She made a sly gesture to slip past me, and I almost decided to let her
go, for the expression that flashed across her face shocked me. She
looked uncomfortable and ashamed; the color came and went a moment in he
cheeks, making me think of a child detected in some secret naughtiness.
It was almost fear.
"It's because they're not finished then?" I said, dropping the tone of
banter, "or because they're too good for me to understand?" For my
criticism of painting, she told me, was crude and ignorant sometimes.
"But you'll let me see them later, won't you?"
Frances, however, did not take the way of escape I offered. She changed
her mind. She drew the portfolio from beneath her arm instead. "You can
see them if you really want to, Bill," she said quietly, and her tone
reminded me of a nurse who says to a boy just grown out of childhood,
"you are old enough now to look upon horror and ugliness--only I don't
advise it."
"I do want to," I said, and made to go downstairs with her. But,
instead, she said in the same low voice as before, "Come up to my room,
we shall be undisturbed there." So I guessed that she had been on her
way to show the paintings to our hostess, but did not care for us all
three to see them together.
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