The Craze of Christina — page 229: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Craze of Christina. 225 no more, and he had been content to let things — alone. He had put that remark down in his own mind to a condition of unnatural excitement in her, just as he had realized with the coolness of morning light (coupled with a downpour of rain) that some of the assertions he himself had made, concerning his willingness to sacrifice anything she might wish to please her, went possibly a little beyond the mark. The moon- light and the witchery of-the night had made them both lose their heads, he fancied. All the same, he could not quite rid his mind of her words. And the result was that an element of uncertainty had stolen insensibly into his love-making. He began to feel that he was not sure of her. Oh, clever Christina! to have managed without lessening her hold upon him, to give him this most valuable impression! She knew, did this wise little witch, that nothing on earth increases and feeds and quick- ens the fire of man’s love so much as a sense of insecurity! That which he possesses abso- lutely and indisputably, is not half so interest- ing to the male imagination as that which he is afraid of losing! From the moment that this sense of doubtful tenure took hold of Clifford’s mind his ulti- Comichooksico