"I never thought of that," replied she unembarrassed. "It was simply
that I can't put myself under obligation to anyone."

As she stood there, her full beauty flashed upon him--the exquisite
form, the subtly graceful poise of her body, of her head--the loveliness
of that golden-hued white skin--the charm of her small rosy mouth--the
delicate, sensitive, slightly tilted nose--and her eyes--above all, her
eyes!--so clear, so sweet. Her voice had seemed thin and faint to him;
its fineness now seemed the rarest delicacy--the exactly fitting kind
for so evasive and delicate a beauty as hers. He made a slight bow of
dismissal, turned abruptly away. Never in all his life, strewn with
gallant experiences--never had a woman thus treated him, and never had a
woman thus affected him. "I am mad--stark mad!" he muttered. "A
ten-dollar-a-week typewriter, whom nobody on earth but myself would look
at a second time!" But something within him hurled back this scornful
fling. Though no one else on earth saw or appreciated--what of it? She
affected _him_ thus--and that was enough. "_I_ want her! . . . I _want_
her! I have never wanted a woman before."

He rushed into the dressing room attached to his office, plunged his
face into ice-cold water. This somewhat eased the burning sensation that
was becoming intolerable. Many were the unaccountable incidents in his
acquaintance with this strange creature; the most preposterous was this
sudden seizure. He realized now that his feeling for her had been like
the quiet, steady, imperceptible filling of a reservoir that suddenly
announces itself by the thunder and roar of a mighty cascade over the
dam. "This is madness--sheer madness! I am still master within myself. I
will make short work of this rebellion." And with an air of calmness so
convincing that he believed in it he addressed himself to the task of
sanity and wisdom lying plain before him. "A man of my position caught