It was as if, in the immense intimacy of this, they were, for the instant and the first time, face to face outside the cage.

Alas! they were face to face but a second or two: she was whirled out on the wings of a panic fear that he might just then be entering or issuing.

This fear was indeed, in her shameless deflexions, never very far from her, and was mixed in the oddest way with depressions and disappointments.

It was dreadful, as she trembled by, to run the risk of looking to him as if she basely hung about; and yet it was dreadful to be obliged to pass only at such moments as put an encounter out of the question.
At the horrible hour of her first coming to Cocker's he was always--it was to be hoped--snug in bed; and at the hour of her final departure he was of course--she had such things all on her fingers'-ends--dressing for dinner.

We may let it pass that if she couldn't bring herself to hover till he was dressed, this was simply because such a process for such a person could only be terribly prolonged.