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The wheels still went round, but the machine of State made less and less progress: stagnation and aimlessness were everywhere apparent. On all sides it was recognised that the existing system had become unworkable, and that a catastrophe could only be averted by speedy reforms.
Some scores of photographs of Vandover's friends were tacked upon the walls, or thrust between the wood and glass of the mirror. A new life now began for Vandover, a life of luxury and aimlessness which he found charming. He had no duties, no cares, no responsibilities. But there could be no doubt that he was in a manner changed; the old life of dissipation seemed to have lost its charm.
That for a footman on holiday. That for a silly child, for any creature that is kept or led or driven. That perhaps for a tired invalid, for a toiler worked to a rag. But able-bodied amusement! The arms of Mrs. Skelmersdale were no worse than the solemn aimlessness of hunting, and an evening of dalliance not an atom more reprehensible than an evening of chatter.
Very suddenly the procession broke off, as though it had been chopped in two; and almost immediately after that the road turned into a street and we were between solid lines of small cottages, surrounded on all sides by people who fluttered about with the distracted aimlessness of agitated barnyard fowls. They babbled among themselves, paying small heed to us.
He must be doing something, searching.... But as he got into his machine he recognized the futility of aimlessness. There was a way of going about such things.... He must be calm. He must enlist aid. Suddenly he thought of Hilda Lightener. He had not seen her for weeks. She had been close to Ruth; perhaps she knew something. He drove to the Lightener residence and asked for her. Hilda was at home.
The seller of perfumes had led her towards a dream. She was not combative, and she would be alone in the garden. As they walked towards it in the sun, through narrow ways where idle Arabs lounged with happy aimlessness, Batouch talked of Count Anteoni, the owner of the garden. Evidently the Count was the great personage of Beni-Mora.
They ate their noon meal behind a third one. They were moved from this one also. They were marched from place to place with apparent aimlessness. The youth had been taught that a man became another thing in a battle. He saw his salvation in such a change. Hence this waiting was an ordeal to him. He was in a fever of impatience.
At that hour of the summer morning when our friends, with the aimlessness of strangers who are waiting to do something else, saw the ancient promenade, a few scant and hungry-eyed little boys and girls were wandering over this weedy growth, not playing, but moving listlessly to and fro, fantastic in the wild inaptness of their costumes.
One of the many, and often humorous, incidents that served to bring about this realization of a former aimlessness happened on their second Sunday excursion. This time he had not chosen the Kingsbury Tavern, but another automobilists' haunt, an enlightening indication of established habits involving a wide choice of resorts.
I suppose he was alive to the ridiculous aimlessness of the race across country. My car is powerful and speedy, but the Chinaman had a thoroughly up-to-date conveyance, too, and drove without paying the least heed to traffic conditions." "There was only one man, then?" "Yes. Didn't I make that clear? Perhaps not.
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