Part 9

“All sorts of things we’re going to do,” said Capes; “all sorts of times

we’re going to have. Sooner or later we’ll certainly do something to

clean those prisons you told me about--limewash the underside of life.

You and I. We can love on a snow cornice, we can love over a pail of

whitewash. Love anywhere. Anywhere! Moonlight and music--pleasing, you

know, but quite unnecessary. We met dissecting dogfish.... Do you

remember your first day with me?... Do you indeed remember? The smell

of decay and cheap methylated spirit!... My dear! we’ve had so many

moments! I used to go over the times we’d had together, the things we’d

said--like a rosary of beads. But now it’s beads by the cask--like the

hold of a West African trader. It feels like too much gold-dust clutched

in one’s hand. One doesn’t want to lose a grain. And one must--some of

it must slip through one’s fingers.”

“I don’t care if it does,” said Ann Veronica. “I don’t care a rap for

remembering. I care for you. This moment couldn’t be better until the

next moment comes. That’s how it takes me. Why should WE hoard? We

aren’t going out presently, like Japanese lanterns in a gale. It’s the

poor dears who do, who know they will, know they can’t keep it up, who

need to clutch at way-side flowers. And put ‘em in little books for

remembrance. Flattened flowers aren’t for the likes of us. Moments,

indeed! We like each other fresh and fresh. It isn’t illusions--for us.

We two just love each other--the real, identical other--all the time.”

“The real, identical other,” said Capes, and took and bit the tip of her

little finger.

“There’s no delusions, so far as I know,” said Ann Veronica.

“I don’t believe there is one. If there is, it’s a mere

wrapping--there’s better underneath. It’s only as if I’d begun to know

you the day before yesterday or there-abouts. You keep on coming truer,

after you have seemed to come altogether true. You... brick!”