The Return by Walter de la Mare — Read

Her husband turned wearily once more, and drawing up a chair sat down in front of the cold grate. He realised that Sheila thought him as much of a fool now as she had for the moment thought him an impostor, or something worse, the night before. That was at least something gained. He realised, too, in a vague way that the exuberance of mind that had practically invented Dr. Ferguson, and outraged Miss Sinnet, had quite suddenly flickered out. It was astonishing, he thought, with gaze fixed innocently on the black coals, that he should ever have done such things. He detested that kind of "rot"; that jaunty theatrical pose so many men prided their jackdaw brains on.

And he sat quite still, like a cat at a cranny, listening, as it were, for the faintest remotest stir that might hint at any return of this -- activity. It was the first really sane moment he had had since the "change. " Whatever it was that had happened at Widderstone was now distinctly weakening in effect. Why, now, perhaps? He stole a thievish look over his shoulder at the glass, and cautiously drew finger and thumb down that beaked nose. Then he really quietly smiled, a smile he felt this abominable facial caricature was quite unused to, the superior Lawford smile of guileless contempt for the fanatical, the fantastic, and the bizarre: He wouldn't have sat with his feet on the fender before a burnt-out fire.