I looked round, a sense of delight, of spontaneous joy, filling slowly every vein, welling up irresistibly all through my being.

For the first time I stood in a room with Viola which we were going to share.  No other form of possession, of intimacy, is quite the same as this, nor speaks to a lover in quite the same way.

I looked at her.  She stood in the centre of the rather poorly furnished and bare-looking room, in her travelling dress of a soft grey cloth.  Her figure that always woke all my senses to rapture, shewed well in the clear, simple lines of the dress.  Over the perfect bosom passed little silver cords, drawing the coat to meet.

Beneath her grey straw summer hat, wide-brimmed, a pink rose nestled against the light masses of her hair.  Her eyes looked out at me with a curious, tender smile.

She threw herself into a low cane chair by the window, I crossed the room suddenly and knelt beside it.

“Darling, you are pleased to be here with me, are you not?”

“Pleased!  I am absolutely happy.  I have the sensation that whatever happened I could not possibly be more happy than I am.”

She put one arm round my neck and went on softly in a meditative voice: 

“I can’t think how some girls go on living year after year all through their youth never knowing this sort of pleasure and happiness, for which they are made, can you?”

“They don’t dare to do the things, I suppose,” I answered.

“Perhaps they wouldn’t give them any pleasure, ... but it seems extraordinary.”  Her voice died away.  Her blue eyes fixed themselves on me in a soft, dreaming gaze.

I locked both my arms round her waist and kissed her lips into silence.  A knock at the door made me spring to my feet.  Viola remained where she was, unmoved, and said, “Come in.”

A trim-looking maid came in with rather round eyes fixed open to see all she could.  She had a can of hot water in her hand.

“Please, mum, I thought you’d like some hot water.”

“Very much,” returned Viola calmly.  “Thank you.”

The maid very slowly crossed the room to the washing-stand and set the can in the basin, covering it with a towel with elaborate care and deliberateness, looking at Viola out of the corners of her eyes as she did so.

“Please, m’m, when your luggage comes shall I bring it up?”

“Yes, do please, bring it up at once,” replied Viola, and the girl slowly withdrew, shutting the door in the same lengthy manner after her.

Viola got up and crossed to the glass.  She took off her hat and smoothed back her hair with her hand.  Each time she did so, the light rippled exquisitely over its shining waves.

“I wonder if I ought to wash my face?” she remarked, looking in the glass; “does it look dusty?”

“Not in the least,” I said, studying the pink and white reflection in the glass over her shoulder.