Alexina had no intention of being afflicted
with rounded shoulders when the present mode had passed.
But her face expressed no guile as she stood there in her simple white
frock with a bunch of periwinkles in her belt, her delicate profile turned
to Gathbroke as she gazed at the irregular majesty of the Coast Range, dark
blue under a pale blue haze. He had retained the impression of starry eyes
and vivid coloring and eager happy youth, a body of perfect slenderness
and grace, whose magnetism was not that of youth alone but personal and
individual.
Now he saw that although her fine little profile was not too regular, and
as individual as her magnetism, the shape of her head was classic. It was
probable that she was not unaware of the fact, for its perfect lines and
curves were fully revealed by the severe flatness of the dusky thickly
planted hair, which was brushed back to the nape of her neck and then drawn
up a few inches and flared outward. The little head was held high on the
long white stem of the throat; and the pose, with the dropping eyelids,
gave her, in that deep shade, the illusion of maturity. Gathbroke realized
that he saw her for the moment as she would look ten years hence. Even the
full curved red lips were closed firmly and once the nostrils quivered
slightly.
The narrow black eyebrows following the subtle curve of her eyelids, the
low full brow with its waving line of soft black hair, seemed to brood over
the lower part of the face with its still indeterminate curves, over the
wholly immature figure of a very young girl.
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