Chapter IV - Page 2

he had been too busy gazing, ever to gaze at
himself. He saw the head and face of a young fellow of twenty,
but, being unused to such appraisement, he did not know how to
value it. Above a square-domed forehead he saw a mop of brown
hair, nut-brown, with a wave to it and hints of curls that were a
delight to any woman, making hands tingle to stroke it and fingers
tingle to pass caresses through it. But he passed it by as without
merit, in Her eyes, and dwelt long and thoughtfully on the high,
square forehead, - striving to penetrate it and learn the quality
of its content. What kind of a brain lay behind there? was his
insistent interrogation. What was it capable of? How far would it
take him? Would it take him to her?

He wondered if there was soul in those steel-gray eyes that were
often quite blue of color and that were strong with the briny airs
of the sun-washed deep. He wondered, also, how his eyes looked to
her. He tried to imagine himself she, gazing into those eyes of
his, but failed in the jugglery. He could successfully put himself
inside other men's minds, but they had to be men whose ways of life
he knew. He did not know her way of life. She was wonder and
mystery, and how could he guess one thought of hers? Well, they
were honest eyes, he concluded, and in them was neither smallness
nor meanness. The brown sunburn of his face surprised him. He had
not dreamed he was so black. He rolled up his shirt-sleeve and
compared the white underside if the arm with his face. Yes, he was
a white man, after all. But the arms were sunburned, too. He
twisted his arm, rolled the biceps over with his other hand, and
gazed underneath where he was least touched by the sun. It was
very white. He laughed at his bronzed face in the glass at the
thought that it was once as white as the underside of his arm; nor
did he dream that in the world there were few pale spirits of women
who could boast fairer or smoother skins than he - fairer than
where he had escaped the ravages of the sun.

His might have been a cherub's mouth, had not the full, sensuous
lips a trick, under stress, of drawing firmly across the teeth. At
times, so tightly did they draw, the mouth became stern and harsh,
even ascetic. They were the lips of a fighter and of a lover.
They could taste the sweetness of life with relish, and they could
put the sweetness aside and command life. The chin and jaw, strong
and just hinting of square aggressiveness, helped the lips to
command life. Strength balanced sensuousness and had upon it a
tonic effect, compelling him to love beauty that was healthy and
making him vibrate to sensations that were wholesome. And between
the lips were teeth that had never known nor needed the dentist's
care.