FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178  
179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   >>   >|  
nd had wanted her to try for a divorce, and no doubt they had been right. But her instincts had refused, still refused to let everyone know her secrets and sufferings--still refused the hollow pretence involved, that she had loved him when she never had. No, it had been her fault for marrying him without love-- "Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds!" What irony--giving her that to read--if her fellow traveller had only known! She got up from before the mirror, and stood looking round her room, the room she had always slept in as a girl. So he had remembered her all this time! It had not seemed like meeting a stranger. They were not strangers now, anyway. And, suddenly, on the wall before her, she saw his face; or, if not, what was so like that she gave a little gasp. Of course! How stupid of her not to have known at once! There, in a brown frame, hung a photograph of the celebrated Botticelli or Masaccio "Head of a Young Man" in the National Gallery. She had fallen in love with it years ago, and on the wall of her room it had been ever since. That broad face, the clear eyes, the bold, clean-cut mouth, the audacity--only, the live face was English, not Italian, had more humour, more "breeding," less poetry--something "old Georgian" about it. How he would laugh if she told him he was like that peasant acolyte with fluffed-out hair, and a little ruching round his neck! And, smiling, Gyp plaited her own hair and got into bed. But she could not sleep; she heard her father come in and go up to his room, heard the clocks strike midnight, and one, and two, and always the dull roar of Piccadilly. She had nothing over her but a sheet, and still it was too hot. There was a scent in the room, as of honeysuckle. Where could it come from? She got up at last, and went to the window. There, on the window-sill, behind the curtains, was a bowl of jessamine. Her father must have brought it up for her--just like him to think of that! And, burying her nose in those white blossoms, she was visited by a memory of her first ball--that evening of such delight and disillusionment. Perhaps Bryan Summerhay had been there--all that time ago! If he had been introduced to her then, if she had happened to dance with him instead of with that man who had kissed her arm, might she not have felt different toward all men? And if he had admired her--and had not everyone, that night--might she not have liked, perha
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178  
179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

refused

 

window

 
father
 

Georgian

 

acolyte

 

Piccadilly

 

peasant

 

ruching

 

strike

 

midnight


clocks

 
smiling
 
plaited
 

fluffed

 
introduced
 
happened
 

Summerhay

 

delight

 

disillusionment

 

Perhaps


admired

 

kissed

 

evening

 

curtains

 

jessamine

 

honeysuckle

 

brought

 

visited

 

memory

 
blossoms

burying

 

giving

 
fellow
 

alters

 

alteration

 
traveller
 

mirror

 
meeting
 

remembered

 
instincts

wanted

 

divorce

 

secrets

 
marrying
 

involved

 

sufferings

 
hollow
 

pretence

 

stranger

 
National