Francois Boucher Madame de Pompadour painting

Francois Boucher Madame de Pompadour paintingFrancois Boucher Adoration of the Shepherds paintingJohannes Vermeer The Concert painting
to reciprocation. Love me? I didn't love myself!
But I got no further than her name, at sound whereof she opened to me her fine clear eyes. They gave back my image, luminous, and another shadow disappeared -- the last but one.
"Show me the way to the Belly, Anastasia."
She understood, evidently, that the lobby-lifts were under guard, and that in any case we could not resummon the elevator Bray had used. My hope was that like the nameless Information-girl, she would know of a hidden stair or other seldom-used route: her "mother," after all, had worked in Tower Hall throughout her adult life. But under this hope and conjecture was a certain knowledge, in view whereof I directed instead of asking her. She paled a little, then quietly got up. We went through the trap-door and down the ladder and stairs to the bottom landing -- one level below the Circulation Room, but still a long way from the Belly. Taking my hand then, she led me through a low door into a maze of unlit bookstacks, through which she threaded as surely as if she dwelt there. More than once our way was barred by locked mesh doors, increasingly formidable,