Man-woman relationships -- Fiction; Marriage -- Fiction
Why hadn't he? Kay knew--because, if he had, there would have been still
time for her to turn him back. The persistent mouth-organ boy, he was
always quite certain that he had only to make up his mind and he'd get
his desire. She didn't like him any the less for that, but----.
No, she wouldn't be there to meet him. She had excused herself to Peter
and had accompanied him to the sun-baked pier, at which the steamer
called on its way from Lerici to Spezia. She had waved and waved till he
was nearly out of sight--then she had fled.
Why? She couldn't say--couldn't say exactly, but very nearly. She
had forbidden her mouth-organ boy to come--and he was coming. She was
secretly elated to find herself defied. After all, she didn't own Italy,
and----. But Harry wasn't making the journey to see Italy, nor to see
Peter. She was well aware of that--Peter wasn't.
So she had persuaded one of her fishermen friends to sail her across the
gulf to Porto Venere. Down there in the sleepy harbor he was waiting,
his brown eyes lazily watching, his ear-rings glittering, his fingers
rolling cigarettes, not at all perturbed but wondering, with a shrug of
his shoulders, why she so long delayed.
And Harry, he too would be wondering, thinking her unkind. Peter had
probably brought him back to San Terenzo by now. They would have been on
the lookout for her directly the steamer rounded the cypressed headland.
When they hadn't found her on the pier, they would have made haste to
the yellow villa in which they lived, which had been Shelley's. And
again, they hadn't found her. She could imagine it all--just what had
happened: Peter's discreet apologies, and Harry's amused suspicion that
he was being punished. His laughter--she could imagine that as well; he
always laughed when he was hurt or annoyed.
Kay clasped her hands. It was rotten of her not to go to him. All day
she had wanted to be with him. He had traveled all the way from London
to get a glimpse of her. And yet, knowing that, she sat on in the ruined
castle, while the reluctant day, like a naughty child at bed-time,
saffron skirts held high, stepped lingeringly down the purple hills,
keeping the sun waiting.
She was trying to arrive at a conclusion. To Peter she was
everything--more than ever this past year had taught her that. He made
no plans for the future in which she was not to share. It was just as it
had been when they were girl and boy--he seemed to take it for granted
that they were always to live together. The thought that she should
marry never entered his head. Save for the mouth-organ boy, it would not
have entered hers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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