Babcock, however, did. The pressure, he felt, was becoming acute. Miss Anthony had made no overt move, but he had from time to time an uneasy feeling that at any moment she might do so: she had waited, hopefully, not to say expectantly, for him to make some such move—and as he had not given a single sign of the required sort, he was increasingly certain that she contemplated some such sign herself. What form would this take? He was not sure: but he greatly enjoyed thinking about it; at the same time fearing that it might be a nuisance.
For this reason he decided that his month’s absence would be a good thing. He went off to Jackson and forgot her. Not wholly: there were days when (to tell the truth) he could not effectively banish her from his mind. She was there, like a color or stain on his consciousness, and he was forcibly reminded of the important part she was playing in his emotional life. Toward the end of his stay in the mountains this became increasingly insistent, and his energetic expeditions to Crawford Notch and Franconia, and his three ascents of Mount Washington, followed by a night in the Madison hut, did little to mitigate his odd feeling as of being in a hurry. Why should he be in a hurry? No reason at all. She meant nothing to him, nothing whatever. Or rather, she was of interest to him only as the experiment is of interest to the chemist. He was curious to see what was going to happen, and that was all. Why not admit this? He admitted it and breathed a sigh of relief, and decided to take the afternoon train back to Massachusetts.
He arrived, as it happened, too late for dinner, and accordingly his first meeting with her had to be postponed till the day following. He could see that she was in her room: there was a light there, and the light was visible in the crack beneath the door. Moreover, he knew that she had heard his arrival. He shut the door (opposite hers) rather loudly, when he came in; and not very long after this he heard her door cautiously but squeakingly open and then shut again. And fifteen minutes later this performance was repeated, and the door this time was left open. He approached his own door quietly and listened; but there wasn’t a sound.
Her little maneuver was, of course, quite obvious. He smiled to himself, fingering his lips, and began to luxuriate in the thing. There she was—he knew—sitting in the wicker rocking-chair, or perhaps standing at the blue chest of drawers pretending to tidy her hair; and she was waiting, desperately waiting, to see what he would do. She was deliberately exposing herself, deliberately inviting him to make—not the first move, since she herself had already made this—but the second. The door, he imagined, was half-open: she would not be quite so overt, or bold, as to open it wide; partly, no doubt, for fear Mrs. Holt might see it, or Mandell. Her heart was beating violently. In all probability, she hardly knew, in her confusion of emotions, what she was doing. If she was standing she would sit down and pretend to read a book.… And as he went over in his mind all these delicious possibilities, or probabilities, he began to wonder, amusedly, what might be the best step for him to take. Should he ignore the affair entirely? Perhaps that would be too cruel? It would be painful for her, it might even make her angry; which would have unpleasant consequences for him at breakfast. Besides, it would in a sense be an avoidance of a modus operandi more definitely and courageously creative. And again, he recognized quite clearly in himself a genuine desire to see her and be seen by her. But how best could this be done?…
He walked to his window and looked out at the summer evening. It was just growing dark: the street-lights were lit: a star or two was visible in the sky. It would be pleasant, for example, to go for a short walk: out to the bridge and back: which would involve an interval of twenty minutes, or less: so that presumably she would remain, for the interval, as she was, with the door open; making an excuse of the fact that the evening was warm, and that she desired through her room a current of air. But if he were to undertake this, then the second question became urgent and subtle; should he, or should he not, pause, as he went out, to speak to her?… This demanded a careful calculation. The meeting must be as casual as possible. And in view of her terrific state of tension—which he could positively feel, like a vibration in the air—it might be exceedingly difficult to manage it. Would she, for example—as seemed more than likely—presume, after the month’s interval, that the tone of their encounter should be cordial, or even intimate? It might well be that she would instinctively try to press this advantage, and shift the balance between them, well, sharply toward a confessed state (on her part, at least) of “being in love.” Could he trust himself to handle such a situation as this? With just the right mixture of friendliness and aloofness?
He decided that he could; and accordingly, taking his hat from the peg, he stood again beside the door for an instant and listened. There was still not a sound. Evidently she was not moving about—she must, as he had surmised, be reading or pretending to read; and in this case she would not immediately see him when he opened his door. He opened it quickly and stepped out.
What he saw astonished him, and took him completely off his guard. For she too was standing in her doorway—like him, with her hand on the knob—and with an unmistakable air of having stood there, in a kind of paralysis, for many minutes. Not only had she been waiting for him: she had actually, he realized, been on the point of coming to see him. Her whole attitude was alert and intense, as if she too had been listening; and when she saw him she started and was horribly embarrassed, as he was himself.
“Oh—” he said, going quickly toward her—“how do you do!”
“How do you do!”
She relinquished the doorknob and held out her hand, which was cold. At the same time she gave a curious little laugh and a shy nod of her head, looking a little to one side and downward. The gesture was oddly attractive, and suddenly made him sorry for her.
“You’re still here, I see.”
“Yes, I’m still here.”
“And as for me, I’ve come back, like the prodigal son, or the bad penny.”
“Did you enjoy the mountains?…”
“Very much.”
He smiled at her, and she smiled back, biting her lip. With her hand, which she had at first dropped a little awkwardly to her side, she again grasped the doorknob, turning it slightly to and fro.
“I heard you come in,” she said, twisting sideways toward her room, as if in sudden access of shyness, “and I was wondering whether to come and say hello.”
“Oh.” Babcock swung his hat, meaninglessly. “As a matter of fact, I was just wondering the same thing—I mean, whether I would come and say hello.”
“Were you?”
She said this without any particular emphasis: though for a fraction of a second he wondered whether her intention might be ironic.
“Yes.… I was just going out for a little stroll.”
“I see.… You won’t come in?”
“Well”—he hesitated smiling—“wouldn’t you like to come out for a little?” He hadn’t wanted to say this; it sounded a shade unconvincing; so he hastened to add—“After that ghastly train ride, I’d like to stretch my legs!…”