ven once had an affair with a girl who was always called the shot
partridge, because her eyes were supposed to be like those of a dying
bird. I tried to laugh to myself as I remembered this. But I felt cold,
and my senses seemed benumbed as by a great horror. I sat like a stone,
with my eyes fixed upon Margot, trying painfully to read into her all
that the words of Professor Black had suggested to me--trying, but
with the wish not to succeed. I was roused by Lady Melchester, who came
toward me asking me to do something, I forget now what. I forced myself
to be cheerful, to join in the conversation, to seem at my ease; but I
felt like one oppressed with nightmare, and I could scarcely withdraw
my eyes from the sofa where my wife was sitting. She was talking now
to Professor Black, who had just been introduced to her; and I felt a
sudden fury in my heart as I thought that he was perhaps dryly, coldly,
studying her, little knowing what issues--far-reaching, it might be,
in their consequences--hung upon the truth or falsehood of his strange
theory. They were talking earnestly, and presently it occurred to me
that he might be imbuing Margot with his pernicious doctrines, that he
might be giving her a knowledge of her own soul which now she lacked.
The idea was insupportable. I broke off abruptly the conversation in
which I was taking part, and hurried over to them with an impulse which
must have astonished anyone who took note of me. I sat down on a chair,
drew it forward almost violently, and thrust myself in between them.

"What are you two talking about?" I said, roughly, with a suspicious
glance at Margot.

The Professor looked at me in surprise.

"I was instructing your wife in some of the mysteries of
salmon-fishing," he said. "She tells me you have a salmon-river running
through your grounds."

I laughed uneasily.

"So you are a fisherman as well as a romantic theorist!" I said, rather
rudely. "How I wish I were as versatile! Come, Margot, we must be going
now. The carriage ought to be here."

She rose quietly and bade the Professor good-night; but as she glanced
up at me, in rising, I fancied I caught a new expression in her eyes.
A ray of determination, of set purpose, mingled with the gloomy fire of
their despair.

As soon as we were in the carriage I spoke, with a strained effort at
ease and the haphazard tone which should mask furtive cross-examination.

"Professor Black is an interesting man," I said.