For one instant Maurice Guest had looked at the girl before him with
unconcern, but the next it was with an intentness that soon became
intensity, and feverishly grew, until he could not tear his eyes away.
The beauty, whose spell thus bound him, was of that subtle kind which
leaves many a one cold, but, as if just for this reason, is almost
always fateful for those who feel its charm: at them is lanced its
accumulated force. The face was far from faultless; there was no
regularity of feature, no perfection of line, nor was there more than
a touch of the sweet girlish freshness that gladdens like a morning in
May. The features, save for a peremptory turn of mouth and chin, were
unremarkable, and the expression was distant, unchanging . . . but
what was that to him? This deep white skin, the purity of which was
only broken by the pale red of the lips; this dull black hair, which
lay back from the low brow in such wonderful curves, and seemed, of
itself, to fall into the loose knot on the neck--there was something
romantic, exotic about her, which was unlike anything he had ever
seen: she made him think of a rare, hothouse flower; some scentless,
tropical flower, with stiff, waxen petals. And then her eyes! So
profound was their darkness that, when they threw off their covering
of heavy lid, it seemed to his excited fancy as if they must
scorch what they rested on; they looked out from the depths of their
setting like those of a wild beast crouched within a cavern; they lit
up about them like stars, and when they fell, they went out like
stars, and her face took on the pallor of early dawn.

She was playing from memory. She gazed straight before her with
far-away eyes, which only sometimes looked down at her hands, to aid
them in a difficult passage. At her belt, she wore a costly yellow
rose, and as she once leaned towards the treble, where both hands were