It urged him to an intensity like madness, which fascinated him, as drug-taking might.
He was discussing Michael Angelo.

It felt to her as if she were fingering the very quivering tissue, the very protoplasm of life, as she heard him.

It gave her deepest satisfaction.

And in the end it frightened her.

There he lay in the white intensity of his search, and his voice gradually filled her with fear, so level it was, almost inhuman, as if in a trance.
"Don't talk any more," she pleaded softly, laying her hand on his forehead.
He lay quite still, almost unable to move.