Great emotion has its moments of calm and hurricane, like the sea. It may lie glassy and level, though deep; again, with the speed of tropical storm, it may have its surface lashed to mountainous billows, against which no ship can make way, but must run before them. And the pitiless and intentional lightness of her words made an upheaval in him of all he was trying to suppress. He had come down here meaning to stop till the next day, but somehow the sight of her, and some deep abiding horror--the root of morality--of that for which his flesh cried out, had revealed to him the grossness of, not his design, but his acquiescence. Thus he had not even told her that he had his luggage with him; but of this blind Fate, in the shape of a liveried servant, had informed her. She knew as well as he what he had intended to do. And looking at her hands as they clutched the wickerwork of her basket chair, he could see that she, too, wrestled with, and tried to throttle, some secret enemy. Then came her light words, interpreted by the quivering of the tense hands, and his passion surged and overwhelmed him. "Let me change my mind, Marie," he said, "and stop." Again she told herself that it was perfectly right and natural that he should do so, but again her clear, clean judgment, recognising the force of the desire that he should, overruled her; but she was tired and nerve-jangled from the struggle, and her voice, pitched high and entreatingly, was no longer under her command. "No, no, Jim!" she cried. "You must go." The word she was afraid she would not be able to speak was spoken. The operation was over; she had only to keep quiet and recuperate. But she had betrayed herself to him: both knew it. A barrier had been broken down between them; each soul in its secret place was visible to the other, and in the awe and amazement of that the cries and strivings of the debatable were for the moment stilled. There was no satisfaction in the world that could equal the self-surrender that each had already made; there was nothing that either could do or say which would not spoil and degrade that which had passed between them. Jim, on his part, though he knew why he had asked to change his mind and stop, could not yet regret it, so tremendous and soul-filling was that which lay behind her refusal; and she could not find it in her heart to blame him, since his weakness had ended so gloriously. Thus in silence for a long moment each looked at the other, unashamed, acknowledging by that look, without fear or regret, the great bond that bound them indissolubly together, the great renunciation that irrevocably divided them. Marie reached out her hand for her ivory silver-handled stick, which had fallen by her chair. "Come and stroll for half an hour before dinner," she said. "See whether I am not right about the antidote to people which one can find in the country." He rose, too. "But who has been poisoning you in town?" he asked.