She lowered her eyes, and the soft warm colour deepened in her cheeks.
Her steady gaze removed, the young man breathed more freely.

He congratulated himself.

Intercourse was in act of becoming normal and easy.

So far it had been quite absurdly hind-leggy--and for him, _him_, to be forced into being hind-leggy by a girl of barely eighteen! Now he prepared to trot gaily, comfortably, off on all fours, when she spoke, bringing him up to the perpendicular again with a start.
"I love Aunt Felicia very dearly," she announced, as though in protest against some implied and subtle disloyalty.
"But don't we all love Cousin Felicia ?" he returned, promptly, eager to maintain his advantage.

"Isn't she kindness incarnate, Christian charity personified?
As for me, I simply dote on her; and with reason, for ever since those remote ages in which I wore scratchy pinafores and horrid little white socks, she has systematically and pertinaciously spoiled me whenever she stayed at Canton Magna .-- Oh! she is an institution.