When she thought that Verreker might read the article (would, in fact, in all probability) she felt ashamed, disgraced. Then, as she realized that a few more criticisms of that kind from the leading critics would damn her reputation, lose her her engagements and fling her back into the common rut, she was overwhelmed with the horror that the future might hold for her. She tossed and fretted in an agony of shame and mortification, cursing blindly at the ill-luck that was falling upon her on all sides. At last, unable to bear the torture of her thoughts any longer, she sprang out of bed with the zest of a tiger and put on a dressing-gown. She did not notice the difficulty she was having to stand upright: she had tapped hidden sources of energy within her which, though not extensive, were sufficient to sustain her for the present. She opened the door and went on to the landing. It was terribly cold there: the open fanlight window let in an icy draught from the north. Her feet were bare, but she did not appear to notice it on the thick stair-carpet. She began to descend, holding on to the stair-rail tightly. At the foot she stood still for a minute, as if waiting for supplies of energy, and then walked into the drawing-room. The fire, lit apparently with damp wood picked up from the Forest, had gone out and the room was very chilly. She walked unerringly to the music-cabinet and, kneeling on the floor, began to search in feverish haste. At last, seemingly, she discovered the object of her quest, a single thin piece of music in a yellow paper cover. With a strangely difficult movement she rose to her feet again and half walked, half staggered the short intervening distance to the piano-stool. It took her quite a minute to open out the music at the first page and place it in front of her on the rest. Instinctively she placed her bare feet on the cold brass of the pedals, and drew them away as quickly as if the metal had been white-hot. The shock restored to her a part of her lost energy. She began to move her fingers desultorily over the keys. At first the music was simple and she managed pretty well. But on the third page it developed octave arpeggio eccentricities in the left hand, and against these the fury of her determination burst in vain. She was handicapped, too, by not having the use of the pedals. For several moments her fingers moved, struggling vainly against chords and runs which her eyes could scarcely read and her memory but vaguely suggest. A terrible battle it was--a truly Homeric contest: her own tigerish determination against all the difficulties that a master-technician could invent.... But you would never have guessed that it was Liszt’s Sposalizio.... On the fourth page her spirit broke, and she fell forward sobbing, with her head and hair on the keys. And there some moments later, Florrie, entering with a jug of milk in her hand, found her, still sobbing uncontrollably.... § 2