Part 50 (2/2)

”You did!” He felt that he was looking through what he had always thought was the opaque surface of things, and seeing a great deal more going on there than he had dreamed. ”But can you count on them?”

She continued to be as surprised at his surprise as he at the whole manoeuver. ”Oh, of course you can never count on servants unless there's something in it for them. I gave them a little tip apiece.”

”You _did_!” He could only stupidly repeat his exclamation. ”What did they say?”

”Why, they found it perfectly natural. They won't mention it--not of course unless somebody else tips them more, and I don't see why anybody should, do you?”

Neale stood looking at her, a little consternation mingling with his astonishment. This was what it was to have been brought up in what people called a civilized way, this smooth mastery of concealment ...

how easy it had been for her, at the breakfast table yesterday, not to give the faintest hint she had just been talking animatedly with him; and this morning not the faintest hint to Livingstone that she was laughing at his expense. Why, that lovely face was just like a mask. You hadn't the least idea what was going on behind it.

There was a silence. She was looking up at him with a new expression, almost timidly. ”You don't like my hiding things?” she asked him, coming to a stop. They were near the pension now, standing in the twilight on a deserted street.

He aroused himself to shrug his shoulders and answer evasively, ”Oh, it's not in the least any business of mine.”

”But you don't like it?” she insisted, looking straight at him with the deadly soft gaze that always made him lose his head entirely. ”It's of no consequence--none,” he murmured. But she still looked at him. He tried to think of some other evasive answer, but in the confusion of his mind he could not think at all. And he must say _something_. With alarm, with horror, he heard himself saying baldly, as he would to a man, to an intimate, the literal truth, ”Well, no, not so very well, if you really want to know.”

It was as though he had seen himself swinging an ax at an angle that would bring the edge deep into his own flesh. He felt it cut deep and bleed. He dared not look at her. He wished to G.o.d he had gone on straight to Naples.

Somehow he _was_ looking at her. Her face was deeply flushed. She looked as though he had struck her in the face. Well, now it was certainly all over. He might as well turn around and walk away and never look at her again.

He said blunderingly, in a trembling voice, ”I'm _so_ sorry! I didn't mean to say that. It's no business of mine. I'm awfully ashamed of myself. _Please_ forget it. What do _you_ care what I think? I'm n.o.body, n.o.body at all.”

”Why did you say that?” she asked him in a low voice, with a driving intensity of accent, as though more than anything else she must have an answer from him.

”Well, you asked me,” he said in abject misery, aware of the hideous, flat futility of such an answer. If only he were an expansive Italian now, he could think of some way openly to abase himself, instead of standing there callously and dully. ”Oh, please don't think of it again,” he implored her, wis.h.i.+ng he could get down on his knees to beg her pardon.

She drew a long breath and put her hand to her heart. ”It's the first time anybody ever told the truth to me, you see,” she said faintly, with a strange accent. ”I ... I'll like it ... I think ... when I can get my breath.”

To his amazement he saw that she was trying bravely to smile at him.

To his greater amazement he s.n.a.t.c.hed up both her hands and carried them roughly and pa.s.sionately to his lips.

CHAPTER XLV

During the interminable process of hanging the skirt of that yellow dress for Donna Antonia's soiree, Marise kept thinking of the Pantheon.

The dressmaker's lodging was near there. If they could only be done with those draperies she would have time to step into the place which she loved best in Rome. She cast a look at herself in the cracked mirror which was all the inexpensive little dressmaker could afford. ”I'm afraid it's higher on the right hip,” she said, and settled with a sigh to endure more pinnings and unpinnings. ”Strange, how important it is for the correct playing of Beethoven,” she thought ironically, ”that the drapery on one hip shall not be higher than on the other.” She caught a glimpse of herself as she thought this, and frowned to see her lip curled in a cold, ugly line of distaste. Her thoughts were showing more and more on her face. She knew well enough what Mme. Vallery would say.

She would say, ”Don't pretend, dear child, that you don't know perfectly well that the kind of dress you wear has a great deal to do with everything that anybody cares about, and that the kind of people you must depend on to make your music profitable are the kind who care nothing about music and altogether about looks.”

That was true, of course, but all the same it did make Marise sick to have people call a ”soiree musicale” what really was a ”sartorial evening.” Of course it was understood that people were hypocritical about everything. She granted that they never called anything by its right name. But she did wish they would leave music alone! She _cared_ about that!

”That's right now,” she said aloud, looking intently from one hip to the other. ”Perhaps a _little_ more--no, it will do as it is.”

She would have time for the Pantheon after all--ten minutes at least.

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