When Michael spoke, which was little, his words verged on the commonplace.

He explained the obvious with modest directness.

He had thought out and made his own a small selection of platitudes.

It is at first a shock to some of us when we discover that a beautiful spiritual nature is linked with a tranquil commonplace mind and narrow abilities.
When Michael's eyes rested on anything his still glance seemed to pass through it, into its essence.

An inscrutable Fate had willed that his eyes should not rest on any woman save Fay.
Was her little hand to rend his illusions from him; or did he perhaps see her as she was, as her husband, her shrewd old grandmother, her sister even, had never seen her?
Fay had revealed to Michael that of which many men who write glibly of passion die in ignorance, the wonder and awe of love, clothed in a woman's form, walking the earth.