“Joe, we can’t go on not seeing Mark and Sybil. Warley’s too small. People will talk. It’s odd to see a great deal of someone and then just cut them off. Sybil must be suspicious already. I can’t put her off indefinitely.”

I rose. “I’m going out.”

“Joe, it’s all over between Mark and me, you must believe that.”

“It seems like it,” I said.

“Where are you going?”

“For a walk.”

She muttered something.

I grabbed her shoulder. “What did you say?”

“Nothing,” she said. “I was a fool to expect you to behave like a gentleman.”

I spat on the floor. “I’m not a gentleman,” I said. I let go her shoulder.

I turned at the door; she seemed struck dumb by fear, her eyes dull with shock.

“Don’t wait up for me,” I said. “I’m not a gentleman. I’m not worth it.”

Her mouth moved, but she didn’t speak; again I was seized by the inexplicable guilt.

I snatched up my coat and hat and rushed out into the rain.

After about half an hour of fast walking I began to enjoy myself. It was a long time since I’d walked in the rain, a long time since I’d walked around Warley; and longer still, it seemed, since I’d been alone.

I found myself standing by the bridge in Snow Park watching the river. It was swollen with the last two days of heavy rain; another day like today, I thought dreamily, and it would burst its banks. I pulled my hat down farther over my eyes. There was something profoundly satisfactory about the idea of a flood, of the black cold water engulfing first the park, then the town. It wouldn’t happen; it couldn’t happen because the town was too high above the river, but it ought to happen; the river had its rights as the town had, the black cold water eddying and swirling under the iron bridge was alive as the town was alive.

The guard rail was waist-high; I leaned over it, the iron cold under my hands. There was a gas lamp at the entrance to the bridge; I could see the rain dimpling the water. To my left I could see only the vague outline of Warley Forest; to my right the trees on the skyline hid the bandstand and the tennis courts. I was alone watching the river, the trees around me, and now, by some trick of light, the water appeared not black but silver. It was flowing, flowing between the trees, flowing away from the town, flowing to wherever rivers flow to, but flowing away. And now the wind was stronger; I could catch the smell of the river, rank, canine, a mastiff coming out of the darkness.