With Mrs. Falchion's hand upon my arm, I felt a
sense of capitulation to the music and to her, uncanny in its suddenness.
At this distance of time it seems to me absurd. I had once experienced
something of the same feeling with the hand of a young medical student,
who, skilled in thought-reading, discovered the number of a bank-note
that was in my mind.
This woman had an attractiveness compelling and delightful, at least in
its earlier application to me. Both professionally and socially I have
been brought into contact with women of beauty and grace, but never one
who, like Mrs. Falchion, being beautiful, seemed so unconscious of the
fact, so indifferent to those about her, so untouched by another's
emotion, so lacking in sensitiveness of heart; and who still drew people
to her. I am speaking now of the earlier portion of our acquaintance; of
her as she was up to this period in her life.
I was not alone in this opinion of her, for, as time went on, every
presentable man and woman on the boat was introduced to her; and if some
women criticised and some disliked her, all acknowledged her talent and
her imperial attraction.
Pages:
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47