But she got up again and pushed Dale away, when he offered to help her
in undressing.
"No, certainly not. What are you thinking of?" and she began to hum
one of the pretty airs they had heard at the theater. "But, my word,
Will," and she stopped humming, and laughed foolishly, "I shan't be
sorry to get out of my things. It _is_ hot. This is the hottest night
we've had."
"Ah, you feel it. I've got acclim'tized."
He undressed rapidly, and lighting the briar pipe which he had not
cared to smoke in the genteel society at the theater, he lay on the
outside of the bed.
"Better now, old girl?"
"Yes. I'm all right, Will. Dear old boy--I'm all right."
Lying on the bed and immensely enjoying his delayed pipe, he watched
her. She wandered about the room, moved one of the two candles from
the mantel-shelf to the chest of drawers, put her blouse on the seat
of a chair and her skirt across the back of it. Then with slow
graceful movements she began to uncoil her hair, and as her smooth
white arms went up and down, the candlelight sent gigantic wavering
shadows across the wall-paper to the ceiling. Beneath one of her
elbows he could see right out through the open window into a dark
void. From his position on the bed nothing was visible out there, but
he could fill it if he cared to do so--the scattered dust of street
lamps below and the scattered dust of solar systems above.
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