Mr. Grig was of those who murmured. His wrists lay one over the other on the table and his face was over the table; and it seemed strange, so low and even was his speech, that Lilian could catch every word, as she did. The people at the next table could have heard nothing. All the animation and variety were in his features, none in his tone. He had been telling her about Brighton. He saw the town of Brighton as a living, developing whole, discussing it as a single organism, showing how its evolution was still in active process, and making the small group of men who were exploiting it and directing it appear like creative giants and the mass of inhabitants like midgets utterly unconscious of their own manipulation. And in his account of the vast affair there was no right and no wrong; there were merely the dark aims and the resolution of the giants determined to wax in power and to imprint themselves on the municipality. Lilian had never heard such revealing talk; she could not follow all of it, but she was fascinated, wonderstruck; profoundly impressed by the quality of the brain opposite to her and the contemptibleness of her own ignorance of life; amazed and enraptured that this brain could be interested in herself. Mr. Grig related the story of the middle-aged proprietor of one of the chief hotels who had married a young wife.
"He had broken up his family, and the family is the real unit of society--and there was no need for it! No need at all! But then, you see, he’d never had time in his existence to understand that a middle-aged man who has already had experience of marriage and marries a girl young enough to be his daughter is either a coward or a fool or without taste. He would only do it because he’s mad for her, and that’s the very reason for not doing it. When romance comes in that way it wants the sauce of secrecy and plotting--the double life, and so on. The feeling of naughtiness--naughtiness is simply a marvellous feeling; you must sometimes have guessed that, haven’t you?--perversity, doing society in the eye. It’s a continual excitement. Of course, it needs cleverness on both sides. You haven’t got to be clumsy over it. The woman runs risks, but nothing to the risks she’d run in marriage. And if the thing dies out in her, and they haven’t been clumsy, she’s free as air to start again. She’s got her experience gratis, and there’s a mysterious flavour about her that’s nearly the most enticing flavour on earth. Naturally people will talk. Let ’em. No harm in rumour. In fact, the more rumour the better." He went on with no pause. "You’ve not looked at me for about five hours. Look at me now and tell me you’re disgusted. Tell me you’re frightened."