Respecting himself he might have cause for shame; but respecting these two beings for whose existence--whether born in wedlock or out of it--he was responsible, he had no cause for shame.
In his first knowledge of them as seen together, they showed strong, generous, sure of purpose, a glamour of high romance in their adventitious meeting and companionship.
This was the first, the unworldly and perhaps deepest view of the matter.
In it Charles Verity allowed himself to rest, inactive for a space.

That there were, not one, but many other views of the said matter, very differently attuned and coloured he was perfectly well aware.

Soon these would leap on him, and that with an ugly clamour which he consciously turned from in repulsion and weary disgust.

For he was very tired, as he now realized.

The anxiety endured during his tedious cross-country journey, the distasteful tragic-comedy of the _scene de seduction_ so artlessly made him by unlucky Theresa Bilsen, followed by this prolonged vigil; lastly the very real tragedy--for such it in great measure remained and must remain--of his interview with Damaris and the re-living of long buried drama that interview entailed, left him mentally and physically spent.