It wasn’t, of course, the normal Sam she met, but a Sam exalted, genuinely raised and not merely puffed up, by his electioneering notoriety. He had a new self-confidence; it seemed to him that little was beyond his reach, that he might even hope to come to terms with Effie. Not, that is to say, to such terms as her last employer had proposed. Sam was not, in these matters, the average sensual man. The point was, and it was to his credit, that he discerned something fine in Effie even at this stage, and the mood of confidence gave him to hope that he might not seem commonplace to her. Already, that afternoon, he cared so much. Her opinion mattered. It mattered so greatly that he went slowly about the business of surprising her: for that, of course, was what he thought he had to do. She might not know things about Branstone which it was good for her to know. He might be any employer who advertised for a typist, and he was not any employer. He was Branstone, of the Classics and the Novels; town councillor; politician; and she must be told about him. She must learn what manner of man he was. He wanted to tell her how much greater he was going to be, but decided that could wait. First she must know what he had done, before it came to telling her what he was going to do, and his record would come better from others than from himself. In the office they knew it all and, even if she asked no questions, there was much which the routine work would tell her of him. He curbed impatience and left her for some weeks in the general office, where it was supposed that she was picking up some knowledge of the business before beginning to act as his secretary, but what he hoped she was picking up was some knowledge of him. He had the idea that he was popular with his staff, and did not think that they would libel him to her. All the time he burned to have her sitting with him in the private office. It was for that purpose that he had advertised for a typist-secretary, and to bring her from the general office could excite no comment. On the contrary, to leave her there so long might look strange or at least suggest that Effie was a failure. A failure! Much he cared whether she was efficient at her work. Yet she was splendidly efficient, and still he coquetted with his purpose of having her with him. It seemed to him that to call her in would be a step definite and irrevocable, one which he wanted and even yearned to make, but about which he hesitated sensuously as a bridegroom might hesitate on the threshold of the bridal chamber. He neglected to make two certainly profitable journeys to London at this time because he could not deny himself the pleasure of seeing her neck as she bent over her typewriter when he passed through the office.