thumped and he
thought it the most glorious adventure, and was mad with desire
for the girl.

Afterwards he glowed with pleasure. By Jove, but that was
something like! He [stayed the afternoon with the girl, and]
wanted to stay the night. She, however, told him this was impossible:
her own man would be back by dark, and she must be with him.
He, Brangwen, must not let on that there had been anything
between them.

She gave him an intimate smile, which made him feel confused
and gratified.

He could not tear himself away, though he had promised not to
interfere with the girl. He stayed on at the hotel over night.
He saw the other fellow at the evening meal: a small,
middle-aged man with iron-grey hair and a curious face, like a
monkey's, but interesting, in its way almost beautiful. Brangwen
guessed that he was a foreigner. He was in company with another,
an Englishman, dry and hard. The four sat at table, two men and
two women. Brangwen watched with all his eyes.

He saw how the foreigner treated the women with courteous
contempt, as if they were pleasing animals. Brangwen's girl had
put on a ladylike manner, but her voice betrayed her. She wanted
to win back her man. When dessert came on, however, the little
foreigner turned round from his table and calmly surveyed the
room, like one unoccupied. Brangwen marvelled over the cold,
animal intelligence of the face. The brown eyes were round,
showing all the brown pupil, like a monkey's, and just calmly
looking, perceiving the other person without referring to him at
all. They rested on Brangwen. The latter marvelled at the old
face turned round on him, looking at him without considering it
necessary to know him at all. The eyebrows of the round,
perceiving, but unconcerned eyes were rather high up, with
slight wrinkles above them, just as a monkey's had. It was an
old, ageless face.

The man was most amazingly a gentleman all the time, an
aristocrat. Brangwen stared fascinated. The girl was pushing her
crumbs about on the cloth, uneasily, flushed and angry.

As Brangwen sat motionless in the hall afterwards, too much
moved and lost to know what to do, the little stranger came up
to him with a beautiful smile and manner, offering a cigarette
and saying:

"Will you smoke?"

Brangwen never smoked cigarettes, yet he took the one
offered, fumbling painfully with thick fingers, blushing to the
roots of his hair. Then he looked with his warm blue eyes at the
almos