He had come simply to meet Cecily; there was the long and short of it.

It was a weakness, such as any man may be guilty of, particularly any artist who groans in lifelong solitude.

Let it he recognized; let it be flung savagely into the past, like so many others encountered and overcome on his course.
The other day, when it was rainy and sunless, he had seemed all at once to find his freedom.

In a moment of mental languor, he was able to view his position clearly, as though some other man were concerned, and to cry out that he had triumphed; but within the same hour an event befell which revived all the old trouble and added new.

Reuben Elgar entered his room, coming directly from Villa Sannazaro, in a state of excitement, talking at once of Cecily Doran as though his acquaintance with her had been unbroken from the time when she was in his mother's care to now.