They looked at each other for a moment.
The moment became a longer moment, and suddenly it was a very long moment, so long one could hardly tell where all the time was coming from.
For Arthur, who could usually contrive to feel self-conscious if left alone for long enough with a Swiss Cheese plant, the moment was one of sustained revelation. He felt on the sudden like a cramped and zoo-born animal who awakes one morning to find the door to his cage hanging quietly open and the savannah stretching grey and pink to the distant rising sun, while all around new sounds are waking.
He wondered what the new sounds were as he gazed at her openly wondering face and her eyes that smiled with a shared surprise.
He hadn’t realized that life speaks with a voice to you, a voice that brings you answers to the questions you continually ask of it, had never consciously detected it or recognized its tones till it now said something it had never said to him before, which was “Yes”.
Fenchurch dropped her eyes away at last, with a tiny shake of her head.
I know, she said. I shall have to remember, she added, that you are the sort of person who cannot hold on to a simple piece of paper for two minutes without winning a raffle with it.
She turned away.
Let’s go for a walk, she said quickly. Hyde Park. I’ll change into something less suitable.
She was dressed in a rather severe dark dress, not a particularly shapely one, and it didn’t really suit her.
I wear it specially for my ‘cello teacher, she said. He’s a nice boy, but I sometimes think all that bowing gets him a bit excited. I’ll be down in a moment.
She ran lightly up the steps to the gallery above, and called down: Put the bottle in the fridge for later.
He noticed as he slipped the champagne bottle into the door that it had an identical twin to sit next to.
He walked over to the window and looked out. He turned and started to look at her records. From above he heard the rustle of her dress fall to the ground. He talked to himself about the sort of person he was. He told himself very firmly that for this moment at least he would keep his eyes very firmly and steadfastly locked on to the spines of her records, read the titles, nod appreciatively, count the blasted things if he had to. He would keep his head down.
This he completely, utterly and abjectly failed to do.
She was staring down at him with such intensity that she seemed hardly to notice that he was looking up at her. Then suddenly she shook her head, dropped the light sundress over herself and disappeared quickly into the bathroom.
She emerged a moment later, all smiles and with a sunhat and came tripping down the steps with extraordinary lightness. It was a strange kind of dancing motion she had. She saw that he noticed it and put her head slightly on one side.
Like it? she said.
他们对望了一会儿。
那个一会儿变成了好长一会儿，突然间变成了相当长的一会儿，长到一个人都难以明白那么些个时间都是打哪儿跑出来的。
对阿瑟这样通常可以在与瑞士干酪藤的长时间独处后最终感到自我意识的存在的人来说，那“一会儿”是一种启示。在刹那间，他感到自己是个狭小的动物园中的动物，某天早上觉醒了，发现他的笼门静静地开着而萨瓦那大草原在初升的旭日下呈现着灰色和粉色，周遭仿佛有某种新的声音被唤醒了。
他疑惑着那种新的声音到底是什么，与此同时他盯着她明显疑惑的脸和她同样惊讶的微笑的眼睛。
他并没意识到生命会用声音对你说话，那种声音会告诉你那些你不停求索的问题的答案，他并没有察觉和识别它的音调直到它现在说了一些以前从未对他说过的话：“是的。”
芬琪诗最后把目光移开了，头微微地颤抖。
“我知道了，”她说，“我应当记起来的，”她补充说，“你是那种拿着一张简单的纸片在两分钟之内不可能不赢一张彩票的人。”
她转过身去。
“我们去散个步吧，”她很快地说。“海德公园。我去换身不太合适的衣服。”
她穿着一身相当暗色的衣服，并不特别合身，而且确实根本不适合她。
“我穿这身衣服是为了我的大提琴老师，”她说，“他是个好人，但我有的时候觉得那些乐弓技法让他有些太兴奋了。我一会儿就下来。”
她轻轻地跑上屋顶的画廊，往下喊道：“把那瓶子放进冰箱里等会儿喝。”
当他把香槟滑进那扇门里时他注意到那瓶香槟旁边有个它的孪生兄弟。
他走到窗边向外眺望。他又转过身来开始观察她的唱片。他听到头顶上传来衣服落到地上的轻响。他对自己说自己应该是怎样的人。他坚定地告诉自己在此刻的目光至少应当坚定地锁定在她的唱片的封套上，阅读标签，作出欣赏的点头姿势，如果必须的话就去数一数这些该死的东西。总之，他要把头低下来。
但这件事，他完完全全，彻彻底底，凄凄惨惨地失败了。
她用如此热烈的目光盯着她，好像她没注意到他正在仰着头注视她。接着她突然摇了摇头，把浅色的太阳裙套在身上然后迅速消失在了浴室里。
过了一会她又出现了，微笑着戴着一顶遮阳帽，用超级轻盈的脚步从台阶上翩然而至。她在跳着一种奇怪的舞步。她发现他注意到了这一点于是微微地把头扭向了一边。
“喜欢么？”她说。