The Devil's GardenMaxwell, W. B. (William Babington)
General
The Devil's Garden
Maxwell, W. B. (William Babington)
Fiction
They took a cab to drive back in, and he almost carried her up to
their bedroom. It was on the same floor as the other room, with the
same marvelous bird's-eye view of the starlit sky and the lamplit
town. He had got her to himself at last--here, high above the world,
half-way to heaven. There seemed to him something poetical, almost
sublime in their situation: they two alone, isolated, millions of
people surrounding them and no living creature able to interfere with
them.
As he knew, they were the only lodgers on this top floor; and so one
need not even trouble to avoid making a noise. He gave full voice to
his exultation.
"There, old lady." He had opened the window as wide as it would go,
and he told her to look out. "The air--what there is of it--will do
you good."
"Oh, I couldn't," and she recoiled.
"Giddy?"
"_Giddy_ isn't the word. Oh, Will, why did you let me drink that
stuff--after drinking the wine?"
"I thought you'd got a better head-piece. Look at _me_. I could 'a'
stood two or three more goes at it, and bin none the worse." And he
chaffed her merrily. "Here's a tale--if it ever leaks out Rodchurch
way. Have you heard how Mrs. Dale behaved up in London? Went to the
theater, and drunk more'n was good for her. Came out fair
squiffy--so's poor Mr. Dale, he felt quite disgraced."
She was not intoxicated in an ugly way; her speech, her movements were
unaffected, and yet the alcohol was troubling her brain. She looked
like a child who has been overexercised at a children's party, and who
comes home with eyebrows raised, eyes glowing and yet dull, and cheeks
very pale.
"Oh, dear, I _am_ tired," and she sat down on a chair by the chest of
drawers, and slowly took off her hat.
But she got up again and pushed Dale away, when he offered to help her
in undressing.
"No, certainly not. What are you thinking of?" and she began to hum
one of the pretty airs they had heard at the theater. "But, my word,
Will," and she stopped humming, and laughed foolishly, "I shan't be
sorry to get out of my things. It _is_ hot. This is the hottest night
we've had."
"Ah, you feel it. I've got acclim'tized."
He undressed rapidly, and lighting the briar pipe which he had not
cared to smoke in the genteel society at the theater, he lay on the
outside of the bed.
"Better now, old girl?"
"Yes. I'm all right, Will. Dear old boy--I'm all right."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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