Sophie wished she had not begun to think back. She wished she had not danced with Arthur. People looking after her wondered why she was not laughing; why suddenly her good spirits had died down. She was tired and wanted to cry.... She hoped she would not cry; but she did not like dancing with Arthur Henty before all these people. It was like dancing on a grave.
Henty's grip tightened. Sophie's face had become childish and pitiful, working with the distress which she could not suppress. His hand on hers comforted her. Their hands loved and clung; they comforted each other, every fibre finding its mate, twined and entwined; all the little nests of nerves were throbbing and crooning to each other.
Were they dancing, or drifting through space as they would drift when they were dead, as perhaps they had drifted through time? Sophie wondered. The noises of the ball-room broke in on her wondering--voices, shouting, and laughter; the little cries of girls and the heavy exclamations of men, the music enwrapping them....
Sophie longed for the deep, straight glance of his eyes; yet she dared not look up. Arthur's will, working against hers, demanded the surrender. Through all her body, imperiously, his demand communicated itself. Her gaze went to him, and flew off again.
As they danced, Arthur seemed to be taking her into deep water. She was afraid of getting out of her depth ... but he held her carefully. His grasp, was strong and his eyes hungry. Sophie could not escape that hungry look of his eyes. She told herself that she would not look up; she would not see it. They moved unsteadily; his breath, hot and smelling of whisky, fanned her. She sickened under it, loathing the smell of whisky and the rank tobacco he had been smoking. His grasp tightened. She was afraid of him--afraid of all the long, old dreams he might revive. Her step faltered, his arm trembled against her. And those hungry, hungry eyes.... She could not see them; she would not.
A clamour of tiny voices rose within her and dinned in her ears. She could hear the clamour of tiny voices going on in Henty, too; his voices were drowning her voices. She looked up to him begging him to silence them ... begging, but unable to beg, terrified and quailing to the implacable in him--the stark passion and tragedy which were in his face. She was helpless before them.