She gazed
at the neck of her husband. On the white skin she had just caught sight
of a pink spot. The rush of blood to the head, increased the size of
this spot, turning it bright red.
"Kiss me, kiss me," repeated Laurent, his face and neck scarlet.
The young woman threw her head further back, to avoid an embrace,
and pressing the tip of her finger on the bite Camille had given her
husband, addressed him thus:
"What have you here? I never noticed this wound before."
It seemed to Laurent as if the finger of Therese was boring a hole in
his throat. At the contact of this finger, he suddenly started backward,
uttering a suppressed cry of pain.
"That," he stammered, "that----"
He hesitated, but he could not lie, and in spite of himself, he told the
truth.
"That is the bite Camille gave me. You know, in the boat. It is nothing.
It has healed. Kiss me, kiss me."
And the wretch craned his neck which was burning him. He wanted Therese
to kiss the scar, convinced that the lips of this woman would appease
the thousand pricks lacerating his flesh, and with raised chin he
presented his extended neck for the embrace. Therese, who was almost
lying back on the marble chimney-piece, gave a supreme gesture of
disgust, and in a supplicating voice exclaimed:
"Oh! no, not on that part.
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