"Is that one of the things you always say to women?"
"I have said it before, but I don't think I ever came so near meaning
it," he answered with a smile. There were no warm lights in her eyes;
only a dreamy, absent look.
"Good night. I adore you. Sleep well," he said, and he kissed her hand
and went away.
She stayed alone in a kind of reverie--a sort of stupor. Step by step
she lived over every instant of the time she had been with Robert after
he had entered Mademoiselle Reisz's door. She recalled his words,
his looks. How few and meager they had been for her hungry heart! A
vision--a transcendently seductive vision of a Mexican girl arose before
her. She writhed with a jealous pang. She wondered when he would come
back. He had not said he would come back. She had been with him, had
heard his voice and touched his hand. But some way he had seemed nearer
to her off there in Mexico.