He glanced at her swiftly. Was that simplicity, or a veiled request for him to close his arms about her? How could she be simple? The mistress of a man for three years--what simplicity could be left in her now? Undoubtedly she must know--of course she knew by now--the thoughts that were travelling wildly through his mind. "Poor child," he said considerately--"I suppose you are." Her eyes opened to that. She sat a little straighter in the corner. There was a tone in his voice more subtle than friendship. Her ears had heard it, but her senses were too drowsy then to dwell for long upon its consideration. He would have said more--in another moment, he would have slipped his arm around her waist, had it not been for her sudden movement of reserve. That warned him. Unconsciously a woman gives out of herself the impression of whether she be easy of winning or not. With Sally, notwithstanding all the circumstances that ranged against her in his mind, Devenish realized that an inconsidered step would be fatal to his desires. That did not thwart him. He admired her the more for it; wanted her the more. When they reached her rooms and, taking off her hat, she seated herself at the piano, creating in the susceptibility of his mind a greater sense of the intimacy of their relations, he stood at the other side of the room watching her, content to let his anticipations slowly drift upon the quiet stream of events to the ultimate cataract of their realization. This is the true nature of the sensualist. Woman or man, whatever sex, you may know them by their feline delight in the procrastination of the moment. It is an evolution of the intellect. The raw, unbridled forces of nature have no dealings with such as these. They are people of pleasure. They have taken the gifts that Nature has offered and, with the subtle cunning of their minds, have torn the inviolable parchment of her laws to shreds before her face. With no inheritance of the intellect, Devenish possessed all the other qualities. Sensualist as he was, with that strain of refinement induced by the easy circumstances of life, the paid women disgusted him. Of mere animalism, he had none. Here in this widest essential, his nature marked its contrast with Traill. To admit the beast in every man would have been beyond him; simply because the admission of a generalization such as that, would most directly have implied himself. In Traill's concession of it, such an admission may easily be read. And this is the type of man, such as Devenish, most dangerous to society. If the threadbare hypocrisy of this country of England could but bring itself to don the acknowledgment that the hired woman has her place in the scheme of things, such men as Devenish would find the virtuous woman more closely guarded from their strategies than she is. When her first song was finished, Sally turned in her chair, laughing frankly to his eyes.