They all three waited; the Parson ran a finger along the lines of calf-bound books, then paused, Old Tring at his elbow.  Ishmael was forgotten, isolated in himself, and, without warning, in the irrational way of such phases, he was overwhelmed by one of those strange periods in which, though actually but a second or so, time seems to hold its breath and the consciousness, muffled by some overwhelming dimness, is arrested and stands alone, on a pin-point of eternity, without past or future.  It seemed to him that nothing would ever move again in the dim room, where for this fraction of a second everything was motionless except the dust motes that danced in the beam slanting through the low window, wreathing this way and that like steam within the strip of brightness, but ceasing to be visible at the edge as sharply as though they ceased to exist—­as though an impalpable line ruled in the air would not allow the twisting coils to pass beyond, even when the pattern demanded it.  Ishmael stared at this aerial path of living light, his mind hypnotised by it, and the remainder of the room by its contrasting density seemed to fall away from him; out of a great distance came the Parson’s voice saying, “So you’ve got a first edition of the Antiquities....”  Followed the soft rubbing sound of one smooth book being drawn out from between its companions, then the crisper noise of large pages being turned.

The moment, which had seemed so intensely the present to Ishmael that during it he had thought it could never cease to be, reeled and sank into the past, leaving him with the feeling that time was once more in motion, like a vast clock whose pendulum has stopped for one beat, only to resume its swing again.  At once it became possible that everything should go on, the idea of the incursion of the boy Killigrew ceased to be wildly chimerical, and with this acceptance of it Killigrew himself was in the room.

The vibrant path was no longer bright to the shutting-off of all else, material and mental; the Parson looked up from his first edition; Old Tring’s hand, advancing, came into the strip of light, and seemed to spring to life, swelled to huge dimensions, became of a glowing whiteness.  Killigrew, red-headed, freckled, standing with an air of surly self-protection, suddenly raised his light lashes to give the sweetest smile Ishmael had ever seen.  Always, even in moments of irritation, it was to remain with him as illuminative of Killigrew—­that peculiar radiant smile which carried him so softly, if not triumphantly, through life.  It would have been a disgusting smile if it had been calculated, even self-conscious; as it was, it made of Killigrew a creature subtly apart, though for no deeper reason.