Youth only recognises Age by fits and starts. Jon, for one, had never
really seen his father's age till he came back from Spain. The face of
the fourth Jolyon, worn by waiting, gave him quite a shock--it looked
so wan and old. His father's mask had been forced awry by the emotion
of the meeting, so that the boy suddenly realised how much he must have
felt their absence. He summoned to his aid the thought: 'Well, I didn't
want to go!' It was out of date for Youth to defer to Age. But Jon was
by no means typically modern. His father had always been "so jolly" to
him, and to feel that one meant to begin again at once the conduct which
his father had suffered six weeks' loneliness to cure was not agreeable.
At the question, "Well, old man, how did the great Goya strike you?" his
conscience pricked him badly. The great Goya only existed because he had
created a face which resembled Fleur's.
On the night of their return, he went to bed full of compunction;
but awoke full of anticipation. It was only the fifth of July, and no
meeting was fixed with Fleur until the ninth. He was to have three days
at home before going back to farm. Somehow he must contrive to see her!
In the lives of men an inexorable rhythm, caused by the need for
trousers, not even the fondest parents can deny. On the second day,
therefore, Jon went to Town, and having satisfied his conscience by
ordering what was indispensable in Conduit Street, turned his face
toward Piccadilly. Stratton Street, where her Club was, adjoined
Devonshire House. It would be the merest chance that she should be at
her Club. But he dawdled down Bond Street with a beating heart, noticing
the superiority of all other young men to himself. They wore their
clothes with such an air; they had assurance; they were old. He was
suddenly overwhelmed by the conviction that Fleur must have forgotten
him. Absorbed in his own feeling for her all these weeks, he had mislaid
that possibility. The corners of his mouth drooped, his hands felt
clammy. Fleur with the pick of youth at the beck of her smile-Fleur
incomparable! It was an evil moment. Jon, however, had a great idea that
one must be able to face anything. And he braced himself with that dour
refection in front of a bric-a-brac shop. At this high-water mark of
what was once the London season, there was nothing to mark it out from
any other except a grey top hat or two, and the sun. Jon moved on, and
turning the corner into Piccadilly, ran into Val Dartie moving toward
the Iseeum Club, to which he had just been elected.