“It’s now....”
Queer—never before had she realized the present so vividly; “it has been a minute ago,” “it will be the day after to-morrow” ... but “It’s now,” as Blair, with a smile and a subtle look, threw away his half-smoked cigar, took the half-finished cup of coffee from her hands.
“Now—now——”
She was one pulse that beat for initiation. Her cheap artist fancy had always decorated the temple of initiation so heavily with incense and tiger-skins and divans and rose-leaves, all the crude stock and properties of rapture, that the reality of this ordinary room, big leather arm-chairs and a few prints on the plain dark walls, and a bookcase, and several ash-trays scattered about, this so essentially a man-room, left her disappointed. Had she relied too much upon the trappings? ... but—Blair had taken her in his arms, now....
And still no response from that—that most damnably sluggish temperament.
Very precisely and dispassionately she noticed for the first time that one of his lids lay over the eye with a heavier slouch than the other. She was pleased with the behaviour of his face under stress of emotion ... it did not grow hot nor red nor damp; the veins did not bulge; his breath was under control. She had been right in her selection of Blair Stevenson—but—but——
The ungrateful temperament, which she had provided with the best advantages, was failing her utterly....
She kissed his exacting lips with as much of faked ecstasy as she could coax to her aid, and then wondered, supposing she laughed,—the word ecstasy always made her want to laugh—if that indecorum could be passed off as further ecstasy?
And all this time she did Stevenson the injustice of believing him imperceptive.