She frowned, as if she were not satisfied with that explanation. And there was another silence. Then she began again:
"Would being unhappy—very, very unhappy—give it you?"
I thought I saw how her mind was working and I advised her to put that idea out of her head. Happiness, I said, wouldn't be good for Jevons.
She said, "Oh, wouldn't it!" And, after prolonged meditation, "I wonder if he'll stay that funny yellow colour all his life."
I found out from her that he had been living in that top room above hers for three weeks—ever since he had finished his book. It looked as if he had become frantic when he saw the end of his pretexts and occasions for meeting her, and had cast off all prudence and had followed her, determined to live under the same roof.
I looked on it as a madness that possessed him.
But that it should ever possess her—that was inconceivable.
II
He recovered.
The brilliant orange of his jaundice faded to lemon, and the lemon to a sallow tint that cleared rapidly as it was flooded by his flush.