第19章

It was Morgan who eventually asked if no supper had been ordered for him; sitting with him below, later, at the dim delayed meal, in the presence of a great deal of corded green plush, a plate of ornamental biscuit and an aloofness marked on the part of the waiter.Mrs.Moreen had explained that they had been obliged to secure a room for the visitor out of the house; and Morgan's consolation - he offered it while Pemberton reflected on the nastiness of lukewarm sauces - proved to be, largely, that his circumstance would facilitate their escape.He talked of their escape - recurring to it often afterwards - as if they were making up a "boy's book" together.But he likewise expressed his sense that there was something in the air, that the Moreens couldn't keep it up much longer.In point of fact, as Pemberton was to see, they kept it up for five or six months.All the while, however, Morgan's contention was designed to cheer him.Mr.Moreen and Ulick, whom he had met the day after his return, accepted that return like perfect men of the world.If Paula and Amy treated it even with less formality an allowance was to be made for them, inasmuch as Mr.Granger hadn't come to the opera after all.He had only placed his box at their service, with a bouquet for each of the party; there was even one apiece, embittering the thought of his profusion, for Mr.Moreen and Ulick."They're all like that,"was Morgan's comment; "at the very last, just when we think we've landed them they're back in the deep sea!"Morgan's comments in these days were more and more free; they even included a large recognition of the extraordinary tenderness with which he had been treated while Pemberton was away.Oh yes, they couldn't do enough to be nice to him, to show him they had him on their mind and make up for his loss.That was just what made the whole thing so sad and caused him to rejoice after all in Pemberton's return - he had to keep thinking of their affection less, had less sense of obligation.Pemberton laughed out at this last reason, and Morgan blushed and said: "Well, dash it, you know what I mean." Pemberton knew perfectly what he meant; but there were a good many things that - dash it too! - it didn't make any clearer.This episode of his second sojourn in Paris stretched itself out wearily, with their resumed readings and wanderings and maunderings, their potterings on the quays, their hauntings of the museums, their occasional lingerings in the Palais Royal when the first sharp weather came on and there was a comfort in warm emanations, before Chevet's wonderful succulent window.Morgan wanted to hear all about the opulent youth - he took an immense interest in him.Some of the details of his opulence - Pemberton could spare him none of them - evidently fed the boy's appreciation of all his friend had given up to come back to him; but in addition to the greater reciprocity established by that heroism he had always his little brooding theory, in which there was a frivolous gaiety too, that their long probation was drawing to a close.

Morgan's conviction that the Moreens couldn't go on much longer kept pace with the unexpended impetus with which, from month to month, they did go on.Three weeks after Pemberton had rejoined them they went on to another hotel, a dingier one than the first;but Morgan rejoiced that his tutor had at least still not sacrificed the advantage of a room outside.He clung to the romantic utility of this when the day, or rather the night, should arrive for their escape.

For the first time, in this complicated connexion, our friend felt his collar gall him.It was, as he had said to Mrs.Moreen in Venice, trop fort - everything was trop fort.He could neither really throw off his blighting burden nor find in it the benefit of a pacified conscience or of a rewarded affection.He had spent all the money accruing to him in England, and he saw his youth going and that he was getting nothing back for it.It was all very well of Morgan to count it for reparation that he should now settle on him permanently - there was an irritating flaw in such a view.He saw what the boy had in his mind; the conception that as his friend had had the generosity to come back he must show his gratitude by giving him his life.But the poor friend didn't desire the gift -what could he do with Morgan's dreadful little life? Of course at the same time that Pemberton was irritated he remembered the reason, which was very honourable to Morgan and which dwelt simply in his making one so forget that he was no more than a patched urchin.If one dealt with him on a different basis one's misadventures were one's own fault.So Pemberton waited in a queer confusion of yearning and alarm for the catastrophe which was held to hang over the house of Moreen, of which he certainly at moments felt the symptoms brush his cheek and as to which he wondered much in what form it would find its liveliest effect.

Perhaps it would take the form of sudden dispersal - a frightened sauve qui peut, a scuttling into selfish corners.Certainly they were less elastic than of yore; they were evidently looking for something they didn't find.The Dorringtons hadn't re-appeared, the princes had scattered; wasn't that the beginning of the end?

Mrs.Moreen had lost her reckoning of the famous "days"; her social calendar was blurred - it had turned its face to the wall.