She turned her hands over and began to drop the leaves one by one.
Bennington caught himself watching her with fascinated interest in
silence. He began to find this one of her most potent charms--the
faculty of translating into a grace so exquisite as almost to realize
the fabled poetry of motion, the least shrug of her shoulders, the
smallest crook of her finger, the slightest toss of her small,
well-balanced head. She looked up.

"Want to smell?" she inquired, and held out her hands with a pretty
gesture.

Not knowing what else to do, Bennington stepped forward obediently and
stooped over. The two little palms held a single crushed bit of the
herb in their cup. They were soft, pink little palms, all wrinkled,
like crumpled rose leaves. Bennington stooped to smell the herb;
instead, he kissed the palms.

The girl sprang to her feet with one indignant motion and faced him.
The eyes now flashed blue flame, and Bennington for the first time
noticed what had escaped him before--that the forehead was broad and
thoughtful, and that above it the hair, instead of being blonde and
curly and sparkling with golden radiance, was of a peculiar wavy brown
that seemed sometimes full of light and sometimes lustreless and black,
according as it caught the direct rays of the sun or not. Then he
appreciated his offence.

"Sir!" she exclaimed, and turned away with a haughty shoulder.

"And we've never been introduced!" she said, half to herself, but her
face was now concealed, so that Bennington could not see she laughed.