eBooks Base 2000

But below any superficial sense of pleasure in outward things,
thought of that likeness--and likeness, dash it all, to whom?--still
vexed him as a riddle he failed to guess. Obligation to guess it, to find
the right answer, obsessed him as of vital interest and importance,
though, for the life of him, he could not tell why. His sense of
proportion, his social sense, his self-complacency, grew restive under
the pressure of it. He told himself it wasn't of the smallest
consequence, didn't matter a fig, yet continued to cudgel his memory.
And, all the while, the sound of deliberate footsteps crunching over the
dry rattling shingle, nearer and nearer, contributed to increase his
inward perturbation.
The footsteps halted close behind him--while for a sensible length of
time a shadow lay across him shutting off the genial warmth--and started
again, passing to the left, as the intruder traversed the crown of the
ridge a few paces from where Damaris was seated, and pursued his way down
to the river-shore on the other side.


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