me great hand were spreading
a black velvet cloth over it all; then Traill heard her uncomplaining
moan, and felt the dead weight of her senseless body as it lurched
against his own.

CHAPTER XVII

There are men of a certain type in this world whose judgment is
exceedingly sound when their instincts are not in play, but who, in
certain channels, when the senses are at riot, become puerile; the
good ship, rudderless, which only rights itself when the storm has
passed. They are men without the necessary leaven of introspection.
Of themselves, in fact, they know nothing, learn nothing even in the
remorse when the deed is done. For first of all, they are men of
strength--men who can over-ride, with determination, rough-shod,
the hampering results of their follies. Fate and circumstance have
no power over them. They make their own destiny; cutting, if
necessary, the knots they have tied, with a knife-edge of will that
needs but the one clear sweep to set them free.

Of this type--a vivid example--is Traill. The lust of animalism and
the determination to possess the woman he once desired, were the two
channels, swept into which, he became ungovernable. All clear
judgment which he displayed in the management of his work, all
foresight which he possessed to a degree in the arrangement of common,
mundane affairs, were in such a moment cast out of him. Brute instinct
hugged him in its embrace. He lost all sense of honour, who could
in other matters be most honourable of all. All sense of pity he left,
to become the animal that scents its prey, and stretches limbs,
strains heart to reach it. In those moments when the hunger held him,
he took the cruelty of the beast into his heart, and drove all else
out before it.

When Sally's inert body fell, crushing him against the window recess,
he looked down at her white face in the first realization of what
he had done. Then he came readily to action; picked her up bodily--a
tender, listless weight. In the bend of his arms, he carried her into
the other room. An uncushioned settle, no springs, the seat of plain
wood, was where he laid her, propping her head, because he knew no
better, with a pillow which he brought from the inner room. The sounds
from the yard at the back still reached his ears. He strode through
to the window and closed it; brought back with him a glass of water,
and stood beside the settle, looking down at the slowly disappearing
pallor of her face. Her ha