"Go ahead--fast!" I called to my man.
And the electric was rushing up the avenue, with the bell ringing for
crossings incessantly. She huddled away from me into the corner of the
seat, sobbing hysterically. I knew that to touch her would be fatal--or
to speak. So I waited.
XXII
MOST UNGENTLEMANLY
As we neared the upper end of the park, I told my chauffeur, through the
tube, to enter and go slowly. Whenever a lamp flashed in at us, I had a
glimpse of her progress toward composure--now she was drying her eyes with
the bit of lace she called a handkerchief; now her bare arms were up, and
with graceful fingers she was arranging her hair; now she was straight and
still, the soft, fluffy material with which her wrap was edged drawn close
about her throat. I shifted to the opposite seat, for my nerves warned me
that I could not long control myself, if I stayed on where her garments
were touching me.
I looked away from her for the pleasure of looking at her again, of
realizing that my overwrought senses were not cheating me. Yes, there she
was, in all the luster of that magnetic beauty I can not think of even now
without an upblazing of the fire which is to the heart what the sun is to a
blind man dreaming of sight.
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