The passion was in him nevertheless, and the stronger for a slow growth that confirmed its union of the mind and heart.

Her counsel fortified him, her suggestions opened springs; her phrases were golden-lettered in his memory; and more, she had worked an extraordinary change in his views of life and aptitude for social converse: he acknowledged it with genial candour.
Through her he was encouraged, led, excited to sparkle with the witty, feel new gifts, or a greater breadth of nature; and thanking her, he became thirstily susceptible to her dark beauty; he claimed to have found the key of her, and he prized it.

She was not passionless: the blood flowed warm.

Proud, chaste, she was nobly spirited; having an intellectual refuge from the besiegings of the blood; a rockfortress.
The 'wife no wife' appeared to him, striking the higher elements of the man, the commonly masculine also .-- Would he espouse her, had he the chance ?--to-morrow! this instant! With her to back him, he would be doubled in manhood, doubled in brain and heart-energy.

To call her wife, spring from her and return, a man might accept his fate to fight Trojan or Greek, sure of his mark on the enemy.
But if, after all, this imputed Helen of a decayed Paris passed, submissive to the legitimate solicitor, back to her husband?
The thought shot Dacier on his legs for a look at the blank behind him.
He vowed she had promised it should not be.