Page 407 - tender-is-the-night

VII

But she went to the beach with Dick next morning with
a renewal of her apprehension that Dick was contriving at
some desperate solution. Since the evening on Golding’s
yacht she had sensed what was going on. So delicately bal-
anced was she between an old foothold that had always
guaranteed her security, and the imminence of a leap from
which she must alight changed in the very chemistry of
blood and muscle, that she did not dare bring the mat-
ter into the true forefront of consciousness. The figures of
Dick and herself, mutating, undefined, appeared as spooks
caught up into a fantastic dance. For months every word
had seemed to have an overtone of some other meaning,
soon to be resolved under circumstances that Dick would
determine. Though this state of mind was perhaps more
hopeful,—the long years of sheer being had had an enliv-
ening effect on the parts of her nature that early illness had
killed, that Dick had not reached—through no fault of his
but simply because no one nature can extend entirely inside
another—it was still disquieting. The most unhappy aspect
of their relations was Dick’s growing indifference, at present
personified by too much drink; Nicole did not know wheth-
er she was to be crushed or spared— Dick’s voice, throbbing
with insincerity, confused the issue; she couldn’t guess how
he was going to behave next upon the tortuously slow un-

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