It was by this time desperately necessary for her to talk to Miranda about Felix. It was not that she expected Miranda to have much to say about this, and she did not really expect anything in the way of an argument. She would put the matter to her, she thought, rather vaguely. But it was necessary simply to have said these things, to have at least mentioned his name; and Ann was surprised to find how hard It was to bring herself to do so. The sudden growth of her relation with Felix might seem to any observer odd and even improper. Whatever would Miranda, who loved her father so much, make of these hints? With this reluctance to speak came a nervous anxiety which was now almost unbearable. There seemed a taboo on speaking of Felix to her daughter; and Ann knew that until she had broken this she would not be able to think further about what she was going to do. At moments she suspected that once she had spoken of the matter, however remotely, with Miranda she would be awakened to the fact that she had indeed crossed the line; and then she saw Miranda in a benevolent light, as a helper, as someone who would bring her to a bright new consciousness of herself.
Meanwhile there was the task of deceiving Felix; for that was what it came to. Though she longed for his company, she was afraid to see too much of him in case there should be some revelation of her need which, if he were but to glimpse it, would whirl them blindly farther on. She did not want too much to enslave him when she was still not certain that she would keep him; and she did not want to be herself driven mad by his loss, if it should come to that. She wanted to see what she was doing; but this was what, with Miranda watchful, curious, morose, terribly present and officially unenlightened, she was not able to do. Her ideas remained separate and-refused to crystallize into a policy. She wondered if having failed in one marriage she should hastily contract another. She wondered if she would make a soldier's wife. She wondered if Randall would ever come back. She wondered about marriage, and Miranda, and Marie-Laure. She doubted everything except that she and Felix were in love. If only she could, quite simply, see that as the solution. She craved for that simplicity as for some unattainable degree of asceticism.
'Do stop walking about the room, said Miranda. 'You make me quite tired. Do stop or sit down. If you're going to stay.
'Sorry, dear, said Ann. She stopped again behind the table.
Miranda must think she was behaving oddly. She was behaving oddly. But the great dark void of the house gaped behind her and she could not bring herself to leave her daughter's room. She must speak to her now.
'What are you so nervous about? said Miranda. 'You're making me nervous.
They stared at each other in the silence of the house, and it was as if they were listening for distant footsteps. If there were other listeners they were hostile ones. Ann shivered. A big white furry moth entered through the window and began to circle the lamp. Beneath them was Randall's empty room.
'I'm sorry.
'Don't keep saying you're sorry. Tell me what's the matter.
'Nothing's the matter, said Ann. She started pacing again. The room about her seemed tattered, shabby, dusty, untidy, as if she and Miranda had been jumbled together in an old bag. Nancy Bowshott was supposed to clean it. Ann took some faded roses off the mantelpiece and dropped them into the waste-paper basket.
'Miranda, she said, 'would you mind if I married again?»
There was a silence in which the fluttering of the moth could be heard. It was beating on the inside of the lamp shade. Ann knew that these were the wrong words. Yet what ought she to have said? She turned towards her daughter.
Miranda's face was a wooden mask. She plumped up her pillows and sat up straighter. 'But there's no question of that, is there?
'Oh well, there might be, said Ann. She added, 'It's only a very vague possibility, you know, nothing immediate! She was sounding guilty already. A scroll of coloured glass, like a misshapen marble, was lying in the fireplace. She picked it up.
The silence continued until she had to look back again, when Miranda said, 'But you are married. To Daddy.
'Yes, but I suppose I won't go on being.
'I thought marriages were for always, said Miranda. She was tense, pinning Ann with her gaze.
Ann felt within herself the blissful stir of a selfish will. She welcomed it as a mother might welcome the first movement of her unborn child. She said, and then regretted it, 'Your father doesn't think so. Then she added, 'You know that he wants a divorce. He wants to marry someone else.
Miranda said after a moment. 'That's what he says now.
'Do you think he'll — stop wanting that?
'Well, he might, mightn't he?
Ann tossed the piece of coloured glass in her hand. The room constrained her, closing in upon her, soft and flabby. She wanted to shake it away with her shoulders. She said, 'You saw Daddy, didn't you, when he came that time — a little before he — wrote to me.
'Yes.
'Did he say anything then which — well, about going away for good? He must have let you know that he was. Ann was breathless. She felt she was asking the wrong questions. She could feel Miranda's will controlling her from the bed. She walked to and fro like an animal upon a short string. She could feel the cord jerking.
'I can't remember exactly what he said, said Miranda, 'but he seemed to think he might want to come back. He didn't seem at all sure. You know what Daddy is.
'But you must remember! said Ann. 'What did he say exactly? Please try to remember.
'How can I? said Miranda. 'I was so miserable. I am so miserable. Her voice was tearful.
'Dear, I'm so sorry! said Ann. She looked at the screwed up hostile little face and felt pangs of guilt and pity. She had not worked enough at measuring Miranda's suffering.
The white moth, who had been silent for some minutes, fell out of the lamp with singed wings. It writhed on the floor.
Miranda leaned over to look at it. 'Better kill it, she said. 'It won't fly again. What won't fly is better killed. Better dead than crawling. It's burnt its wings off.
Ann trod on the moth. It was a plump moth. She returned her attention to Miranda, who seemed revived by the incident and was looking singularly like her father.
Colder herself, Ann said, 'But you thought he seemed to think it at least conceivable that he might come back?
'Oh, certainly, said Miranda. 'He talked about coming back. She began to rearrange her bed with an air of casualness and tossed two dolls off on to the floor.
Ann walked to the window. The night was suffocating. She looked out into the darkness. A distant owl hooted throwing successive rings of sound out over the roosting birds of the Marsh. Outside a silent world waited for the conclusion of their interview. No lights could be seen, and even the stars seemed to be stifled in the dark velvety air. She looked out into the close black emptiness and her heart seemed like a bird ready to break from her breast and fly over the quiet Marsh, to Dungeness, to the sea.
She turned back to the little crumpled room and Miranda watching her. The cord twitched her back. She said, 'But if he doesn't come back and we do get divorced. Well, then I might think of another marriage. And I felt I should just say this to you, though it's something so vague and really unlikely. These were blundering incompetent words.