lse. She
looked lies, breathed lies, lived lies--would tell lies--always--to the
end of life! And he would never know what she meant. Never! Never! No
one could. Impossible to know.

He dropped his knife and fork, brusquely, as though by the virtue of a
sudden illumination he had been made aware of poison in his plate, and
became positive in his mind that he could never swallow another morsel
of food as long as he lived. The dinner went on in a room that had been
steadily growing, from some cause, hotter than a furnace. He had to
drink. He drank time after time, and, at last, recollecting himself,
was frightened at the quantity, till he perceived that what he had
been drinking was water--out of two different wine glasses; and the
discovered unconsciousness of his actions affected him painfully. He was
disturbed to find himself in such an unhealthy state of mind. Excess of
feeling--excess of feeling; and it was part of his creed that any excess
of feeling was unhealthy--morally unprofitable; a taint on practical
manhood. Her fault. Entirely her fault. Her sinful self-forgetfulness
was contagious. It made him think thoughts he had never had before;
thoughts disintegrating, tormenting, sapping to the very core of
life--like mortal disease; thoughts that bred the fear of air, of
sunshine, of men--like the whispered news of a pestilence.

The maids served without noise; and to avoid looking at his wife and
looking within himself, he followed with his eyes first one and then
the other without being able to distinguish between them. They moved
silently about, without one being able to see by what means, for
their skirts touched the carpet all round; they glided here and there,
receded, approached, rigid in black and white, with precise gestures,
and no life in their faces, like a pair of marionettes in mourning;
and their air of wooden unconcern struck him as unnatural, suspicious,
irremediably hostile. That such people's feelings or judgment could
affect one in any way, had never occurred to him before. He understood
they had no prospects, no principles--no refinement and no power. But
now he had become so debased that he could not even attempt to disguise
from himself his yearning to know the secret thoughts of his servants.
Several times he looked up covertly at the faces of those girls.
Impossible to know. They changed his plates and utterly ignored his
existence. What impenetrable duplicity. Women--nothing but women roun