The Cathedral

But paying a formal visit with his wife, he found the new
Baroness a little, creamy-skinned, insidious thing with
red-brown hair and a mouth that one must always watch, because
it curved back continually in an incomprehensible, strange laugh
that exposed her rather prominent teeth. She was not beautiful,
yet Tom Brangwen was immediately under her spell. She seemed to
snuggle like a kitten within his warmth, whilst she was at the
same time elusive and ironical, suggesting the fine steel of her
claws.

The Baron was almost dotingly courteous and attentive to her.
She, almost mockingly, yet quite happy, let him dote. Curious
little thing she was, she had the soft, creamy, elusive beauty
of a ferret. Tom Brangwen was quite at a loss, at her mercy, and
she laughed, a little breathlessly, as if tempted to cruelty.
She did put fine torments on the elderly Baron.

When some months later she bore a son, the Baron Skrebensky
was loud with delight.

Gradually she gathered a circle of acquaintances in the
county. For she was of good family, half Venetian, educated in
Dresden. The little foreign vicar attained to a social status
which almost satisfied his maddened pride.

Therefore the Brangwens were surprised when the invitation
came for Anna and her young husband to pay a visit to Briswell
vicarage. For the Skrebenskys were now moderately well off,
Millicent Skrebensky having some fortune of her own.

Anna took her best clothes, recovered her best high-school
manner, and arrived with her husband. Will Brangwen, ruddy,
bright, with long limbs and a small head, like some uncouth
bird, was not changed in the least. The little Baroness was
smiling, showing her teeth. She had a real charm, a kind of
joyous coldness, laughing, delighted, like some weasel. Anna at
once respected her, and was on her guard before her,
instinctively attracted by the strange, childlike surety of the
Baroness, yet mistrusting it, fascinated. The little baron was
now quite white-haired, very brittle. He was wizened and
wrinkled, yet fiery, unsubdued. Anna looked at his lean body, at
his small, fine lean legs and lean hands as he sat talking, and
she flushed. She recognized the quality of the male in him, his
lean, concentrated age, his informed fire, his faculty for
sharp, deliberate response. He was so detached, so purely
objective. A woman was thoroughly outside him. There was no
confusion. So he could give that fine, deliberate response.