It was, however, her manner that had led Cartaret first to doubt his own senses, and then to doubt hers. This girl spoke like a queen resenting a next-to-impossible familiarity. He had half a mind to leave the place and allow her to discover her own mistake, the nature of which—his room ran the length of the old house and half its width, being separated from a similar room by only a dark and draughty hallway—now suddenly revealed itself to him. He seriously considered leaving her alone to the advent of her humiliation.
Then he looked at her again. Her hair, in sharp contrast to the tint of her face, was a shining blue-black; though her features were almost classical in their regularity, her mouth was generous and sensitive, and, under even black brows and through long, curling lashes, her eyes shone frank and blue. Cartaret decided to remain.
“You are an artist?” he inquired.
“Leave this room!” She stamped a little foot. “Leave this room instantly!”
Cartaret stooped to one of the canvases that were piled against the wall nearest him. He turned its face to her.
“And this is some of your work?” he asked.
He had meant to be only light and amusing, but when he saw the effect of his action, he cursed himself for a heavy-witted fool: the girl glanced first at the picture and then wildly about her. She had at last realized her mistake.
“Oh!” she cried. Her delicate hands went to her face. “I had just come in and I thought—I thought it was my room!”
He registered a memorandum to kick himself as soon as she had gone. He moved awkwardly forward, still between her and the door.
“It’s all right,” he said. “Everybody drops in here at one time or another, and I never lock my door.”