Produced by Suzanne Shell, Iris Schimandle and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net THE IMMORTAL MOMENT Books by MAY SINCLAIR The Helpmate The Divine Fire Two Sides of a Question Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson Etc., etc. [Illustration: "Kitty's face ... pleaded with the other face in the glass."] THE IMMORTAL MOMENT The Story of Kitty Tailleur _By_ MAY SINCLAIR ILLUSTRATED AND DECORATED BY C. COLES PHILLIPS. NEW YORK DOUBLEDAY PAGE & CO. 1908 COPYRIGHT, 1908 BY MAY SINCLAIR PUBLISHED, OCTOBER, 1908 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN PUBLISHERS' NOTE THIS STORY APPEARS IN ENGLAND UNDER THE TITLE "KITTY TAILLEUR" ILLUSTRATIONS "Kitty's face ... pleaded with the other face in the glass" FRONTISPIECE "She stood there, strangely still ... before the pitiless stare that went up to her appealing face" 10 "'You won't be tied to me a minute longer than you like'" 208 "'I want to make you loathe me ... never see me again'" 268 [Illustration: THE IMMORTAL MOMENT] THE IMMORTAL MOMENT CHAPTER I They came into the hotel dining-room like young persons making their first entry into life. They carried themselves with an air of subdued audacity, of innocent inquiry. When the great doors opened to them they stood still on the threshold, charmed, expectant. There was the magic of quest, of pure, unspoiled adventure in their very efforts to catch the head-waiter's eye. It was as if they called from its fantastic dwelling-place the attendant spirit of delight. You could never have guessed how old they were. He, at thirty-five, had preserved, by some miracle, his alert and slender adolescence. In his brown, clean-shaven face, keen with pleasure, you saw the clear, serious eyes and the adorable smile of seventeen. She, at thirty, had kept the wide eyes and tender mouth of childhood. Her face had a child's immortal, spiritual appeal. They were charming with each other. You might have taken them for bride and bridegroom, his absorption in her was so unimpaired. But their names in the visitors' book stood as Mr. Robert Lucy and Miss Jane Lucy. They were brother and sister. You gathered it from something absurdly alike in their faces, something profound and racial and enduring. For they combined it all, the youth, the abandonment, the innocence, with an indomitable distinction.