marks. The word of all work Love will no more express the myriad modes of mutual attraction, than the word Thought can inform you what is passing through your neighbour's mind. It would be hard to tell on which side—Gwendolen's or Grandcourt's—the influence was more mixed. At that moment his strongest wish was to be completely master of this creature—this piquant combination of maidenliness and mischief: that she knew things which had made her start away from him, spurred him to triumph over that repugnance; and he was believing that he should triumph. And she—ah, piteous equality in the need to dominate!—she was overcome like the thirsty one who is drawn towards the seeming water in the desert, overcome by the suffused sense that here in this man's homage to her lay the rescue from helpless subjection to an oppressive lot.
All the while they were looking at each other; and Grandcourt said, slowly and languidly, as if it were of no importance, other things having been settled—
"You will tell me now, I hope, that Mrs Davilow's loss of fortune will not trouble you further. You will trust to me to prevent it from weighing upon her. You will give me the claim to provide against that."
