Point Counter Point - Aldous Huxley [50]
‘But of course,’ Molly went on, ‘intelligence ought never to marry intelligence. That’s why Jean is always threatening to divorce me. He says I’m too stimulating. “Tu ne m’ennuies pas assez,” he says; and that what he needs is une femme sedative. And I believe he’s really right. Philip Quarles has been wise. Imagine an intelligent fairy of a man like Philip married to an equally fairyish intelligent woman—Lucy Tantamount, for example. It would be a disaster, don’t you think? ‘
‘Lucy’d be rather a disaster for any man, wouldn’t she, fairy or no fairy? ‘
‘No, I must say, I like Lucy.’ Molly turned to her inner store-house of Theophrastian phrases
‘I like the way she floats through life instead of trudging. I like the way she flits from flower to flower—which is perhaps a rather too botanical and poetical description of Bentley and Jim Conklin and poor Reggie Tantamount and Maurice Spandrell and Tom Trivet and Poniatovsky and that young Frenchman who writes plays, what is his name? and the various others one has forgotten or never heard about.’ Burlap smiled; they all smiled at this passage. ‘Anyhow, she flits. Doing a good deal of damage to the flowers, I must admit.’ Burlap smiled again. ‘But getting nothing but fun out of it herself. I must say, I rather envy her. I wish I were a fairy and could float.’
‘She has much more reason to envy you,’ said Burlap, looking deep, subtle and Christian once more, and wagging his head.
‘Envy me for being unhappy? ‘
‘Who’s unhappy? ‘ asked Lady Edward breaking in on them at this moment. ‘Good evening, Mr. Burlap,’ she went on without waiting for an answer. Burlap told her how much he had enjoyed the music.
‘We were just talking about Lucy,’ said Molly d’Exergillod, interrupting him. ‘Agreeing that she was like a fairy. So light and detached.’
‘Fairy!’ repeated Lady Edward, emphatically rolling the ‘r’ far back in her throat.’she’s like a leprechaun. You’ve no idea, Mr. Burlap, how hard it is to bring up a leprechaun.’ Lady Edward shook her head.’she used really to frighten me sometimes.’
‘Did she?’ said Molly. ‘But I should have thought you were a bit of a fairy yourself, Lady Edward.’
‘A bit,’ Lady Edward admitted. ‘But never to the point of being a leprechaun.’
‘Well?’ said Lucy, as Walter sat down beside her in the cab. She seemed to be uttering a kind of challenge. ‘Well?’
The cab started. He lifted her hand and kissed it. It was his answer to her challenge. ‘I love you. That’s all.’
‘Do you, Walter?’ She turned towards him and, taking his face between her two hands, looked at him intently in the half-darkness
‘Do you? ‘ she repeated; and as she spoke, she shook her head slowly and smiled. Then, leaning forward, she kissed him on the mouth. Walter put his arms round her; but she disengaged herself from the embrace. ‘No, no,’ she protested and dropped back into her corner. ‘No.’
He obeyed her and drew away. There was a silence. Her perfume was of gardenias; sweet and tropical, the perfumed symbol of her being enveloped him. ‘I ought to have insisted,’ he was thinking. ‘Brutally. Kissed her again and again. Compelled her to love me. Why didn’t I? Why?’ He didn’t know. Nor why she had kissed him, unless it was just provocatively, to make him desire her more violently, to make him more hopelessly her slave. Nor why, knowing this, he still loved her. Why, why? he kept repeating to himself. And echoing his thoughts out loud her voice suddenly spoke.
‘Why do you love me?’ she asked from her corner.
He opened his eyes. They were passing a street lamp. Through the window of the moving cab the light of it fell on her face. It stood out for a moment palely against the darkness, then dropped back into invisibility—a pale mask that had seen everything before and whose expression was one of amused detachment and a hard, rather weary languor. ‘I was just wondering,