"What she said was this: 'I've sent for you because, if you keep on, you're going to win. No, don't get up. Before you keep on, I want to tell you something about myself--about what I believe with all my soul. I don't have to tell you that I'm a good woman; you know it. The first time you saw me dance you were rather disgusted, weren't you? I nodded. 'What do you think of my dancing now?"
"I remember my answer to that. It was: 'You possess people gradually, you hold them forever. It's more than personality with you, it's power.'
"Her eyes were fastened on me. They drew mine. 'That's right,' she said; 'look at me. I want you to look at me. You see I'm an ugly woman.' I cried out in protest, and I meant it. Her face went suddenly hard. 'You fool,' she said, 'say that I'm pretty--say it now!' And I cried out at her, 'Not when you look like that. But you can assume beauty. You know it.'
"She seemed to pause in her thoughts at that and smiled. 'Can I--for you?' she asked in a way that made her divine. Then she jerked herself back. 'I'm an ugly woman. My body is wonderful. Look!' She raised her long arms, which were bare, gave a half-turn, and glanced at me over her shoulder. An apparently simple movement, but it was consummate in grace and display. 'You see?' she said, with a flashing smile. Then she turned and stood stolidly. 'I didn't have a body worth speaking of once. What I've got I made--every bit of it.'
"She sat down sidewise on a chair, folded her arms on the back of it, and looked at me over them. 'I have that power you were speaking of. Do you know just in what consists a woman's power over a man? I'll tell you: in keeping eternally just one thing that he wants.'
"She paused a long time on that, then she went on: 'Some women hold their own in the world and their men by beauty, others by wit, others by culture, breeding, and occasionally there's a woman clever enough to hold her place and her man by wealth. I've got none of these things. I've got only one great gift of God by which I hold my power. When that's gone, all is gone. Wise people have told me so. I know it is true.' She rose slowly, came and stood close beside me. 'It's--it's this--that I'm still my own. Do you want to--to rob me?"