ng purple and crimson and white. She asked about
everything, and he told her very exactly and minutely, in a
queer pedantic way that made her want to laugh. Yet she was
really interested in what he did. And he had the curious light
in his face, like the light in the eyes of the goat that was
tethered by the farmyard gate.

She went down with him into the warmish cellar, where already
in the darkness the little yellow knobs of rhubarb were coming.
He held the lantern down to the dark earth. She saw the tiny
knob-end of the rhubarb thrusting upwards upon the thick red
stem, thrusting itself like a knob of flame through the soft
soil. His face was turned up to her, the light glittered on his
eyes and his teeth as he laughed, with a faint, musical neigh.
He looked handsome. And she heard a new sound in her ears, the
faintly-musical, neighing laugh of Anthony, whose moustache
twisted up, and whose eyes were luminous with a cold, steady,
arrogant-laughing glare. There seemed a little prance of triumph
in his movement, she could not rid herself of a movement of
acquiescence, a touch of acceptance. Yet he was so humble, his
voice was so caressing. He held his hand for her to step on when
she must climb a wall. And she stepped on the living firmness of
him, that quivered firmly under her weight.

She was aware of him as if in a mesmeric state. In her
ordinary sense, she had nothing to do with him. But the peculiar
ease and unnoticeableness of his entering the house, the power
of his cold, gleaming light on her when he looked at her, was
like a bewitchment. In his eyes, as in the pale grey eyes of a
goat, there seemed some of that steady, hard fire of moonlight
which has nothing to do with the day. It made her alert, and yet
her mind went out like an extinguished thing. She was all
senses, all her senses were alive.

Then she saw him on Sunday, dressed up in Sunday clothes,
trying to impress her. And he looked ridiculous. She clung to
the ridiculous effect of his stiff, Sunday clothes.

She was always conscious of some unfaithfulness to Maggie, on
Anthony's score. Poor Maggie stood apart as if betrayed. Maggie
and Anthony were enemies by instinct. Ursula had to go back to
her friend brimming with affection and a poignancy of pity.
Which Maggie received with a little stiffness. Then poetry and
books and learning took the place of Anthony, with his goats'
movements and his cold, gleaming humour.

While Ursula was at Belcot