She took down her hands and looked at him. “It seemed so good to have—enough—more than enough! to be extravagant!” She threw out her hands with a little wasteful gesture.
He was looking at her closely. A suspicion leaped at him. Her face was so free and the tears had made it mysterious and sweet—she was as wonderful as that other—she was—She was—He stopped with a quick jerk. “I want you to be extravagant on yourself!” he said. He was watching her face.
It flamed again but it did not drop before him. Only the eyes sent back a look—on guard, it seemed to him. “I do not need so much for myself,” she said quietly, “part of it will be quite enough.”
He put the bills in his pocket. “All or nothing,” he said easily.
All the next day he turned it in his mind—the look in her eyes, the beauty—something deep within her, shining out.... He no longer went peacefully about his work. Could it have been Rosalind, after all?... He had never seen her look like that—he had not dreamed.... But when he came home at night the look was not there; he fancied that she was more worn and a little troubled. Certainly, no one could think of her as beautiful... and why should a man want to think his wife beautiful?... It was the woman in the alcove that had done the mischief. He should never get over the woman in the alcove. She had got into his life whether or not. He could not be comfortable about Rosalind. There was something about her that he had not known or suspected before. He fell to watching her when she was not aware. He had thought he knew her so well and now she was a stranger.... But perhaps it was himself—the woman had done something to him. Rosalind was the same—but was she? He looked at her a long time one night as she lay asleep. The moonlight had come in and was on her face. He watched it—as if a breath might speak to him—it was not Rosalind’s face. Some stranger was there, out of a strange land; a great yearning came to him to waken her, to ask her whence she came, what it was that she knew—what made her face so peaceful in the moonlight—calling to him? He got up softly and closed the blind. He remembered he had heard that it was not good for people to sleep with the moon shining on them—it was only superstition, of course. But superstition had suddenly changed its bounds for him.... Were there things, perhaps, that people knew, that they guessed—true things that they could not explain and did not talk about?...
IV
HE could not bring himself to speak to Rosalind about the woman in the alcove. He wanted to speak—to do away, once for all, with the strangeness and the spell she seemed to have cast about him, to speak of her casually as that woman I saw the other day at Merwin’s; but he could not do it. It was as if he were afraid—or bashful. He had not felt like this since—not since he was in love—with Rosalind! He looked at the thought and turned it over slowly. He was not in love with the woman—certainly he was not in love with her! He would not know her again if he met her on the street.... Would he not! Suddenly he felt that he had known her always—longer than he had known Rosalind—longer than he had been alive! He found himself wondering about the world—how it was the world got into existence—what were men doing in it—and women—and his mind travelled out into space—great stars swung away mistily—what did it mean—all his world and stars?... Perhaps if he saw her again, just a few minutes, he would feel like himself again.... It was worth trying—and how he wanted—to—see her! Well, what of that? There was nothing wrong in being curious about a woman like that. If she had some uncanny power over him he might as well find it out—fight it!