That such pleasingness would reside for her in any man astonished her.
"What a pretty boy," she thought to herself, innocently and instinctively
trying to ward off the power to hold and draw her that lay behind the
mere prettiness. "Besides, he isn't pretty," she thought, as she placed
the glass before him, received the silver dime in payment, and for the
third time looked into his eyes. Her vocabulary was limited, and she
knew little of the worth of words; but the strong masculinity of his
boy's face told her that the term was inappropriate.

"He must be handsome, then," was her next thought, as she again dropped
her eyes before his. But all good-looking men were called handsome, and
that term, too, displeased her. But whatever it was, he was good to see,
and she was irritably aware of a desire to look at him again and again.

As for Joe, he had never seen anything like this girl across the counter.
While he was wiser in natural philosophy than she, and could have given
immediately the reason for woman's existence on the earth, nevertheless
woman had no part in his cosmos. His imagination was as untouched by
woman as the girl's was by man. But his imagination was touched now, and
the woman was Genevieve. He had never dreamed a girl could be so
beautiful, and he could not keep his eyes from her face. Yet every time
he looked at her, and her eyes met his, he felt painful embarrassment,
and would have looked away had not her eyes dropped so quickly.

But when, at last, she slowly lifted her eyes and held their gaze
steadily, it was his own eyes that dropped, his own cheek that mantled
red. She was much less embarrassed than he, while she betrayed her
embarrassment not at all. She was aware of a flutter within, such as she
had never known before, but in no way did it disturb her outward