mantelpiece, as a wayfarer rests against a fence. A tinge of
wildness in her aspect was derived from the black veil hanging like
a rag against her cheek, and from the fixity of her black gaze
where the light of the room was absorbed and lost without the trace
of a single gleam. This woman, capable of a bargain the mere
suspicion of which would have been infinitely shocking to Mr
Verloc’s idea of love, remained irresolute, as if scrupulously
aware of something wanting on her part for the formal closing of
the transaction.
On the sofa Mr Verloc wriggled his shoulders into perfect comfort,
and from the fulness of his heart emitted a wish which was
certainly as pious as anything likely to come from such a source.
“I wish to goodness,” he growled huskily, “I had never seen
Greenwich Park or anything belonging to it.”
The veiled sound filled the small room with its moderate volume,
well adapted to the modest nature of the wish. The waves of air of
the proper length, propagated in accordance with correct
mathematical formulas, flowed around all the inanimate things in
the room, lapped against Mrs Verloc’s head as if it had been a head
of stone. And incredible as it may appear, the eyes of Mrs Verloc
seemed to grow still larger. The audible wish of Mr Verloc’s
overflowing heart flowed into an empty place in his wife’s memory.
Greenwich Park. A park! That’s where the boy was killed. A park
– smashed branches, torn leaves, gravel, bits of brotherly flesh
and bone, all spouting up together in the manner of a firework.
She remembered now what she had heard, and she remembered it
pictorially. They had to gather him up with the shovel. Trembling
all over with irrepressible shudders, she saw before her the very
implement with its ghastly load scraped up from the ground. Mrs
Verloc closed her eyes desperately, throwing upon that vision the
night of her eyelids, where after a rainlike fall of mangled limbs
the decapitated head of Stevie lingered suspended alone, and fading
out slowly like the last star of a pyrotechnic display. Mrs Verloc
opened her eyes.
Her face was no longer stony. Anybody could have noted the subtle
change on her features, in the stare of her eyes, giving her a new
and startling expression; an expression seldom observed by
competent persons under the conditions of leisure and security
demanded for thorough analysis, but whose meaning could not be
mistaken at a glance. Mrs Verloc’s doubts as to the end of the
bargain no longer existed; her wits, no longer disconnected, were
working under the control of her will. But Mr Verloc observed
nothing. He was reposing in that pathetic condition of optimism
induced by excess of fatigue. He did not want any more trouble –
with his wife too – of all people in the world. He had been
unanswerable in his vindication. He was loved for himself. The
present phase of her silence he interpreted favourably. This was
the time to make it up with her. The silence had lasted long
enough. He broke it by calling to her in an undertone.
“Winnie.”
“Yes,” answered obediently Mrs Verloc the free woman. She
commanded her wits now, her vocal organs; she felt herself to be in
an almost preternaturally perfect control of every fibre of her
body. It was all her own, because the bargain was at an end. She
was clear sighted. She had become cunning. She chose to answer
him so readily for a purpose. She did not wish that man to change
his position on the sofa which was very suitable to the
circumstances. She succeeded. The man did not stir. But after
answering him she remained leaning negligently against the
mantelpiece in the attitude of a resting wayfarer. She was
unhurried. Her brow was smooth. The head and shoulders of Mr
Verloc were hidden from her by the high side of the sofa. She kept
her eyes fixed on his feet.
She remained thus mysteriously still and suddenly collected till Mr
Verloc was heard with an accent of marital authority, and moving
slightly to make room for her to sit on the edge of the sofa.