XVI
THE BEACON
Through the meal, neither spoke; and if there were any serious thinking in process, Whitaker was not only ignorant of it, but innocent of participation therein. With the first taste of food, he passed into a state of abject surrender to
sheer brutish hunger. It was not easily that he restrained himself, schooled his desires to decent expression. The smell, the taste, the sight of food: he fairly quivered like a ravenous animal under the influence of their sensual promise. He
was sensible of a dull, carking shame, and yet was shameless.
The girl was the first to finish. She had eaten little in comparison; chiefly, perhaps, because she required less than he. Putting aside her knife and fork, she
rested her elbows easily on the table, cradled her chin between her half-clo
