He had all his usual self-control again, for he was now on his throne, his seat of power; his inner attitude changed subtly; he was examining two patients—the girl and himself. She sat before him demure, obedient, honest, very sweet but very strong; if her perfume reached him he did not notice it, the appeal of her loveliness went past him, he did not see her eyes. He had a very comely and intelligent young woman facing him, and the glow, as it were, of an intense inner activity, strongly suppressed, was the chief quality in her that he noted. But his new attitude made other things, too, stand out sharply: he realized there was confusion in her own mind and heart. Her being was not wholly at one with itself. This impersonal rôle meant safety until she was sure of herself; and so far she had been entirely and admirably non-committal. No girl, he remembered, could look back upon what she had experienced in the Studio, upon what she had herself said and done, before a crowd of onlookers too, without deep feelings of a mixed and even violent kind. That scene with a young man she had never seen before must bring painful memories; if it was love at first sight the memories must be more painful still. But was it a case of this sudden, rapturous love? What, indeed, were her feelings? What at any rate was her dominant feeling? She had felt his appeal beyond all question, but was it as Nayan or as Iraida that she felt it?
She was non-committal and impersonal, conscious that therein safety lay—until, having become one with herself, harmonious, she could feel absolutely sure. One hint only had she dropped—it was Nayan speaking—that her mothering, maternal instinct was needed and that she must obey its prompting. She must "care" for him....
Dr. Fillery, meanwhile, though he might easily have probed and made discoveries without her knowing that he did so, was not the man to use his powers now. Unless she gave of her own free will, he would not ask. He would close eyes and ears even to any chance betrayal or unconscious revelation.
"When you first looked in, for instance? You had just come in from the street, I think. You opened the door on your way upstairs. Do you remember?"
She remembered perfectly. "I wanted to see who was there. You, I think, were chiefly in my thoughts—I was wondering if you had come." Her voice was even, her eyes quite steady; she chose her next words slowly: "I saw—to my intense surprise—a figure of light."
"Shining, you mean? A shining figure?"
She nodded her head, as one little hand put back a straying wisp of dark hair from her forehead. "A figure like flame," she agreed. "I saw it quite clearly. I saw everything else quite clearly too—the inner room, various people standing about, the piano, the thick smoke, everything as usual. I saw you. You were in the big outer room beyond, but your face was very distinct. You were staring—staring straight at me."
"True," put in Dr. Fillery; "I saw you in the doorway plainly."
"In the foreground, by itself apart somehow, though surrounded by people, was this shining, radiant outline. I thought it was a Vision—the first thing of that sort I had ever seen in my life."
"That was your very first impression—even before you had time to think?"