I 76 Hshes of Incense

swered, ‘a doll, a pretty French doll.’ You said ‘no—what you are is—-an Eastern woman.’ You remember?”

“I remember.’ Barali’s eyes were on the beau- tiful little arm raised out of its draperies to hold the pipe, so near him. He did not touch her; but she quivered—under the contact of his eyes.

“Since I was a little child in blarseilles,” went on Dorofée, “I have found pleasure in being what I am not; so long have I been that, I scarcely know any longer what I am. Except—as you say—an Eastern woman. I dreamed, I had fan- cies; instinct assured me they were not the dreams and fancies of other people: I must hide them, keep silent, pretend I had others. I did this; I found life one long amusement, playing tricks on other people—with this strange thing I had that they had not. I called it subtlety: really I do not know what it is. Only it makes me different. So all my life I have been pleased, convincing people that I was the same-only more same than they. I have bored them—ah, the exquisite joy it has given me to bore them! All this till I was eighteen—and since; but—there was an in- terlude.”

Barali leaned to her again. His eyes, now keen

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