"You wanted to kill me, Mike." Her fingers slipped round his throat. "And now I should like to kill you, yes, kill you! Strangle you and leave your austere, ascetic body for the vultures to enjoy!"
Mike tried to shake her off, to unclasp her hands. She was as strong as a young leopard.
"I would," she said. "For I hate you and despise you!
"Then leave me," he said. "I wish to God you would!"
"Ah, but I won't!" The cry came from Millicent savagely. "I won't leave you, not until my will has subjected yours! Before I leave your camp you will have been my lover—mystic, aesthetic, dreamer, drifter!"
"Never!" Michael said. "Never, never that!"
Still Millicent clung to him. Her angry words blew her hot breath over his cheeks.
"You are not altogether the ascetic or the saint you appear to be. You have scorned my love. I will break your will. I will humble you in your own fine estimation of yourself. When I take it into my head to do a thing, I generally accomplish it."
Michael disengaged her hands with a tremendous wrench. If he hurt her thumbs he could not help it. He held her from him at arm's length and shook her, shook her as though she was a naughty child in a paroxysm of passion which had to be subdued by extreme severity.
"You little devil!" he said. "You'll leave my camp at once, this very day! I've had more than enough of you!"