you to think well of me.
We've had our little explanation out, and if we meet again we shan't, at
any rate look like a pair of boobies."

He tried to interrupt her with a movement of the hand.

"Let me finish! There's not a man, you understand, able to accuse me of
doing him a blackguardly turn; well, and it struck me as horrid to begin
in your case. We all have our sense of honor, dear boy."

"But that's not my meaning!" he shouted violently. "Sit down--listen to
me!" And as though he were afraid of seeing her take her departure, he
pushed her down on the solitary chair in the room. Then he paced about
in growing agitation. The little dressing room was airless and full of
sunlight, and no sound from the outside world disturbed its pleasant,
peaceful, dampish atmosphere. In the pauses of conversation the
shrillings of the canary were alone audible and suggested the distant
piping of a flute.

"Listen," he said, planting himself in front of her, "I've come to
possess myself of you again. Yes, I want to begin again. You know that
well; then why do you talk to me as you do? Answer me; tell me you
consent."

Her head was bent, and she was scratching the blood-red straw of the
seat underneath her. Seeing him so anxious, she did not hurry to answer.
But at last she lifted up her face. It had assumed a grave expression,
and into the beautiful eyes she had succeeded in infusing a look of
sadness.

"Oh, it's impossible, little man. Never, never, will I live with you
again."

"Why?" he stuttered, and his face seemed contracted in unspeakable
suffering.

"Why? Hang it all, because--It's impossible; that's about it. I don't
want to."

He looked ardently at her for some seconds longer. Then his legs curved
under him and he fell on the floor. In a bored voice she added this
simple advice:

"Ah, don't be a baby!"

But he was one already. Dropping at her feet, he had put his arms round
her waist and was hugging her closely, pressing his face hard against
her knees. When he felt her thus--when he once more divined the presence
of her velvety limbs beneath the thin fabric of her dress--he was
suddenly convulsed and trembled, as it were, with fever, while madly,
savagely, he pressed his face against her knees as though he had been
anxious to force through her flesh. The old chair creaked, and beneath
the low ceiling, where the air was pungent with stale perfumes,
smothered sobs of desire were audible.

"Well, and after?"