"I want no payment," she said, huskily, and she turned to the threshold and crossed it.
He stayed her with his hand.
"Wait. I did not mean to hurt you. Will you not take them as reward?"
"No."
She spoke almost sullenly; there was a certain sharpness and dullness of disappointment at her heart. She wanted, she wished, she knew not what. But not that he should offer her payment.
"Can you return to-morrow? or any other day?" he asked her, thinking of the sketch unfinished on the sheet of pinewood. He did not notice the beating of her heart under her folded arms, the quick gasp of her breath, the change of the rich color in her face.
"If you wish," she answered him below her breath.
"I do wish, surely. The sketch is all unfinished yet."
"I will come, then."
She moved away from him across the threshold as she spoke; she was not afraid of the people, but she was afraid of this strange, passionate sweetness, which seemed to fill her veins with fire and make her drunk and blind.