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Hichens, Robert Smythe, 1864-1950

"The Garden of Allah"

The sense of her womanhood, lost for
a moment in the ecstasy of worship, had returned to her, but with a
new and tremendous meaning which seemed to change her nature. Androvsky
forcibly pressed her hand with his, let it go, then pressed it again,
repeating the action with a regularity that seemed suggested by some
guidance. She imagined him pressing her hand each time his heart pulsed.
She did not want to return the pressure. As she felt his hand thus
closing and unclosing over hers, she was conscious that she, who in
their intercourse had played a dominant part, who had even deliberately
brought about that intercourse by her action on the tower, now longed to
be passive and, forgetting her own power and the strength and force of
her nature, to lose herself in the greater strength and force of this
man to whom she had given herself. Never before had she wished to be
anything but strong. Nor did she desire weakness now, but only that his
nature should rise above hers with eagle's wings, that when she looked
up she should see him, never when she looked down. She thought that to
see him below her would kill her, and she opened her lips to say so.


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