Page:O Genteel Lady! (1926).pdf/287

 throat and breast swelled. Her mouth, which had not uttered a word, mocked him and the black eyes promised incredible things. He was wild with joy and put out his arms to pick this exotic black flower at his feet, then he realized that she had not once glanced at him during the enactment of her pantomime. Her beautiful, passionate eyes had been fixed steadily on some point behind him, some image or some memory. He drew back from her and her cruelty.

'You do wrong to—torture me,' he said slowly. 'Do not show me—what you can be to—other men, if you cannot be so to me. Get up, Lanice. Some one may come in.'

Shamefacedly she got to her feet and walked over to the table in the window where the Chinese objects of ivory, jade, amethyst, and amber were spread on a heavy piece of gold embroidery. The late afternoon light shone through them and they cast pools of colored shadow.

'I beg your pardon,' she said, and sleeked her hair with a trembling hand.

'My dear,' he said, coming close to her, 'why are you crying?'

'I don't know, but I'll never get what I really want from life, never.'

'Do you know what you want?'

'No.'

'Then how do you know you'll never get it?'

'Oh, I have always known that, really.'

'Lanice, will you let me give you—all I can, and see if that may not be enough?'