Part 189

"Oh, I don't mind," she moaned, "he can believe anything he likes if it makes him happier."

"He is happy," said George tempestuously. "If I were to be born again, I'd pray to the high gods, the cruel gods, Jinny, to make me mad--like Nicky--to give me the gift of indestructible illusion. Then, perhaps, I might know what it was to live."

She had seen him once, and only once, in this mood, the night he had dined with her in Kensington Square six weeks before he married Rose.

"But you and I have been faithful to reality--true, as they say, to life. If the idiots who fling that phrase about only knew what it meant! You've been more faithful than I. You've taken such awful risks. You fling your heart down, Jinny, every time."

"Do you never take risks? Do you never fling your heart down?"

He looked at her. "Not your way. Not unless I know that I'll get what I want."

"And haven't you got it?"

"I've got most of it, but not all--yet."

His tone might or might not imply that getting it was only a question of time.

"I say, where are you going?"

She was heading rapidly for Augustus Road. She wanted to get away from George.

"Not there," he protested, perceiving her intention.

"I must."

He followed her down the long road where the trees drooped darkly, and he stood with her by the gate.

"How long will you be?" he said.

"I can't say. Half-an-hour--three-quarters--ever so long."

He waited for an hour, walking up and down, up and down the long road under the trees. She reappeared as he was turning at the far end of it. He had to run to overtake her.

Her face had on it the agony of unborn tears.

"What is it, Jinny?" he said.

"Mabel Brodrick."

She hardly saw his gesture of exasperation.

"Oh, George, she suffers. It's terrible. There's to be an operation--to-morrow. I can think of nothing else."

"Oh, Jinny, is there no one to take care of you? Is there no one to keep you from that woman?"

"Oh don't--if you had seen her----"

"I don't want to see her. I don't want you to see her. You should never have anything to do with suffering. It hurts you. It kills you. You ought to be taken care of. You ought to be kept from the sight and sound of it." He gazed wildly round the Heath. "If Brodrick was any good he'd take you out of this damned place."

"I wouldn't go. Poor darling, she can't bear me out of her sight. I believe I've worn a path going and coming."

They had left the beaten path. Their way lay in a line drawn straight across the Heath from Brodrick's house. It was almost as if her feet had made it.

"Jinny's path," he said.