“You wonderful little wildcat!” he murmured, as he pinned her elbows close to her sides and drew her, smothered and helpless, in under the wing of his shoulder.
For a moment or two she fought with all that was left of her strength, writhing and twisting and panting, struggling to free her pinioned arms. Then she ceased, abruptly, devastated, not so much by her helplessness as by the ignominy of her efforts. She went limp in his arms as he forced back her head, and with his arm encircling her shoulders, kissed her on the mouth.
He stopped suddenly, perplexed by her passiveness, even suspecting for a moment that she might have fainted. But he found himself being surveyed with a tight-lipped and narrow-eyed intentness which shot a vague trouble through his triumph. He even let his arms drop, in bewilderment, though the drunkenness had not altogether gone out of his eyes.
She was wiping her mouth with her handkerchief, with a white look of loathing on her face. She was still mopping her lips as she crossed to the studio-door and swung it open.
“But I didn’t say I was going,” he demurred, frowning above his smile. He was sure of himself, sure of his mastery, sure of his technique.
“You are going,” she said, slowly and distinctly.
He stood there, as she repeated those three flat-toned words of hers, reviewing his technique, going back over it, for some undivulged imperfection. For it was plain that she piqued him. She more than piqued him; she disturbed him. But he refused to sacrifice his dignity for any such momentary timidity. It was familiar ground to him; each endearing move and maneuver was instinctive with him. Only the type was new. And novelty was not to be scoffed at.
He was smiling absently as he picked up his hat and gloves from the cherrywood table. And he stopped in front of her, still smiling, on his way out.
“Remember, wild-bird, that I am coming back to-morrow,” he said, arrested in spite of himself by the beauty of the white face with the luminous eyes. “To-morrow, at three!”
She did not look at him. She didn’t even bother to attempt to look through him.