Part 2 — XII

THEY went into the smoking-room, and whilst uncle Solon was plunging his arms up to the elbows into a mahogany cabinet full of cigars with his name on the bands, Lewis said:—

"I have a feeling that it was in the silence of a seraglio like this in Trieste that you strangled my poor little San Lucido venture."

"Don't make fun of this house," answered Irene; "I love it just as it is. I lived here as a girl; I was a day boarder at a Maida Vale school then, and I was captain of the hockey team. I used to come back here every evening when the fog begins to thicken and when the street singers cast fantastic shadows on the walls and smile behind their make-up. Yesterday I went up to my old room under the roof; it has been empty since I left it. My bed, a very hard one, where I used to weave ridiculous dreams, still stood in the corner."

"What sort of dreams?"

"I've forgotten now. There's a stuffed cuckoo which I brought back from Interlaken still there."

"I want to see it, this room of yours."

"Why?"

"Just because ..."

"Just as you like," said Irene simply, without waiting to be begged.

"I collect famous rooms," said Lewis. "I have already seen Cecil Rhodes' college rooms with his old cricket bat and his rhinoceros heads; Gaby Deslys' room in Knightsbridge after her death: there I found her old mother who had come from Marseilles too late, crying before a golden sun rising above a cream velvet bed; the ceiling was a painted sky in which aeroplanes were manœuvring: they were all the different machines flown by the pilot who was her lover at that time.... And again, the bedroom of the Empress Zita at Schœnbrunn, with her soap and towel just as she left them in her flight. But all this is quite beside the point...."

Irene's room was enamelled white with a green ribbon running along it like a water line, and two shiny chintz curtains covered with hollyhocks. It was what thirty years ago would have been called a symphony in white.

Lewis went up to her.

"You are still only a girl."

She stepped back.

"Let me alone."

Her nose twitched and her narrow nostrils dilated. Her brow, swept clear of the abundant hair that grew slightly over her temples, caught the light.

Lewis put his hands on her shoulders.

"I adore your prim face with all the romance lurking in it. Give me your hand. Open it. Look, there I am in the middle of your line of Fate; here I am again after climbing this mountain. You see: I've got to get there sometime...."

"I am always told that I've got a man's hand, the hand of a pioneer, the fingers of a banker, made to handle money; will you let me alone ..."

"Your slim figure, your long neck, your slender arms, your narrow waist..."

"Let me alone."

"Your honest mouth and your Byzantine eyes, like the eyes in a peacock's tail. I don't want you to be my mistress."

"Let me alone."

"Will you marry me?"

"Certainly not. I've been married once; that's enough for me."

"Irene, I think of nothing but you. I live only in expectation ..."

"Let me alone."

Lewis' hands began to make dark bracelets round Irene's wrists.

"I want to stay here with you. I can't leave you any more. I want to grovel at your feet.... Tell me ..."

"Let me alone."

"Let me destroy you, burn you down and build you up again."

They spoke hoarsely, in whispers; they were struggling now, forehead to forehead, like goats. Irene kept him at arm's length to prevent him from "clinching."

At first he had made an effort not to throw himself on her, feeling that for once this was not the right way. But from force of habit he let himself go.

In falling they sank on to the bed. An English bed, that is to say a bench made of stone. Irene tightened her limbs and crossed one foot over the other for safety.

"Let me alone."

Lewis knelt on her with all his weight; the fabric of Irene's chemise tore in his hand; their hearts beat together. Their faces were red from being rubbed together so much. Lewis held one of the girl's hands behind her back and kept the other motionless beneath her chin; hairpins rained; the blue ribbons of her chemise slid off her shoulders.

"Let me alone, you're killing me!"

She gave such a cry that he got up, a thing he had never done before for any woman.

"Forgive me," he said.

They were both out of breath, like boxers during an interval. Irene shook out her hair and put it up again; her whole face shone from the frame of her thick mane, which looked as if it was modelled in lead: it altered her whole being: she was even more her own self.

"Naturally," said Lewis, "we shall never meet again after this."

"Why not? I'm not frightened of you."

She was bubbling over with emotion.

"You're not frightened either of telling me that you are attracted to me a little?"

"No."

"You're not angry with me?"

"I'm angry with myself for standing here calmly like this."

"Cut your hair off."

"Never."

"For the last time.... Don't you agree that we ought to be partners in the same firm?"

Irene smiled.

"No. Anything but that. Say good-night nicely like an Englishman and go."

Lewis saw before him the abyss of the staircase. He took a few steps and then with French impudence he turned and said:—

"I hate going like this. Give me something to take away, something that belongs to you. Not a handkerchief, it's unlucky. I know, give me your camisole. I'll keep it in my pocket book in memory of you."

She looked at him in bewilderment. She had never met a man like him before.

"At least tell me of someone in Paris who loves you and knows you well, to whom I can talk about you."

"I don't know anyone in Paris."

"Well, then, promise me one thing, before going back to Trieste you will ring me up ... Ségur 5555. It's quite easy to remember."

With flaming cheeks and steady eyes Irene stood on the landing and signed to him that she did not want to talk any more.

She watched Lewis go down the stairs.