RODERICK HUDSON
in her innermost faith. But her fright was over, though she was still catching her breath a little, like a person dragged ashore out of waters uncomfortably deep. She was exquisitely astray about everything, and appealed more than ever to correction and precaution. Before her companion he was distinctly conscious that he quaked. He wondered extremely what was going on in this young lady's mind, what had been her silent commentary on the incidents of the night before. He wondered all the more because he immediately perceived that she was now a person changed, and changed not to her disfigurement. She was older, easier, lighter; she had, as would have been said in Rome, more form. She had thus, he made out, more expression, facial and other, and it was beautifully as if this expression had been accumulating all the while, lacking on the scene of her life any channel to waste itself. It was like something she had been working at in the long days of home, an exquisite embroidery or a careful compilation, and she now presented the whole wealth of it as a kind of pious offering. Rowland felt almost instantly—he could hardly have said why; it was in her voice, in her tone, in the air—that a different principle governed her manner of regarding him. She built on him now absolutely; whether or no she liked him she believed in his solidity. He felt that during the coming weeks he should need to be solid. Mrs. Hudson was at one of the smaller hotels, and her sitting-room was frugally lighted by a couple of candles. He made the most of this dim illumination for some quest of the afterglow of that fright-
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