For a moment the vision of a thin blonde face, with its expression
of sour discontent, rose before him. What had he not given that
woman--what had she not demanded? Extravagant clothes to deck out
her tall lean body, a carriage to drive her here and there, a
mansion to live in, all the money he could gain by constant
work--these things she demanded because she was his wife, and he
had given them, and yet she was always discontented, simply because
she was one of those women who do not know desire nor the delight
of it. This one had nothing but that divine gift, and it made all
her life joy.
"Dance for me now in the cool," murmured Hamilton in the little
fine curved ear with the rose-bud just over it.
Saidie slipped off his knee, and fastening the little gilt link at
her neck more securely, drew her soft filmy garment more closely to
her, and commenced to dance before him in the screened verandah,
with the hot moonlight, filtered through the delicate tracery; of
innumerable leaves falling on her smooth, warm-tinted body.
To please him, to please him, her lord, her owner, her king: it was
the one passion in her thoughts, and it flowed through every limb
and muscle, glowed in her eyes, quivered on her parted lips, and
made each movement a miracle of sweet sinuous grace.
The soft, hot night passed minute by minute, the scents of a
thousand flowers mingled together in the still violet air.
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