midday
And he thought of all the notices she had had for Clairette , for Serpolette , for Olivette . He would like to see her play the Duchess . At that moment his thoughts returned to the last time he had seen her , about half an hour ago ; the memory was not a pleasant one , and he was glad that he had run out of the house and come down to the pier . And in the silence and solitude of the pier at midday he asked himself again why he should not return to town and take his chance of getting into a new company or being sent out to manage another provincial tour . In London he might be able to persuade his wife to go into a home , and he fell to thinking of the men and women who he had heard had been cured of drunkenness . His thoughts melted into dreams and then , passing suddenly out of dreams into words , he said : ` She will never consent to go into a home , and if she did she would only be thinking all the time that I 'd put her there so that I might be after another woman . ' His thoughts were interrupted by a lancinating pain in his feet , and he withdrew into the shade , and resting the heel of the right boot on the toe of the left , a position that freed him from pain for the time being , he looked round and seeing everywhere a misted sky filled with an inner radiance , he said : ` To-day will be the hottest day we 've had yet , and there wo n't be a dozen people in the theatre ; everybody will be too hot to leave their houses . '