face was set towards him; that she turned from him and then paused
in her going; that she looked at the fire again to make sure of its
burning, and at him to make sure of his sleep (so intently that she
never noticed the white thing which had slipped from her shoulders as
she stood upright); that she stooped to draw his coat more closely
over him. He heard the flowing of her gown, and saw without seeing her
feet shining as she went from him.

And his desire went after her, and the mere bodiless idea of her
became a torment to his body as it had been a joy to his soul.

He took up her shawl which lay there by the hearth and looked at it;
he stroked it, unfolded it, spread it out and looked at it again; he
held it to his face; its whiteness and its tender texture were as
flame to his sight and touch, the scarcely perceptible scent of it
pierced him like a delicate pain. He gathered it up again in a heap
and covered it with kisses. Then, because it made his longing for her
insupportable, he flung it back, that innocent little white shawl, as
if shaking off her touch and her presence.

He rose to his feet and ramped up and down the room savagely, like a
wild animal in a cage. With every thought of Lucia his torment
returned upon him. He tried to think of the whiteness and the beauty
of her soul, and he could think of nothing but the whiteness of her
face and the beauty of her bending body.

He sat down, stretched his arms on the table and laid his miserable
head upon them, all among the pages of the catalogue _raisonne_. He
had passed from his agony of desire to an agony of contrition. He felt
that the very vehemence of his longing was an affront to her white
unconsciousness Up till now he had not admitted that he was "in love"
with Lucia; he was indeed hardly aware of it. He imagined his feeling
for her to be something altogether immaterial and incorruptible. It
now seemed to him that in the last few minutes he had lowered it
almost to the level of the emotion inspired by Miss Poppy Grace. It
was not, and it never could be, what it had been three weeks ago. Why,
he could not even recall his sensations of Easter Sunday, that strange
renewal of his heart's virginity his first vague imperfect vision of
the dawn of love, his joy when he discerned its tender and mysterious
approach. He knew that it held no rights, or held them only on the
most subtle and uncertain tenure, that his soul touched the soul of
Lucia Harden by th