Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. III, 1889.djvu/113

 used to know? Between his mind and hers there was distinct kinship; the sense that he had both power and right to judge her explained in a great measure her attitude of defiance towards him when she was determined to break away from her humble conditions. All along, had not one of her main incentives to work and strive been the resolve to justify herself in his view, to prove to him that she possessed talent, to show herself to him as one whom the world admired? The repugnance with which she thought of meeting him, when she came home with her father, meant in truth that she dreaded to be assured that he could only shrink from her.

All her vital force setting in this wild current, her self-deception complete, she experienced the humility of supreme egoism,—that state wherein self multiplies its claims to pity in passionate support of its demand for the object of desire. She felt capable of throwing herself at Sidney’s feet, and imploring him not to withdraw from her the love of which he had given her so many assurances. She gazed at her scarred face until the image was blurred with tears; then, as though there were luxury