him? First as a pale disturbing reflection on the sea of his content, like the reflection of a stormy moon. Then clear and brilliant, wearing his strange ironic smile, the blank look in his eyes, as though he never quite clearly knew why he did things. Piers shut his own eyes more tightly. He clenched his teeth and pressed his forehead against Pheasant's shoulder, trying not to think, trying not to see Eden's face with its mocking smile.
He tried to draw comfort from her nearness and warmth. She was his! That awful night when Finch had discovered the two in the wood together was a dream, a nightmare. He would not let the dreadful thought of it into his mind. But the thought came like a slinking beast, and Piers's mouth was suddenly drawn to one side in a grimace of pain. Pheasant must have felt his unease, for she turned to him and put an arm about his head, drawing it against her breast.
Nicholas could not sleep. "Too damn much rum," he thought. "This comes of drinking scarcely anything stronger than tea. You get your system into such a state that a little honest spirits knocks your sleep into a cocked hat."
However, he didn't particularly mind lying awake. His body was in a tranquil, steamy state, and pleasant visions from his past drifted before his eyes. The glamour of women he had cared for long ago hung like an essence in the room. He had forgotten their names (or would have had to make an effort to recall them), their faces were a blur, but the froufrou of their skirts—that adorable word "froufrou" that had no meaning now—whispered about him, more significant, more entrancing, than euphonious names or pretty faces. And their little hands (in days when women's hands were really small, and "dazzling" was a word not too intense for the whiteness of their flesh) held out to him offering the flowers of dalliance. . . . His thoughts became poetic; there was a kind of rhythm to them. Realizing this, he wondered if it were possible that Eden had taken his talent from him. That would be rather a joke, he
