He went to Berne because she had let slip the name of that place during
the afternoon at Maidenhead. It was the only hint of the kind she threw
out during the afternoons--four in all--they passed together. He forgot
the connection in which they came, but he retained the words: "He may
have to go to Berne."
_He_ was between them as an awesome presence, never mentioned otherwise
than allusively. His name was too sinister to speak. Each thought of him
unceasingly, in silence, and with anguish; but, as far as possible, they
kept him out of their intercourse. It was enough to know that he was
there, a fearful authority in the background, able to summon her from
this brief renewal of old happiness, as Pluto could recall Eurydice.
It was the supremacy of this power, which they themselves had placed in
his hands, that in the end drove Chip Walker to wondering what he was
like.
"What _is_ he like?" he found the force to ask.