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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Chapter XXI THE LURE OF THE SPIRIT: THE FLESH IN PURSUIT When Carrie came Hurstwood had been waiting many minutes. His blood was warm; his nerves wrought up. He was anxious to see the woman who had stirred him so profoundly the night before. "Here you are," he said, repressedly, feeling a spring in his limbs and an elation which was tragic in itself. "Yes," said Carrie. They walked on as if bound for some objective point, while Hurstwood drank in the radiance of her presence. The rustle of her pretty skirt was like music to him. "Are you satisfied?" he asked, thinking of how well she did the night before. "Are you?" He tightened his fingers as he saw the smile she gave him. "It was wonderful." Carrie laughed ecstatically. "That was one of the best things I’ve seen in a long time," he added. He was dwelling on her attractiveness as he had felt it the evening before, and mingling it with the feeling her presence inspired now. Carrie was dwelling in the atmosphere which this man created for her. Already she was enlivened and suffused with a glow. She felt his drawing toward her in every sound of his voice. "Those were such nice flowers you sent me," she said, after a moment or two. "They were beautiful." "Glad you liked them," he answered, simply. He was thinking all the time that the subject of his desire was being delayed. He was anxious to turn the talk to his own feelings. All was ripe for it. His Carrie was beside him. He wanted to plunge in and expostulate with her, and yet he found himself fishing for words and feeling for a way. "You got home all right," he said, gloomily, of a sudden, his tone modifying itself to one of self-commiseration. "Yes," said Carrie, easily. He looked at her steadily for a moment, slowing his pace and fixing her with his eye. She felt the flood of feeling. "How about me?" he asked. This confused Carrie considerably, for she realised the floodgates were open. She didn’t know exactly what to answer. "I don’t know," she answered. He took his lower lip between his teeth for a moment, and then let it go. He stopped by the walk side and kicked the grass with his toe. He searched her face with a tender, appealing glance. "Won’t you come away from him?" he asked, intensely. "I don’t know," returned Carrie, still illogically drifting and finding nothing at which to catch. As a matter of fact, she was in a most hopeless quandary. Here was a man whom she thoroughly liked, who exercised an influence over her, sufficient almost to delude her into the belief that she was possessed of a lively passion for him. She was still the victim of his keen eyes, his suave manners, his fine clothes. She looked and saw before her a man who was most gracious and sympathetic, who leaned toward her with a feeling that was a delight to observe. She could not resist the glow of his temperament, the light of his eye. She could hardly keep from feeling what he felt. |
