That I felt myself nothing when in his presence was part of this, inevitably, — what there had been between us a year ago was a juggling game of power and now the desire for power had gone. There was the possibility of something being put in its place, but not the fact of it — a game that was played beyond us, in which our desires did not create the rules but rather had to be subordinated to them. I was conscious of this possibility as one is conscious of a truth that is at the moment beyond one’s comprehension; but it was not Marius, as he had said, who could give me understanding. At times I felt so much less than him that if he had been selfish it would have been awkward, but as it happened he did not seem to notice the disparity in our states. He kept me amused, and I listened to him. He was never sad. It is always this that I remember, that he was productive of happiness. Whatever he said about himself was not true of what he gave. On the surface we lived with each other irrelevantly, with myself as looker-on, but there was always something relevant in what I saw of myself in Marius.
One day I went to Church. I did this only in order to see if there was anything I had forgotten. I went indifferently and yet warily, as if I were having some joke within myself. I was surprised to see how much I remembered. There were memories of schools, of the smell of stale clothing, of the incongruous backs of necks. I became lulled in the old inertness which was broken only by the recurrent pain of kneeling. I found that I could do what I was supposed to do, that there was nothing I had forgotten. I sang descants to the hymns, got the timing of the psalms right, went through the words of the confession. And then, as always, my thoughts wandered away from what was going on around me. This always happens when nothing seems to be going on at all.
The words wander, music wanders, why should thoughts keep still? It is not of myself I should be thinking. Words and music drone without form and without ability, they are like the noises of birds, and should I notice birds? The building is not ugly. But the people, here, is it true that no one beautiful ever goes to Church? They are supposed to be beautiful. They whisper and do not care for each other, and yet I must hope they are beautiful. Can beautiful people kneel and say that they are ugly? If they are beautiful, do they need to go to Church? Church is for nothingness in the memory of schools.
The words are words and they do not mean much to me. A stream without sound no closer than the door. And yet there is something else I should think of. On the altar there is something that is never not beautiful, a body in silver shod with candles of light. There is sacrilege done each day in church, but not to the altar. Why is not sacrilege done more often? For one who believes in nothing it should be possible to think of it. A piece of smashed silver and a crumb on the carpet: a falling body spilling its blood against the stone. And yet it is not possible. These are trifles, explainable by custom, and yet they frighten me. Would it even be possible to sneer at a priest?
I cannot even say to Mr. Palmerston that all this means nothing to me. I cannot say that everything cancels out and has its opposite, that beauty is cancelled by ugliness, hope by despair, Christ by humanity. I cannot say that I have been to Church and that is one world and soon I shall be walking in the street and that is another world, and that it is absurd to join them because there is nothing in between. There are bits of people that live in one world and people who live in the other. I cannot say this to him because it would frighten me. And are the bits really any less of machinery? I have watched them and would not like to believe this. I cannot say to Mr. Palmerston — I have heard you and thought about it and I do not care a damn.
I left the church. I walked in my world which was not a world and I had my jokes which were, at most, jokes against myself. I had forgotten that my world was not a world. I came to a cross-roads where traffic was passing, and I waited for the lights to change so that I might cross. It was then that I was reminded. I watched a small car approaching and as it drew near me I knew that it was familiar although I did not know whose it was, and even after I had seen the occupants who were Annabelle and her father the recognition of them did not strike me, and it was only after they had been drawn up beside me for an instant that I knew who they were. They sat side by side staring rigidly in front of them, and as I stepped forwards in response to my surprise they did not move and did not look at me, and so I stopped, I thought they must have seen me, I thought they must be ignoring me because they did not wish to speak. I remembered then that this would be possible. I stood stupidly not being able to go forwards or back while people pushed past me and I did not know what to do, I wished only that they might not be made to do something that would hurt me. I pretended that I had not seen them, I waited terribly while the seconds dragged like hours and then I moved to the back of the car because I could not bear it. When the lights changed again the car went away and I found myself trembling. Then I did not think that they could have seen me, I did not believe it, but I did not know. I only knew that it was true that I had imagined it.
So, beginning to walk again, I knew what was terrible. It was I who had asked for this and now I had got it. No one else could have told me but her, and what she has told me is this sickness of it. Sickness of a world that is nothing, that kills what it loves, that on a grey carved day once made her cry, that in brutality betrayed itself. There is no love that I would not kill that was the means of life to me, no madness that I would not allow in the name of sanity. O fool, fool, there was a love that was given to you, a love that you would not give to, you ugly damned fool to pretend you do not care. Walking dead and unbearable this is what you cannot bear, you can bear any folly except your own. For your own there is no mercy when it is you who must suffer it, judgment is insufferable when it is you who must judge. I have played with the world and lost it: it is what we should have made ourselves. O Annabelle, Annabelle, you are the only person I shall love. I will ask you, once, and there will be no pride in it. Without it this time it will be I who will cry.
I thought there was time.
VI. CHILDREN AGAIN
Annabelle looked sad in the rain. “I did not know if you’d come,” I said. Her hair was dripping like seaweed around the white face of a stone. I wondered if she were ill. “You must come in,” I said.
“I got your letter.” She went up the stairs ahead of me. In my room I had put flowers and some candles against the wall. She sat on the bed with her feet turned inwards as if her ankles were broken. She did not take off her coat.
“Why don’t you lie down?” I said. And then, because she did not answer me, “Perhaps you are ill?”
She lay back on the bed. She said, “If I walked now in the streets I could get rid of this child.”
I was lighting the candles. The flames burnt with a vacancy at the centre like a soul. “Is that what you want?” I said.
“I am ill,” she said. “Will you walk with me until it happens?” She spoke to the ceiling where the plaster crumbled. “That is what I meant,” she said.