““It would have been absurd of him to trace into ramifications the effect of the ribbon from which Miss Gostrey’s trinket depended, had he not for the hour, at the best, been so given over to uncontrolled perception. What was it but an uncontrolled perception that his friend’s velvet band somehow added, in her appearance, to the value of every other item – to that of her smile and of the way she carried her head, to that of her complexion, of her lips, her teeth, her eyes, her hair? What, certainly, had a man conscious of a man’s work in the world to do with red velvet bands? He would n’t for anything have so exposed himself as to tell Miss Gostrey how much he liked hers, yet he had none the less not only caught himself in the act – frivolous, no doubt, idiotic, and above all unexpected – of liking it: he had in addition taken it as a starting point for fresh backward, fresh forward, fresh lateral flights.””
