contemptuously, and rose suddenly.

She had succeeded in dispelling for the moment the charm of her
beauty. Her prudery, her deceit, her lies made up to me a peculiarly
obnoxious mixture.

She sprang up, too, as I rose and threw herself on her knees,
clasping her arms round mine so that I could not move.

"Oh Treevor, I do love you so much. You are my real master, not he. A
woman loves a man who conquers her, but not by buying her. But because
he is better and stronger than she. Because he has great muscles, as
you have, and could kill her, and because she can't deceive him,
because he sees all her lies, as you do. Yes, Treevor, I love you now
very much indeed. Come here again, kiss me again."

But somehow her pleading did not move me. The moment when I had been
drawn to her had gone by, swallowed up in a feeling of disgust.

I stooped down and unlocked her hands and put her back among her
cushions.

"Good-bye, Suzee, for to-day," I said. "To-morrow I will come and take
you for a walk. You must let me go now. I do not want to stay any
longer."

She looked at me in silence, but did not offer to move from where I
had put her.

I gathered up my portfolio and left the room, went down the stairs and