“Ah! And what flowers shall t give YOU?”
She put her hands behind her.
“There are all the other flowers for me.”
Shelton snatched from the mass in front of him an Iceland poppy with straight stem and a curved neck, white pinks, and sprigs of hard, sweet mignonette, and held it out to her.
“There,” he said, “that's you.” But Antonia did not move.
“Oh no, it is n't!” and behind her back her fingers slowly crushed the petals of a blood-red poppy. She shook her head, smiling a brilliant smile. The blossoms fell, he flung his arms around her, and kissed her on the lips.
But his hands dropped; not fear exactly, nor exactly shame, had come to him. She had not resisted, but he had kissed the smile away; had kissed a strange, cold, frightened look, into her eyes.
“She did n't mean to tempt me, then,” he thought, in surprise and anger. “What did she mean?” and, like a scolded dog, he kept his troubled watch upon her face.