Page:The Climber (Benson).djvu/76

66 The effect, too, was to add to the estimate of her own charm and amiability.

So the retrospect of the last month being satisfactory, and showing a handsome profit, to use a financial term which very well expressed Lucia's view, she let go, so to speak, of the past, and just laid before her mind the new factor. It had come like some sudden unconjectured comet into her horizon, and at present she knew nothing of its orbit, but it was large and bright, and seemed, during the survey she had had of it, to be getting quickly nearer. She did not in the least credit Edgar Brayton with the discernment and good sense necessary to fall in love with her at first sight, but she knew quite well that he had felt her to be attractive. On the other hand, what he had said about Maud clearly showed that he had a great admiration for her, while Lucia knew what her friend thought about him. That was the bald statement of the case.

Lucia had come to the path which led by a short cut to the cricket-field, and she left the hot dusty road to stroll quietly down this, while she thought with great intentness. She knew that she must act in one way or in another way, and she had to choose.

If she decided one way she would firmly and unerringly, though with all the tact in her possession, chase him, run him down, grab him, or do her best in that line (and she rightly felt capable of a good deal). On the other hand, Maud was her greatest friend, and Maud had confided that she was in love with him. And she stood quite still for about three seconds.

From the next field came the sunny sounds of the band, and through the railings she could see the many-coloured crowd. From behind her came the clip-clop of horses' hoofs on the road she had left, and the whirring buzz of motors. The sun was westerly, and spread a golden haze over the brownish-green of the scorched fields, where swallows were flying low. All this she saw with photographic distinctness, and it seemed to her that during those three seconds her mind was empty. It was not really so; it was only that her mind had dived deep, leaving the surface of itself automatically conscious. Then out of her apparently empty mind there suddenly came a couple of thoughts that had the distinctness of spoken words. Indeed, she repeated them aloud.

"It is not in my hands. If he falls in love with me, it will be a