I went to her, this woman surrounded by implacable enemies, this woman who had played for great stakes and lost them, and who knew so well how to lose.

I stood before her, ashamed and yet not ashamed, for something of her greatness, evil though it might be, drove out my shame, and I knew that my foolishness was lost in a vast tragedy.
Slowly she lifted her languid arm and threw it about my neck; slowly she bent her red lips to mine and kissed me, once upon the mouth and once upon the forehead.

But between those two kisses she did a thing so swiftly that my eyes could scarcely follow what she did.

It seemed to me that she brushed her left hand across her lips, and that I saw her throat rise as though she swallowed something.

Then she thrust me from her, saying: "Farewell, O Macumazana, you will never forget this kiss of mine; and when we meet again we shall have much to talk of, for between now and then your story will be long.