"I'm not going to think about the future," she said. "Sufficient to the day is the good thereof. It is enough this morning that Hughie has got through the night and is stronger. If I had been given any wish to be fulfilled I should have chosen that. And if on the top of that I had been given another, it would have been that I should have helped towards it, which I suppose is the old Eve coming in. I think I had better finish dressing, Mama, instead of babbling. Have you had breakfast?"
"Yes, dear, I had it with Edith. She is in bed making tunes and pouring ink over the counterpane, and not minding."
Nadine's face clouded for a moment, in spite of the accomplishment of her wishes.
"And then I must see Seymour," she said. "It is no use putting that off. But, oh, Mama, to think that till yesterday I was willing to marry him, with Hugh in the world all the time. Whatever happens to Hugh, I can't marry him, Seymour, I mean, if the ridiculous English pronouns admit of any meaning; and I must tell him."
"Seymour left half an hour ago," said Dodo. "But there's no need for you to tell him. I took him into Hugh's room and he saw you asleep. He understands. He couldn't very well help understanding, darling. He told me he understood before, when you called out to Hugh not to attempt the rescue. But he only understood it pretty well, as the ordinary person says he understands French. But when he saw you asleep, not exactly in Hugh's arms, but sufficiently close, he understood it like a real native, poor boy!"
"What did he do?" asked Nadine.
"He behaved very rightly and properly, and lost his temper with me, just as I lose my temper with the porter at the station if I miss my train. I had been just porter to him. He thanked me for a horrid visit, only he called it damnable, and so I lost my temper, too, and we had a few flowers of speech on the staircase, not big ones, but just promising buds. And then, poor chap, he came back to me, and told me he was in hell, and I kissed him, and he didn't seem to mind much, and I suppose he caught his train. Otherwise he would have been back by now. I'm exceedingly sorry for him, Nadine, and you must write him a sweet little letter, which won't do any good at all, but it's one of the things you have to do. Darling, I wonder if jilting runs in families like consumption and red faces. You see I jilted my darling Jack, to marry into your family. But you must write the sweet little letter I spoke of, because you are sorry, only you couldn't help it."
"Did you write a sweet little letter under—under the same circumstances to Papa Jack?" asked Nadine.
"No, dear, because I hadn't got anybody exceedingly wise to give me that good advice," said Dodo. "Also, because I was a little brute there is no reason why you should be."
"Perhaps it runs in the family, too," suggested Nadine.
"Then the quicker it runs out of the family the better. Besides you are sorry for Seymour."
Nadine opened her hands wide.
"Am I? I hope so," she said. "But if you are quite full of gladness for one thing, Mama, it is a little difficult to find a corner for anything else."
Dodo turned to leave the room.
"Anywhere will do. Just under the stairs," she said. "I don't want to put it in the middle of the drawing-room. After all, darling, you propose to jilt him."
"There's something in that," said Nadine. "Oh, Mama, I used not to have any heart at all, and now that I've got one it doesn't belong to me."
"No woman's heart belongs to her," said Dodo. "If it belongs to her, it isn't a heart."
"I should have thought that nonsense yesterday," said Nadine. "Oh, wait while I finish dressing; I shan't be ten minutes. What meetings we have had in my lovely back room! One, I remember so particularly. You and Esther and Berts all lay on my bed like sardines in evening dresses, and I had just refused to marry Hugh, who was playing billiards with Uncle Algie. Somehow the things like love and devotion seemed to me quite old-fashioned, or anyhow they seemed to me signs of age. They did, indeed. I thought a clear brain was infinitely preferable to a confused heart, especially if it belonged to somebody else. I'm not used to it, Mama: it still seems to me very odd like a hat that doesn't fit. But it's a fact, and I suppose I shall grow into it, not that any one ever grew into a hat. But when Hugh swam out yesterday morning, something came tumbling down inside me. Or was it that only something cracked, like the shell of a nut? It does not much matter, so long as it is not mended again. But how queer that it should happen in a second, like that. I suppose time has nothing to do with what concerns one's soul. I believe Plato says something about it. I don't think I shall look it up. He wrote wonderfully, but when a thing happens to oneself, that seems to matter more than Plato's reflections on the subject."
There was a short pause as Nadine brushed her teeth, but Dodo sitting on the unslept-in bed did not feel inclined to break it. She wondered whether a particular point in the situation would occur to Nadine, whether her illumination as regards a woman's heart threw any light on that very different affair, a man's heart. She was not left long in doubt. The question of a man's heart was altogether unilluminated, and to Dodo there was something poignantly pathetic about Nadine's blissful ignorance. She came and sat down on the bed close to her mother.
"Hughie will see I love him," she said, "because he won't be able to help it. I shall just wait, oh, so happily, for him to say again what he has so often said before. He will know my answer, before I give it him. I hope he will say it soon. Then we shall be engaged, and people who are engaged are a little freer, aren't they, Mama?"
Dodo felt incapable of clouding that radiant face, for she knew in the days that were coming, all its radiance would be needed: not a single sparkle of light must be wasted. But it did not seem to her very likely that Hugh, whose joyous strength and splendid activity had been so often rejected by Nadine, would be likely to offer to her again what would be, in all probability, but a crippled parody of himself. But her sense of justice told her that Nadine owed him all the strength and encouragement her eager vitality could give him. It was only fair that she should devote herself to him, and let him feel all the inspiration to live that her care of him could give him. But it seemed to her very doubtful if Hugh would consent, even if he perceived that it was love not warm friendship that she gave him, to let himself and his crippled body appeal to her. In days gone by, she would not marry him for love, and it seemed to Dodo that a real man, as Hugh was, would not allow her to marry him for pity. He had offered her his best, and she had refused it; it would not be surprising if he refused to offer her his worst. The joy that had inspired Dodo so that she had softly melted over the sight of Nadine asleep by Hugh, and had exultantly mopped up the spilt ink with Edith, suddenly evaporated, leaving her dry and cold.
"You must wait, Nadine," she said. "You must make no plans. Give Hughie your vitality, and don't ask more."
She got up.
"Now, my darling, I shall go downstairs," she said, "and order your breakfast. You must be hungry. And then you can say your prayers, and breakfast will be ready."
Nadine, absorbed in her own thoughts, felt nothing of this.
"Prayers?" she said. "Why I was praying all night till dawn. At least, I was wanting, just wanting, and not for myself. Isn't that prayers?"
Dodo loved that: it was exactly what she meant in her inmost heart by prayers. She drew Nadine to her and kissed her.
"Darling, you have said enough for a week," she said, "if not more. And you said them because you must, which is the only proper plan. If you don't feel you must say your prayers, it is just as well not to say them at all. But you shall have breakfast, whether you feel you must or not. I say you must."
