In a moment's panic he thought that this time she had really "cut and run," and he was almost stunned with his terror of it. It was too soon, too soon: it would be disastrous; he would be left without understanding, to the mercy of the obsession; he had not all the threads in his hands; until he had, it would be rash folly to snap. He stood against her door, with his ear to the panel, holding his breath, straining to hear. There were explosive noises in the house. From the room he could catch nothing for them. Closer and closer he pressed to the door, his ear against the panel. He lurched and the panel creaked. Silence. He heard her stir in her bed. She was there! That was all he wanted to know. On tiptoe he crept away. . . . She was there! He would yet gather all the threads and then he or she would snap. One or other would be broken. What had he then? The evidence of his own eyes. Was that not enough? It was enough for prescribed remedies, to which he could not resort without revenge, for which he had not now the least desire. What his eyes had seen was so isolated, so severed from the rest of his life as to be monstrous and injurious. By itself it was damnable harlotry. (There was a sort of boyish satisfaction in fishing out the words of a grosser age with which to bespatter it and make it even more offensive to pure-mindedness.) But, as he loved the woman, it could not stand by itself. He was in it, too. Actions cannot be judged by themselves. There must have been an antecedent conspiracy of circumstance and fault to lead to such misdemeanor. With a tight control of himself he could now almost think of it without jealousy (hardly any of that was left but the quick, shallow jealousy of the brute), but he could not think of it without passion, and through that he could discern its inherent passion and, faintly, respond to it. That put an end to all mean suspicions of a conspiracy against himself, or of cowardly contriving to enjoy stolen fruit and leave no trace. . . . She had locked the door against him. So much was definite, and he had a sort of envying admiration for her that she could be precise while he was still floundering and groping for understanding. . . . Certainly he had never seen her so sure of herself. But then, if she were so sure, why did she not "cut and run." Then it would not be so bad. For a flash he saw the thing with the eyes of a fat clubman; the passion in him ebbed and he lost grip, and blundered into a mist. A lunge forward cleared him. She was sure of herself, so sure that she was giving no thought to her position except as it immediately presented itself. The new factor in her life called for no change, and everything she had was enriched by it, her possessions, her work, even her domestic life. It must all seem to her clear gain, and therefore she was sure. She loved her love, and everything that had led to it, and therefore she was sure.