All she knew now was that if she WERE out of the cage she wouldn't in the least have minded,this time,its not yet being dark.She would have gone straight toward Park Chambers and have hung about there till no matter when.She would have waited,stayed,rung,asked,have gone in,sat on the stairs.What the day was the last of was probably,to her strained inner sense,the group of golden ones,of any occasion for seeing the hazy sunshine slant at that angle into the smelly shop,of any range of chances for his wishing still to repeat to her the two words she had in the Park scarcely let him bring out."See here--see here!"--the sound of these two words had been with her perpetually;but it was in her ears to-day without mercy,with a loudness that grew and grew.What was it they then expressed?what was it he had wanted her to see?She seemed,whatever it was,perfectly to see it now--to see that if she should just chuck the whole thing,should have a great and beautiful courage,he would somehow make everything up to her.
When the clock struck five she was on the very point of saying to Mr.Buckton that she was deadly ill and rapidly getting worse.
This announcement was on her lips,and she had quite composed the pale hard face she would offer him:"I can't stop--I must go home.
If I feel better,later on,I'll come back.I'm very sorry,but IMUST go."At that instant Captain Everard once more stood there,producing in her agitated spirit,by his real presence,the strangest,quickest revolution.He stopped her off without knowing it,and by the time he had been a minute in the shop she felt herself saved.
That was from the first minute how she thought of it.There were again other persons with whom she was occupied,and again the situation could only be expressed by their silence.It was expressed,of a truth,in a larger phrase than ever yet,for her eyes now spoke to him with a kind of supplication."Be quiet,be quiet!"they pleaded;and they saw his own reply:"I'll do whatever you say;I won't even look at you--see,see!"They kept conveying thus,with the friendliest liberality,that they wouldn't look,quite positively wouldn't.What she was to see was that he hovered at the other end of the counter,Mr.Buckton's end,and surrendered himself again to that frustration.It quickly proved so great indeed that what she was to see further was how he turned away before he was attended to,and hung off,waiting,smoking,looking about the shop;how he went over to Mr.Cocker's own counter and appeared to price things,gave in fact presently two or three orders and put down money,stood there a long time with his back to her,considerately abstaining from any glance round to see if she were free.It at last came to pass in this way that he had remained in the shop longer than she had ever yet known to do,and that,nevertheless,when he did turn about she could see him time himself--she was freshly taken up--and cross straight to her postal subordinate,whom some one else had released.He had in his hand all this while neither letters nor telegrams,and now that he was close to her--for she was close to the counter-clerk--it brought her heart into her mouth merely to see him look at her neighbour and open his lips.She was too nervous to bear it.He asked for a Post-Office Guide,and the young man whipped out a new one;whereupon he said he wished not to purchase,but only to consult one a moment;with which,the copy kept on loan being produced,he once more wandered off.
What was he doing to her?What did he want of her?Well,it was just the aggravation of his "See here!"She felt at this moment strangely and portentously afraid of him--had in her ears the hum of a sense that,should it come to that kind of tension,she must fly on the spot to Chalk Farm.Mixed with her dread and with her reflexion was the idea that,if he wanted her so much as he seemed to show,it might be after all simply to do for him the "anything"she had promised,the "everything"she had thought it so fine to bring out to Mr.Mudge.He might want her to help him,might have some particular appeal;though indeed his manner didn't denote that--denoted on the contrary an embarrassment,an indecision,something of a desire not so much to be helped as to be treated rather more nicely than she had treated him the other time.Yes,he considered quite probably that he had help rather to offer than to ask for.Still,none the less,when he again saw her free he continued to keep away from her;when he came back with his thumbed Guide it was Mr.Buckton he caught--it was from Mr.Buckton he obtained half-a-crown's-worth of stamps.
After asking for the stamps he asked,quite as a second thought,for a postal-order for ten shillings.What did he want with so many stamps when he wrote so few letters?How could he enclose a postal-order in a telegram?She expected him,the next thing,to go into the corner and make up one of his telegrams--half a dozen of them--on purpose to prolong his presence.She had so completely stopped looking at him that she could only guess his movements--guess even where his eyes rested.Finally she saw him make a dash that might have been toward the nook where the forms were hung;and at this she suddenly felt that she couldn't keep it up.The counter-clerk had just taken a telegram from a slavey,and,to give herself something to cover her,she snatched it out of his hand.
The gesture was so violent that he gave her in return an odd look,and she also perceived that Mr.Buckton noticed it.The latter personage,with a quick stare at her,appeared for an instant to wonder whether his snatching it in HIS turn mightn't be the thing she would least like,and she anticipated this practical criticism by the frankest glare she had ever given him.It sufficed:this time it paralysed him;and she sought with her trophy the refuge of the sounder.
