nothing. over what had been really the greatest obstacle in her view to their having become betrothed. small person who always wore black.

AH sorts
. AH sorts. You are a cunning. they said. overfastidious.????I trust you??re using the adjective in its literal sense. she murmured.At least he began in the spirit of such an examination; as if it was his duty to do so. Charles. This was very dis-graceful and cowardly of them. battledore all the next morning. The snobs?? struggle was much more with the aspirate; a fierce struggle. she felt in her coat pocket and silently.??Once again they walked on. he bullied; and as skillfully chivvied. and worse. tender.

and Captain Talbot wishes me to suggest to you that a sailor??s life is not the best school of morals. Suddenly she was walking. at least. That is why I go there??to be alone. a thunderous clash of two brontosauri; with black velvet taking the place of iron cartilage. but all that was not as he had expected; for theirs was an age when the favored feminine look was the demure. Again she glanced up at Charles. Sarah took upon herself much of the special care of the chlorotic girl needed. What was happening was that Sam stood in a fit of the sulks; or at least with the semblance of it. Her father had forced her out of her own class. lying at his feet. You may rest assured of that.Her outburst reduced both herself and Sarah to silence. something singu-larly like a flash of defiance. ??He was very handsome. two excellent Micraster tests. They felt an opportunism.

his pipe lay beside his favorite chair. Then came an evening in January when she decided to plant the fatal seed.Which brings me to this evening of the concert nearly a week later. How for many years I had felt myself in some mysterious way condemned??and I knew not why??to solitude. her mistress. Fairley never considered worth mentioning) before she took the alley be-side the church that gave on to the greensward of Church Cliffs. ??And perhaps??though it is not for me to judge your conscience??she may in her turn save. ????Ave yer got a bag o?? soot????? He paused bleakly. like a tiny alpine meadow. But they don??t. An orthodox Victorian would perhaps have mistrusted that imperceptible hint of a Becky Sharp; but to a man like Charles she proved irresisti-ble. a very near equivalent of our own age??s sedative pills. All in it had been sacrificed. There was worse: he had an unnatural fondness for walking instead of riding; and walking was not a gentleman??s pastime except in the Swiss Alps. together with the water from the countless springs that have caused the erosion. My hand has been several times asked in marriage. the Burmah cheroot that accom-panied it a pleasant surprise; and these two men still lived in a world where strangers of intelligence shared a common landscape of knowledge.

an actress.??So they went closer to the figure by the cannon bollard. in people.155. It is better so. but to certain trivial things he had said at Aunt Tranter??s lunch. To the mere landscape enthusiast this stone is not attractive.?? She was silent a moment.?? she whispered fiercely. He watched her smell the yellow flowers; not po-litely.?? Charles could not see Sam??s face. And let me have a double dose of muffins.Then.??The vicar gave her a solemn look.Ernestina gave her a look that would have not disgraced Mrs. for he was at that time specializing in a branch of which the Old Fossil Shop had few examples for sale. men-strual.

But he heard a little stream nearby and quenched his thirst; wetted his handkerchief and patted his face; and then he began to look around him. of the importance of sea urchins. in strictest confidence??I was called in to see her ..??Varguennes recovered. She believes you are not happy in your present situation. and there was a silence. who had known each other sufficient decades to make a sort of token embrace necessary. Very slowly he let the downhanging strands of ivy fall back into position. Her hair. She is asleep. a pigherd or two. But I must confess I don??t understand why you should seek to . it was agreeably warm; and an additional warmth soon came to Charles when he saw an excellent test. vain. yet as much implosive as directed at Charles..

The new warmth. touching tale of pain. There were better-class people... glanced at him with a smile. Charles glanced back at the dairyman. One was that Marlborough House commanded a magnificent prospect of Lyme Bay. an English Garden of Eden on such a day as March 29th. eager and inquiring.????To give is a most excellent deed. he urged her forward on to the level turf above the sea. and Sarah had by this time acquired a kind of ascendancy of suffering over Mrs. He was detected. therefore I am happy. a sure symptom of an inherent moral decay; but he never entered society without being ogled by the mamas..

and allowed Charles to lead her back into the drawing room. Poulteney.?? If the mis-tress was defective in more mundane matters where her staff was concerned. ??I agree??it was most foolish. madam. He said finally he should wait one week. You must not think I speak of mere envy. Spiders that should be hibernating run over the baking November rocks; blackbirds sing in December. a litany learned by heart. He must have conversation. Fairley??s uninspired stumbling that the voice first satisfied Mrs. if I??m not mistaken. and that. didn??t she show me not-on! And it wasn??t just the talking I tried with her.??He parts the masses of her golden hair. person returns; what then???But again Sarah did the best possible thing: she said nothing. ??Another dress??? he suggested diffidently.

eye it is quite simply the most beautiful sea rampart on the south coast of England. he added a pleasant astringency to Lyme society; for when he was with you you felt he was always hovering a little. it was discovered that she had not risen.But one day. she did turn and go on.?? he had once said to her. and saw on the beach some way to his right the square black silhouettes of the bathing-machines from which the nereids emerged. In secret he rather admired Gladstone; but at Winsyatt Gladstone was the arch-traitor. a room his uncle seldom if ever used. This was very dis-graceful and cowardly of them. and the silence. No mother superior could have wished more to hear the confession of an erring member of her flock.????It??s the ??oomiliation. respectabili-ty. Charles would almost certainly not have believed you??and even though. ??It was as if the woman had become addicted to melancholia as one becomes addicted to opium. ma??m.

I drank the wine he pressed on me.. He was worse than a child.. cannot be completely exonerated. frontiers. Two days after he had gone Miss Woodruff requested Mrs. notebooks.??I know lots o?? girls. relatives.. so disgracefully Mohammedan. then said. I flatter myself . sand dollars. but I will not have you using its language on a day like this.And let us start happily.

and cannot believe. in place of the desire to do good for good??s sake. indeed. at the end. Another look flashed between them. These iron servants were the most cherished by Mrs.Ernestina gave her a look that would have not disgraced Mrs. A distant lantern winked faintly on the black waters out towards Portland Bill. his reading. was left well provided for. It was the same one as she had chosen for that first interview??Psalm 119: ??Blessed are the undefiled in the way. She was not wearing nailed boots. neat civilization behind his back.??If only poor Frederick had not died. Poulteney flinched a little from this proposed wild casting of herself upon the bosom of true Christianity. This path she had invariably taken. when he called dutifully at ten o??clock at Aunt Tranter??s house.

he found himself unexpected-ly with another free afternoon. microcosms of macrocosms. risible to the foreigner??a year or two previously. Instead they were a bilious leaden green??one that was. just as the simple primroses at Charles??s feet survived all the competition of exotic conserva-tory plants. ??Quisque suos patimur manes. or so it was generally supposed. tables. so often brought up by hand.Sarah kept her side of the bargain. Poulteney and Sarah had been discussed.?? Still Sarah was silent. His calm exterior she took for the terrible silence of a recent battlefield. Poulteney enounced to him her theories of the life to come. Fairley will give you your wages. The turf there climbed towards the broken walls of Black Ven.??And that too was a step; for there was a bitterness in her voice.

yes. because..????I do not wish to speak of it. is the point from which we can date the beginning of feminine emancipation in England; and Ernestina. and resting over another body. Poulteney. ??It came to seem to me as if I were allowed to live in paradise. I do not know. The two young ladies coolly inclined heads at one another. and allowed Charles to lead her back into the drawing room. and his conventional side triumphed. a lady of some thirty years of age.??She stared out to sea for a moment. the lack of reason for such sorrow; as if the spring was natural in itself. Mr. her home a damp.

??She looked at the turf between them. ??Eighty-eight days. But since this tragic figure had successfully put up with his poor loneliness for sixty years or more.????But you will come again?????I cannot??????I walk here each Monday. When the doctor dressed his wound he would clench my hand.??He could not bear her eyes then. Poulteney had two obsessions: or two aspects of the same obsession.????Yes. a moustache as black as his hair.??The vicar felt snubbed; and wondered what would have happened had the Good Samaritan come upon Mrs. perceptive moments the girl??s tears. neat civilization behind his back.??Is something wrong. too occupied in disengaging her coat from a recalcitrant bramble to hear Charles??s turf-silenced approach. After all. Miss Woodruff is not insane. Ware Cliffs??these names may mean very little to you.

that he doesn??t know what the devil it is that causes it. I will make inquiries. I wish for solitude. Though direct. But in his second year there he had drifted into a bad set and ended up. Poulteney began to change her tack.?? She laid the milkwort aside. in a very untypical way. ??I was introduced the other day to a specimen of the local flora that inclines me partly to agree with you. then with the greatest pleasure.. All seemed well for two months. Poulteney. and moved her head in a curious sliding sideways turn away; a characteristic gesture when she wanted to show concern??in this case.. tentative sen-tence; whether to allow herself to think ahead or to allow him to interrupt. Burkley.

Lyme Regis being then as now as riddled with gossip as a drum of Blue Vinny with maggots.??He will never return. also asleep. in short. that I do not need you. was plunged in affectionate contemplation of his features. He was taken to the place; it had been most insignificant. It irked him strangely that he had to see her upside down. I knew then I had been for him no more than an amusement during his convalescence. And she died on the day that Hitler invaded Poland.??Mrs. come clean. The husband was evidently a taciturn man. He was worse than a child.The great mole was far from isolated that day. in the form of myxomatosis. Had you described that fruit.

matched by an Odysseus with a face acceptable in the best clubs.??I am most grateful. He stepped quickly behind her and took her hand and raised it to his lips. madam. fourth of eleven children who lived with their parents in a poverty too bitter to describe. piety and death????surely as pretty a string of key mid-Victorian adjectives and nouns as one could ever hope to light on (and much too good for me to invent.?? He smiled grimly at Charles. He was being shaved. Moments like modulations come in human relationships: when what has been until then an objective situation. here they stop a mile or so short of it. his scientific hobbies . Her sharper ears had heard a sound. where a russet-sailed and westward-headed brig could be seen in a patch of sunlight some five miles out. should he take a step towards her. part of me understands. so to speak. they would not have missed the opportunity of telling me.

I think he was a little like the lizard that changes color with its surround-ings. They had left shortly following the exchange described above. floated in the luminous clearing behind Sarah??s dark figure. Voltaire drove me out of Rome. and more frequently lost than won. But no. His uncle viewed the sight of Charles marching out of Winsyatt armed with his wedge hammers and his collecting sack with disfavor; to his mind the only proper object for a gentleman to carry in the country was a riding crop or a gun; but at least it was an improvement on the damned books in the damned library. and the couple continued down the Cobb. to have endless weeks of travel ahead of him. waiting to pounce on any foolishness??and yet. When I have no other duties. which veered between pretty little almost lipless mouths and childish cupid??s bows.??Did he bring them himself?????No.??And that too was a step; for there was a bitterness in her voice. Medicine can do nothing. over what had been really the greatest obstacle in her view to their having become betrothed. small person who always wore black.