Alpha Book

"
Maria Consuelo laughed.
"You see--you can be a moralist when you please," she said.
There was a wonderful attraction in her yellow eyes just at that moment.
"To please you, Madame, I could do something much worse--or much
better."
He was not quite in earnest, but he was not jesting, and his face was
more serious than his voice. Maria Consuelo's hand was lying on the
table beside the silver paper-cutter. The white, pointed fingers were
very tempting and he would willingly have touched them. He put out his
hand. If she did not draw hers away he would lay his own upon it. If she
did, he would take up the paper-cutter. As it turned out, he had to
content himself with the latter. She did not draw her hand away as
though she understood what he was going to do, but quietly raised it and
turned the shade of the lamp a few inches.
"I would rather not be responsible for your choice," she said quietly.
"And yet you have left me none," he answered with, sudden boldness.
"No? How so?"
He held up the silver knife and smiled.


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