Henry James

Beast in the Jungle Henry James

What determined the speech that startled him in the course of their encounter scarcely matters, being probably but some words spoken by himself quite without intention -- spoken as they lingered and slowly moved together after their renewal of acquaintance. He had been conveyed by friends an hour or two before to the house at which she was staying. The great rooms caused so much poetry and history to press upon him that he needed some straying apart to feel in a proper relation with them. They led to his closer meeting with May Bartram, whose face had begun merely by troubling him rather pleasantly. . . .