Page:Des Grieux, The Prelude to Teleny.djvu/52

 that bends with the slightest wind, a hothouse flower that parches at the sun's hot rays, and withers under the slightest touch. Her slender alabaster white arms were entwined round his bull-like neck and her tiny tapering fingers played with his sooty curls. All at once, as he held her clasped by her dainty waist, he put his hand under her gown, passed his palm over her legs and thighs, then finally caught the thin lips of her small slit in his capacious palm. As she felt herself thus touched, she shivered and all her flesh seemed to bicker like the waters of a mere. Then, as a protruding and lewd finger tried to push its way in the soft juicy flesh, she wriggled in his arms like a wounded bird, and, shuddering, vainly endeavoured to push him away from her. But his huge sinewy arm—which was as bulky as a strong man's leg—held her tightly clasped against his quivering body, he then for an instant fixed his jet black eyes upon hers, and the glances of his large and lustrous pupils were like glowing sparks which, falling upon soft wax, bury themselves in it. Thus, under the