A thousand times he railed at himself, profanely calling himself many varieties of a fool. Once and again he strove to restore to cold, passionless order the seething maelstrom of his thoughts. Why, he demanded fiercely of himself, should he long to possess this girl with every aching fibre of his being? The mere urge and fever of animal passion did not explain the matter; there was something deeper, more elemental still in the fury of the desire which possessed him, which drove him forth out of his comfortable house by night and by day as if pursued by the furies. Because Jarvis was a strong man, his nature hardened by years of stern, unrelaxing self-discipline, the utter rout and confusion of his cold, passionless self was the more complete and disastrous. He hated himself for loving a woman who disdained him, and hating himself, he loved her with a despair akin to torment. That she was poor, helpless, already fast closed in his savage grip, like a bird in a snare, he knew; and yet for the first time he dimly realized the illusive part of her which successfully evaded his grasp, defied his power, despised his threats. He might, if he would, crush her by main force; he could not compel her to love him. The thought of his own strength, helpless before her weakness, maddened him. Houses, lands, money, had become passively obedient to the power of his will. He controlled these things, did with them as he pleased, in effect an overlord, haughty, unbending, merciless; but this one thing which he had put out his hand to take—carelessly, as one will pluck a ripe apple from the bough at the languid prompting of appetite—this girl, who had for years been no more to him than the birds hopping in the trees outside his window, how and by what means had she suddenly contrived to gain this monstrous ascendency over him? What uncanny power in those clear gray eyes of hers had metamorphosed Stephen Jarvis, cool, middle-aged man of affairs, into the weak creature he had always despised in his saner moments? During these days of inward tumult he carried on the dull routine of his business, forcing himself to the task with all the powers of a will suddenly turned traitor to its master. In spite of himself he seemed to see her there in his lonely house over against the sombre rows of books, her face vividly alive, defiantly youthful. Despite his resolves she perpetually came between him and the printed page which he strove to read; worst of all, she haunted his restless slumbers by night, now pleading with him; now defying him; mocking him with elfin laughter, as she fled before him, the child in her arms; while he pursued leaden-footed through uncounted miles of shadowy country.