Mauritius

blurted out.

"Maurice, my dear, I have thought of you more than you can imagine. As I said last fall, I care for you in a real sense and always will. We were once a couple Young fools, eh?—But there is something to be gained even from foolishness. Growth, no, more than that, intimacy. Just because we were fools once, we can understand and trust each other. Marriage Didn't divide us. Oh, what a pleasure, I really think—"

"So, are you blessing me?"

"you do not say!"

"Thank you."

Clive's eyes softened.He wanted to express something more intimate than growing up.Dare he borrow a gesture from the past?

"You will think of me all day tomorrow," said Maurice. "As for Anne—she may think of me too."

His gesture was so gracious and modest that Clive decided to kiss his large brown hand lightly.

Maurice shuddered.

"You do not mind right?"

"Oh no."

"Maurice, my dear, I just wanted to let you know that I haven't forgotten the past. I'm all for it—let's never talk about the past again. But I just wanted to say this once."

"Ok."

"Aren't you relieved that it ended well?"

"How to do it properly?"

"It didn't make a mess like it did last year."

"Oh, fuck you."

"Let's settle the matter, and then I'll leave."

Maurice touched his lips to the starched dress shirt cuff.As soon as the ceremony was over, he stepped back.Clive became more and more intimate with him, and insisted that please come back to Peng Jie as soon as possible after finishing the business.Clive stopped talking late, when the gurgle of running water came through the skylight.After he was gone, Maurice drew back the curtains, put his chin on the windowsill on his knees, and let the rain soak his hair.

"Come on!" he cried suddenly, startling himself.Who is he calling for?He didn't think about anything, but the words popped out.He shut out the fresh air and darkness as fast as he could, re-enclosing himself in the russet room.Then he started writing written materials, which took some time.Though he was far from being an imaginative man, he was restless at bedtime.He was sure that someone was watching over his shoulder as he wrote, that he was not alone.Furthermore, he feels that he did not write it himself.Since coming to Penjack he seemed not to be Maurice, but to be a mass of voices which he could almost hear now arguing within him.None of the voices were Clive's, however: Maurice had gotten to this point.

Archie London was going to town too.Early next morning they waited together in the hall for the carriage.The man who led them on a rabbit hunt stood outside, expecting a tip.

"Tell him not to be a fool," said Maurice petulantly. "I offered him five shillings and he wouldn't take it. Disrespectful bastard!"

Mr. London was outraged.What are the servants used to?Are they only willing to accept gold coins?That being the case, you can resign as much as you can, just say it.He told of the monthly nurse employed by his wife.Pippa treats her exceptionally favorably.But what can you expect from someone with little education?A superficial education is worse than no education at all.

"Well said, well said," said Maurice, yawning.

However, Mr. London still pondered in his mind, is it not the duty of good people to do good things?

"Oh, try it, if you have such a desire."

He put one hand out into the rain.

"Hall, let me tell you, he obediently accepted."

"Really? The rascal!" said Maurice. "Why won't he take mine? I reckon you give more."

Mr. London admitted with a look of shame that this was the case.He was afraid that his nose would be dusted, so he gave more tips cruelly.The guy was obviously intolerable, but he thought Hall was being serious about it, and it wasn't elegant.When a servant is rude, it should be ignored.

Maurice, however, was very angry and tired, and a trip to London to see a hypnotist also made him anxious.He felt that what happened just now was an example of Peng Jie's sloppy hospitality.Wanting revenge, he strolled up to the door and said in a casual but menacing tone: "Hey! Then five shillings ain't enough! Then you'll only accept gold coins!" Anne came to see them off and put him The words were interrupted.

"Good luck," she said to Maurice, her expression extremely charming, and she paused, as if inviting him to confide in him.She fluttered, but added: "I'm glad you're not being cynical now."

"Are you happy?"

"Men like to come across as cynical. That's what Clive is. Don't you, Clive? Mr. Hall, men are all funny." She fiddled with the necklace and smiled. "Very funny. Good luck." Maurice liked her now.His situation, and his manner of facing reality, struck her as properly manly. "Women in love these days," she explained to Clive standing on the doorstep as they watched their guests depart, "women in love these days don't put on airs—I wish I knew That girl's name."

The gamekeeper, visibly ashamed, took Maurice's suitcase from the servant and carried it to the carriage. "Put it in," said Maurice dryly.Anne, Clive, and Mrs Durham waved their hands, and they set off.Mr. London resumed the story of the nurse for whom Pippa was paid by the month.

"How about a change of air?" Morris couldn't help it.He opened the car window and looked out at the wet garden.It's ridiculous that there's so much rain!Why is it raining?Everything in the universe doesn't care about humans at all!The carriage trudged feebly along the downhill road in the forest.It seemed that it would never reach the station, and Pippa's misfortune seemed endless.

Not far from the caretaker's cottage there is a steep uphill road, which is always potholed.Briar roses were stabbing on both sides, scratching the side of the carriage, and clusters of flowers passed by the side of the carriage.The rain made them drag in the muddy water, some had black rot, and some buds could not bloom.One to the east, one to the west, beauty triumphs, but only a hopeless flicker in the dark world.Maurice looked at each of them.Although he didn't like flowers very much, their decay annoyed him.Few things are perfect.Every flower on this branch leans to one side, and the other branch is densely covered with caterpillars or galls. Excessive growth or swelling of local plant tissues), bulging.How indifferent is nature!How inadequate!He leaned out of the car window to see if there was anything acceptable, and the bright brown eyes of a young man came straight into his sight.

"My God, why is it the guy watching the hunting ground again!"

"Impossible, he couldn't have come here. We left him at the house."

"If he runs all the way, he can still come."

"What is he running for?"

"That's right, what are you running for?" Maurice said, and raising the back of the car, he squinted at the briar bushes, which were obscured by the morning mist.

"is it him?"

"I don't see it," his traveling companion resumed the conversation at once, and babbled almost continuously until they parted at Waterloo Station.

In the taxi, Maurice rereads his written material, which surprises him with its candor.He can't trust Jowett, but puts himself in the hands of a quack.Despite Risley's assurances, he still associated hypnotism with seances and blackmail.Whenever he read such a report in the Daily Telegraph, he used to rant about it.Is it better for him to back down?

However, the house seemed to make sense.When the door opened, little Lasker Joneses were playing on the stairs--these lovely children mistook him for "Uncle Peter" and grabbed his hand.When he was locked in the waiting room and picked up a copy of "Punch", the mood became more normal.He intended to calmly submit to fate.He wanted a woman who would secure him socially, lessen his sensuality, and bear him children.He had never expected that woman to give him pure pleasure—Dickie had, at least had pleasure—because in the course of the long struggle he had forgotten what love was.It was not happiness that he sought from Mr. Lasker Jones, but ease.

The gentleman comforted him even more.For in Morris's mind a man of advanced modern science was almost like Mr. Jones.Sallow and expressionless, he sat facing a rolltop desk in a large room devoid of a single picture. "Mr. Hall?" he said, holding out a pale hand.He speaks with a slight American accent. "Ah, Mr. Hall, what's wrong with you?" Morris also held a detached attitude.It was as if they had met to talk about an outsider. "It's all written here." He said while showing the written material. "I ask a doctor