The girls had understood that the evening had been a vital experience. But they had sat far away, seeming to be more than ever enclosed in their attitude of tolerant amusement at her doings; more than ever supporting each other in a manner that told, with regard to herself, of some final unanimous conclusion reached and decision taken, after much discussion, once for all. In the old days they would have thought nothing of her dropping in at eleven o’clock at night, with no reason but that of just dropping in. But now, their armoury of detached expectancy demanded always that she should supply some pretext. Tonight, feeling that the pretext was theirs, everyone’s, news too pressing to wait, she had rushed in unprepared, with something of her old certainty of welcome. It was so simple. It must be important to Jan that what Hegel meant was only just beginning to be understood. If Jan’s acceptance of Haeckel made her sad, here was what she wanted; even though McHibbert said that we have no right to believe a theory because we could not be happy unless it were true. … All the same a theory that makes you miserable can’t be altogether true … Miserable ; not sorry. Everything depends upon the kind of man who sets up the theory. … Pessimists can find as good reasons as optimists … but if the optimist is cheerful because he is healthy and the pessimist gloomy because … everything is a matter of temperament. Neither of them sees that the fact of there being anything anywhere is more wonderful than any theory about the fact … making optimists and pessimists look exactly alike … then why was philosophy so fascinating?
“You will lose your colour, my child, and get protuberances on your brow.”
“What then?”
St. Pancras clock struck midnight as she reached home. The house was in darkness. She went noiselessly up the first two flights and forward, welcomed, towards the blue glimmer of street lamps showing through