All at once there was a shape like a black spinning top circling before her eyes, her knees froze in dreadful rigidity, and she had to catch hold of the banister rail in haste to keep herself from falling abruptly forwards. It was not the first time she had taken the risk of visiting him here, and this sudden fit of terror was by no means new to her. However much she steeled herself against it, every time she set off for home she was always subject, for no reason at all, to such attacks of senseless, ridiculous fear. The way to her rendezvous was infinitely easier. Then she told the cab driver to stop at the corner of the street, swiftly and without looking up she walked the few steps to the front door of the building where he lived, and hurried upstairs. After all, she knew he was waiting for her in the apartment, he would be quick to open the door, and her initial alarm, which had been mingled with ardent impatience, dissolved in the heat of their embrace as they met. But then, when she left to go home, that mysterious shuddering fit came over her, vaguely mingled with a sense of guilt, and the stupid delusion that every stranger in the street could tell from her face where she had been, and might add to her confusion by giving her a bold smile.
