Riding uptown on the subway beside her, he began to dislike her. If only she would flirt or be demure or pretend that she did not know what was going to happen! Then he could feel free to choose her all over again. But she did not speak, and when he looked into her face, he saw there an expression that was like a tracing made with fine tissue paper of his own feelings, an expression of suffering, of resignation, of stoical endurance. It was as if she were his sister, his twin, his tormented Electra; it was as if they were cursed, both together, with a wretched, unquenchable, sterile lust that “ran in the family.” Once she turned her head and smiled at him disconsolately, but though he felt a touch of pity, he could not smile back; he had lost the ability to make any human gesture toward her.