after he had virtually made up his mind to go. The influence that
kept him away really revealed to him how little to himself his Dead
EVER left him. He went only for THEM--for nothing else in the
world.

The force of this revulsion kept him away ten days: he hated to
connect the place with anything but his offices or to give a
glimpse of the curiosity that had been on the point of moving him.
It was absurd to weave a tangle about a matter so simple as a
custom of devotion that might with ease have been daily or hourly;
yet the tangle got itself woven. He was sorry, he was
disappointed: it was as if a long happy spell had been broken and
he had lost a familiar security. At the last, however, he asked
himself if he was to stay away for ever from the fear of this
muddle about motives. After an interval neither longer nor shorter
than usual he re-entered the church with a clear conviction that he
should scarcely heed the presence or the absence of the lady of the
concert. This indifference didn't prevent his at once noting that
for the only time since he had first seen her she wasn't on the
spot. He had now no scruple about giving her time to arrive, but
she didn't arrive, and when he went away still missing her he was
profanely and consentingly sorry. If her absence made the tangle
more intricate, that was all her own doing. By the end of another
year it was very intricate indeed; but by that time he didn't in
the least care, and it was only his cultivated consciousness that
had given him scruples. Three times in three months he had gone to
church without finding her, and he felt he hadn't needed these
occasions to show him his suspense had dropped. Yet it was,
incongruously, not indifference, but a refinement of delicacy that
had kept him from asking the sacristan, who would of course