She was very silent, too, listening to his impetuous, broken avowal—suffering his close embrace, his lips on her eyes and mouth and throat once more. The enormous novelty of it preoccupied her; the intense interest in his state of mind. Her curiosity held her spellbound, too, and unresponsive but fascinated.
She lay very quietly in his arms, her lovely head resting on his shoulder, sometimes with eyes closed, sometimes watching him, meeting his eyes with a faint smile.
Contact with him no longer frightened her. Her mind was clear, busy with this enormous novelty, searching for the reason of it, striving to understand his passion which she shyly recognized with an odd feeling of pride and tenderness, but to which there was nothing in her that responded—nothing more than tender loyalty and the old love she had always given him.
The grey tranquillity of her eyes, virginal and clear—the pulseless quiet of the girl chilled him.
"You don't love me, Steve, do you?"
"Not—as you—wish me to."
"Can't you?"
"I don't know."
"Is there any chance?"
She looked out across the studio, considering, and her grey eyes grew vague and remote.