Her face with the delicate carnation of a rose and downcast eyes was as if veiled in firm immobility and was so appealing that I had an insane impulse to walk round and kiss the forearm on which it was leaning; that strong, well-shaped forearm, gleaming not like marble but with a living and warm splendour.

So familiar had I become already with her in my thoughts! Of course I didn't do anything of the sort.

It was nothing uncontrollable, it was but a tender longing of a most respectful and purely sentimental kind.

I performed the act in my thought quietly, almost solemnly, while the creature with the silver hair leaned back in his chair, puffing at his cigar, and began to speak again.
It was all apparently very innocent talk.

He informed his "dear Rita" that he was really on his way to Monte Carlo.