*    *    *    *    *

Henry was in his middle thirties, temperate, studious, a moderate smoker, and
- one would have said - a bachelor of the bachelors, armour-plated against Cupid's
well-meant but obsolete artillery.

*    *    *    *    *

She was a small, slim girl, thinner and paler than she should have been,
with large eyes that seemed to Henry pathetic and stirred his chilvary.

*    *    *    *    *

Henry's soul was expanding like a flower and purring like a well-tickled cat.
Never in his life had he been admired by a woman. The sensation was intoxicating.

*    *    *    *    *

She merged with his life as smoothly as one river joins another.

*    *    *    *    *

Sometimes, catching her eye when she was not expecting it, he surprised an enigmatic
look in it. It was a look, however, which he was able to read. It meant that she was bored.

*    *    *    *    *

Henry belonged to the large circle of human beings who consider that there is acuter
pleasure in being suddenly cured of toothache than in never having toothache at all.

*    *    *    *    *