'There!' said Claire, and slipped the ring on her finger.
She kissed the top of his head once more.
'So there we are!' she said.
'There we are!' gurgled the infatuated Dudley.
'Happy now?'
'Ur-r!'
'Then kiss me.'
Mr Pickering kissed her.
'Dudley, darling,' said Claire, 'we're going to be awfully,
awfully happy, aren't we?'
'You bet we are!' said Mr Pickering.
Subconscious Self said nothing, being beyond speech.
21
For some minutes after Claire had left him Bill remained where he
was, motionless. He felt physically incapable of moving. All the
strength that was in him he was using to throw off the insidious
poison of her parting speech, and it became plainer to him with
each succeeding moment that he would have need of strength.
It is part of the general irony of things that in life's crises a
man's good qualities are often the ones that help him least, if
indeed they do not actually turn treacherously and fight against
him. It was so with Bill. Modesty, if one may trust to the verdict
of the mass of mankind, is a good quality. It sweetens the soul
and makes for a kindly understanding of one's fellows. But
arrogance would have served Bill better now. It was his fatal
habit of self-depreciation that was making Claire's words so
specious as he stood there trying to cast them from his mind.
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