His quick inquisitive but still respectful eye took in every delightful detail.
"If I don't give you leave, my experience is that you will take it!" she said, half laughing, half resentful, as though she had old aggressions in mind.
"You admit the strength of the temptation?
It is very simple, no one could help making it.

To be spectator of the _height_ of anything--the best, the climax--makes any mortal's pulses run.

Beauty, success, happiness, for instance ?" He paused smiling.

She leant a thin hand on the mantelpiece and looked away; Aldous's pearls slipped backwards along her white arm.
"Do you suppose to-night will be the height of happiness ?" she said at last with a little scorn.

"These functions don't present themselves to _me_ in such a light." Wharton could have laughed out--her pedantry was so young and unconscious.