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Gissing, George, 1857-1903

"The Unclassed"

What was the
explanation of her being without employment? Why had she hesitated
to tell him, as soon as she lost her work? Was there not some
mystery at the bottom of this, arguing a lack of complete frankness
on Ida's part from the first?
The actual pain caused by Ida's danger was, strange to say, a far
less important item in his state of mind than the interest which the
situation inspired. Through the night he had thought more of Julian
than of Ida. What he had for some time suspected had now found
confirmation; Julian was in love with Ida, in love for the first
time, and under circumstances which, as Julian himself had said,
might well suffice to change his whole nature. Waymark had never
beheld such terrible suffering as that depicted on his friend's face
during those hours of talk in the night. Something of jealousy had
been aroused in him by the spectacle; not jealousy of the ordinary
gross kind, but rather a sense of humiliation in the thought that he
himself had never experienced, was perhaps incapable of, such
passion as racked Julian in every nerve. This was the passion which
Ida was worthy of inspiring, and Waymark contrasted it with his own
feelings on the previous day, and now since the calamity had fallen.


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