tion of her ladyship's having inspected the apartments, to see to
the minutest of his customary luxuries, cut at him all round. His valet
had it from the footmen and maids; and their speaking of it meant
a liking for their mistress; and that liking, added to her official
solicitude on his behalf, touched a soft place in him and blew an
icy wind; he was frozen where he was warmed. Here was evidence of her
intending the division to be a fixed gap. She had entered this room and
looked about her. He was here to feel her presence in her absence.

Some one or something had schooled her, too. Her large-eyed directness
of gaze was the same as at that inn and in Wales, but her easy
sedateness was novel, her English, almost the tone of the English world:
he gathered it, at least, from the few remarks below stairs.

His desire to be with her was the desire to escape the phantasm of the
woman haunting to subjugate him when they were separate. He could kill
illusion by magnifying and clawing at her visible angles and audible
false notes; and he did it until his recollections joined to the sight
of her, when a clash of the thought of what she had been and the thought
of what she was had the effect of conjuring a bitter sweet image that
was a more seductive illusion. Strange to think, this woman once loved
the man who was not half the value of the man she no longer loved. He
took a shot at cynicism, but hit no mark. This woman protected her whole
sex.

They sat at the dinner-table alone, thanks to a handsome wench's
attractions for a philosopher. Married, and parents of a lusty son, this
was their first sitting at table together. The mouth that said 'I guard
my rooms' was not obtruded; she talked passingly of her brother, much
of Lady Arpington and of old Mr. Woodseer; and, though she reserved a
smile, there was no look of a lock on her face. She seemed pleased to
be treated very courteously; she returned the stately politeness in
exactest measure; very simply, as well. Her face had now an air of
homeliness, well suited to an English household interior. She could
chat. Any pauses occurring, he was the one guilty of them; she did not
allow them to be barrier chasms, or 'strids' for the leap with effort;
she crossed them like the mountain maid over a gorge's plank--kept her
tones perfectly. Her Madge and Mr. Gower Woodseer made a conversible
topic. She was inquisitive for accounts of Spanish history and the land
of Spain.

They pass