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 vii

Avoid Clichés 414 Popular Culture and College Life


Standard English Versus Slang 415 ◆◆ “Being a Hyphenated American”

33 Spelling and Commonly ◆◆


by Zaina Arafat
“ Domains of Sacred Consumption”
487

Confused Words 418 by Michael R. Solomon 489


Spelling Rules 418 ◆◆ “Emojis” by Celine Cooper 492
120 Commonly Misspelled Words 424 ◆◆ “This Boat Is My Boat” by Drew Hayden Taylor 494
Look-Alike and Sound-Alike Words 427 ◆◆ “It’s Class, Stupid!” by Richard Rodriguez 497
◆◆ “ Why Diversity on Campus
Section 8: Punctuation and Mechanics Matters” by Matthew Lynch 500
Theme: The Workplace
Psychology and Health Care
34 Commas 433 ◆◆ “The Catcher of Ghosts” by Amy Tan 502
What Is a Comma? 433 ◆◆ “The Sanctuary of School” by Lynda Barry 505
Commas in a Series 434 ◆◆ “Planting False Memories” by Sarah Barmak 508
Commas After Introductory Words and Phrases 435
Commas Around Interrupting Words and Phrases 436 Our Environment and The Workplace
Commas in Compound Sentences 437 ◆◆ “Mother Nature’s Melting Pot” by Hugh Raffles 512
Commas in Complex Sentences 438 ◆◆ “Aunt Tee” by Maya Angelou 514
Commas in Business Letters 440 ◆◆ “ Advertising Appeals” by Michael R. Solomon,
Greg W. Marshall, and Elnora W. Stuart 517
35 The Apostrophe, ◆◆ “The Beeps” by Josh Freed 519
Quotation Marks, and Titles 445 ◆◆ “ Of Rags and Riches—and Social
The Apostrophe (’) 445 Responsibility” by Dorothy Nixon 522
Quotation Marks (“ ”) 450
Punctuation of Titles 452
Spies and Hackers and The Legal World
◆◆ “ My Father Taught Me to Love Guns”
36 Capitalization and Other by Tricia Braun 524
Punctuation Marks 457 ◆◆ “ The Criminal Justice Process”
by John Randolph Fuller 529
Capitalization 457 ◆◆ “How Spies Are Caught” by Anonymous 533
Other Punctuation Marks 459 ◆◆ “ The Real Reason Crime Is Falling”
Section 9: Editing Practice by Zoe McKnight 535

37 Editing Paragraphs and Essays 464 Appendices


Appendix 1 Grammar Glossary 538
Appendix 2 Irregular Verbs 540
Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

Part V Reading Strategies Appendix 3 A Quick Guide to Verb Tenses 542

and Selections 471 Appendix 4 Combining Ideas in Sentences 543


Appendix 5 Punctuation and Mechanics 544
38 Reading Strategies 472 Appendix 6 Writing Paragraphs and Essays
in Exams 547
An Overview of the Reading Process 472
Appendix 7 Spelling, Grammar, and Vocabulary
Previewing 473 Logs 552
Reading Actively 475 Credits 556
Understanding Difficult Words 476 Index 558
Making Inferences 483
Inside Back Cover
39 Reading Selections 485
Revising Checklist for a Paragraph
The Link Between Reading and Writing 485 Revising Checklist for an Essay
Reading Selections 486 Editing Checklist
Revising and Editing Symbols

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 7 2/28/17 11:53 AM


Readings Listed by Rhetorical
Mode
Illustration “Advertising Appeals” by Michael R. Solomon, Greg W.
“Comics as Social Commentary” by Nicolas Slayton (page 178) Marshall, and Elnora W. Stuart (page 517)
“What’s in an African Name” by Ryan Lenora Brown “Emojis” by Celine Cooper (page 492)
(page 180) “Domains of Sacred Consumption” by Michael R. Solomon
“Domains of Sacred Consumption” by Michael R. Solomon (page 489)
(page 489)
“Mother Nature’s Melting Pot” by Hugh Raffles (page 512)
Comparison and Contrast
“Cuban Schools and American Schools” by Reina Lopetequi
“Advertising Appeals” by Michael R. Solomon, Greg W.
(page 205)
Marshall, and Elnora W. Stuart (page 517)
“Just Say No” by Mark Milke (page 207)
“The Beeps” by Josh Freed (page 519)
“Being a Hyphenated American” by Zaina Arafat (page 487)
“The Criminal Justice Process” by John Randolph Fuller
“This Boat Is My Boat” by Drew Hayden Taylor (page 494)
(page 529)
“It’s Class, Stupid!” by Richard Rodriguez (page 497)
”Planting False Memories” by Sarah Barmak (page 508)
“Mother Nature’s Melting Pot” by Hugh Raffles (page 512)
“Emojis” by Celine Cooper (page 492)
“Aunt Tee” by Maya Angelou (page 514)
“Why Diversity on Campus Matters” (page 500)
“The Beeps” by Josh Freed (page 519)
Narration “Of Rags and Riches—and Social Responsibility” by Dorothy
“My Prison Story” by Yirga Gebremeskel (page 183) Nixon (page 522)
“Laughing Through the Fog” by Eileithyia Marshall “My Father Taught Me to Love Guns” by Tricia Braun
(page 184) (page 524)
“Being a Hyphenated American” by Zaina Arafat “The Real Reason Crime Is Falling” by Zoe McKnight
(page 487) (page 535)
“The Catcher of Ghosts” by Amy Tan (page 502)
Cause and Effect
“The Sanctuary of School” by Lynda Barry (page 505)
“Why Small Businesses Fail” by Jim Baek (page 210)
“Aunt Tee” by Maya Angelou (page 514)
“Don’t Worry, Act Happy” by Albert Nerenberg (page 211)
“My Father Taught Me to Love Guns” by Tricia Braun
“This Boat Is My Boat” by Drew Hayden Taylor (page 494)
(page 524)
“The Catcher of Ghosts” by Amy Tan (page 502)
Description “Mother Nature’s Melting Pot” by Hugh Raffles (page 512)
“Roaring Waves of Fire” by Christi Lester (page 188) “The Beeps” by Josh Freed (page 519)
“Chicken Hips” by Catherine Pigott (page 189) “The Criminal Justice Process” by John Randolph Fuller
“The Catcher of Ghosts” by Amy Tan (page 502) (page 529)
“The Sanctuary of School” by Lynda Barry (page 505) “How Spies Are Caught” by Anonymous (page 533)
“Aunt Tee” by Maya Angelou (page 514) “The Real Reason Crime Is Falling” by Zoe McKnight
“My Father Taught Me to Love Guns” by Tricia Braun (page 535)
(page 524) “Domains of Sacred Consumption” by Michael R. Solomon
(page 489)
Process “Why Diversity on Campus Matters” by Matthew Lynch
“The Wonders of PowerPoint” by Karine Godin (page 193) (page 500)
“How I Overcame My Panic Attacks” by Rohan Healy (page 194) “Planting False Memories” by Sarah Barmak (page 508)
“The Criminal Justice Process” by John Randolph Fuller
Argument
(page 529)
“The Importance of Music” by Christine Bigras (page 214)
“How Spies Are Caught” by Anonymous (page 533)
“Robot Ethics” from The Economist (page 215)
“Of Rags and Riches—and Social Responsibility” by Dorothy
“Why Diversity on Campus Matters” by Matthew Lynch
Nixon (page 522)
(page 500)
Definition “This Boat Is My Boat” by Drew Hayden Taylor (page 494)
“Homophobia” by Dominic Chartrand (page 197) “It’s Class, Stupid!” by Richard Rodriguez (page 497)
“What Is Luck?” by Matthew Hutson (page 198) “Advertising Appeals” by Michael R. Solomon, Greg W.
“Being a Hyphenated American” by Zaina Arafat (page 487) Marshall, and Elnora W. Stuart (page 517)
“How Spies Are Caught” by Anonymous (page 533) “Emojis” by Celine Cooper (page 492)
“Domains of Sacred Consumption” by Michael R. Solomon “Planting False Memories” by Sarah Barmak (page 508)
(page 489) “Of Rags and Riches—and Social Responsibility” by Dorothy
“Emojis” by Celine Cooper (page 492) Nixon (page 522)
“My Father Taught Me to Love Guns” by Tricia Braun
Classification (page 524)
“Origins of Names” by Cleavon Henry (page 201) “The Real Reason Crime Is Falling” by Zoe McKnight
“The Purpose of Pets” by W. Stephen Damron (page 202) (page 535)
viii

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 8 2/28/17 11:53 AM


Preface

T
hank you for making The Writer’s World series Learn more about Revel at http://www.pearson
a resounding success. We are delighted that highered.com/revel/.
Paragraphs and Essays has been able to help so many
students produce writing that is technically correct and
richly detailed whether students have varying skill levels,
Enhanced Reading Support
are native or nonnative speakers of English, or learn more Brimming with insightful readings and vocabulary tips,
effectively using visuals. The Writer’s World series has always drawn attention
When we started writing the first edition, we set to the strong connection between reading and writing.
out to develop practical and pedagogically sound This edition goes a step further by offering extra reading
approaches to these challenges. We began with the idea strategies in a new Chapter 38, such as skimming and
that collaboration is crucial. So we met with more than scanning, using context clues, and making inferences.
forty-five instructors from around the country, asking for Students build their reading skills as they work on dozens
their opinions and insights regarding (1) the challenges of sample paragraphs, essays, and practices. By enhancing
posed by the course, (2) the needs of today’s ever-changing their reading skills, students are also better equipped to
student population, and (3) the ideas and features we were do research for essay writing.
proposing in order to provide a more effective teaching
and learning tool. For that first edition and every edition 2016 Modern Language Association
since, Pearson also commissioned dozens of detailed (MLA) Updates
reviews from instructors, asking them to analyze and
In Spring 2016, the Modern Language Association (MLA)
evaluate each draft of the manuscript. These reviewers
published updates to their writing and documentation
identified numerous ways in which we could refine and
guidelines. Chapter 15, “Enhancing Your Writing with
enhance our key features. Their invaluable feedback has
Research” has related content to reflect the new in-text
been incorporated throughout The Writer’s World. This text
citation and Works Cited formats.
is truly the product of a successful partnership between
the authors, publisher, and more than one hundred
developmental writing instructors. Updated Model Writing and New
Essays and Readings
What’s New in the Fifth Approximately thirty percent of this text has updated
examples, sample paragraphs, writing practices, Writer’s
Edition? Desk topics, and grammar practices. We’ve added new
student and professional essays to the essay patterns
NEW Revel™ for The Writer’s World covered in Chapter 14. All are annotated to highlight the
components of each essay (e.g., thesis statements, topic
Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

Educational Technology Designed for the Way Today’s


sentences, and concluding sentences). Each student essay
Students Read, Think, and Learn
is followed by a professional essay and a set of questions
When students are engaged deeply, they learn more
that deepen students’ understanding of the different essay
effectively and perform better in their courses. This simple
patterns. In Chapter 39, seven new thought-provoking
fact inspired the creation of Revel: an interactive learning
readings relate to the themes presented in the grammar
environment designed for the way today’s students read,
chapters.
think, and learn.
Revel enlivens course content with media interactives
and assessments—integrated directly within the authors’ New Images
narrative—that provide opportunities for students to This edition presents new dynamic and vibrant images—
read, practice, and study in one continuous experience. photos of exotic locales and pop culture icons, as well
This immersive educational technology replaces the as images from independent and mainstream films and
textbook and is designed to measurably boost students’ television shows—that will engage students and prompt
understanding, retention, and preparedness. critical thinking.

ix

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 9 2/28/17 11:53 AM


x Preface

New Grammar Themes and instructors in our focus groups and the reviewers at
every stage not only to critique our ideas but to offer their
Practices suggestions and recommendations for features that would
Many grammar practices in Part IV: The Editing Handbook enhance the learning process of their students. The result
are new, providing updated grammar instruction through has been the integration of many elements that are not
the lens of topical and culturally relevant content. All found in other textbooks, including our visual program,
of the themes were chosen to appeal to developmental coverage of nonnative speaker material, and strategies
writing students of any background. New topics include: for addressing the varying skill levels students bring to
Online and app-based Consumer protection Click-bait online the course.
shopping journalism
Body altering practices The rise in plastic Popular diet fads
surgery for men The Visual Program
Wrestling, the oldest Basketball’s rise in Rock climbing
A stimulating full-color book with more than 140 photos,
sport popularity
The Writer’s World recognizes that today’s world is a
Idolizing professional Silicon Valley Mindfulness
athletes visual one, and the book encourages students to become
Human behavior: The Personality: Influence Links: emotional and better communicators by responding to images. Chapter-
Blue/Brown-Eyed of Carl Jung physical health opening visuals in Parts I, II, III, and IV help students
Experiment
think about the chapter’s key concept in a new way. For
Bystander apathy Childrearing practices CIA psychiatrist:
Donald Ewan example, in the Chapter 9 opener, a photograph of a
Cameron mechanic’s tool case sets the stage for classification. Tools
Government espionage Social media privacy Online security are grouped by type, which helps students understand
measures
the premise of classification. In Part IV, chapter-opening
Digital tracking Online hacking in Preparing for college
photos help illustrate the theme of the examples and
financial institutions entrance exams
exercises. These visual aids can also serve as sources for
Teaching overseas Unpaid internships U.S. and global
college fees writing prompts.
Chico Mendes and the Climate change California’s longest The visuals in Part II provide students with another
Amazon’s rubber trees drought set of opportunities to write in response to images,
Chernobyl nuclear Accidental explosion Student debt with Media Writing activities that encourage them to
disaster at Texas’ West for healthcare
Fertilizer Company professions respond using particular paragraph and essay patterns.
Food contamination and International response Holistic medicine Throughout The Writer’s World, words and images work
inspection practices to the Ebola virus together to encourage students to explore, develop, and
History of acupuncture Rewarding college The “open office” revise their writing.
degrees trend
Building a start-up Online entrepreneurs: Oscar Wilde’s “The
company A clothing delivery
service
Model Millionaire” Seamless Coverage for Nonnative
Electronic music (e.g., Unauthorized file Tesla’s Elon Musk Speakers
Daft Punk) sharing and his innovations
Instructors in our focus groups consistently note the
Youth social and political Drug testing and trials Paying NCAA athletes
growing number of nonnative/ESL/ELL students
movements
enrolling in developmental writing courses. Although
some of these students have special needs relating to the
A Fresh Look writing process, many native speakers in courses have
An updated, clean, and modern design streamlines more traditional needs that must also be satisfied. To
instruction and increases usability, allowing students to address this rapidly changing dynamic, we have carefully
more effectively find and retain the information covered. implemented and integrated content throughout to assist
And, of course, our signature “sunglasses” are back on the these students. The Writer’s World does not have separate
cover by popular demand! ESL boxes, ESL chapters, or tacked-on ESL appendices.
Instead, information that traditionally poses a challenge

How The Writer’s World to nonnative speakers is woven seamlessly throughout


the book. In our extensive experience teaching writing
Meets Students’ Diverse to both native and nonnative speakers of English, we

Needs have learned that both groups learn best when they are
not distracted by ESL labels. With the seamless approach,
We created The Writer’s World to meet your students’ nonnative speakers do not feel self-conscious and
diverse needs. To accomplish this, we asked both the segregated, and native speakers do not tune out detailed

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 10 2/28/17 11:53 AM


Preface xi

explanations that may also benefit them. Many of these and a second Hint points out the need to avoid circular
traditional problem areas receive more coverage than you reasoning. In Chapter 22, a Hint discusses checking for
would find in other textbooks, arming the instructor with consistent voice in compound sentences. Hints include
the material to effectively meet the needs of nonnative brief discussions and examples so that students will
speakers. Moreover, the Annotated Instructor’s Edition see both concept and application.
provides more than seventy-five ESL Teaching Tips
designed specifically to help instructors better meet the Vocabulary Boost Throughout Part II of The Writer’s
needs of their nonnative speaking students. World, Vocabulary Boost boxes give students tips to
improve their use of language and to revise and edit
Issue-Focused Thematic Grammar their word choices. For example, a Vocabulary Boost
in Chapter 4 asks students to replace repeated words
In surveys, many of you indicated that one of the primary
with synonyms, and the one in Chapter 5 gives specific
challenges in teaching your course is finding materials
directions for how to vary sentence openings. These
that are engaging to students in a contemporary context.
lessons give students concrete strategies and specific
This is especially true in grammar instruction. Students
advice for improving their diction.
come to the course with varying skill levels, and many
students are simply not interested in grammar. To The Writer’s Desk Parts I, II, and III include The
address this challenge, we have introduced issue-focused Writer’s Desk exercises that help students get used to
thematic grammar in The Writer’s World. practicing all stages and steps of the writing process.
Each chapter centers on a theme that is carried out As the chapter progresses, students warm up with a
in examples and activities. These themes include topics prewriting activity and then use specific methods for
related to popular culture, psychology, spies and hackers, developing, organizing (using paragraph and essay
college life, the environment, health care, the legal world, plans), drafting, and revising and editing to create a
and the workplace. final draft.
The thematic approach enables students to broaden
their awareness of subjects important to American life, Paragraph Patterns at Work To help students
such as understanding advertising and consumerism and appreciate the relevance of their writing tasks,
thinking about health care issues and alternative medicine. Chapters 4–12 highlight an authentic writing sample
The thematic approach makes reading about grammar from work contexts. Titled Illustration at Work,
more engaging. And the more engaging grammar is, the Narration at Work, and so on, this feature offers a
more likely students will retain key concepts—raising their glimpse of how people use writing patterns in different
skill level in these important building blocks of writing. workplace settings.
We also think that it is important to teach grammar in the
context of the writing process. Students should not think that Reflect On It Each Reflect On It is a chapter-review
grammar is an isolated exercise. Therefore, each grammar exercise. Questions prompt students to recall and
chapter concludes with a warm-up writing activity. review what they have learned in the chapter.

The Writer’s Room The Writer ’s Room contains


Learning Aids to Help Students Get writing activities that correspond to general, college,
the Most from The Writer’s World
Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

and workplace topics. Some prompts are brief to allow


Overwhelmingly, focus group participants and students to freely form ideas while others are expanded
reviewers asked that both a larger number and a greater to give students more direction.
diversity of exercises and activities be incorporated into There is something for every student writer in
The Writer’s World. In response, we have developed and this end-of-chapter feature. Students who respond
tested the following learning aids in The Writer’s World. well to visual cues will appreciate the media writing
We are confident they will help your students become exercises in The Writer ’s Room in Part II: Paragraph
better writers. Patterns. Students who learn best by hearing through
collaboration will appreciate the discussion and group
Hints In each chapter, Hint boxes highlight important work prompts of selected The Writer ’s Rooms. To
writing and grammar points. Hints are useful for all help students see how grammar is not isolated from
students, but many will be particularly helpful for the writing process, there are also The Writer ’s Room
nonnative speakers. For example, in Chapter 12, one activities at the end of sections 1–8 in Part IV: The
Hint encourages students to state an argument directly Editing Handbook.

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 11 2/28/17 11:53 AM


xii Preface

How We Organized The Pearson Writing Resources


Writer’s World for Instructors and
The Writer’s World is separated into five parts for ease of
use, convenience, and ultimate flexibility.
Students
Part I: The Writing Process teaches students Book-Specific Ancillary Material
how to (1) formulate ideas (Exploring); (2) expand,
Annotated Instructor’s Edition for The Writer’s World:
organize, and present those ideas in a piece of writing
Paragraphs and Essays, 5/e ISBN 9-780-13431159-3
(Developing); and (3) polish their writing so that they
convey their message as clearly as possible (Revising The AIE offers in-text answers, marginal
and Editing). The result is that writing a paragraph or annotations for teaching each chapter, and links
an essay becomes far less daunting because students to the Instructor’s Resource Manual It is a valuable
have specific steps to follow. resource for experienced and first-time instructors
alike.
Part II: Paragraph Patterns gives students a solid
overview of the patterns of development. Using Instructor’s Resource Manual for The Writer’s World:
the same easy-to-understand process (Exploring, Paragraphs and Essays, 5/e ISBN 9-780-13431160-9
Developing, and Revising and Editing), each chapter The material in the IRM is designed to save
in this section explains how to convey ideas using one instructors time and provide them with effective
or more writing patterns. As they work through the options for teaching their writing classes. It offers
practices and write their own paragraphs and essays, suggestions for setting up their course; provides a
students begin to see how using a writing pattern can lot of extra practice for students who need it; offers
help them fulfill their purpose for writing. quizzes and grammar tests, including unit tests;
Part III: The Essay covers the parts of the essay and furnishes grading rubrics for each rhetorical mode;
explains how students can apply the nine patterns and supplies answers in case instructors want
of development to essay writing. This section also to print them out and have students grade their
discusses the role research plays in writing and own work. This valuable resource is exceptionally
explains some ways that students can incorporate useful for adjuncts who might need advice in
research in their essays. setting up their initial classes or who might be
teaching a variety of writing classes with too many
Part IV: The Editing Handbook is a thematic students and not enough time.
grammar handbook. In each chapter, the examples PowerPoint Presentation for The Writer’s World: Paragraphs
correspond to a theme, such as popular culture, and Essays, 5/e ISBN 9-780-13431260-6
college life, and work. As students work through the
chapters, they hone their grammar and editing skills PowerPoint presentations to accompany each
while gaining knowledge about a variety of topics. chapter consist of classroom-ready lecture outline
In addition to helping build interest in the grammar slides, lecture tips and classroom activities, and
practices, the thematic material provides a spark that review questions. The PPT slide set is available for
ignites new ideas that students can apply to their download from the Instructor Resource Center.
writing. Answer Key for The Writer’s World: Paragraphs and Essays,
5/e ISBN 9-780-13431263-7
Part V: Reading Strategies and Selections offers
tips, detailed reading strategies to help students The Answer Key contains the solutions to
improve their reading skills, as well as interesting and the exercises in the student edition of the text.
relevant essays and follow-up questions. Students Available for download from the Instructor
learn how to write by observing and dissecting what Resource Center.
they read. The readings relate to the themes found in
Part IV: The Editing Handbook, thereby providing
more fodder for generating writing ideas.

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 12 2/28/17 11:53 AM


Preface xiii

MyWritingLab Jefferson State CC; Zoe Ann Cerny, Horry-Georgetown


Technical College; Cathy J. Clements, State Fair CC;
MyWritingLab, a complete online learning resource,
Michael F. Courteau, St. Paul College; Cynthia Dawes,
provides additional practice exercises and engaging
Edgecombe CC; Mary F. Di Stefano Diaz, Broward
animations for developing writers. It accelerates learning
College; Claudia Edwards, Piedmont CC; Stephanie
through layered assessment and a personalized learning
Fischer, Southern Connecticut State University;
path using the Knewton Adaptive Learning PlatformTM,
Paul Gallagher, Red Rocks CC; Kim Allen Gleed,
which customizes standardized educational content. With
Harrisburg Area CC; Ellen Hernandez, Camden CC;
over eight thousand exercises and immediate feedback to
Karen Hindhede, Central Arizona College; Schahara
answers, the integrated learning aids of MyWritingLab
Hudelson, South Plains College; Nikkina Hughes,
reinforce learning throughout the semester.
Tarrant CC; Dianna W. Hydem, Jefferson State CC; Stacy
Janicki, Ridgewater College; Patrice Johnson, Dallas
Additional Resources County CC District; Jennifer Johnston, Hillsborough
Pearson is pleased to offer a variety of support materials to CC; Julie Keenan, Harrisburg Area CC; Patricia A.
help make teaching writing easier for teachers and to help Lacey, Harper College; Nicole Lacroix, Red Rock CC;
students excel in their coursework. Many of our student Ruth K. MacDonald, Lincoln College of New England;
supplements are available free or at a greatly reduced Joy McClain, Ivy Technical CC, Evansville; Heather
price when packaged with The Writer’s World: Paragraphs Moulton, Central Arizona College; Ellen Olmstead,
and Essays, 5/e. Visit www.pearsonhighereducation.com, Montgomery College; Deborah Peterson, Blinn
contact your local Pearson sales representative, or review College; Rebecca Portis, Montgomery College; Sharon
a detailed listing of the full supplements package in the Race, South Plains College; Lisa M. Russell, Georgia
Instructor’s Resource Manual for more information. Northwestern Technical College; Stephanie Sabourin,
Montgomery College; Sharisse Turner, Tallahassee
CC; Samantha Vance, Chattahoochee Valley CC; Jody
Acknowledgments Wheeler, Saint Paul College; Julie Yankanich, Camden
Many people have helped us produce The Writer’s World. County College
First and foremost, we would like to thank our students We are indebted to the team of dedicated professionals
for inspiring us and providing us with extraordinary who have helped make this project a reality. They
feedback. Their words and insights pervade this book. have boosted our spirits and have believed in us every
We also benefited greatly from the insightful step of the way. Special thanks to Veronica Tomaiuolo
comments and suggestions from over one hundred for developing this series and to Matthew Wright for
instructors across the nation, all of whom are listed in trusting our instincts and enthusiastically propelling us
the opening pages of the Annotated Instructor’s Edition. forward. Also, we’d like to thank Diego Pelaez-Gaetz for
Our colleagues’ feedback was invaluable and helped writing contemporary and thought provoking grammar
shape The Writer’s World series content, focus, and practices. We appreciate Kathleen Reynolds for her help
organization. finding articles for this new edition. We owe a deep debt
of gratitude to Yolanda de Rooy, whose encouraging
words helped ignite The Writer’s World project. Ohlinger
Reviewers
Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

Publishing Services helped keep us motivated and on


The following reviewers provided insight and assistance task during the production process. Thanks to everyone’s
in the latest revision of The Writer’s World series: efforts, The Writer’s World is an even better resource for
Tia Adger, Piedmont Technical College; Phillip both instructors and students.
Bannowsky, University of Delaware; Betty Benns, Finally, we would like to dedicate this book to our
Orangeburg-Calhoun Technical College; Justin Bonnett, families who supported us and who patiently put up
Saint Paul College; Cheryl Borman, Hillsborough CC, with our long hours on the computer. Manu and Murray
Ybor City Campus; Adam Carlberg, Tallahessee CC; continually encouraged us, as did Diego, Rebeka, Kiran,
Judith L. Carter, Amarillo College; Connie Caskey, and Meghana.

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 13 2/28/17 11:53 AM


xiv Preface

A Note to Students inspire them. The Writer’s World includes strategies that
will help you improve your reading skills and your written
Your knowledge, ideas, and opinions are important. The communication. Quite simply, when you become a better
ability to clearly communicate those ideas is invaluable in reader and writer, you become a better communicator. It
your personal, academic, and professional life. When your is our greatest wish for The Writer’s World to make you
writing is error-free, readers will focus on your message, excited about learning. Enjoy!
and you will be able to persuade, inform, entertain, or
Lynne Gaetz & Suneeti Phadke

Lynne Gaetz in Morocco Suneeti Phadke in India

A01_GAET5384_05_SE_FM.indd 14 2/28/17 11:53 AM


Part I
The Writing Process

An Overview
The writing process is a series of steps that most writers follow to get from thinking
about a topic to preparing the final draft. Generally, you should follow the process step
by step; however, sometimes you may find that steps overlap. For example, you might
do some editing before revising, or you might think about your main idea while pre-
writing. The important thing is to make sure that you have done all of the steps before
preparing your final draft.
Before you begin the chapters that follow, review the steps in the writing process.

CHAPTER 1 EXPLORING
• Think about your topic.
• Think about your audience.
• Think about your purpose.
• Try exploring strategies.

CHAPTER 2 DEVELOPING
• Narrow your topic.
• Express your main idea.
• Develop your supporting ideas.
• Make a plan or an outline.
• Write your first draft.

CHAPTER 3 REVISING AND EDITING


• Revise for unity.
• Revise for adequate support.
• Revise for coherence.
• Revise for style.
• Edit for technical errors.

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2 Part I

The Paragraph and the Essay


Most of the writing that we do—email messages, work reports, college papers—is made
up of paragraphs and essays. A paragraph is a series of sentences that are about one
central idea. Paragraphs can stand alone, or they can be part of a longer work such as an
essay, a letter, or a report. An essay is a series of paragraphs that are about one central
idea. Both the paragraph and the essay are divided into three parts.
Characteristics of a Paragraph Characteristics of an Essay
• The topic sentence introduces the subject • The introduction engages the reader’s
of the paragraph and shows the writer’s interest and contains the thesis statement.
attitude toward the subject. • The body paragraphs each support the
• The body of the paragraph contains details main idea of the essay.
that support the topic sentence. • The conclusion reemphasizes the thesis
• The paragraph ends with a concluding and restates the main points of the essay. It
sentence. brings the essay to a satisfactory close.
Review the following paragraph and essay, written by college student Anthony
Coffman.

The Paragraph
Topic sentence A worthwhile place to visit is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Built in 1909, it is
home to the greatest spectacle in racing: the Indianapolis 500 Indy races. The stadium
showcases the apex in automotive design. In addition to the Indy car races, there are
Supporting ideas
Brickyard 400 NASCAR races, Grand Prix events, and GP moto-race events. Races can
be expensive; a more wallet-friendly alternative is to attend qualifying time trials or to take
a tour and visit the museum on the grounds during the non-race times of the year. Visiting
Concluding sentence the Indianapolis Motor Speedway provides fun for the whole family.

The Essay
Born in Indiana, I’ve lived here most of my life. Often, I hear fellow Indianans (often
called “Hoosiers”) say there’s not much to do here. In fact, visitors and local citizens
The introduction contains a
thesis statement.
can visit many great entertainment venues, including state parks, museums, and the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Indiana provides twenty-five recognized state parks that provide a variety of activities.
Visitors can camp, fish, cycle, and see natural and historic sites. Some of the best parks
include Turkey Run, Brown County, White River, Whitewater Memorial, and McCormick’s
Creek. I have had the opportunity to visit the grounds of Turkey Run, Brown County, and
White River and had a wonderful time while hiking.
Another great activity to do in Indiana is visit museums. The Indianapolis Children’s Museum
offers educational exhibits including Dinosphere and the Anne Frank Peace Park with exhibits
of the Seven Wonders of the World. The Indianapolis Museum of Art has over fifty thousand
Each body paragraph has a
topic sentence that supports artworks and is home to the Virginia B. Fairbanks Art and Nature Park, which provides an
the thesis statement. urban oasis of woodlands, wetlands, lakes, and meadows. On the museum grounds, the
Oldfield’s-Lilly House gives visitors a glimpse into a country estate in the early twentieth century.
A worthwhile place to visit is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Built in 1909, it is
home to the greatest spectacle in racing: the Indianapolis 500 Indy races. The stadium
showcases the apex in automotive design. In addition to the Indy car races, there are
Brickyard 400 NASCAR races, Grand Prix events, and GP moto-race events. Races can
be expensive; a more wallet-friendly alternative is to attend qualifying time trials or to take
a tour and visit the museum on the grounds during the non-race times of the year. Visiting
the Indianapolis Motor Speedway provides fun for the whole family.
Indiana has so much to offer. Enjoy scenic landscapes in the great outdoors of our
Concluding paragraph
state parks or artistic landscapes in the great halls of our museums. And for those with the
need for speed, who can resist the spectacle of watching cars whiz by at nearly 200 miles
per hour? I can’t imagine living anywhere else!

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1 Exploring
Learning
Objectives

1.1 Define exploring.


1.2 Identify your topic.
1.3 Identify your
­audience.
1.4 Identify your
­purpose.
1.5 Practice exploring
strategies.
1.6 Practice journal and
portfolio writing.

Before creating a final image, an artist takes the time to consider what to create. Similarly, before
developing a draft, a writer needs to explore the topic.

What Is Exploring?
1.1 Define exploring.
Have you ever been given a writing subject and then stared at the blank page, thinking,
“I don’t know what to write”? Well, it is not necessary to write a good paragraph or
essay immediately. There are certain things that you can do to help focus on your topic.

Understanding Your Assignment


As soon as you are given an assignment, make sure that you understand the task.
Answer the following questions about the assignment.

• How many words or pages should I write?


• What is the due date for the assignment?
• Are there any special qualities my writing should include?

After you have considered your assignment, follow the four steps in the exploring
stage of the writing process.

Exploring ESSAY LINK


When you plan an essay, follow the
four exploring steps in the same way.

STEP 1 Think about your topic. Determine what you will write about.
STEP 2 Think about your audience. Consider your intended readers and what
interests them.

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4 Chapter 1

STEP 3 Think about your purpose. Ask yourself why you want to write.
STEP 4 Try exploring strategies. Experiment with different ways to generate ideas.

Topic
1.2 Identify your topic.
Your topic, or subject, is what you are writing about. When an instructor gives a topic
for your writing, narrow the topic and find an angle that interests you. For example,
if your instructor asks you to write about travel, you can take many approaches to the
topic. You might write about the dangers of travel or explain what people can learn
when they travel. Try to narrow the topic to suit your interests. When thinking about
your topic, ask yourself the following questions.

• What special knowledge do I have about the topic?


• What subtopics are most relevant to me?
• What aspect of the topic arouses my emotions?

Audience
1.3 Identify your audience.
Your audience is your intended reader. Your audience might be your instructor, your
classmates, your boss, your coworkers, and so on. Remember to adapt your language
and vocabulary for a specific audience. For example, in a report written for your business
class, you might use specialized accounting terms that would not be appropriate in an
essay for another class. When you think about your audience, ask yourself the following
questions.

• Who will read my assignment? Will the reader be my instructor, or will other
­students also read it?
• What does my audience already know about the topic?
• What information will my readers expect?
• Should I use formal or informal language?

HINT: Instructor as the Audience


Your instructor represents a general audience. Such an audience will expect you to
use correct grammar and to reveal what you have learned or understood about the
topic. Do not leave out information because you assume that your instructor is an
expert in the field. Your ideas should be presented in a clear and organized manner.

Purpose
1.4 Identify your purpose.
Your purpose is your reason for writing. Sometimes you may have more than one
purpose. When you consider your purpose, ask yourself the following questions.

• Is my goal to entertain? Do I tell a personal story or anecdote?


• Is my goal to persuade? Do I convince the reader that my point of view is correct?
• Is my goal to inform? Do I explain something or present information?

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Exploring 5

HINT: General and Specific Purpose


Your general purpose is to entertain, inform, or persuade. Your specific purpose
is your more precise reason for writing. For example, imagine that you have to
write about music. You can have the following general and specific purposes.
General purpose: to inform
Specific purpose: to explain how to become a better musician

Practice 1
Read text messages A and B. Then answer the questions that follow.

Text Message A Text Message B


whaddup? how ru? can’t cu at 3 cuz I will not be able to work as scheduled
forgot about doc appt. wanna meet tomorrow afternoon because I have a
later? im prob free 2nite. anyway ttyl medical appointment at 3:00 pm. If
you would like me to work the late
shift instead, I could do that. Please let
me know. Thanks!

1. Who is the intended audience for text message A?


friend           boss
What language clues helped you determine the audience?

2. Who is the intended audience for text message B?


friend           boss
What language clues helped you determine the audience?
Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

Practice 2
Read each selection carefully. Underline any words or phrases that help you iden-
tify its source, audience, and purpose. Then answer the questions that follow each
selection.

EXAMPLE:
I’m totally psyched about learning the drums. It’s taken me a while to get used to Slang
keeping up a steady beat, but I think I’m getting it. My drum teacher is cool, and
he’s pretty patient with me. I try to practice, but it bugs the neighbors when I hit Slang, informal tone
the cymbals.

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6 Chapter 1

What is the most likely source of this paragraph?


a. website article b. textbook c. email

What is its purpose? To inform


Who is the audience? Friend or family member
1. The nationalist movement in music was first felt in Russia, where music had
been dominated entirely by foreign influence. Starting in the middle of the
nineteenth century, Russian composers began to write operas in their own
language, on Russian themes, and they often based their librettos on literary
works by the great Russian writers of the time.
What is the most likely source of this paragraph?
a. short story b. textbook c. email

What is its purpose?


Who is the audience?
2. When dealing with club managers, it is imperative that you act
professionally. Get all the details of a gig in advance. Doing so will eliminate
any confusion or miscommunication that could result in a botched deal.
It will also instantly set you apart from the legions of flaky musicians that
managers must endure on a daily basis. That’s a good thing.
What is the most likely source of this paragraph?
a. website article b. novel c. email

What is its purpose?


Who is the audience?
air: song (also known as aria) 3. We are rather a musical family, and when Christiana sees me, at any time, a
little weary or depressed, she steals to the piano and sings a gentle air she
used to sing when we were first betrothed. So weak a man am I, that I cannot
bear to hear it from any other source. They played it once, at the Theatre,
when I was there with Little Frank; and the child said wondering, “Cousin
Michael, whose hot tears are these that have fallen on my hand!”
What is the most likely source of this paragraph?
a. short story b. textbook c. email

What is the purpose?


Who is the audience?

Practice 3
View the following cartoon on the next page. What is the topic? Who is the audi-
ence? What is the purpose? Does the cartoon achieve its purpose?

M01B_GAET5384_05_SE_C01.indd 6 2/17/17 1:03 PM


Exploring 7

John McPherson/Distributed by Universal Uclick via


www.CartoonStock.com

Exploring Strategies
1.5 Practice exploring strategies.
After you determine your topic, audience, and purpose, try some exploring ­strategies—
also known as prewriting strategies—to help get ideas flowing. The four most common
strategies are freewriting, brainstorming, questioning, and clustering. It is not necessary
to do all of the strategies explained in this chapter. Find the strategy that works best
for you.
You can do both general and focused prewriting. If you have writer’s block and do
not know what to write, use general prewriting to come up with possible topics. Then,
after you have chosen a topic, use focused prewriting to find an angle of the topic that
is interesting and that could be developed in your paragraph.

HINT: When to Use Exploring Strategies


Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

You can use exploring strategies at any stage of the writing process.
• To find a topic
• To narrow a broad topic
• To generate ideas about your topic
• To generate supporting details

Freewriting
Freewriting is writing for a limited period of time without stopping. The point is to
record the first thoughts that come to mind. If you have no ideas, you can indicate that
in a sentence such as “I don’t know what to write.” As you write, do not be concerned
with your grammar or spelling. If you use a computer, let your ideas flow and do not
worry about typing mistakes.

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8 Chapter 1

TIA’S FREEWRITING
TECHNOLOGY LINK
On a computer, try typing without College student Tia Clement did freewriting about her favorite place. During her
looking at the screen or with the
screen turned off. Don’t worry about
freewriting, she wrote everything that came to mind.
mistakes. You can also try using the
dictation notetaking function on your Don’t know. The coffee shop? The snacks are good. Friends hang there.
smartphone as a freewriting tool. Talk What else? The beach. Love that sand. My bedroom is really cozy. Calm
thoughts out freely into the microphone
to help generate ideas. You can then
colors. I can relax there. Feel safe in my room. I listen to music. Songs
refer to those notes when writing. help me sleep. Nature. Love trees and flowers in the park. Feel free when
I’m outdoors in a natural place. Love grass under my bare feet. Feels
awesome.
TIA’S FOCUSED FREEWRITING
After Tia did her general freewriting, she underlined ideas that she thought she could
expand into a complete paragraph. Then she developed one of her underlined ideas.
Her purpose was to describe, so she decided to do focused freewriting about the
beach.
The beach. It is a joyous place. The houses and hotels are around it. Gotta
love the sound of the ocean. So peaceful. Water never ends it goes on
and on. When does it stop? Goes forever. Smells like salt. What else? The
bright sun reflects off the water. So warm on my skin. I love the ­feeling
of sand between the toes. Hot sand burns my feet. Lots of sounds. Kids
­playing, birds. Adults chatting. The air feels thick. And damp. A feeling of
happiness.

The Writer’s Desk: Freewriting


Choose one of the following topics and do some freewriting. Remember to write without
stopping.

Stress Nature Sports

Brainstorming
Brainstorming is like freewriting except that you create a list of ideas, and then stop
and think about what’s on the list. As you think about the topic, write down words or
phrases that come to mind. Do not be concerned about grammar or spelling. The point
is to generate ideas.

JIN’S BRAINSTORMING
College student Jin Park brainstormed about health issues. He made a list of general
ideas.
—lack of health care
—obesity
—fast food
—not enough exercise
JIN’S FOCUSED BRAINSTORMING
Jin chose “not enough exercise” as his topic, and then he did focused brainstorming.
—gaming and game apps
—parents worry about dangers on streets
—sports activities (e.g., football) cost a lot for fees, equipment, etc.
—too much sitting at school
—not enough physical education time
—need more community sports programs

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Exploring 9

The Writer’s Desk: Brainstorming


Choose one of the following topics and brainstorm. Create a list of ideas.

Ceremonies Gossip Good or bad manners

Questioning
Another way to generate ideas about a topic is to ask yourself a series of questions
and write responses to them. The questions can help define and narrow a topic. One
common way to do this is to ask who, what, when, where, why, and how questions. Like
other exploring strategies, questioning can be general or focused.

RACHEL’S QUESTIONING
College student Rachel Jubinville used a question-and-answer format to generate ideas
about family.

What is a family? —a unit of people tied by blood or legal


documents
Can friends be considered like — maybe long-time friends become part of an
family? extended family
What are problems in families? —abuse, bankruptcy, grudges, divorce, jealousy
How do families stay together? —love, patience, withholding judgment, listening
to each other, acceptance of differences
When can families connect the —holidays, weddings, funerals, weekly dinners
best?
Why is our family important? —provides support and connection, helps during
times of crisis

The Writer’s Desk: Questioning


Choose one of the following topics and write questions and answers. Ask who, what, when,
where, why, and how questions.

Technology Patriotism Celebrities


Copyright © 2018 by Pearson Education

Clustering
Clustering is like drawing a word map; ideas are arranged in a visual image. To
begin, write your topic in the middle of the page and draw a box or a circle around it.
That idea will lead to another, so write the second idea and draw a line connecting it
to your topic. Keep writing, circling, and connecting ideas until you have groups, or
“clusters,” of them on the page. You can use clustering to get ideas about a general or
a specific topic.

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10 Chapter 1

MAHAN’S CLUSTERING
College student Mahan Zahir used clustering to explore ideas about crime. He ­identified
some main topics.

White-collar
crimes

Reasons Who should pay


people commit crimes for crimes?
CRIME

Celebrity How to
criminals punish criminals

MAHAN’S FOCUSED CLUSTERING


Mahan decided to write about the reasons that people commit crimes. He added ­clusters
to that topic.

stagnant
minimum
wage influence
of luxurious
advertising tastes

poverty
greed
cuts to
social services

REASONS PEOPLE
COMMIT CRIMES alcohol
impairs
gangs
judgment
drugs or
peer pressure alcohol

addicts
desire to steal to buy
dares drugs
look cool

The Writer’s Desk: Clustering


Choose one of the following topics and use clustering to explore it on a separate sheet of
paper. Begin by writing the key word in the middle of the space. Then connect related ideas.

Jobs Health Relationships

M01B_GAET5384_05_SE_C01.indd 10 2/17/17 1:03 PM


Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
‘I do think it good of your dear mother to bother about that young man,’
said Mrs. Colquhoun. ‘Let us hope she will teach him better manners. And
now,’ she added briskly, laying an affectionate arm round her daughter-in-
law’s shoulder, ‘isn’t it time our little Virginia put her feet up?’

XX
Christopher’s was the slowest motor-cycle on the road that day. At times
it proceeded with the leisureliness of a station fly. They loitered along in the
sunshine, stopping at the least excuse—a view, an old house, a flock of
primroses. They had tea at Salisbury, and examined the Cathedral, and
talked gaily of Jude the Obscure, surely the most unfortunate of men, and
from him they naturally proceeded to discuss death and disaster, and all
very happily, for they were in the precisely opposite mood of the one
praised by the poet as sweet, and the sad thoughts evoked by Sarum Close
brought pleasant thoughts to their mind.
How much they had to say to each other. There was no end to their talk,
their eager exchange of opinions. Chickover was dim as a dream now in
Catherine’s mind; and the Catherine who had gone to bed there every
evening in a growing wretchedness was a dream within a dream. With
Christopher she was alive. He himself was so tremendously alive that one
would indeed have to be a hopeless mummy not to catch life from him and
wake up. Besides, it was impossible to be—anyhow for a short time—with
some one who adored one, unless he was physically repulsive, and not be
happy. That Christopher adored her was plain to the very passers-by. The
men who passed grinned to themselves in sympathy; the women sighed;
and old ladies, long done with envy, smiled with open benevolence between
their bonnet-strings.
Unconscious of everybody except each other, they walked about
Salisbury looking at the sights and not seeing them, so deeply were they
engaged in talk. What could be more innocent than to walk, talking, about
Salisbury? Yet if Stephen, Virginia, or Mrs. Colquhoun had met them they
would have been moved by unpleasant emotions. Once during the afternoon
this thought crossed Catherine’s mind. It was when, at tea in a
confectioner’s, Christopher was holding out a plate of muffins to her, his
face the face of a seraph floating in glory; and she took a muffin, and held it
suspended while she looked at him, arrested by the thought, and said, ‘Why
mayn’t one be happy?’
‘But one may, and one is,’ said Christopher.
‘One is,’ she smiled, ‘but one mayn’t. At least, one mayn’t go on being
happy. Not over again. Not in this way. Not——’ she tried to find the words
to express it—‘out of one’s turn.’
‘What one’s relations think, or wish, or approve, or deplore,’ said
Christopher, who scented Stephen somewhere at the back of her remarks,
‘should never be taken the least notice of if one wishes to go on
developing.’
‘Well, I seem to be going on developing at a breakneck rate.’
‘Besides, it’s jealousy. Nearly always. Deep down. The grudge of the
half dead against the wholly alive, of the not wanted against the wanted.
They can’t manage to be alive themselves, so they declare the only
respectable thing is to be dead. The only pure thing. The only holy thing.
And they pretend every sort of pious horror if one won’t be dead too.
Relations,’ he finished, lighting a cigarette and speaking from the depths of
an experience that consisted of one uncle, and he the most amiable and
unexacting of men, who never gave advice and never criticised, and only
wanted sometimes to be played golf with, ‘are like that. They have to be
defied. Or they’ll strangle one.’
‘It seems dangerous,’ said Catherine, pursuing her first thought, ‘to show
that one likes anything or anybody very much.’
‘Isn’t it the rankest hypocrisy,’ said Christopher with a face of disgust.
‘If you were bald, and had a long white beard——’ she began. ‘But even
then,’ she went on after a pause, ‘if we looked pleased while we talked and
seemed very much interested, we’d be done for.’
She smiled. ‘They wouldn’t mind at all,’ she said, ‘if you were eating
muffins happily with a girl of your own age. It’s when somebody like me
comes along, who has had her turn, who is out of her turn.’
‘They would have people love by rule,’ said Christopher.
‘I don’t know about love, but they would have them be happy by rule,’
said Catherine.
‘They must be defied,’ said Christopher.
She laughed. ‘We are defying them,’ she said.
Proceeding from Salisbury with the setting sun behind them, they
continued with the same leisureliness in the direction of Andover and
London.
‘Oughtn’t we to go a little faster?’ Catherine asked, noticing the lowness
of the sun.
‘If you’re home by nine o’clock, won’t that be soon enough?’ he asked.
‘Oh, quite. I love this.’
‘I’d like to go on for ever,’ said Christopher.
‘Aren’t we friends,’ said Catherine, looking up at him with a smile.
‘Aren’t we,’ said Christopher, in deep contentment.
The chimney stacks of an old house on their right among trees attracted
her, and they turned off the main road to go and look at it. The house was
nothing specially beautiful, but the road that led to it was, and it went
winding on past the house through woods even more beautiful.
They followed it, for the main road was uninteresting, and this one,
though making a detour, would no doubt ultimately arrive at Andover.
Charming, this slow going along in the soft, purple evening. The smell
of the damp earth and grass in the woods they passed through was
delicious. It was dead quiet, and sometimes they stopped just to listen to the
silence.
Companionship: what a perfect thing it was, thought Catherine. To be
two instead of one, to be happily two, with no strain, no concealing or
pretending, quite natural, quite simple, quite relaxed—so natural and simple
and relaxed that it was really like being oneself doubled, but oneself at
one’s best, at one’s serenest and most amusing. Could any condition be
more absolutely delightful? And, thought Catherine, to be two with some
one of the opposite sex, some one strong who could take care of one, with
whom one felt safe and cosy, some one young, who liked doing all the
things the eternal child in oneself liked doing so much, but never dared to
for want of backing up, for fear of being laughed at—how completely
delightful.
They came, on the outer edge of the woods, to a group of cottages; a
little hamlet, solitary, tucked away from noise, the smoke of its chimneys
going straight up into the still air, so small that it hadn’t even got a church
—happy, happy hamlet, thought Catherine, remembering her past week of
church—and in one of the cottage gardens, sheltered and warm, was the
first flowering currant bush she had seen that year.
It stood splendid against the grey background of the shadowy garden,
brilliant pink and crimson in the dusk, and Christopher stopped at her
exclamation, and got off and went into the cottage and asked the old woman
who lived there to sell him a bunch of the flowers; and the old woman,
looking at him and Catherine, was sure from their faces of peace that they
were on their honeymoon, and picked a bunch and went to the gate and
gave it to Catherine, and wouldn’t take any money for it, and said it was for
luck.
It seemed quite natural, and in keeping with everything else that
afternoon, to find a nice old woman who gave them flowers and wished
them luck. In Salisbury people had all seemed extraordinarily amiable. This
old woman was extraordinarily amiable. She even called them pretty dears,
which filled their cup of enjoyment to the brim.
After this the country was very open, and solitary, and still. No signs of
any town were to be seen; only rolling hills, and here and there a little
group of trees. Also a few faint stars began to appear in the pale sky.
‘Oughtn’t we to go faster?’ asked Catherine again, her lap full of the
crimson flowers.
‘We’ll make up between Andover and London,’ said Christopher. ‘If it’s
half-past nine instead of nine before we get to Hertford Street, will it be
early enough?’
‘Oh, quite,’ said Catherine placidly.
They jogged along, up and down the windings of the lane, which
presently grew grassier and narrower, into hollows and out of them again.
Not a house was to be seen, not a human being. Stillness, evening, stars. It
seemed to Catherine presently, in that wide place of rolling country and
great sky, that in the whole world there was nothing except herself,
Christopher, and the stars.
About seven miles beyond the hamlet of the flowering currant bush, just
at the top of an incline, the motor-cycle stopped.
She thought, waking from the dream she had fallen into, that he was
stopping it, as so often before that afternoon, to listen to the silence; but he
hadn’t stopped it, it had stopped itself.
‘Damn,’ said Christopher, pulling and pushing and kicking certain parts
of the thing.
‘Why?’ asked Catherine comfortably.
‘The engine’s stopped.’
‘Perhaps it wants winding up.’
He got off, and began to stoop and peer. She sat quiet, her head back, her
face upturned, gazing at the stars. It was most beautiful there in the great
quiet of the falling night. There was still a dull red line in the sky where the
sun had gone down, but from the east a dim curtain was drawing slowly
towards them. The road, just at the place they were, curved southwards, and
she had the red streak of the sunset on her right and the advancing darkness
on her left. They were on the top of a rising in the vast flatness, and it was
as if she could see to the ends of the world. The quiet, now that the motor
had stopped, was profound.
Christopher came and looked at her. She smiled at him. She was
perfectly content and happy.
He didn’t smile back. ‘The petrol’s run out,’ he said.
‘Has it?’ said Catherine placidly. In cars, when petrol ran out, one
opened another can of it and ran it in again.
‘There isn’t any more,’ said Christopher. ‘And from the look of this
place I should say we were ten miles from anywhere.’
He was overwhelmed. He had meant to have his tank filled up at
Salisbury, and in his enchanted condition of happiness had forgotten. Of all
the infernal, hopeless fools....
He could only stare at her.
‘Well, what are we going to do?’ she asked, waking up a little to the
seriousness of his face.
‘If we were near anywhere——’ he said, looking round.
‘Can’t we go back to those cottages?’
‘The thing won’t budge.’
‘Walk?’
‘At least seven miles.’
They stared at each other in the deepening dusk.
‘Well, but, Christopher——’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘We’re in a hell of a fix, and it’s entirely my fault. I
simply forgot to have her filled up at Salisbury.’
‘Well, but there must be some way out.’
‘Not unless some one happens to come along, and I could persuade him
to go to the nearest petrol place and fetch us some.’
‘Can’t you go?’
‘And leave you here?’
‘Can’t I go?’
‘As though you could!’
In silence they gazed at each other. The stars were growing brighter.
Their faces stood out now as something white in the darkening landscape.
‘Well, but, Christopher——’ began Catherine incredulously.
‘If I thought we could by walking get anywhere within reasonable time,
I’d leave the blighted machine here to its fate. But we might get lost, and
wander round for hours. And besides, where would we find a railway
station? Miles and miles we might have to go.’
‘That wouldn’t matter. I mean, however late we got to London wouldn’t
matter as long as we did get there.’
‘I quite see we’ve jolly well got to get there. What beats me is how.’
Catherine was silent. They were indeed, as Christopher said, in a fix. She
would even, mentally, agree with him that it was a hell of a one.
‘Catherine, I’m sorry,’ he said, laying his hand on hers.
The words but feebly represented his feelings. He was crushed by his
folly, by his idiotic forgetfulness in Salisbury. Would she ever trust herself
with him again? If she didn’t, he deserved all he got.
‘I was so happy in Salisbury,’ he said, ‘that I never thought about the
petrol. I’m the most hopeless blighter.’
‘But what are we to do?’ asked Catherine earnestly.
‘I’m hanged if I know,’ he said.
Again they stared at each other in silence. The night seemed to have
descended on them now with the suddenness of a huge swooping bird.
‘I suppose we had better leave it here and walk on,’ she said. ‘It seems a
dreadful thing to do, but there’s a chance perhaps of our meeting some one
or getting somewhere. Or couldn’t we push it? Is it very heavy?’
‘I could push it for two miles, perhaps, but that would be about the
limit.’
‘But I’d help.’
‘You!’
He smiled at her, miserable as he was.
‘We might strike the main road,’ he said, gazing across the dim space to
where—how many miles away?—it probably lay.
‘It can’t be very far, can it?’ she said. ‘And then perhaps a car passing
might help us.’
He struck a match and lit the lamps—their light comforted them a little
—and took out his map and studied it.
As he feared, this obscure and attractive cart-track was not to be found
on it, nor was the group of solitary cottages.
Far away to the north, in some distant trees, an owl hooted. It had the
effect of making them feel more lost than ever.
‘I think we’d better stay where we are,’ he said.
‘And hope some one may come along?’
‘Yes. We’ll have the lights on. They ought to be seen for miles round.
Somebody may wonder what they’re doing up here, not moving. There’s
just a chance. People are so damned incurious, though,’ he added.
‘Especially if being curious would mean walking up here in the dark.’
She tried to talk in her usual voice, but it was difficult, for she was
aghast at the misfortune that had overtaken them.
‘Perhaps if you shouted——?’ she suggested.
He shouted. It sounded awful. It emphasised the loneliness. It made her
shiver. And after each shout, out of the silence that succeeded it, the owl
away in the distant trees hooted. It was the only answer.
‘Let us wait quietly,’ she said, laying her hand on his arm. ‘Some one is
sure to see the lights, sooner or later.’
A little wind began to creep round them, a mere stirring, to begin with,
of the air, but it was a very cool little wind, not to say cold, and any more of
it would be decidedly unpleasant.
He looked round him again. The ground dropped on the left of the track
into one of the many hollows they had been down into and up out of since
leaving the cottages.
‘We’ll go and sit down there,’ he said. ‘It’ll be more sheltered, and we
shall hear all right if anybody comes along the road.’
She got on to her feet, and he helped her out, unwinding the rug as he
had done that morning—was it really only that morning?—in the sunny
cove by the sea.
‘What a day we’re having!’ said Catherine, trying to be gay; but never
did anybody feel less so.
He carried the rug and cushions across the grass and down the slope. He
had nothing he could say. He was overwhelmed by his folly. Of what use
throwing himself at her feet and begging her to forgive him? That wouldn’t
help them. Besides, she wasn’t angry with him, she couldn’t forgive an
offence she didn’t recognise. She was an angel. She was made up of
patience and sweet temper. And he had got her into this incredible mess.
Silently Christopher chose, by one of the lamps he took off his machine,
a little hollow within the hollow, and spread the rug in it and arranged the
cushions. ‘It’s not much past eight,’ he said, looking at his wrist-watch.
‘Quite early. With any luck——’
He broke off, and covered her up, as she sat on it, with the ends and
sides of the rug, for what did he mean by luck? If anybody were to come
across that plain and consent to go and fetch petrol, what hours before it
could be found and brought! Still, to get her back to Hertford Street in the
small hours of the night, even in the very smallest, would be better than not
getting her back till next day.
‘You stay here,’ he said, ‘and I’ll go up to that confounded machine
again, and do a bit more shouting.’
‘It sounds so gruesome,’ she said, with a shiver. ‘As if we were being
murdered.’
‘You won’t hear it so much down here.’
He went up the slope, and presently the forlorn sound echoed round
again. The night rang with it. It seemed impossible that the whole world
should not be startled into activity by such a noise.
When he was hoarse he came back to her, and sat listening with a cocked
ear for any sounds of approaching footsteps.
‘You’re not cold?’ he asked. ‘Oh, Catherine—forgive me.’
‘Quite warm,’ she answered smiling. ‘And I don’t mind this a bit, you
know. It really is—fun.’
He said no more. He who was so ready of tongue had nothing to say
now. In silence he sat beside her, listening.
‘I’m glad we ate all those muffins for tea,’ she said presently.
‘Are you hungry?’
‘Not yet. But I think I shall be soon, and so will you.’
‘And soon you’ll be cold, I’m afraid. Oh, Catherine——’
‘Well, I’m not cold yet,’ she interrupted him, smiling again, for what was
the good of poor Christopher reproaching himself?
Peering into her face, white in the darkness, he could see she was
smiling. He tucked the rug closer round her. He wanted to kiss her feet, to
adore her for being so cheerful and patient, but what was the good of that?
Nothing he did could convey what he thought of himself. There they were;
and it was getting cold.
He fancied he heard a sound on the track above, and leapt up the bank.
Silence up there. Silence, and the stars, and the lonely lights of his
deserted machine, and black down below, and all round emptiness.
He shouted again. His shout seemed to come back to him mournfully,
from great distances.
By this time it was half-past nine.
He stayed up there, shouting at intervals, for half an hour, till his voice
gave out. When he scrambled down again into the hollow, Catherine was
asleep.
He sat down carefully beside her. He didn’t dare light a cigarette for fear
the smell would wake her. It was better that she should sleep.
He sat cursing himself. Suppose she caught cold, suppose she was ill
from fatigue and exposure? Beyond this, and her natural, and he was afraid
inevitable, loss of trust in him, he saw no other danger for her. These were
bad enough, but he saw no others. Nobody would know about this. None of
her detestable relations would ever hear that she did not after all get home
till—when? How should they? It wouldn’t enter Mrs. Mitcham’s head, or
the porter’s, to mention it. Why on earth should they? His mind was quiet as
to that. But Catherine out there, in a damp field, at night, perhaps for hours
—Catherine who was so precious a jewel in his eyes that he felt she ought
never to be let out of the softest, safest nest—Catherine brought there by
him, marooned there by his fault—these were the things that made him
swear under his breath, sitting beside her while she slept.
It got colder, much colder. A mist gathered below them, and crawled
about among the hillocks. No wind could reach them in their hollow, but a
mist, he knew, is a nasty clammy thing to have edging up over one’s boots.
Perhaps it wouldn’t come so high. He watched it anxiously. He was in
despair. They could get warm, he knew, by walking, and he himself would
get more than warm pushing his machine, but he couldn’t push it for
anything like two miles, as he had told her, on that rough track, and when
he was obliged to stop from exhaustion they would both very soon be
colder than ever. Besides, imagine Catherine, with her little feet, slithering
and stumbling about in the mud and the dark! And anyhow they’d get
nowhere now there was that mist. Better stick where they were. At least
they were sheltered from wind. But it was fantastic to think, as he was
beginning to be forced to think, that they might have to stay there till
daylight.
He sat with his hands gripped round his knees, and stared at the stars.
How hard and cold they looked. What did they care? Cruel brutes. He
wondered why he had ever admired them.
Catherine moved, and he turned to her quickly, and gently tucked the
loosened rug round her again.
This woke her, and she opened her eyes and looked for a moment in
silent astonishment at his head, dark and shadowy, with stars behind it in a
black sky, bending over her.
It seemed to be Christopher’s, but why?
Then she remembered. ‘Oh,’ she said faintly, ‘we’re still here....’
She tried not to shiver, but she was very cold, and what is one rug and
damp grass to lie on to a person used at that time of night to a bed and
blankets? Also, her surface was small, and she got cold more quickly than
bigger people.
He saw her shiver, and without asking leave, or wasting time in phrases,
moved close up to her and took her in his arms.
‘This is nothing to do with anything, Catherine,’ he explained, as she
made a movement of resistance, ‘except a determination not to let you die
of cold. Besides, it will keep me warm too—which I daresay I wouldn’t be,
towards the small hours of the morning, if I kept myself to myself.’
‘The morning?’ she echoed in a very small voice. ‘Are we—do you
think we shall be here all night?’
‘It looks like it,’ he said.
‘Oh, Christopher——’
‘I know.’
She said no more, and he held her and her coat and the rug tightly in his
arms. As a mother holds her babe, so did Christopher hold Catherine, and
with much the same sort of passionate protective tenderness. One arm was
beneath her shoulders, so that her head rested on his breast, the other was
round her body, keeping her coverings close round her. His own head was
on the cushion from the side-car, and his cheek leaned against her soft
motoring cap.
Like this they lay in silence, and what Catherine felt was, first,
amazement that she should be there, on an unknown hillside in a lonely
country at night with Christopher, forced by circumstances to get as close to
him as possible; and secondly, as she became warmer and drowsier, and
nature accordingly prevailed over convention, a queer satisfaction and
peace. And what Christopher felt, as he lay leaning his cheek against her
head and gazing up at the stars, was that he had never seen anything more
beautiful than the way those blessed stars seemed to understand—twinkling
and flashing down at them as if they were laughing for joy at the amount of
happiness that was flung about the world. His precious little love—his
precious, precious little love....
‘Of course—you know—’ murmured Catherine, on the verge of sleep,
‘this is only—a kind of—precautionary measure——’
‘Quite,’ whispered Christopher, holding the rug closer round her.
But sleep is a great loosener of the moral sense. How is one to know
right from wrong if one is asleep? How can one, in that state, be expected to
be responsible? Catherine slept, and Christopher kissed her. Dimly through
her dreams she knew she was being kissed, but it was so gentle a kissing, so
tender, it made her feel so safe ... and up there there was no one to mind, no
one to criticise ... and yesterday was infinitely far away ... and to-morrow
might never come....
She was not so much asleep that she did not know she was happy; she
was too much asleep to feel she ought to stop him.

XXI
Mrs. Mitcham, not expecting her mistress back till Monday, went on that
Saturday to visit a friend in Camden Town, and when she came back soon
after nine was surprised to find Miss Virginia’s husband on the mat outside
the door of the flat ringing the bell. He, of all people, should know her
mistress wasn’t there, thought Mrs. Mitcham, seeing that it was in Miss
Virginia’s house she was staying.
The carpet on the stairs was thick, and Mrs. Mitcham arrived at
Stephen’s side unnoticed. He was absorbed in ringing. He rang and rang.
‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ said Mrs. Mitcham respectfully.
He turned quickly. ‘Where is your mistress?’ he inquired.
‘My mistress, sir?’ said Mrs. Mitcham, much surprised. ‘I understood
she was coming back on Monday, sir.’
‘She left the Manor this afternoon on her way home. She ought to have
been here long ago. Have you had no telegram announcing her arrival?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Well, I have,’ he said, looking quite upset, Mrs. Mitcham noticed, and
pulling a telegram out of his overcoat pocket. ‘My wife telegraphed her
mother had started, and asked me to see if she got here safely.’
‘Safely, sir?’ echoed Mrs. Mitcham, surprised at the word.
‘Mrs. Cumfrit was—motoring up. As you know, my wife should not be
worried and made anxious just now,’ said Stephen frowning. ‘It is most
undesirable—most undesirable.’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Mrs. Mitcham. ‘But I’m sure there is no cause. Mrs.
Cumfrit will be here presently. It’s not more than nine o’clock, sir.’
‘She left at half-past two.’
‘Allowing for punctures, sir——’ suggested Mrs. Mitcham respectfully.
‘Will you come in, sir?’ she added, unlocking the door and holding it open
for him.
‘Yes—and wait,’ said Stephen in a determined voice.
He went straight into the drawing-room without taking off his overcoat.
That Miss Virginia’s husband was upset was plain to Mrs. Mitcham. He
hardly seemed like the same gentleman who had on his last visit so nicely
called her and her mistress little children and told them to love one another.
She was quite glad to get away from him into her calm kitchen.
Stephen was very much upset. He had received Virginia’s telegram at six
o’clock, just as he was quietly sitting in his hotel bedroom going over his
sermons and giving them the last important touches. These were valuable
hours, these afternoon and evening hours of the Saturdays before he
preached, and to be taken away from them for any reason was most
annoying. To be taken away from them for this one was more than
annoying, it was gravely disturbing. Again that side-car; again that young
man; as if a whole morning in it and with him were not sufficiently
deplorable. No wonder his poor little darling at home was anxious. She said
so in the telegram. It ran: Mother left for Hertford Street in Mr. Monckton’s
side-car 2.30. Do see if arrived safely. Anxious.
Two-thirty; and it was then six. He went round at once. He didn’t know
much about motor-cycles, but at the pace he had seen them going he judged
that Monckton, not less swift than his confrères in upsetting the peace of
God’s countryside, would have had time to get to London.
No one, however, was in the flat, not even Mrs. Mitcham, who was
bound to it by duty. He rang in vain. As he went away he inquired of the
hall porter why no one was there, and learned that Mrs. Mitcham had gone
out at three o’clock and had not yet returned, and that Mrs. Cumfrit had
been away for the last week in the country,—which he already only too well
knew.
At half-past seven he called again—his sermons would suffer, he was
painfully aware—but with the same result. It was dark then, and he too
began to feel anxious; not on his mother-in-law’s account, for whatever
happened to her would be entirely her own fault, but on Virginia’s. She
would be in a terrible state if she knew her mother had not reached home
yet. That Mrs. Mitcham should still be absent from her duties he regarded
as not only reprehensible and another proof of Mrs. Cumfrit’s laxness, but
as a sign that she was unaware of her mistress’s impending return, which
was strange.
Immediately after dinner—a bad one, but if it had been good he could
not have appreciated it in his then condition of mind—he went back to
Hertford Street, and unable to believe, in spite of the hall porter’s
assurances, that the flat was still empty, rang and rang, and was found by
Mrs. Mitcham ringing. His mother-in-law must be there by now. She was
inside. He felt she was inside, and had gone to bed tired.
But directly he got in he knew she was not. There was a chill, a silence
about the flat, such as only places abandoned by their inhabitants have. The
drawing-room was as cold and tidy as a corpse. He kept his coat on. The
idea of taking it off in such bleakness would not have occurred to him. He
would have liked to keep his hat on too, for he had gone bald early, but the
teaching of his youth on the subject of ladies’ drawing-rooms and what to
do in them prevented him.
Mrs. Mitcham, coming in to light the fire, found him staring out of the
window in the dark. The room was only lit by the shining in of the street
lamps. She was quite sorry for him. She had not supposed him so much
attached to Mrs. Cumfrit. Mrs. Mitcham was herself feeling rather worried
by now, and as she made Catherine’s bed and got her room ready she had
only kept cheerful by recollecting that a car had four tyres, all of which
might puncture, besides innumerable other parts, no doubt equally able to
have things the matter with them.
‘I’ll light the fire, if you please, sir,’ she said.
‘Not for me,’ said Stephen, without moving.
She lit it nevertheless, and also turned on the light by the sofa. She didn’t
like to draw the curtains, because he continued to stand at the window
staring into the street. Watching, thought Mrs. Mitcham; watching
anxiously. She was quite touched.
‘Is there anything you would like, sir?’ she inquired.
‘Nothing,’ said Stephen, his gaze riveted on the street.
Throughout that dreadful night Stephen watched at the window, and
Mrs. Mitcham came in at intervals to see what she could do for him. She
made coffee at eleven o’clock, and brought it to him, and fetched it away
again at midnight cold and untouched. She carried in an armful of blankets
at one o’clock, and arranged a bed for him on the sofa, into which he did
not go. At five she brought him tea, which he did not drink. At eight she
began to get breakfast ready. Throughout the night he stood at the window,
or walked up and down the room, and each time she saw him he seemed to
have grown thinner. Certainly his face looked sharper than it had the night
before. Mrs. Mitcham could not but be infected by such agitation, though
being naturally optimistic she felt somehow that her mistress was delayed
rather than hurt. Still, it was impossible to see a gentleman like Mr.
Colquhoun, a gentleman of great learning, she had heard, who must know
everything about everything and had preached in St. Paul’s Cathedral,—it
was impossible to see such a gentleman grow thinner with anxiety before
one’s eyes without becoming, in spite of one’s secret faith, anxious too. And
the hard fact that her mistress’s bed had not been slept in stared her in the
face.
‘I must wash,’ said Stephen hoarsely, when she told him breakfast was
ready and would do him good.
She conducted him to the bathroom.
‘I must shave,’ he said, looking at her with hollow eyes. ‘I have to
preach this morning. I must go back to my hotel and shave.’
‘Oh no, sir,’ said Mrs. Mitcham; and brought him George’s razors—a
little blunt, but yet razors.
He stared at them. His eyes seemed to become more hollow.
‘Razors?’ he said. ‘Here?’
That there should be razors in the apartment of a widow——
‘The late Mr. Cumfrit’s, sir,’ said Mrs. Mitcham.
Of course. Really his control was gone; he was no longer apparently able
to keep his thoughts from plunging into the most incredible places.
He stropped the razors, thinking of the probable last time they had been
stropped by his father-in-law before being folded away by him who would
never strop again, and shaved in front of the glass in the bathroom before
which the excellent man must so often have stood. Pulvis et umbra sumum,
said Stephen to himself in his profound dejection, forgetting for a moment
the glorious resurrection he so carefully believed in. At what point did one,
he wondered, his mind returning to his troubles,—at what point did one, in
the circumstances in which he found himself, inform the police?
He forced himself to eat some breakfast for fear he might otherwise
collapse in the pulpit, and he drank a cup of strong coffee with the same
idea of being kept up. The thought that it was his own mother-in-law who
had brought all this trouble on him had a peculiar sting. Quite evidently
there had been an accident, and God knew how he would get through his
sermon, with the fear crushing him of the effect such terrible news would
have on the beloved mother of his child to be. There was no blessing, he
told himself, outside the single straight path of one’s duty. If his mother-in-
law had continued in that path as she used to continue in it, instead of
suddenly taking to giving way to every impulse—that she should still have
impulses was in itself indecent—this misery for Virginia, and accordingly
for himself, would have been avoided. To go rushing about the country with
a young man,—why, how scandalous at her age. And the punishment for
this, the accident that had so evidently happened, fell most heavily, as
punishments so mysteriously often did—only one must not question God’s
wisdom—on the innocent. What living thing in the whole world could be
more innocent than his wife? Except the child; except the little soul of love
she bore about with her beneath her heart; and that too would suffer through
her suffering.
Stephen prayed. He couldn’t bear the thought of what Virginia was going
to suffer. He bowed his head on his arms and prayed. Mrs. Mitcham found
him like this when she came to clear away the breakfast. She was deeply
sorry for him; he seemed to have been so much more attached to her
mistress than one would have ever guessed.
‘You’ll feel better, sir,’ she consoled him, ‘when your breakfast has had
more time.’ And she ventured to ask, ‘Was it Miss Virginia’s car bringing
Mrs. Cumfrit up? I beg pardon, sir—I mean, your car? Because if so, I’ll be
bound she’ll be safe with Smithers.’
Stephen shook his head. He could bear no questions. He could not go
into the story of the motor-cycle with Mrs. Mitcham. He felt ill after his
night walking about the drawing-room; his head seemed to be bursting. He
got up and left the room.
He had to go to the hotel on his way to St. Jude’s to fetch his sermon. He
waited till the last possible minute, still hoping that some news might come;
and then, when he dared wait no longer, and Mrs. Mitcham was helping him
into his coat, he told her he would come back immediately after morning
service and consider what steps should be taken as to informing the police.
‘The police?’ repeated Mrs. Mitcham, much shocked. The police and her
mistress. Out of her heart disappeared the last ray of optimism.
‘We must somehow find out what has happened,’ said Stephen sharply.
‘Yes, sir,’ said Mrs. Mitcham, opening the door for him.
The police and her mistress. She had a feeling that the mere putting the
police on to search would make them find something dreadful,—that if
nothing had happened, the moment they began to look something would
have happened.
Feeling profoundly conscious of being only a weak woman in a world
full of headstrong men, she opened the door for Stephen, and he, going
through it without further speech, met Catherine coming out of the lift,—
Catherine perfectly sound and unharmed,—and with her was Christopher.
They all three stopped dead.
‘You, Stephen?’ said Catherine after a moment, very faintly. ‘Why, how
——?’
‘I have,’ said Stephen, ‘been waiting all night. Waiting and watching for
you.’
‘I—we—broke down.’
He made a sign to the lift boy that he was coming down with him.
‘Enough—enough,’ he said, with a queer gesture of pushing her and
everything connected with her out of his sight; and hurried into the lift and
disappeared.
Catherine and Christopher looked at each other.

XXII
That was an awful day for Stephen.
Men have found out, with terrible pangs, that their wives, whom they
regarded as models of blamelessness, were secretly betraying their homes
and families, but Stephen could not recall any instance of a man’s finding
this out about his wife’s mother. It was not, he supposed, quite so personally
awful as if it were one’s wife, but on the other hand it had a peculiar
awfulness of its own. A young woman might descend declivities, impelled
by the sheer momentum of youth; but for women of riper years, for the
matrons, for the dowagers, for those whose calm remaining business in life
is to hold aloft the lantern of example, whose pride it should be to be quiet,
to be immobile, to be looked-up to and venerated,—for these to indulge in
conduct that disgraced their families and ruined themselves was, in a way,
even more horrible. In any woman of riper years it was horrible and terrible.
In this one,—what it was in this one was hardly to be uttered, for she—ah,
ten times horrible and terrible—was his own mother-in-law.
He preached his sermon mechanically, with no sense of what he was
reading, never lifting his eyes from his manuscript. The dilapidated pair—
they had looked extraordinarily dilapidated as they stood there, guilty and
caught, in the unsparing light of Sunday morning—floated constantly
before him, and made it impossible for him to attend to a word he was
saying.
What was he to do next? How could he ever face Virginia, and answer
her anxious, loving questions about her mother’s safety? It must be kept
from her, the appalling, the simply unutterable truth; at all costs it must be
kept from her in her present condition, or it well might kill her. He felt he
must tell his mother, for he could not bear this burden alone, but no one else
must ever know what he knew. It would be the first secret between him and
Virginia, and what a secret!
His thoughts whirled this way and that, anywhere but where he was,
while his lips read out what he had written in those days last week of
innocent peace, that now seemed so far away, about Love. Love! What sins,
thought Stephen, were committed in its name. Incredible as it was, almost
impossible to imagine at their different ages, and shocking to every feeling
of decency and propriety, the word had probably frequented the
conversations of those two.
He shuddered away. There were some things one simply could not think
of. And yet he did think of them; they haunted him. ‘We broke down,’ she
had said. Persons in her position always said that. He was man of the world
enough to know what that meant. And then their faces,—their startled,
guilty faces, when they found him so unexpectedly confronting them.
‘Love,’ read out Stephen from his manuscript, quoting part of his text
and with mechanically uplifted hand and emphasis impressing it on his
congregation, ‘thinketh no evil....’
After the service he went straight back to Hertford Street. Useless to
flinch from his duty. His first impulse that morning, and he had followed it,
was to remove himself at once from contact with his mother-in-law. But he
was a priest; he was her nearest living male relative; he was bound to do
something.
He went straight back to Hertford Street, and found her sitting in the
dining-room quietly eating mutton.
It had always seemed grievous to Stephen, and deeply to be regretted,
that no traces of sin should be physically visible on the persons of the
sinners, that a little washing and tidying should be enough to make them
indistinguishable from those who had not sinned. Here was this one,
looking much the same as usual, very like any other respectable quiet lady
at her Sunday luncheon, eating mutton as though nothing had happened. At
such a crisis, he felt, at such an overwhelming moment of all their lives, of
his, of hers, of his dear love’s, whitely unconscious at home, whatever his
mother-in-law did it ought anyhow not to have been that.
She looked up when he came in, walking in unannounced, putting Mrs.
Mitcham aside when she tried to open the door for him.
‘I’m glad you’ve come back, Stephen,’ she said, leaning forward and
pushing out the chair on her right hand for him to sit on—as though he
would dream of sitting!—‘I want to tell you what happened.’
He took no notice of the chair, and stood facing her at the end of the
table, leaning on it with both hands, their thin knuckles white with his
heavy pressure.
‘Won’t you sit down?’ she said.
‘No.’
‘Have you had lunch?’
‘No.’
‘Will you have some?’
‘No.’
There was nothing for it, Catherine knew, but to face whatever music
Stephen should make, but she did think he might have said ‘No, thank you.’
Still, her position was very weak, so she accepted his monosyllables
without comment. Besides—poor Stephen—he did look wretchedly upset;
he must have had a dreadful night.
She was very sorry for him, and began to tell him what had happened,
how the petrol had run out just when they were in that bare stretch of
country between Salisbury and Andover——
Stephen raised his hand. ‘Spare me all this,’ he said. ‘Spare me and
yourself.’
‘There’s nothing to spare,’ said Catherine. ‘I assure you I don’t mind
telling you what happened.’
‘You should blush,’ said Stephen, leaning forward on his knuckles. ‘You
should blush.’
‘Blush?’ she repeated.
‘Do you not know that you are fatally compromised?’
‘My dear Stephen——’
He longed to forbid her to call him by that name.
‘Fatally,’ he said.
‘My dear Stephen, don’t be ridiculous. I know it was most unfortunate
that I shouldn’t get back till this morning——’
‘Unfortunate!’
‘But who will ever hear about it? And I couldn’t help it. You don’t
suppose I liked it?’
Then, as she said the words, the remembrance of herself being kept
warm in Christopher’s arms, and of him softly kissing her eyes, came back
to her. Yes; she had liked that. Yes; she knew she had liked that, and been
happy.
A deep red flooded her face even as she said the words, and she lowered
her eyes.
Stephen saw; and any faint hope he had had that her story might be true
went out. His soul seemed to drop into a pit of blackness. She was guilty.
She had done something unthinkable. Virginia’s mother. It was horror to be
in the same room with her.
‘This thing,’ he said in a low voice, his eyes wide open and blazing, as
though he indeed beheld horror, ‘must be made good somehow. There is
only one way. It is a shame, a shame to have to utter it in connection with a
boy of his age and a woman of yours, but the only thing left for you to do is
to marry him.’
‘Marry him?’
She stared at him, her mouth open in her amazement.
‘Nothing else will save you, either from man’s condemnation or God’s
punishment.’

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