"
Emotion, for an instant, held them. Then quietly, they stepped back
again. It was almost too good to be true that, after all the turnings and
twistings, life should have brought Peter to this. He did not look very far
ahead, he did not ask himself whether the book were likely to be a success,
whether his career would justify this beginning. If only they would let him
alone.... He did not, even to himself, name those powers. He was wrapped
about with comfort, he had friends, above all (and this he had discovered
at the sea) the Galleons knew Miss Rossiter ... this last thought seemed,
by the glorious clamour of it, to draw that sheet of stars down through the
window into the room, the air crackled with their splendour.
He was drawn back, down into the world again, by hearing Bobby's voice:
"The evening post and a letter for you. Peter."
He looked down and, with a sudden pang of accusing shame because he had
forgotten so easily, with also a sure knowledge that that easy escape from
his other life was already forbidden him, saw that the letter was from
Stephen. He felt that their eyes were upon him as he took the letter up
and he also felt that in Alice Galleon's gaze there was a wise and tender
understanding of the things that he must be feeling. The roughness of the
envelope, the rudeness of the hand-writing, a stain in one corner that
might be beer, the stamp set crookedly--these things seemed to him like so
many voices that called him back.
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