her shy.

"I'm Winny's friend, too," she said. "That's why I'm here."

And with that she looked him in the face with eyes that shot at him a
clear blue out of their darkness. Her eyes, as he expressed it
afterward, were "stunners," and they were "queer"; they were the
"queerest" thing about her. That was his word for their
half-fascinating, half-stupefying quality.

"Are you waiting for her?" he asked.

"No. It's no good waiting for her. She's gone."

"Gone?"

"Gone home."

He rallied. "Then what are you waiting for?"

"I was waiting for you," she said, "to tell you that it's no good."

He had moved a little way out of the stream of people, so that he was
now placed with his back against the shutter, and she with her shoulder
to the stream. As she stood thus a man jostled her, more to attract her
attention than to move her from his path. She gave a little gasp and
shrank back with a movement that brought her nearer to Ransome and to
his side. And as she moved there came from her, from her clothes, and
from her hair, a faint odor of violets, familiar yet wonderful.

"You don't mind my speaking to you?" she said.

"No," said he, "but let's get out of this first."

He put his hand lightly on her arm to steer her through the stream.
There was something about her--it may have been in her voice, or in the
way she looked at him--something helpless that implored and entreated
and appealed to his young manhood for protection. Her arm yielded to his
touch, yet with a slight pressure that made him aware that its tissue
was of an incredible softness. Somehow, for the moment while this touch
and pressure lasted, he found it impossible to look at her. Some
instinct held his eyes from her, as if he had been afraid.

They moved on slowly, aimlessly it seemed to Ransome; yet steering he
was steered, northward, up the side street where he had seen her
disappear with Winny. It was quiet there. He no longer touched her. He
could look at her now.

He looked. And what he saw was a girl well grown and of incomparable
softness. She could not have been much more than twenty, but her body
was already rounded to the full flower of its youth. This body was
neither tall nor slender nor particularly graceful. Yet it carried
itself with an effect of tallness and slenderness and grace.

In the same way she impressed him as being well dressed. Yet she only
wore a little plain black gown cut rather low, with a broad lace collar.
There