Milly wrote back that of course she understood. It should be as Agatha wished. Only (so Milly "sustained" her) Agatha must not allow herself to doubt the Power. How could she when she saw what it had done for Harding. If _she_ doubted, what could she expect of Harding? But of course she must take care of her own dear self. If she failed--if she gave way--what on earth would the poor darling do, now that he had become dependent on her? She wrote as if it was Agatha's fault that he had become dependent; as if Agatha had nothing, had nobody in the world to think of but Harding; as if nobody, as if nothing in the world beside Harding mattered. And Agatha found herself resenting Milly's view. As if to her anything in the world mattered beside Rodney Lanyon. For three days she did not see the Powells. CHAPTER TEN The three nights passed as before, but with an increasing struggle and fear. She knew, she knew what was happening. It was as if the walls of personality were wearing thin, and through them she felt him trying to get at her. She put the thought from her. It was absurd. It was insane. Such things could not be. It was not in any region of such happenings that she held him, but in the place of peace, the charmed circle, the flawless crystal sphere. Still the thought persisted; and still, in spite of it, she held him, she would not let him go. By her honour, and by her love for Milly she was bound to hold him, even though she knew how terribly, how implacably he prevailed. She was aware now that the persistence of his image on the blackness was only a sign to her of his being there in his substance; in his supreme innermost essence. It had obviously no relation to his bodily appearance, since she had not seen him for three days. It tended more and more to vanish, to give place to the shapeless, nameless, all-pervading presence. And her fear of him became pervading, nameless and shapeless too. Somehow it was always behind her now; it followed her from room to room of her house; it drove her out of doors. It seemed to her that she went before it with quick uncertain feet and a fluttering heart, aimless and tormented as a leaf driven by a vague light wind. Sometimes it sent her up the field towards the wood; sometimes it would compel her to go a little way towards the Farm; and then it was as if it took her by the shoulders and turned her back again towards her house.