after the soul-rending time
she had been having, in spite of the shadows beneath the eyes, the
droop at the corners of the mouth, in spite, too, it must be said of
the flagrantly cottage fashion in which Annalise had done her hair,
seemed to the Prince so extremely beautiful, so absolutely the face of
his dearest, best desires, so limpid, apart from all grace of
colouring and happy circumstance of feature, with the light of a sweet
and noble nature, so manifestly the outward expression of an
indwelling lovely soul, that his eyes, after one glance round the
room, fixed themselves upon it and never were able to leave it again.

For a minute or two she stood silent, trying to collect her thoughts,
trying to shake off the feeling that she was being called back to life
out of a dream. It had not been a dream, she kept telling herself--bad
though it was it had not been a dream but the reality; and this man
dropped suddenly in to the middle of it from another world, he was the
dream, part of the dream she had rebelled against and run away from a
fortnight before.

Then she looked at him, and she knew she was putting off her soul with
nonsense. Never was anybody less like a dream than the Prince; never
was anybody more squarely, more certainly real. And he was of her own
kind, of her own world. He and she were equals. They could talk
together plainly, baldly, a talk ungarnished and unretarded by
deferences on the one side and on the other a kindness apt to become
excessive in its anxiety not to appear to condescend. The feeling that
once more after what seemed an eternity she was with an equal was of a
singular refreshment. During those few moments in which they stood
silent, facing each other, in spite of her efforts to keep it out, in
spite of really conscientious efforts, a great calm came in and spread
over her spirit. Yet she had no reason to feel calm she thought,
struggling. Was there not rather cause for an infinity of shame? What
had he come for? He of all people. The scandalously jilted, the
affronted, the run away from. Was it because she had been looking so
long at Fritzing that this man seemed so nicely groomed? Or at Tussie,
that he seemed so well put together? Or at Robin, that he seemed so
modest? Was it because people's eyes--Mrs. Morrison's, Lady
Shuttleworth's--had been so angry lately whenever they rested on her
that his seemed so very kind? No; she did remember thinking them that,
even being struck by the