Impatiently, he would have
driven her from him, but all the way down the Sea Road she kept pace with
him.
"I'm done with her.... I'm done with everybody. Damn it all, one keeps
thinking...."
In the evening light the sea below the road was a pale blue and near the
shore a calm green. It was all very peaceful. The water lapped the shore,
the Bell Rock sighed its melancholy note across space; out a little way,
when some jagged stones sprang like shoulders from the blue, gentle waves
ringed them in foam like lace and broke with a whisper against their sides.
Except for the sea there was absolute silence. Peter alone seemed to walk
the world. As he strode along his excitement increased and his knees
trembled and his eyes were burning. He did not think of the earlier days
when he had walked that same road. That was another existence that had
nothing to do with him as he was now. The anticipation that possessed him
was parallel with the eager demand of the opium-smoker. "Soon I shall be
drugged. I'm going to forget, to forget, to forget. Just to let myself
go--to sink, to drown."
He had still with him the consciousness of keeping at bay an army of
thoughts that would leap upon him if he gave them an opportunity. But soon
that would be all over--no more battle, no more struggle. He turned the
corner and saw Scaw House standing amongst its dark trees, with its black
palings in front of its garden and the deserted barren patch of field in
front of that again.
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