Explore "The Woman with the Fan" by Robert Hichens on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
IN a large and cool drawing-room of London a few people were / scattered about, listening to a soprano voice that was singing to the / accompaniment of a piano. The sound of the voice came from an inner / room, towards which most of these people were looking earnestly. Only / one or two seemed indifferent to the fascination of the singer.
A little woman, with oily black hair and enormous dark eyes, leaned back / on a sofa, playing with a scarlet fan and glancing sideways at a thin, / elderly man, who gazed into the distance from which the voice came. His / mouth worked slightly under his stiff white moustache, and his eyes, in / colour a faded blue, were fixed and stern. Upon his knees his thin and / lemon-coloured hands twitched nervously, as if they longed to grasp / something and hold it fast. The little dark woman glanced down at / these hands, and then sharply up at the elderly man's face. A faint and / malicious smile curved her full lips, which were artificially reddened, / and she turned her shoulder to him with deliberation and looked about / the room.