Sunday at Bellomont is announced by the smart omnibus bound for the little church at the gates. Whether anyone boards matters less than the show of going. Lily has told Percy Gryce that the Trenors' neglect of Sunday offends her, and that she regularly accompanies Muriel and Hilda. Gryce waits on the gravel with his prayer-book, hoping she will come alone. The Wetheralls arrive, then the Trenor girls, who had promised Lily they would go with her. Lady Cressida Raith follows. Gryce rolls away between four women, and Lily is not among them.
The night before, at dinner, Judy Trenor seated Selden beside Bertha Dorset and sent Lily in with George Dorset. Watching Selden talk in low murmurs while Gryce sat farther down the table, Lily saw the gilt cage and the long white road of the life she had chosen. Miss Corby joked that Jack Stepney should have Sim Rosedale as best man. The name pulled Lily back. If she did not marry Gryce she might have to be civil to such men. She meant to marry him. Upstairs, Mrs. Peniston's late post had forwarded a fresh batch of bills.
Sunday morning she lays out a grey gown and borrows a prayer-book, then rebels. The dress flashes years of front pews, parish lists, and a husband who strikes divorcees from the dinner table. She watches the omnibus take up its freight and reads disappointment on Gryce's face, telling herself it will sharpen the afternoon walk she still means to keep. Then she rustles downstairs, sunshade in hand, and finds Lawrence Selden in the library with Bertha Dorset. A book lies on his knee. His eyes are on Bertha. Bertha looks up with frank displeasure. Selden smiles as usual.
Bertha asks if Lily is late for an earlier engagement and says Selden is at her disposal, with an air of proprietorship. Lily laughs that her only engagement was church, and that the omnibus has already gone. Later she walks the grounds with Selden while the church party comes back along the path. Lady Cressida has insisted on walking. Gryce brings up the rear with Mrs. Wetherall and the Trenors. Selden sees why she has been getting up her Americana. He is leaving in the morning. He asks her to devote the afternoon to a walk.
Coming Up in Chapter 6
The afternoon is perfect. A haze softens the American autumn. Lily and her companion climb the long slopes beyond the high-road into a zone of lingering summer. The path crosses a meadow, then a lane of asters and bramble, and the country unrolls below them. They have the whole walk ahead, and the rest of the party has gone.
