nitely more disastrous, more humiliating, were the fatal habits of
his speech. Take the occasional but terrific destruction of the aitch.
It was worse than drink; it wrecked a man more certainly, more utterly
beyond redemption and excuse. It was anxiety on this point that partly
accounted for his reserve. He simply dared not talk about AEschylus or
Euripides, because such topics were exciting, and excitement was apt
to induce this lapse.

But most of all he dreaded the supreme agitation of love. For he knew
now perfectly well what had happened to him; though he had never known
it happen to him in this manner before. It was love as his heart had
imagined it in the days before he became the thrall of Miss Poppy
Grace. He had known the feeling, but until now he had not known the
woman who could inspire it. It was as if his heart had renewed its
primal virginity in preparation for some divine experience.

The night of Sunday beheld the withdrawal of Mr. Rickman into the
immensity of his preposterous dream. From this blessed state he
emerged on Monday morning, enlightened as to the whole comedy and
tragedy of his passion. To approach Lucia Harden required nothing less
than a change of spirit; and Mr. Rickman doubted whether he could
manage that. He could only change his shirts. And at this point there
arose the hideous fear lest love itself might work to hinder and
betray him.

As it turned out, love proved his ally, not his enemy. So far from
exciting him, it produced a depression that rendered him disinclined
for continuous utterance. In this it did him good service. It
prevented him from obtruding his presence unduly on Miss Harden. In
his seat at the opposite table he had achieved something of her
profound detachment, her consummate calm. And Lucia said to herself,
"Good. He can keep quiet for a whole day at a time, which is what I
doubted."

Six days had passed in this manner, and he had not yet attempted to
penetrate the mystery and seclusion of the Aldine Plato, the
Neapolitan Horace and the _Aurea Legenda_ of Wynkyn de Worde. He
turned away his eyes from that corner of the bookcase where he had
good reason to suppose them to be. He would have to look at them some
time, meanwhile he shrank from approaching them as from some gross
impiety. His father had written to him several times, making special
inquiries after the Aldine Plato, the Neapolitan Horace, and the
_Aurea Legenda_ of Wynkyn de Worde. He replied with