Chapter XXIX.

by Aldous Huxley

　　It was after ten o'clock. The dancers had already dispersed andthe last lights were being put out. To-morrow the tents would bestruck, the dismantled merry-go-round would be packed intowaggons and carted away. An expanse of worn grass, a shabbybrown patch in the wide green of the park, would be all thatremained. Crome Fair was over.By the edge of the pool two figures lingered."No, no, no," Anne was saying in a breathless whisper, leaningbackwards, turning her head from side to side in an effort toescape Gombauld's kisses. "No, please. No." Her raised voicehad become imperative.Gombauld relaxed his embrace a little. "Why not?" he said. "Iwill."With a sudden effort Anne freed herself. "You won't," sheretorted. "You've tried to take the most unfair advantage ofme.""Unfair advantage?" echoed Gombauld in genuine surprise."Yes, unfair advantage. You attack me after I've been dancingfor two hours, while I'm still reeling drunk with the movement,when I've lost my head, when I've got no mind left but only arhythmical body! It's as bad as making love to someone you'vedrugged or intoxicated."Gombauld laughed angrily. "Call me a White Slaver and have donewith it.""Luckily," said Anne, "I am now completely sobered, and if youtry and kiss me again I shall box your ears. Shall we take a fewturns round the pool?" she added. "The night is delicious."For answer Gombauld made an irritated noise. They paced offslowly, side by side."What I like about the painting of Degas..." Anne began in hermost detached and conversational tone."Oh, damn Degas!" Gombauld was almost shouting.From where he stood, leaning in an attitude of despair againstthe parapet of the terrace, Denis had seen them, the two palefigures in a patch of moonlight, far down by the pool's edge. Hehad seen the beginning of what promised to be an endlesspassionate embracement, and at the sight he had fled. It was toomuch; he couldn't stand it. In another moment, he felt, he wouldhave burst into irrepressible tears.Dashing blindly into the house, he almost ran into Mr. Scogan,who was walking up and down the hall smoking a final pipe."Hullo!" said Mr. Scogan, catching him by the arm; dazed andhardly conscious of what he was doing or where he was, Denisstood there for a moment like a somnambulist. "What's thematter?" Mr. Scogan went on. "you look disturbed, distressed,depressed."Denis shook his head without replying."Worried about the cosmos, eh?" Mr. Scogan patted him on the arm."I know the feeling," he said. "It's a most distressing symptom.'What's the point of it all? All is vanity. What's the good ofcontinuing to function if one's doomed to be snuffed out at lastalong with everything else?' Yes, yes. I know exactly how youfeel. It's most distressing if one allows oneself to bedistressed. But then why allow oneself to be distressed? Afterall, we all know that there's no ultimate point. But whatdifference does that make?"At this point the somnambulist suddenly woke up. "What?" hesaid, blinking and frowning at his interlocutor. "What?" Thenbreaking away he dashed up the stairs, two steps at a time.Mr. Scogan ran to the foot of the stairs and called up after him."It makes no difference, none whatever. Life is gay all thesame, always, under whatever circumstances--under whatevercircumstances," he added, raising his voice to a shout. ButDenis was already far out of hearing, and even if he had notbeen, his mind to-night was proof against all the consolations ofphilosophy. Mr. Scogan replaced his pipe between his teeth andresumed his meditative pacing. "Under any circumstances," herepeated to himself. It was ungrammatical to begin with; was ittrue? And is life really its own reward? He wondered. When hispipe had burned itself to its stinking conclusion he took a drinkof gin and went to bed. In ten minutes he was deeply, innocentlyasleep.Denis had mechanically undressed and, clad in those flowered silkpyjamas of which he was so justly proud, was lying face downwardson his bed. Time passed. When at last he looked up, the candlewhich he had left alight at his bedside had burned down almost tothe socket. He looked at his watch; it was nearly half-past one.His head ached, his dry, sleepless eyes felt as though they hadbeen bruised from behind, and the blood was beating within hisears a loud arterial drum. He got up, opened the door, tiptoednoiselessly along the passage, and began to mount the stairstowards the higher floors. Arrived at the servants' quartersunder the roof, he hesitated, then turning to the right he openeda little door at the end of the corridor. Within was a pitch-dark cupboard-like boxroom, hot, stuffy, and smelling of dust andold leather. He advanced cautiously into the blackness, gropingwith his hands. It was from this den that the ladder went up tothe leads of the western tower. He found the ladder, and set hisfeet on the rungs; noiselessly, he lifted the trap-door above hishead; the moonlit sky was over him, he breathed the fresh, coolair of the night. In a moment he was standing on the leads,gazing out over the dim, colourless landscape, lookingperpendicularly down at the terrace seventy feet below.Why had he climbed up to this high, desolate place? Was it tolook at the moon? Was it to commit suicide? As yet he hardlyknew. Death--the tears came into his eyes when he thought of it.His misery assumed a certain solemnity; he was lifted up on thewings of a kind of exaltation. It was a mood in which he mighthave done almost anything, however foolish. He advanced towardsthe farther parapet; the drop was sheer there and uninterrupted.A good leap, and perhaps one might clear the narrow terrace andso crash down yet another thirty feet to the sun-baked groundbelow. He paused at the corner of the tower, looking now downinto the shadowy gulf below, now up towards the rare stars andthe waning moon. He made a gesture with his hand, mutteredsomething, he could not afterwards remember what; but the factthat he had said it aloud gave the utterance a peculiarlyterrible significance. Then he looked down once more into thedepths."What are you doing, Denis?" questioned a voice from somewherevery close behind him.Denis uttered a cry of frightened surprise, and very nearly wentover the parapet in good earnest. His heart was beatingterribly, and he was pale when, recovering himself, he turnedround in the direction from which the voice had come."Are you ill?"In the profound shadow that slept under the eastern parapet ofthe tower, he saw something he had not previously noticed--anoblong shape. It was a mattress, and someone was lying on it.Since that first memorable night on the tower, Mary had slept outevery evening; it was a sort of manifestation of fidelity."It gave me a fright," she went on, "to wake up and see youwaving your arms and gibbering there. What on earth were youdoing?"Denis laughed melodramatically. "What, indeed!" he said. If shehadn't woken up as she did, he would be lying in pieces at thebottom of the tower; he was certain of that, now."You hadn't got designs on me, I hope?" Mary inquired, jumpingtoo rapidly to conclusions."I didn't know you were here," said Denis, laughing more bitterlyand artificially than before."What is the matter, Denis?"He sat down on the edge of the mattress, and for all reply wenton laughing in the same frightful and improbable tone.An hour later he was reposing with his head on Mary's knees, andshe, with an affectionate solicitude that was wholly maternal,was running her fingers through his tangled hair. He had toldher everything, everything: his hopeless love, his jealousy, hisdespair, his suicide--as it were providentially averted by herinterposition. He had solemnly promised never to think of self-destruction again. And now his soul was floating in a sadserenity. It was embalmed in the sympathy that Mary sogenerously poured. And it was not only in receiving sympathythat Denis found serenity and even a kind of happiness; it wasalso in giving it. For if he had told Mary everything about hismiseries, Mary, reacting to these confidences, had told him inreturn everything, or very nearly everything, about her own."Poor Mary!" He was very sorry for her. Still, she might haveguessed that Ivor wasn't precisely a monument of constancy."Well," she concluded, "one must put a good face on it." Shewanted to cry, but she wouldn't allow herself to be weak. Therewas a silence."Do you think," asked Denis hesitatingly--"do you really thinkthat she...that Gombauld...""I'm sure of it," Mary answered decisively. There was anotherlong pause."I don't know what to do about it," he said at last, utterlydejected."You'd better go away," advised Mary. "It's the safest thing,and the most sensible.""But I've arranged to stay here three weeks more.""You must concoct an excuse.""I suppose you're right.""I know I am," said Mary, who was recovering all her firm self-possession. "You can't go on like this, can you?""No, I can't go on like this," he echoed.Immensely practical, Mary invented a plan of action.Startlingly, in the darkness, the church clock struck three."You must go to bed at once," she said. "I'd no idea it was solate."Denis clambered down the ladder, cautiously descended thecreaking stairs. His room was dark; the candle had long agoguttered to extinction. He got into bed and fell asleep almostat once.