"He gathered her into the cave of his body." (Roy,338)

Seated by her side in the narrow cabin, pressing cold compresses to her forehead and holding her while she vomited, he felt profoundly happy....

But in the night he woke and held her tight as though she were all of life and it was being taken from him. He held her feeling she was all of life there was and it was true.

She listened to him all night and he found her fascinating.

He was an addiction she didn’t want to be free of. And the more she had of him, the more she craved.

Thus in this heaven he took his delight And smothered her with kisses upon kisses Till gradually he came to know where bliss is.

He'd fallen in love slowly and quietly, and it was a quiet sort of love, full of phrases left unsaid, laced with dreams.

And anyway, I suspect he secretly liked it when a woman was cold and distant

Her neck is like a stately tower,
Where Love himself imprison'd lies

Love hath so long possessed me for his own
And made his lordship so familiar.

"She had an overwhelming desire to tell him, like the most banal of women. Don't let me go, hold me tight, make me your plaything, your slave, be strong! But they were words she could not say.

The only thing she said when he released her from his embrace was, "You don't know how happy I am to be with you." That was the most her reserved nature allowed her to express."

"I believe in that goodly mansion, his heart, he kept one little place under the skylights where Lucy might have entertainment, if she chose to call. It was not so handsome as the chambers where he lodged his male friends; it was not like the hall where he accommodated his philanthropy, or the library where he treasured his science, still less did it resemble the pavilion where his marriage feast was splendidly spread; yet, gradually, by long and equal kindness, he proved to me that he kept one little closet, over the door of which was written " Lucy's Room." I kept a place for him, too — a place of which I never took the measure, either by rule or compass: I think it was like the tent of Peri-Banou. All my life long I carried it folded in the hollow of my hand — yet, released from that hold and constriction, I know not but its innate capacity for expanse might have magnified it into a tabernacle for a host."

That night, I slept hugging my secret. (p112)

He loved her so passionately he wanted her to be one soul and one body with him; and he was conscious that here, with those deep roots attaching her to the native life, she would always keep something from him.