The existence he led looked to him for the instant supremely absurd. The instincts towards wider freedom and plainer habits, and higher thoughts than those possible in his society, had always been in him from his youth, though they had found no issue and no sympathy; and in his marriage he had tightened around him the bondage of the world.
The brilliant rooms were deserted when he re-entered them: here and there a servant moved, attending to a lamp or carrying away a stray teacup; there was no one else.
In his gentlest tones he again addressed Damaris:
'We are about to go to dinner,' he said to her kindly; 'will you do me the honour to accompany me?'
No hunted antelope could have looked more terrified than she.
'Dinner,' she echoed. 'I dined at noon.'
'But you can dine again? The sea air always gives one an appetite. You must not starve like this in my house.'
'I could not! I could not!' she said with tremulous lips. She glanced in an agony of dread through the rooms where all those gay people were. The idea of dining with them appalled her more than it would have done to find herself on a wrecked vessel, in the midst of the winds and waves. What would they think of her? What errors would she not make? What could she know of their manners and fashions?
'I could not! I could not!' she repeated, her colour changing a dozen times a minute.