5. tring Quartet

    ell,  your eye over t tubes and trams and omnibuses, private carriages not a feure to believe, landaus  it, o t I begin to s—

    If indeed it’s true, as t Regent Street is up, and treaty signed, and t cold for time of year, and even at t rent not a flat to be  of influenza its after effects; if I betten to e about t my glove in train; if ties of blood require me, leaning foro accept cordially tatingly—

    “Seven years since !”

    “t time in Venice.”

    “And where are you living now?”

    “ell, te afternoon suits me t, t  asking too much—”

    “But I kne once!”

    “Still, the war made a break—”

    If t ttle arro—no sooner is one launc and in addition turned on tric lig a need to improve and revise, stirring besides regrets, pleasures, vanities, and desires—if it’s all ts I mean, and ts, tlemen’s sail coats, and pearl tie–pins t come to t chere?

    Of  becomes every minute more difficult to say   no time it happened.

    “Did you see the procession?”

    “the King looked cold.”

    “No, no, no. But ?”

    “S a  Malmesbury.”

    “o find one!”

    On trary, it seems to me pretty sure t s’s all a matter of flats and s and sea gulls, or so it seems to be for a ting e. Not t I can boast, since I too sit passive on a gilt curning t mistaken, t ively seeking somet?  t of cloaks; and gloves—ton or unbutton? tc elderly face against t ago urbane and flusaciturn and sad, as if in s tuning in te–room? ruments, and seat te squares under t; rest tips of tand; aneous movement lift tly poise t te, t violin counts one, three—

    Flouris! tree on top of tain. Fountains jet; drops descend. But ters of t and deep, race under trailing er leaves, ed fis ers, no into an eddy  tion of fis t te spirals into tepping ligted under arco side, hum, hah!

    “t’s an early Mozart, of course—”

    “But tune, like all unes, makes one despair—I mean  do I mean? t’s t of music! I  to dance, laug pink cakes, yello story, no at? You said notleman opposite. . . But suppose—suppose—hush!”

    trailing . oven togetricably commingled, bound in pain and strewn in sorrow—crash!

    t sinks. Rising, t noapering to a dusky ipped, dras t sings, unseals my sorroes its tenderness but deftly, subtly,  until in ttern, tion, t ones unify; soar, sob, sink to rest, sorrow and joy.

    ? Remain unsatisfied? I say all’s been settled; yes; laid to rest under a coverlet of rose leaves, falling. Falling. A t, like a little parace dropped from an invisible balloon, turns, flutters   reach us.

    “No, no. I noticed not’s t of music—te, you say?”

    “t—blinder eachis slippery floor.”

    Eyeless old age, grey–ands on t, beckoning, so sternly, the red omnibus.

    “hey play! how—how—how!”

    tongue is but a clapper. Simplicity itself. t next me are brigtle. tree flasain. Very strange, very exciting.

    “how—how—how!” hush!

    the grass.

    “If, madam, you ake my hand—”

    “Sir, I rust you . Moreover, ing urf are the shadows of our souls.”

    “t. ts dreaming into mid stream.

    “But to return. urned trod on tticoat.  could I do but cry ‘Aop to finger it? At o deating in t in  skull–cap and furred slippers, snatc, you kno—to  listen! the horns!”

    tleman replies so fast to tty exc noing in a sob of passion, t tinguiser, flig, celestial bliss—all floated out on t ripple of tender endearment—until t first far distant, gradually sounds more and more distinctly, as if senescing t pool, lemons, lovers, and fisrumpets and supported by clarions te arced on marble pillars. . . tramp and trumpeting. Clang and clangour. Firm establis. Fast foundations. Marcrod to eart ty to o peris my joy; naked advance. Bare are to none; casting no s; severe. Back to go, find treet, mark t to tarry night.

    “Good nig. You go this way?”

    “Alas. I go t.”