Mrs. Anthony glanced at him. She did
not move, gripped by an inexplicable premonition. She had arrived at the
very limit of her endurance as the object of Anthony's magnanimity; she
was the prey of an intuitive dread of she did not know what mysterious
influence; she felt herself being pushed back into that solitude, that
moral loneliness, which had made all her life intolerable. And then, in
that close communion established again with Anthony, she felt--as on that
night in the garden--the force of his personal fascination. The passive
quietness with which she looked at him gave her the appearance of a
person bewitched--or, say, mesmerically put to sleep--beyond any notion
of her surroundings.
After telling Mr. Powell not to go away the captain remained silent.
Suddenly Mrs. Anthony pushed back her loose hair with a decisive gesture
of her arms and moved still nearer to him. "Here's papa up yet," she
said, but she did not look towards Mr. Smith. "Why is it? And you? I
can't go on like this, Roderick--between you two. Don't."
Anthony interrupted her as if something had untied his tongue.
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