There was a strange fascination in her eyes, too, which at times
was quite irresistible, so that he would feel himself drawn to her by a
power which seemed to take away his will for the moment It may have been
nothing but the common charm of bright eyes; but he had never before
experienced the same kind of attraction.
Perhaps she was not so very different from what she had been as a child,
after all. At any rate, so it seemed to Dick Venner, who, as was said
before, had tried making love to her. They were sitting alone in the study
one day; Elsie had round her neck that somewhat peculiar ornament, the
golden _torque_, which she had worn to the great party. Youth is
adventurous and very curious about neck laces, brooches, chains, and other
such adornments, so long as they are worn by young persons of the female
sex. Dick was seized with a great passion for examining this curious chain,
and, after some preliminary questions, was rash enough to lean towards her
and put out his hand toward the neck that lay in the golden coil. She threw
her head back, her eyes narrowing and her forehead drawing down so that
Dick thought her head actually flattened itself. He started involuntarily;
for she looked so like the little girl who had struck him with those sharp
flashing teeth, that the whole scene came back, and he felt the stroke
again as if it had just been given, and the two white scars began to sting
as they did after the old Doctor had burned them with that stick of gray
caustic, which looked so like a slate pencil, and felt so much like the end
of a red-hot poker.
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