repertoire was limited; she sang folk-songs mostly, the simple
love-songs of primitive people, of peasants and the like, yet sang
them with such truth and charm, with such power and conviction,
somehow, that I knew enchantment as I listened. This, too, she
instantly divined, and that behind my compliments lay hid a weakness
of deep origin she could play upon to her sure advantage. She did so
without mercy, until gradually I passed beneath her sway.

I will not now relate in detail the steps of my descent, or if you
like it better, of my capture. This is a summary merely. So let me
say in brief that her singing to the harp combined with the
revelation of her physical beauty to lead me swiftly to the point
where I ardently desired her, and that in this turmoil of desire I
sought eagerly to find real love. There were times when I deceived
myself most admirably; there were times when I plainly saw the truth.
During the former I believed that my happiness lay in marrying her,
but in the latter I recognised that a girl who meant nothing to my
better self had grown of a sudden painfully yet exquisitely
desirable. But even during the ascendancy of the latter physical
mood, she had only to seat herself beside the harp and sing, for the
former state to usurp its place, I watched, I listened, and I
yielded. Her voice, aided by the soft plucking of the strings,
completed my defeat. Now, strangest of all, I must add one other
tiling, and I will add it without comment. For though sure of its
truth, I would not dwell upon it. And it is this: that in her singing,
as also in her playing, in the "colour" of her voice as also in the
very attitude and gestures of her figure as she sat beside the
instrument, there lay, though marvellously hidden, something gross.
It woke a response of something in myself, hitherto unrecognized,
that was similarly gross. . . .