“Well, perhaps we are a bit previous,” said French laughing, and turned the conversation.
Later in the evening Thornton and Clytie came out of the dancing-room. She was flushed, dazed with the music, the noise, the electric light and the heavy scent of cut flowers; confused, too, by Thornton's presence, by the after-pressure of his arm around her waist, overwrought a little by his personal magnetism.
They threaded their way through the crowd that lined the passage and the stairs, went through the brilliantly lit studio with its polished oak floor and wealth of hangings and costly decoration, into the models' dressing-room beyond, that had been turned into a small boudoir for the occasion. Many couples were wandering about the studio, examining the pictures and the china, but the dressing-room had escaped notice.
“This is soothing after the glare,” said Clytie, sitting down restfully on a divan.
Great palms screened the door, the room was hung with dark, heavy drapery, and between them shaded electric lamps shed a subdued light. Thornton sat down by her side. After a while the steps and talking in the adjacent studio ceased, and there rose from below the faint strains of the music and the dull rhythmic thud of the dancers.
“What were we talking about? I forget,” said Clytie, after a short silence, and then, meeting his eyes fixed upon her, she turned away her head:
“Don't! I can't bear it,” she murmured involuntarily.
Then he caught her hand: “Clytie, you are adorable, glorious, bewitching!” he cried, and kissed her quickly, twice, on the corner of her lips. She snatched her hand away and started to her feet, pale and trembling, her eyes blazing.
“Why did you do that? You have no right to do that!”
He rose, went to her, caught her wrists again—but this time she was powerless to withdraw them, and he spoke in a quick, deep voice: