A wind that was hardly more than an erratic
stirring of super-heated dust agitated a loose slat in a shutter and
deposited a fine dun film across the floor. Savina put as much as
possible, so early, into her bags. Standing before a narrow mirror
nailed to a wall, with her comb, she turned. "My hair is soaked," she
wailed; "just putting my arms up is more than I can manage. Haven't you
been thinking about all the cold things in the world?" She slipped into
a chair, spent and dejected, with her hair clouding one shoulder. It
would, he repeated, be over soon, and he gazed at her with a veiled
inspection. Savina was so entirely unprepared for this, the least
hardship so new, that he was uncertain about the temper of her
resistance.
Aware of his gaze, she smiled slowly at him, and, seated, again took up
her task with the comb. "I couldn't have you see me very often like
this," she proceeded: "it would be fatal. I don't mean that when I'm
finished I'm irresistible, but the process simply must go on in
private. I don't want to be a wife, Lee--one of those creatures in a
dressing sacque with hair pins in her mouth. I can't bear the thought
of you and a flannel petticoat together. That is where married women
make a serious mistake: they let their husbands see them while the maid
is doing their hair, or when they're smeared with creams, or, maybe,
with tonsilitis.
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