“You think that he is black? You think it? You insult me, the daughter of the gods, in whose hands are life and death! Shall I tear the heart out of your body? Shall I kill you? Tell me!—yes or no!”
“No.”
It seemed an unnecessary answer to give, but I felt that I might as well give expression to my sentiments since she was so insistent. Though I thought it quite likely that she might at any moment commence, as she called it, to tear the heart out of my body, while I waited for the moment to arrive I could not but own that, even in her rage, she was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. But it seemed that she decided that, after all, it would be scarcely worth her while to soil her fingers just for the sake of tearing me to pieces; so she emptied the vials of her scorn on me instead.
“Bah! You are a fool—of the fools! That is all you are. You know nothing, not even what you say. Why should I attend to the witless when they babble? Listen to me—fool!”
She held her finger up close to my nose. I listened with might and main. She spoke as if she intended to lay emphasis upon her every word.
“He is English, my lover, of the English; of the flower of the nation. He is not one who lives in shops which pretend to help ugly women to hide their ugliness; he is not that kind. His home is the wide world. He is tall, and brave, and strong; a ruler of men; handsome beyond any of his fellows.” She made that last statement as if she dared me to question it by so much as a movement of my eyelids. “Were you but to see his picture you would faint for love of him.” I wondered. “With all women it is so. But, beware! Hide yourself when he is coming; if he but deigns to look on you I’ll tear you into pieces. I suffer no woman to stand in his presence, save only I.”
Words and manner suggested not only that she was not by any means too sure of the gentleman’s affection, but, also, that there was a lively time in store for him. If she wished to be taken literally, and really did mean that no woman was to be allowed to stand in his presence except herself, then the sooner she returned to the particular parts from which, in spite of all that she might say to the contrary, I felt sure she came, then the pleasanter it would be for everyone concerned. I should like to see the man in whose presence I was not to be allowed to stand.
I said nothing when she stopped; I had nothing to say. Or, rather, if I had been allowed a moment or two to think it over, and been given time to get back a little of my breath again, I should have had such a quantity to say that I should have been at a loss as to which end I had better begin. Nor do I fancy that her temper would have been improved wherever I had started.
While she was still glaring as if she would like to eat me, her finger-nails within an inch or two of my face, and I was thinking, in spite of my natural indignation, not to speak of other things, that being in a rage positively suited her, for the second time that night, there came from below what sounded like the opening of a door. On the instant she stood up straight. She looked more than ever like one of the beautiful wild creatures at the Zoo; poised so lightly on her feet, with every sense on the alert, listening as if she did not intend to allow the dropping of a pin to escape her. Suddenly she stooped; waved her hands before my face; caught up the lamp from the floor; vanished from the room.