ppening. All he said, as well as all
she said, kept pouring in upon her brain without a missing word, and she
hugged herself in the delight of these imaginings, and the hours went by
without weariness for her. She lay, her arms folded, thinking,
thinking, seeing him through the darkness.

He came to see them the following day. Her father was there all the
time, but to hear and see him was almost enough for her. She seemed to
lose sight of everything and to be engulfed in her own joy. When he had
gone away she remembered the smile which had lit up some pretty thought
of her; her ears were full of his voice, and she heard the lilt that
charmed her whenever she pleased. Then she asked herself the meaning of
some casual remark, and her mind repeated all he had said like a
phonograph. She already knew his habitual turns of speech; they had
begun to appear in her own conversation, and all that was not connected
with him lost interest for her. Once or twice during the week she went
to bed early so that she might not fancy her father was looking at her
while she thought of Owen.

Owen called at the end of the week--the _Wagnerian Review_ always
supplied him with sufficient excuse for a visit--but he had to spend his
visit in discussing the text of a Greek hymn which he had seen
disinterred in Greece. She was sorry for him, sorrier than she was for
herself, for she could always find him in her thoughts.... She wondered
if he could find her as vividly in his thoughts as she settled herself
(the next day was Sunday) in the corner of her pew, resolved from the
beginning not to hear a word of the sermon, but to think of Owen the
whole time. She wanted to hear why he had left England so suddenly, and
why he had returned so suddenly. She was sure that she and the
red-haired lady were the cause of one or the other, and that neither was
the cause of both. These two facts served for a warp upon which she
could weave endless mental embroideries, tales as real as the tales of
old tapestry, tales of love and jealousy, and unexpected meetings, in
which she and Owen and the red-haired lady met and re-met. Whilst Father
Railston was preaching, these tales flowed on and on, subtle as silk,
illusive as evening tinted clouds; and it was not until she had
exhausted her fancy, and Owen had made one more fruitless visit to
Dulwich, that she began to scheme how she might see him alone. There was
so much that they could only talk about if they were a