Three
In the succeeding weeks I was a good deal bored. Mrs. Flemming and herfriends seemed to me to be supremely¹ uninteresting. They talked forhours of themselves and their children and of the difficulties of gettinggood milk for the children and of what they say to the dairy when the milkwasn’t good. Then they would go on to the servants, and the difficulties ofgetting good servants and of what they had said to the woman at the re-gistry office and of what the woman at the registry office had said to them.
They never seemed to read the papers or to care about what went on inthe world. They disliked travelling—everything was so different to Eng-land. The Riviera was all right, of course, because one met all one’s friendsthere.
I listened and contained myself with difficulty. Most of these womenwere rich. The whole wide beautiful world was theirs to wander in andthey deliberately² stayed in dirty dull London and talked about milkmenand servants! I think now, looking back, that I was perhaps a shade intol-erant. But they were stupid—stupid even at their chosen job: most of themkept the most extraordinarily³ inadequate⁴ and muddled⁵ housekeeping ac-counts.
My affairs did not progress very fast. The house and furniture had beensold, and the amount realized had just covered our debts. As yet, I had notbeen successful in finding a post. Not that I really wanted one! I had thefirm conviction that, if I went about looking for adventure, adventurewould meet me half way. It is a theory of mine that one always gets whatone wants.
My theory was about to be proved in practice.
It was early in January—the 8th, to be exact. I was returning from anunsuccessful interview with a lady who said she wanted a secretary-com-panion, but really seemed to require a strong charwoman who wouldwork twelve hours a day for ￡25 a year. Having parted with mutual⁶ veiledimpolitenesses, I walked down Edgware Road (the interview had takenplace in a house in St. John’s Wood), and across Hyde Park to St. George’sHospital. There I entered Hyde Park Corner Tube Station and took a ticketto Gloucester Road.

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