know about it."
But Michael persisted.
"I only know what you have taught me," he said. "But you must knowthat."
In a flash she became aware that it would be impossible for her tobehave to Michael as she had behaved to him for several months past.She could not any longer put a hand on his shoulder, beat time with herfingers on his arm, knowing that the physical contact meant nothing toher, and all--all to him. The rejection of him as a lover rendered thesisterly attitude impossible. And not only must she revise her conduct,but she must revise the mental attitude of which it was the physicalcounterpart. Up till this moment she had looked at the situation fromher own side only, had felt that no plans could be made, that thenatural thing was to go on as before, with the intimacy that she likedand the familiarity that was the obvious expression of it. But now shebegan to see the question from his side; she could not go on doingthat which meant nothing particular to her, if that insouciance meantsomething so very particular to him. She realised that if she had lovedhim the touch of his hand, the proximity of his face would have hadsignificance for her, a significance that would have been intolerableunless there was something mutual and secret between them. It had seemedso easy, in anticipation, to tell him that he must wait, so simplefor him just--well, just to wait until she could make up her mind. Shebelieved, as she had told her brother, that she cared for Michael, oras she had told him that she wanted to--the two were to the girl'smind identical, though expressed to each in the only terms that werepossible--but until she came face to face with the picture of thefuture, that to her wore the same outline and colour as the past, shehad not known the impossibility of such a presentment. The desire of thelover on Michael's part rendered unthinkable the sisterly attitude onhers. That her instinct told her, but her reason revolted against it.
"Can't we go on as we were, Michael?" she said.
He looked at her incredulously.
"Oh, no, of course not that," he said.
She moved a step towards him.
"I can't think of you in any other way," she said, as if making anappeal.
He stood absolutely unresponsive. Something within him longed that sheshould advance a step more, that he should again have the touch of herhands on his shoulders, but another instinct stronger than that made himrevoke his desire, and if she had moved again he would certainly havefallen back before her.
"It may seem ridiculous to you," he said, "since you do not care. But Ican't do that. Does that seem absurd to you I? I am afraid it does; butthat is because you don't understand. By all means let us be what theycall excellent friends. But there are certain little things which seemnothing to you, and they mean so much to me. I can't explain; it's justthe brotherly relation which I can't stand. It's no use suggesting thatwe should be as we were before--"
She understood well enough for his purposes.
"I see," she said.
Michael paused for a moment.
"I think I'll be going now," he said. "I am off to Ashbridge in twodays. Give Hermann my love, and a jolly Christmas to you both. I'll letyou know when I am back in town."
She had no reply to this; she saw its justice, and acquiesced.
"Good-bye, then," said Michael.
He walked home from Chelsea in that utterly blank and unfeelingconsciousness which almost invariably is the sequel of any event thatbrings with it a change of attitude towards life generally. Not for amoment did he tell himself that he had been awakened from a dream, orabandon his conviction that his dream was to be made real. The rare,quiet determination that had made him give up his stereotyped mode oflife in the summer and take to music was still completely his, and, ifanything, it had been reinforced by Sylvia's emphatic statement that"she wanted to care." Only her imagining that their old relations couldgo on showed him how far she was from knowing what "to care" meant. Atfirst without knowing it, but with a gradually increasing keenness ofconsciousness, he had become aware that this sisterly attitude of herstowards him had meant so infinitely much, because he had taken it to bethe prelude to something more. Now he saw that it was, so to speak, apiece complete in itself. It bore no relation to what he had imaginedit would lead into. No curtain went up when the prelude was over; thecurtain remained inexorably hanging there, not acknowledging the preludeat all. Not for a moment did he accuse her of encouraging him to havethought so; she had but given him a frankness of comradeship that meantto her exactly what it expressed. But he had thought otherwise; he hadimagined that it would grow towards a culmination. All that (and herewas the change that made his mind blank and unfeeling) had to be cutaway, and with it all the budding branches that his imagination hadpictured as springing from it. He could not be comrade to her as he wasto her brother--the inexorable demands of sex forbade it.
He went briskly enough through the clean, dry streets. The frost of lastnight had held throughout the morning, and the sunlight sparkled witha rare and seasonable brightness of a traditional Christmas weather.Hecatombs of turkeys hung in the poulterers' windows, among sprigs ofholly, and shops were bright with children's toys. The briskness ofthe day had flushed the colour into the faces of the passengers in thestreet, and the festive air of the imminent holiday was abroad. All thisMichael noticed with a sense of detachment; what had happened had causeda veil to fall between himself and external things; it was as if he wassealed into some glass cage, and had no contact with what passed roundhim. This lasted throughout his walk, and when he let himself into hisflat it was with the same sense of alienation that he found his cousinFrancis gracefully reclining on the sofa that he had pulled up in frontof the fire.
Francis was inclined to be querulous.
"I was just wondering whether I should give you up," he said. "The hourthat you named for lunch was half-past one. And I have almost forgottenwhat your clock sounded like when it struck two."
This also seemed to matter very little.
"Did I ask you to lunch?" he said. "I really quite forgot; I can't evenremember doing it now."
"But there will be lunch?" asked Francis rather anxiously.
"Of course. It'll be ready in ten minutes."
Michael came and stood in front of the fire, and looked with a suddenspasm of envy on the handsome boy who lay there. If he himself had beenanything like that
--"I was distinctly chippy this morning," remarked Francis, "and so Ididn't so much mind waiting for lunch. I attribute it to too much beerand bacon last night at your friend's house. I enjoyed it--I mean theevening, and for that matter the bacon--at the time. It really wasextremely pleasant."
He yawned largely and openly.
"I had no idea you could frolic like that, Mike," he said. "It was quitea new light on your character. How did you learn to do it? It's quite anew accomplishment."
Here again the veil was drawn. Was it last night only that Falbehad played the Variations, and that they had acted charades? Francisproceeded in bland unconsciousness.
"I didn't know Germans could be so jolly," he continued. "As a ruleI don't like Germans. When they try to be jolly they generally onlysucceed in being top-heavy. But, of course, your friend is half-English.Can't he play, too? And to think of your having written those rippingtunes. His sister, too--no wonder we haven't seen much of you, Mike, ifthat's where you've been spending your time. She's rather like the newgirl at the Gaiety, but handsomer. I like big girls, don't you? Oh, Iforgot,
you don't like girls much, anyhow. But are you learning yourmistake, Mike? You looked last night as if you were getting moresensible."
Michael moved away impatiently.
"Oh, shut it, Francis," he observed.
Francis raised himself on his elbow.
"Why, what's up?" he asked. "Won't she turn a favourable eye?"
Michael wheeled round savagely.
"Please remember you are talking about a lady, and not a Gaiety lady,"he remarked.
This brought Francis to his feet.
"Sorry," he said. "I was only indulging in badinage until lunch wasready."
Michael could not make up his mind to tell his cousin what had happened;but he was aware of having spoken more strongly than the situation, asFrancis knew of it, justified.
"Let's have lunch, then," he said. "We shall be better after lunch, asone's nurse used to say. And are you coming to Ashbridge, Francis?"
"Yes; I've been talking to Aunt Bar about it this morning. We're bothcoming; the family is going to rally round you, Mike, and defend youfrom Uncle Robert. There's sure to be some duck shooting, too, isn'tthere?"
This was a considerable relief to Michael.
"Oh, that's ripping," he said. "You and Aunt Barbara always make me feelthat there's a