It was different certainly. The book called _Silence_ would not
now be the same book that it would have been. He would then put down his
pencil and stare in front of him, and wonder in what respects the world
was different--it had, perhaps, more solidity, more coherence, more
importance, greater depth. Why, even the earth sometimes seemed to him
very deep; not carved into hills and cities and fields, but heaped in
great masses. He would look out of the window for ten minutes at a time;
but no, he did not care for the earth swept of human beings. He liked
human beings--he liked them, he suspected, better than Rachel did. There
she was, swaying enthusiastically over her music, quite forgetful of
him,--but he liked that quality in her. He liked the impersonality which
it produced in her. At last, having written down a series of little
sentences, with notes of interrogation attached to them, he observed
aloud, "'Women--'under the heading Women I've written:
"'Not really vainer than men. Lack of self-confidence at the base of
most serious faults. Dislike of own sex traditional, or founded on fact?
Every woman not so much a rake at heart, as an optimist, because they
don't think.' What do you say, Rachel?" He paused with his pencil in his
hand and a sheet of paper on his knee.
Rachel said nothing. Up and up the steep spiral of a very late Beethoven
sonata she climbed, like a person ascending a ruined staircase,
energetically at first, then more laboriously advancing her feet with
effort until she could go no higher and returned with a run to begin at
the very bottom again.
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