'Yes.
'Ever since I saw her there, said Hugh, and his words had the resonance of a song, 'I have been able to think of nothing else. I've been in a haze of expectation like a boy, like a foolish boy. You would hardly credit it, would you, Mildred? He seemed to address the Tintoretto, and leaned forward to touch it very gently with his finger in a way that Mildred suddenly remembered from long ago. She was afraid — that if she tried to speak she might make some grotesque sound, so she remained silent.
'It's odd, he said, 'to keep love for someone stored up so long and then to find it fresh and alive at the end. I thought I had quite sealed up that tomb, but no — no.
'It's hard for me to imagine, said Mildred, trying out her voice briskly. 'But then I'm riddled with common sense. What are you going to do about it?
'Ah, well, said Hugh, and the exaltation faded and the old worried look came back, 'that's it. That's where I need your help, your advice. You know Emma. You know me. You must help me to be objective. I've really made myself thoroughly upset and anxious, worrying about this. I think it has even affected my health. I hope talking to you will have made a difference. Perhaps I shall find it has — and this Absurd state of mind will simply fade away. I wish it would. I looked forward to — some peace, just, well, holiday, after — I'm too old for this nonsense really, don't you think? Why should one make trouble for oneself when one's old?
'Heaven help us when we are too old to make trouble for ourselves, Mildred murmured.
'You must make up my mind for me, Mildred, said Hugh. 'Your asking me to come to India puts me, in a way, up against it. Should I go and see Emma or should I not? I haven't really any idea how she lives now. Whether there is — anyone else. Do you happen to know? He turned anxiously towards her.
'So far as I know there is — no one else. She retreated slowly back into the depths of the chair. The rain was beating down and it was quite dark in the room now except for the light from the picture which gilded half of Hugh's entreating face.
'But should I go, he said, 'or am I just being foolish — romantic, meddlesome, or worse? Why open an old wound? Only pain and chaos would follow if I went to see her. She wouldn't want, after all those years, to see me, would she? I was exaggerating of course just now. I'm not in love. I can't be, one isn't at my age. I can overcome this obsession — just by giving myself a good shake. You must help me, Mildred, you're so sensible. Why, you've no idea how much I rely on you! I think I feel better already. A long voyage would be just the thing, a long time away, travelling with you. Really, you must think me quite extraordinary, Mildred, a mild old fellow like me. You agree, don't you, it would be quite wrong to go and see her?
Mildred was right back now against the back of the chair, her forearms stretched stiffly out on the two Anns, as if she were pinned there. Once more in her mind's eye she saw dog-faced Emma, Emma in the short white tennis dress, defeated Emma talking to the boy Felix. She said, 'You want to go and see her, Hugh. You want to, you're longing to, you're dying to. Why deny that you're sort of, almost; ready to be, in love?
He let out a long sigh. He was silent a while. 'Yes. Then again, 'Yes. Yes.
Mildred relaxed slowly. 'Go then, she said. 'Go, go. Go and see her. You'll regret it forever if you don't.
'That's true, he said, nodding his head, 'that's quite true. I would regret it. His face turned again towards the Tintoretto and seemed to fill out once more. His lips parted, his eyes widened, and he threw his tonsured head back as his gaze moved up toward the face of the golden Susannah.
'Then you must go, Hugh, said Mildred. 'That's my advice. She rose awkwardly and began to grope for her things.
'Oh, you're not leaving? he said, coming to her and fumbling with her coat, crumpling it inconclusively in his hands and laying it back on the Ann of the chair.
Standing now, Mildred was very close to him. She could have reached up and put her hands on his shoulders in a way she had often imagined. 'Yes, I must be off.
'Please don't go, said Hugh, 'please have dinner with me.
'I can't. I've got to be somewhere else.
'Oh dear, he said. 'I've so much enjoyed talking to you, I've enjoyed every moment. I hope I haven't shocked or annoyed you, Mildred? I assure you I didn't intend all this to come out.
'That's all right, my dear, she said. She pulled her coat on. 'It was 'Very interesting.
'Well, at least let me get you a taxi'
'All right. Hugh, you will go and see Emma, won't you? You must have courage, you know.
'Bless you, Mildred, he said. 'You've given it to me. Yes. I'll go. Bless you.
Mildred smiled at him. 'You have quite a passionate nature, Hugh dear. I wouldn’t have suspected it.
'Have I? He seemed pleased, and pressed her hand with gratitude and cordiality.
Chapter Eleven
HUGH stood looking down the long corridor that led to Emma's door. He told himself, twenty-five years ago I was here. Only 'I' and 'here' refused to do their work. He put out one hand and touched the wall. The intermittent babble inside his head had this morning risen to a crescendo and he doubted his ability to hear anything that might be said. He also felt slightly giddy. He waited. He had, of course, arrived too early.
Hugh had been, he thought, when he saw Mildred, in two minds.
His condition of trouble about Emma had increased steadily and alarmingly. It really had the air of being a disease. It was not like thinking and coming to conclusions, thinking further and coming to more conclusions. What indeed it was that was increasing so was something which his mind could not at all confront. It was sometimes like a great cloud emanating from him and surrounding him, a new form of his being, something almost physical. It was not regret for the past, it was not even exactly yearning for Emma: these were far too like thoughts. Whereas what was the case was opaque, it had no reflective qualities. What it was indeed was just — somehow — Emma, and nothing else; and this nonsensical way was the only way he could put it.
All the same, he kept his head, and beside, or within, this great balloon that tugged him off the ground a sort of monologue went on, though in a rather high-pitched tone, as if the Voice of Reason had become slightly hysterical. He knew perfectly well that conditions such as the one he was in — he did not give it a name — were temporary. He could weary out the inflated thing that so pulled him About, he could weary it out just by keeping his feet firmly planted and directing his attention elsewhere. He could be sane in a week, if he really wanted to be, he told himself; and he reflected that his condition undoubtedly had more than he had at first realized to do with his simply being tired and overwrought. He had so much looked forward, had quite childishly looked forward, to having a holiday when poor Fanny was dead. It sounded a very callous way to put it, but there it was, and it was perfectly natural. He had, since his retirement from the Civil Service, had no opportunities for self-indulgence, since Fanny's illness had followed so soon after. He had promised himself many things, reading, painting, travel, the untrammelled conversation of friends: these things, like toys put away in a cupboard, awaited him still. His freedom awaited him still.
It would indeed be an act of gratuitous folly to, as he had put it to Mildred, make trouble for himself at this stage. He knew nothing of Emma's present arrangements or state of mind and shrank from any attempt to 'make inquiries' about her. To try to reestablish any sort of 'relationship' however vague with Emma would be likely to cause pain and confusion and nothing else. And of course he would make himself ridiculous: though this thought in fact troubled him comparatively little, and he had been sincere in saying to Mildred that at his age one outgrows certain considerations of dignity. He was well aware that: his selective memory retained for him, from that strange episode of the far past, only what was joyful and what was tragic. What it suppressed was that Emma was a tough and difficult customer and not by any means well adapted to get on with someone like himself. When, moreover, he reflected on the curious beauty which, after all, that memory retained, worked as it had been into a self-contained crystal sphere of intense experience, he felt at moments that it would be a pity to risk spoiling it: to risk spoiling it by a painful, embarrassing or irritating sequel, or worse still, by a boring one. For the most depressing thought was the thought that if he and Emma were to meet now the meeting might have no significance at all.