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Ann Veronica Chapter 12 - Ann Veronica puts things in order · The H. G. Wells Library

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  Speaker 1: Chapter twelve of and Veronica. This is a LibriVox recording.
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  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
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  Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording
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  Speaker 1: by Joy Chan and Veronica by H. G. Wells, Chapter
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  Speaker 1: the twelfth and Veronica Puts Things in Order, Part one,
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  Speaker 1: and Veronica made a strenuous attempt to carry out her
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  Speaker 1: good resolutions. She meditated long and carefully upon her letter
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  Speaker 1: to her father before she wrote it, and gravely and
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  Speaker 1: deliberately again before she despatched it. My dear father, She wrote,
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  Speaker 1: I have been thinking hard about everything since I was
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  Speaker 1: sent to this prison. All these experiences have taught me
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  Speaker 1: a great deal about life and realities. I see that
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  Speaker 1: compromise is more necessary to life than I ignorantly supposed
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  Speaker 1: it to be. And I have been trying to get
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  Speaker 1: Lord Morley's book that subject, but it does not appear
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  Speaker 1: to be available in the prison library, and the chaplain
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  Speaker 1: seems to regard him as an undesirable writer. At this point,
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  Speaker 1: she had perceived that she was drifting from her subject.
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  Speaker 1: I must read him when I come out, But I
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  Speaker 1: see very clearly that as things are, a daughter is
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  Speaker 1: necessarily dependent on her father, and bound while she is
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  Speaker 1: in that position to live harmoniously with his ideals. Bitstarchie,
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  Speaker 1: said Anne Veronica, and altered the key abruptly. Her concluding
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  Speaker 1: paragraph was, on the whole, perhaps hardly starchy enough. Really, Daddy,
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  Speaker 1: I am sorry for all I have done to put
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  Speaker 1: you out. May I come home and try to be
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  Speaker 1: a better daughter to you, Anne Veronica. Part two. Her
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  Speaker 1: aunt came to meet her outside Canongate, and, being a
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  Speaker 1: little confused between what was official and what was merely
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  Speaker 1: a rebellious light upon our national justice, foult herself involved
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  Speaker 1: in a triumphal procession to the vindicate a vegetarian restaurant,
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  Speaker 1: and was specifically and personally cheered by a small shabby
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  Speaker 1: crowd outside that rendezvous. They decided, quite audibly, she's an
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  Speaker 1: old dear anyhow, voting wouldn't dear it no arm to her.
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  Speaker 1: She was on the very verge of a vegetarian meal.
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  Speaker 1: Be surely she recovered her head again, obeying some fine instinct.
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  Speaker 1: She had come to the prison in a dark veil,
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  Speaker 1: but she had pushed this up to kiss Anne Veronica
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  Speaker 1: and never drawn it down again. Eggs were procured for her,
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  Speaker 1: and she set out the subsequent emotions and eloquence with
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  Speaker 1: the dignity becoming an injured lady of good family. The
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  Speaker 1: quiet encounter and homecoming. Anne Veronica, as she had contemplated,
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  Speaker 1: was entirely disorganized by this misadventure. There were no adequate explanations,
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  Speaker 1: and after they had settled things at Anne Veronica's lodgings,
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  Speaker 1: they reached home in the early afternoon, estranged and depressed,
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  Speaker 1: with headaches and the true voice of the indomitable Kitty
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  Speaker 1: Bread still ringing in their ears. Dreadful women, my dear,
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  Speaker 1: said Miss Stanley, and some of them quite pretty and
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  Speaker 1: well dressed. No need to do such things. We must
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  Speaker 1: never let your father know we went. Why ever did
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  Speaker 1: you let me get into that Wagonette, I thought we
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  Speaker 1: had to, said Anne Veronica, who had also been a
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  Speaker 1: little under the compulsion of the marshals of the occasion.
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  Speaker 1: It was very tiring. We will have some tea in
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  Speaker 1: the drawing room as soon as ever we can, and
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  Speaker 1: I will take my things off. I don't think I
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  Speaker 1: shall ever care for this bonnet again. We'll have some
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  Speaker 1: buttered toast. Your poor cheeks are quite sunken and hollow.
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  Speaker 1: Part three when Anne Veronica found herself and her father's
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  Speaker 1: studied that evening, it seemed to her, for a moment
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  Speaker 1: as though all the events of the past six months
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  Speaker 1: had been a dream. The big gray spaces of London,
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  Speaker 1: the shop lit, greasy, shining streets, had become very remote.
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  Speaker 1: The biological laboratory, with its work and emotions, the meetings
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  Speaker 1: and discussions, the rides and hansoms with Rammage, were like
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  Speaker 1: things in a book read and closed. The study seemed
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  Speaker 1: absolutely unaltered. There was still the same lamp with a
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  Speaker 1: little chip out of the shade, still the same gas fire,
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  Speaker 1: Still the same bundle of blue and white papers, it seemed,
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  Speaker 1: with the same pink tape about them at the elbow
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  Speaker 1: of the arm chair, Still the same father. He sat
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  Speaker 1: in much the same attitude, and she stood just as
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  Speaker 1: she had stood when he told her she could not
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  Speaker 1: go to the fad and dance. Both had dropped the
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  Speaker 1: rather elaborate politeness of the dining room, and in their
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  Speaker 1: faces an impartial observer would have discovered little lines of
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  Speaker 1: obstinate wilfulness in common, a certain hardness, sharp indeed in
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  Speaker 1: the father, and softly rounded in the daughter. But hardness nevertheless,
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  Speaker 1: that made every compromise a bargain, and every charity a discount,
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  Speaker 1: And so you have been thinking. Her father began quoting
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  Speaker 1: her letter and looking over his slanting glasses at her. Well,
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  Speaker 1: my girl, I wish you had thought about all these
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  Speaker 1: things before these bothers began, and Veronica perceived that she
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  Speaker 1: must not forget. To remain eminently reasonable, one has to
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  Speaker 1: live and learn, she remarked, with a passable imitation of
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  Speaker 1: her father's manner. So long as you learn, said mister Stanley.
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  Speaker 1: Their conversation hung. I suppose, daddy, you've no objection to
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  Speaker 1: my going on with my work at the Imperial College,
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  Speaker 1: She asked. If it will keep you busy, he said,
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  Speaker 1: with a faintly ironical smile. The fees are paid to
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  Speaker 1: the end of the session. He nodded twice with his
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  Speaker 1: eyes on the fire, as though that was a formal statement.
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  Speaker 1: You may go on with that work, he said, so
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  Speaker 1: long as you keep in harmony with things at her
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  Speaker 1: I'm convinced that much of Russell's investigations are on wrong lines,
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  Speaker 1: unsound lines. Still, you must learn for yourself. You're of age.
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  Speaker 1: You're of age. The work's almost essential for the bachelor
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  Speaker 1: of science exam. It's scandalous, but I suppose it is.
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  Speaker 1: The agreement so far seemed remarkable, and yet as a
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  Speaker 1: homecoming the thing was a little lacking in warmth. But
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  Speaker 1: Anne Veronica had still to get to her chief topic.
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  Speaker 1: They were silent for a time. It's a period of
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  Speaker 1: crude views and crude work, said mister Stanley. Still, these
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  Speaker 1: Mendelian fellows seem likely to give mister Russell trouble, a
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  Speaker 1: good lot of trouble. Some of their specimens, wonderfully selected,
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  Speaker 1: wonderfully got up, Daddy, said Anne Veronica. These affairs being
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  Speaker 1: away from home has cost money. I thought you would
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  Speaker 1: find that out. As a matter of fact, I happened
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  Speaker 1: to have got a little debt. Never, her heart sank
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  Speaker 1: at the change in his expression. Well, lodgings in things,
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  Speaker 1: and I paid my fees at the college. Yes, but
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  Speaker 1: how could you get who gave you credit? You see?
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  Speaker 1: Said Anne Veronica. My landlady kept on my room while
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  Speaker 1: I was in Holloway, and the fees for the college
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  Speaker 1: mounted up pretty considerably. She spoke rather quickly because she
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  Speaker 1: found her father's question the most awkward she had ever
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  Speaker 1: had to answer in her life. Molly and you settled
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  Speaker 1: about the rooms. She said you had some money. I
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  Speaker 1: borrowed it, said Anne Veronica, in a casual tone, with
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  Speaker 1: white despair in her heart. But who could have lent
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  Speaker 1: you money? I poured my poor necklace. I've got three pounds,
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  Speaker 1: and there's three on my watch. Six pounds got the tickets? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: But then you said you borrowed, I did too, said
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  Speaker 1: Anne Veronica, who from she met his eye for a second,
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  Speaker 1: and her heart failed her. The truth was impossible, indecent.
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  Speaker 1: If she mentioned Rammedy might have a fit, anything might happen.
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  Speaker 1: She lied the widgets, she said, Tut tut. He said, really,
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  Speaker 1: the you seem to have advertised our relations pretty generally.
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  Speaker 1: They they knew, of course, because of the dance. She
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  Speaker 1: knew forty pounds was a quite impossible sum for their neighbors.
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  Speaker 1: She knew too, she must not hesitate. Eight pounds, she plunged,
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  Speaker 1: and added foolishly, fifteen pounds will see me clear of everything.
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  Speaker 1: She muttered some unladylike comment upon herself under her breath,
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  Speaker 1: and engaged in secreted Mister Stanley, determined to improve the occasion.
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  Speaker 1: He seemed to deliberate well. He said, at last, slowly.
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  Speaker 1: I'll pay it. I'll pay it. But I do hope
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  Speaker 1: thee I do hope this is the end of these adventures.
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  Speaker 1: I hope you have learned your lesson now and come
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  Speaker 1: to see come to realize how things are. People. Nobody
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  Speaker 1: can do as they like in this world. Everywhere. There
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  Speaker 1: are limitations, I know, said Anne Veronica, fifteen pounds. I
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  Speaker 1: have learned that. I mean, I mean to do what
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  Speaker 1: I can fifteen pounds fifteen from forty twenty five. He hesitated.
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  Speaker 1: She could think of nothing more to say. Well, she
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  Speaker 1: achieved at last. Here goes for the new life. Here
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  Speaker 1: goes for the new life, he echoed, and stood up.
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  Speaker 1: Father daughter regarded each other arily, each more than a
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  Speaker 1: little insecure with the other. He made a movement toward
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  Speaker 1: her and then recalled the circumstances of their last conversation
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  Speaker 1: in that study. She saw his purpose and his doubt.
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  Speaker 1: Hesitated also, and then went to him, took his coat
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  Speaker 1: lapels and kissed him on the cheek. Ah v. He said,
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  Speaker 1: that's better, and kissed her back rather clumsily. We're going
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  Speaker 1: to be sensible. She disengaged herself from him and went
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  Speaker 1: out of the room with a grave preoccupied expression. Fifteen pounds,
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  Speaker 1: and she wanted forty. Part four. It was perhaps the
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  Speaker 1: natural consequence of a long and tiring and exciting day
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  Speaker 1: that Anne Veronica should pass a broken and distressful night,
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  Speaker 1: a night in which the noble and self subduing resolutions
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  Speaker 1: of Canongate displayed themselves for the first time in an
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  Speaker 1: atmosphere of almost lurid dismiss Her father's peculiar stiffness of
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  Speaker 1: soul presented itself now as something altogether left out of
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  Speaker 1: the calculations upon which her plans were based, And in particular,
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  Speaker 1: she had not anticipated the difficulty she would find in
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  Speaker 1: borrowing the forty pounds she needed for Rammage. That had
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  Speaker 1: taken her by surprise, and her tired wits had failed her.
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  Speaker 1: She was to have fifteen pounds and no more. She
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  Speaker 1: knew that to expect more now was like anticipating a
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  Speaker 1: gold mine in the garden. The chance had gone. It
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  Speaker 1: became suddenly, glaringly apparent to her that it was impossible
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  Speaker 1: to return fifteen pounds, or any sum less than twenty
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  Speaker 1: pounds to Rammage, absolutely impossible. She realized that, with a
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  Speaker 1: pang of disgust and horror, already she had sent him
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  Speaker 1: twenty pounds and never written to explain to him why
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  Speaker 1: it was she had not sent it back sharply directly
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  Speaker 1: he returned it. She ought to have written at once
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  Speaker 1: and told him exactly what had happened. Now, if she
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  Speaker 1: sent fifteen pounds, the suggestion that she had spent a
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  Speaker 1: five pound note in the meanwhile would be irresistible. No,
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  Speaker 1: that was impossible. She would just have to keep the
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  Speaker 1: fifteen pounds until she could make it twenty. That might
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  Speaker 1: happen on her birthday in August. She turned about and
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  Speaker 1: was persecuted by visions, half memories, half dreams of Rammage.
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  Speaker 1: He became ugly and monstrous, dunning her, threatening her, assailing
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  Speaker 1: her confound sex from first to last, said Anne, Veronica,
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  Speaker 1: why can't we propagate by sexless spores as the ferns do.
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  Speaker 1: We restrict each other, we badger each other. Friendship is
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  Speaker 1: poisoned and buried under it. I must pay off that
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  Speaker 1: forty pounds. I must. For a time there seemed no
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  Speaker 1: comfort for her, even in capes. She was to see
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  Speaker 1: capes to morrow. But now, in this state of misery
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  Speaker 1: she had achieved she felt assured he would turn his
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  Speaker 1: back upon her, take no notice of her at all,
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  Speaker 1: And if he didn't, what was the good of seeing him?
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  Speaker 1: I wish he was a woman, She said that I
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  Speaker 1: could make him my friend. I want him as my friend.
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  Speaker 1: I want to talk to him and go about with him,
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  Speaker 1: Just go about with him. She was silent for a time,
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  Speaker 1: with her nose on the pillow, and that brought her
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  Speaker 1: to what's the good of pretending I love him? She
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  Speaker 1: said aloud to the dim forms of her room, and
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  Speaker 1: repeated it, and went on to imagine herself doing acts
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  Speaker 1: of tragically doglike devotion to the biologist, who, for the
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  Speaker 1: purposes of the drama, remained entirely unconscious of and indifferent
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  Speaker 1: to her proceedings. At last, some anodyne formed itself from
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  Speaker 1: these exercises, and, with eyelashes wet with such feeble tears
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  Speaker 1: as only three o'clock in the morning pathos can distill,
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  Speaker 1: she fell asleep Part five pursue it to some altogether
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  Speaker 1: private calculations. She did not go up to the Imperial
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  Speaker 1: College until after midday, and she found the laboratory deserted
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  Speaker 1: even as she desired. She went to the table under
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  Speaker 1: the end window at which she had been accustomed to work,
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  Speaker 1: and found it swept and garnished with full bottles of reagents.
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  Speaker 1: Everything was very neat. It had evidently been straightened up
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  Speaker 1: and kept for her. She put down the sketch book
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  Speaker 1: an apparatus she had brought with her, pulled out her
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  Speaker 1: stool and sat down. As she did so, the preparation
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: room door opened behind her. She heard it open, but
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  Speaker 1: as she felt unable to look round in a careless manner,
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  Speaker 1: she pretended not to hear it. Then Cape's footsteps approached.
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  Speaker 1: She turned with an effort. I expected you this morning,
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  Speaker 1: he said. I saw they knocked off your fetters yesterday.
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  Speaker 1: I think it is very good of me to come
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  Speaker 1: this afternoon. I began to be afraid you might not
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  Speaker 1: come up all afraid. Yes, I'm glad you're back, for
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  Speaker 1: all sorts of reasons, he spoke a little nervously, among
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  Speaker 1: other things. You know, I didn't understand quite. I didn't
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  Speaker 1: understand that you were so keenly interested in this suffrage question.
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  Speaker 1: I have it on my conscience that I offended. You
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  Speaker 1: offended me when I've been haunted by the memory of you.
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  Speaker 1: I was rude and stupid. We were talking about the suffrage,
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  Speaker 1: and I rather scoffed. You weren't rude, she said, I
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  Speaker 1: didn't know you were so keen on this suffrage business,
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  Speaker 1: nor I you haven't had it on your mind all
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  Speaker 1: this time. I have. Rather, I felt somehow i'd hurt you.
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  Speaker 1: You didn't, I I hurt myself. I mean, I behave
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  Speaker 1: like an idiot. That's all. My nerves were in rags.
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  Speaker 1: I was worried. We're the hysterical animal, mister Capes. I
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  Speaker 1: got myself locked up to cool off by a sort
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  Speaker 1: of instinct as a dog eats grass. I'm right again now,
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  Speaker 1: because your nerves were exposed. That was no excuse for
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  Speaker 1: my touching them. I ought to have seen. It doesn't
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  Speaker 1: matter a rap if you're not disposed to resent the
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  Speaker 1: the way I behaved, I resent. I was only sorry
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  Speaker 1: i'd been so stupid. Well, I take it where straight again,
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: said Capes with a note of relief, and assumed an
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  Speaker 1: easier position on the edge of her table. But if
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  Speaker 1: you weren't keen on the suffrage business, why on earth
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  Speaker 1: did you go to prison? And Veronica reflected it was
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  Speaker 1: a phase, she said, He smiled, it's a new phase
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  Speaker 1: in the life history. He remarked. Everybody seems to have
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  Speaker 1: it now, everybody who's going to develop into a woman.
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  Speaker 1: There's miss Garvus. She's coming on, said capes, and you
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  Speaker 1: know you're altering us all. I'm shaken. The campaign's a success.
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: He met her questioning eye and repeated, Oh, it is
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  Speaker 1: a success. A man is so apt to take women
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  Speaker 1: a little too lightly unless they remind him now, and
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: they're not too You did that. I didn't waste my
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: time in prison altogether. It wasn't the prison impressed me,
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: but I liked the things you said here. I felt
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: suddenly I understood you as an intelligent person, if you'll
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  Speaker 1: forgive my saying that and implying what goes with it.
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: There's something puppyish in a man's usual attitude to women.
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  Speaker 1: That is what I've had on my conscience. I don't
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  Speaker 1: think we're all together to blame if we don't take
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  Speaker 1: some of your lot seriously, some of your sex. I mean,
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: but we smirk, I'm afraid habitually when we talk to you,
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: we smirk, and we're a bit furtive. He paused, with
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: his eyes studying her gravely. You, anyhow, don't deserve it,
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: he said. Their colloquy was ended abruptly by the apparition
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: of Miss Clay at the further door. When she saw
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: Anne Veronica, she stood for a moment as if entranced,
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: and then advanced with outstretched hands Veronique. She cried with
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: a rising intonation, though never before had she called Anne
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: Veronica anything but Miss Stanley, and seized her and squeezed
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: her and kissed her with profound emotion to think that
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: you were going to do it, and never said a word.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: You are a little thin, but except for that you
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: look you look better than ever. Was it very horrible?
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: I tried to get into the police court, but the
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: crowd was ever so much too big. Push as I would.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: I mean to go to prison directly. The session is over,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: said Miss Clake. Wild horses not if they have all
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: the mounted police in London, shan't keep me out. Part
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: six Cape slit Things wonderfully for Anne Veronica all that afternoon.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: He was so friendly, so palpably interested in her, and
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: glad to have her back with him. Tea in the
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: laboratory was a sort of suffragette reception. Miss Garvus assumed
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: a quality of neutrality, professed herself almost won over by
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: Anne Veronica's example, and the Scotchman decided that if women
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: had a distinctive sphere, it was at any rate an
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  Speaker 1: enlarging sphere, and no one who believed in the doctrine
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: of evolution could logically deny the vote to women ultimately,
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  Speaker 1: however much they might be disposed to doubt the advisibility
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  Speaker 1: of its immediate concession. It was a refusal of expediency,
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  Speaker 1: he said, and not an absolute refusal. The youth with
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  Speaker 1: his hair like Russell cleared his throat and said irrelevantly
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  Speaker 1: that he knew a man. He knew Thomas Bayard Simmons,
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  Speaker 1: who had rioted in the Stranger's gallery, and then Capes,
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  Speaker 1: finding them all distinctly pro and Veronica, if not pro feminist,
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  Speaker 1: ventured to be perverse and started a vein of speculation
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  Speaker 1: upon the Scotchman's idea that there were still hopes of
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  Speaker 1: women evolving into something higher. He was unusually absurd and ready,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: and all the time it seemed to end Veronica as
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: a delightful possibility, as a thing, not indeed to be
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: entertained seriously, but to be half furtively felt that he
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: was being so agreeable because she had come back again.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: She returned home through a world that was as roseate
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: as it had been gray overnight. But as she got
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: out of the train at Morningside Park station, she had
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: a shock. She saw twenty yards down the platform the
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: shiny hat and brought back an inimitable swagger of Rammage.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: She dived at once behind the cover of the lamp
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  Speaker 1: room and affected serious trouble with her shoelace until he
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: was out of the station, and then she followed slowly
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  Speaker 1: and with extreme discretion, until the bifurcation of the avenue
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: from the field way insured her escape. Rammage went up
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: the avenue, and she hurried along the path with a
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: beating heart and a disagreeable sense of unsolved problems in
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: her mind. That thing's going on, she told herself. Everything
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: goes on, confounded, one doesn't change anything one has set
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: going by making good resolutions. And then ahead of her
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: she saw the radiant and welcoming figure of Manning. He
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: came as an agreeable diversion from an insoluble perplexity. She
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: smiled at the sight of him, and thereat his radiation increased.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: I missed the hour of your release, he said, But
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: I was at the Vindicate, a restaurant. You did not
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: see me. I know I was among the common herd
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: in the place below, but I took good care to
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: see you. Of course, you're converted, she said, to the
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: view that all those splendid women in the movement ought
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: to have votes rather who could help it. He towered
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: up over her and smiled down at her in his
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: fatherly way, to the view that all women ought to
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: have votes, whether they like it or not. He shook
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: his head, and his eyes, and the mouth under the
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: black mustache wrinkled with his smile, and as he walked
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: by her side, they began a wrangle that was none
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: the less pleasant to Anne Veronica because it served to
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: banish a disagreeable preoccupation. It seemed to her, in her
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: restored geniality, that she liked Manning extremely. The brightness Capes
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: had diffused over the world glorified even his rival. Part seven.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: The steps by which Anne Veronica determined to engage herself
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: to marry Manning were never very clear to her. A
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: medley of motives warred in her, and it was certainly
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: not one of the least of these that she knew
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: herself to be passionately in love with Capes. At moments
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: she had a giddy intimation that he was beginning to
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: feel keenly interested in her. She realized more and more
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: the quality of the brink upon which she stood, the
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: dreadful readiness with which, in certain moods she might plunge,
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: the unmitigated wrongness and recklessness of such a self abandonment.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: He must never know, she would whisper to herself. He
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: must never know, or else else it will be impossible
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: that I can be his friend. That simple statement of
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: the case was by no means all that went on
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: in Anne Veronica's mind, but it was the form of
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: her ruling determination. It was the only form that she
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: ever allowed to see daylight. What else was there lurked
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: in shadows and deep laces. If in some mood of reverie,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: it came out into the light, it was presently overwhelmed
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: and hustled back into hiding. She would never look squarely
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: at these dream forms that mocked the social order in
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: which she lived, never admit she listened to the soft
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: whisperings in her ear. But Manning seemed more and more
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: clearly indicated as a refuge as security. Certain simple purposes
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: emerged from the disingenious model of her feelings and desires.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Seeing Capes from day to day made a bright eventfulness
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: that hampered her in the call she had resolved to follow.
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: She vanished from the laboratory for a week, a week
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: of oddly interesting days. When she renewed her attendance at
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: the Imperial College, the third finger of her left hand
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: was adorned with a very fine, old ring with dark
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: blue sapphires that had once belonged to a great aunt
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: of Manning's. That ring manifestly occupied her thoughts a great deal.
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: She kept pausing in her work and regarding it, And
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: when Capes came round to her, she first put her
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: hand in her lap, and then rather awkwardly in front
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: of him. But men are often blind to rings, he
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: seemed to be. In the afternoon, she had considered certain
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: doubts very carefully and decided on a more emphatic course
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: of action. Are these alltosinary sapphires? She said. He bent
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: to her hand, and she slipped off the ring and
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: gave it to him to examine. Very good, he said,
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: rather darker than most of them. But I'm generously ignorant
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: of gems. Is it an old ring, he asked, returning it.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: I believe it is. It's an engagement ring. She slipped
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: it on her finger and added in a voice she
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: tried to make matter of fact. It was given to
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: me last week. Oh, he said, in a colorless tone,
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: and with his eyes on her face. Yes, last week.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: She glanced at him, and it was suddenly apparent, for
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: one instant of illumination that this ring upon her finger
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: was the crowning blunder of her life. It was apparent,
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: and then it faded into the quality of an inevitable necessity. Odd,
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: he remarked, rather surprisingly. After a little interval, there was
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: a brief pause, a crowded pause between them. She sat
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: very still, and his eyes rested on that ornament for
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: a moment, and then traveled slowly to her wrist and
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: the soft lines of her forearm. I suppose I ought
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: to congratulate you, he said. Their eyes met, and his
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: expressed perplexity and curiosity. The fact is, I don't know
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: why this takes me by surprise. Somehow I haven't connected
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: the idea with you. You seemed complete without that, did I?
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: She said? I don't know? Why But this is like
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: like walking round a house that looked square and complete
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: and finding an unexpected long wing running out behind. She
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: looked up at him and found he was watching her closely.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: For some seconds of voluminous thinking, they looked at the
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: ring between them, and neither spoke. Then Cape shifted his
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: eyes to a microscope and the little trays of unmounted
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: sections beside it. How is that Carmine working, he asked,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: with a forced interest. Better, said Anne Veronica, with an
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: unreal alacrity. But it still misses the nucleolus. End of
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: Chapter twelve.