mach for it! What did
Cecily say when I didn't turn up?"

"She looked rather cross. She told me as we came away to tell you she
was angry with you. You're to go and apologise to her as soon as
possible!"

"Did she?"

"Yes. I say, Gilbert, why didn't you turn up?"

They had reached the Embankment, and they crossed to the riverside and
leant against the parapet.

"Because I was afraid to," said Gilbert.

"Afraid to!"

"Yes. Can't you see I'm in love with her?"

"Well, I guessed as much...."

"I love her so much that she can do what she likes with me, and all she
likes to do is to destroy me!"

"Destroy you!"

"Yes. If you love Cecily, she demands the whole of your life. Every bit
of it. She consumes you.... Oh, I know this sounds like a penny
dreadful, Quinny, but it's true. I've asked her to run away with me, but
she won't come. She says she hates scandal and she likes her social
position. My God, I feel sick when I see Jimphy with her ... like a
damned big lobster putting his ... his claws about her. He isn't a bad
fellow in his silly way, but I can't stand him as Cecily's husband!"

"I know what you mean," said Henry.

"I thought that if Cecily and I were to go away together, we could get
our lives into some sort of perspective, and then I could go on with my
work and have her as well, but she won't go away with me. She wants me
to hang around, being her lover ... and I can't do that, Quinny. It's
mean and furtive, and I hate that. You're always listening for some one
coming ... a servant or the husband or some one ... and I can't stand
that. If I love a woman, I love her, and I don't want to spend part of
my life in pretending that I don't. I loathe myself when I have to
change the talk suddenly or move away when a door opens.... Do you
understand, Quinny?"

Henry nodded his head, but did not speak.

"Once when I'd been begging Cecily to go away with me, Jimphy walked
into the room ... and I had to pretend to be talking about some
nasturtiums that Cecily had grown. I felt like a cad. That's what's
rotten about loving another man's wife. It's the treachery of the thing,
the pretending.... I've often wondered why it is that love of that sort
seems so romantic and splendid in books and so damnably mean when it
comes into the Divorce Court ... but when I met Cecily I knew why ...
it's because of the treachery and the deceit. I used to think that it
was beautiful in books because artists were able to s