Читать книгу The Meadows of the Moon - James Hilton - Страница 18

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Curious, that morning, that she did not settle so easily to work. Yet perhaps not entirely curious, for innumerable aches and sprains revealed to her that the fall from the car had not left her entirely unscathed. But there was another ache, and one that defied analysis. It was an ache that kept interposing itself between her eyes and the calm facts of economic history; a sort of lens through which she saw things personally rather than economically. If, for example, she studied the conditions of factory labour in the early nineteenth century she caught herself picturing some particular family of child-slaves, their dull miseries and morbid joys; the whole subject stood out in her mind with extraordinary vividness, yet rather as material for a novel than for a text-book.

The subtly altered aspect annoyed her. Her ambition, formed during her first year at college, was to pursue some work to research and write a book about it. Neither John nor Michael understood how quietly passionate she was about this work. John’s attitude was sympathetic and respectful, but he looked instinctively for some practical result that did not exist; while Michael was innately unsympathetic towards the impartiality of outlook necessary for such work. “That’s your aloofness, Fran,” he used to tell her. “The part of you that walks by itself.”

The part of her that walked by itself would not walk at all on the morning after the motor accident. It collapsed into an undignified heap as it were, and lay comatose. And when, in the midst of her desperate efforts to revive it, Michael knocked at the door and burst in upon her, she was quite in the mood to snub him.

“Hullo, Fran ... I wondered where I should find you. Feeling all right after yesterday?”

“Rather a mass of aches.”

“Aches? Oh yes ... but isn’t it lovely to ache? I hate feeling too comfortable.... Fran, come for a walk.”

“Sorry, Micky, I’ve got work to do.”

“Put it off.”

“I’m not going to.”

“Well, let’s go out to-night after dinner. It’ll be moonlight again. Over the meadows——”

“Can’t spare the time, Micky. I really must get some of this work done. I gave you a whole day yesterday, remember.”

“Oh, damn the work.... We’ll go to-night, anyhow. You wait. You’ll have had enough of your work by then.”

“I warn you I shan’t,” she answered, laughing.