d not know--she half lay in his arms, her
untaught lips cold against his. Lassitude, faint consciousness, then
tiny shock on shock came the burning revulsion; and her voice came back,
too, sounding strangely to her, a colourless, monotonous voice.

He had freed her; she remembered that somebody had asked him to--perhaps
herself. That was well; she needed to breathe, to summon strength and
common-sense, find out what had been done, what reasonless madness she
had committed in the half-light of the silver-stemmed trees clustering
in shameful witness on every hand.

Suddenly the hot humiliation of it overwhelmed her, and she covered
her face with her hands, standing, almost swaying, as wave on wave of
incredulous shame seemed to sweep her from knee to brow. That phase
passed after a while; out of it she emerged, flushed, outwardly
composed, into another phase, in full self-possession once more, able
to understand what had happened without the disproportion of emotional
exaggeration. After all, she had only been kissed. Besides she was a
novice, which probably accounted, in a measure, for the unreasonable
emotion coincident with a caress to which she was unaccustomed. Without
looking up at him she found herself saying coolly enough to surprise
herself: "I never supposed I was capable of that. It appears that I
am. I haven't anything to say for myself ... except that I feel fearfully
humiliated. ... Don't say anything now ... I do not blame you, truly I do
not. It was contemptible of me--to do it--wearing this--" she stretched
out her slender left hand, not looking at him; "it was contemptible!" ...
She slowly raised her eyes, summoning all her courage to face him.

But he only saw in the pink confusion of her lovely face the dawning
challenge of a coquette saluting her adversary in gay acknowledgment of
his fleeting moment of success. And as his face fell, then hardened
into brightness, instantly she divined how he rated her, and in a flash
realized her weapons and her security, and that the control of the
situation was hers, not in the control of this irresolute young man who
stood so silently considering her. Strange that she should be ashamed
of her own innocence, willing that he believe her accomplished in such
arts, enchanted that he no longer perhaps suspected genuine emotion in
the swift, confused sweetness of her first kiss. If only all that
were truly hidden from him, if he dare not in his heart convict her of
an