A poker was
more suited to his capacity than a pen. He glanced about him, uncertain
and anxious, and then crept to the door near the foot of the stairs and
listened. There was no sound; and that was curious. The woman who was
bringing into the world the hero's child made no cry that reached us
below. Once or twice I had heard muffled movements not quite
overhead--somewhere above--but naught else. The doctor and Jos's sister
seemed to have retired into a sinister and dangerous mystery. I could
not dispel from my mind pictures of what they were watching and what
they were doing. The vast, cruel, fumbling clumsiness of Nature, her
lack of majesty in crises that ought to be majestic, her incurable
indignity, disgusted me, aroused my disdain, I wanted, as a philosopher
of all the cultures, to feel that the present was indeed a majestic
crisis, to be so esteemed by a superior man. I could not. Though the
crisis possibly intimidated me somewhat, yet, on behalf of Jos Myatt, I
was ashamed of it. This may be reprehensible, but it is true.
He sat down by the fire and looked at the fire. I could not attempt to
carry on a conversation with him, and to avoid the necessity for any
talk at all, I extended myself on the sofa and averted my face,
wondering once again why I had accompanied the doctor to Toft End.
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