illy has nothing to _do_ in the story, but
she has to _be_ with great intensity, for it is on what she is that
the story turns. Of that in a moment, however; in these chapters,
which are the central chapters of the book, Milly's consciousness is
to the fore, the deep agitation within her is the concern of the
moment.

Once more it is the superficial play of thought that is put before us.
The light stir and vibration of Milly's sensibility from hour to hour
is all we actually see; for the most part it is very light, very easy
and airy, as she moves with her odd poetry and grace and freedom. She
comes from New York, it will be remembered, a "pale angular princess,"
loaded with millions, and all alone in the world save for her small
companion, Mrs. Stringham. She is a rare and innocent creature,
receptive and perceptive, thrown into the middle of a situation in
which she sees everything, excepting only the scheme by which it is
proposed to make use of her. Of that she knows nothing as yet; her
troubles are purely her own, and gradually, it is hard to say where or
how, we discover what they are. They are much too deeply buried in her
mind to appear casually upon the surface at any time; but now and
then, in the drama of her meditation, there is a strange look or a
pause or a sudden hasty motion which is unexplained, which is
portentous, which betrays everything. Presently her great hidden facts
have passed into the possession of the reader _whole_, so to
speak--not broken into detail, bit by bit, not pieced together
descriptively, but so implied and suggested that at some moment or
other they spring up complete and solid in the reader's attention.
Exactly how and where did it happen? Turning back, looking over the
pages again, I can mark the very point, perhaps, at which the thing
was liberated and I became possessed of it; I can see the word that
finally gave it to me. But at the time it may easily have passed
unnoticed; the enlightening word did not seem peculiarly emphatic as
it was uttered, it was not announced with any particular circumstance;
and yet, presently--there was the piece of knowledge that I had not
possessed before.

Not to walk straight up to the fact and put it into phrases, but to
_surround_ the fact, and so to detach it inviolate--such is Henry
James's manner of dramatizing it. Soon after Milly's first appearance
there are some pages that illustrate his procedure very clearly, or
very clearly, I shou