“But I am a woman, stupid!”
“I want a slave.”
She whispered in his ear, hanging on his neck.
“No! You may be a woman, but you’re not a slave.”
“Don’t be so quarrelsome. Forget those silly words of yours—slave, woman. It’s all right when you’re talking about art, but you’re hugging a woman at present. This is something that can die! Ha ha! We’re in life, my Tarr. We represent absolutely nothing—thank God!”
“I realize I’m in life, darling. But I don’t like being reminded of it in that way. It makes me feel as though I were in a mauvais lieu.”
“Give me a kiss, you efficient chimpanzee!”
Tarr scowled at her, but did not alter the half-embrace in which they sat.
“You won’t give me a kiss? Silly old inefficient chimpanzee!”
She sat back in her chair, and head down looked through her eyelashes at him with demure menace.