htly once or twice already that day; she felt unable to cope
with the strength of her own desires. To a person controlled by habit,
there was humiliation as well as alarm in this sudden release of what
appeared to be a very powerful as well as an unreasonable force. An
aching in the muscles of her right hand now showed her that she was
crushing her gloves and the map of Norfolk in a grip sufficient to crack
a more solid object. She relaxed her grasp; she looked anxiously at the
faces of the passers-by to see whether their eyes rested on her for
a moment longer than was natural, or with any curiosity. But having
smoothed out her gloves, and done what she could to look as usual, she
forgot spectators, and was once more given up to her desperate desire to
find Ralph Denham. It was a desire now--wild, irrational, unexplained,
resembling something felt in childhood. Once more she blamed herself
bitterly for her carelessness. But finding herself opposite the Tube
station, she pulled herself up and took counsel swiftly, as of old. It
flashed upon her that she would go at once to Mary Datchet, and ask
her to give her Ralph's address. The decision was a relief, not only in
giving her a goal, but in providing her with a rational excuse for her
own actions. It gave her a goal certainly, but the fact of having a goal
led her to dwell exclusively upon her obsession; so that when she rang
the bell of Mary's flat, she did not for a moment consider how this
demand would strike Mary. To her extreme annoyance Mary was not at home;
a charwoman opened the door. All Katharine could do was to accept the
invitation to wait. She waited for, perhaps, fifteen minutes, and
spent them in pacing from one end of the room to the other without
intermission. When she heard Mary's key in the door she paused in front
of the fireplace, and Mary found her standing upright, looking at once
expectant and determined, like a person who has come on an errand of
such importance that it must be broached without preface.

Mary exclaimed in surprise.

"Yes, yes," Katharine said, brushing these remarks aside, as if they
were in the way.

"Have you had tea?"

"Oh yes," she said, thinking that she had had tea hundreds of years ago,
somewhere or other.

Mary paused, took off her gloves, and, finding matches, proceeded to
light the fire.

Katharine checked her with an impatient movement, and said:

"Don't light the fire for me.... I want to know Ralph Denham's a