第65章

"If you don't know that yet!" I exclaimed under my breath.

"No, not in your mind.Can any one ever tell what is in a man's mind? But I see you won't tell.""What's the good? You have written to her before, I understand.

Do you think of continuing the correspondence?""Who knows?" she said in a profound tone."She is the only woman that ever wrote to me.I returned her three letters to her with my last answer, explaining humbly that I preferred her to burn them herself.And I thought that would be the end of it.But an occasion may still arise.""Oh, if an occasion arises," I said, trying to control my rage, "you may be able to begin your letter by the words 'Chere Maman.'"The cigarette box, which she had taken up without removing her eyes from me, flew out of her hand and opening in mid-air scattered cigarettes for quite a surprising distance all over the room.Igot up at once and wandered off picking them up industriously.

Dona Rita's voice behind me said indifferently:

"Don't trouble, I will ring for Rose."

"No need," I growled, without turning my head, "I can find my hat in the hall by myself, after I've finished picking up...""Bear!"

I returned with the box and placed it on the divan near her.She sat cross-legged, leaning back on her arms, in the blue shimmer of her embroidered robe and with the tawny halo of her unruly hair about her face which she raised to mine with an air of resignation.

"George, my friend," she said, "we have no manners.""You would never have made a career at court, Dona Rita," Iobserved."You are too impulsive."

"This is not bad manners, that's sheer insolence.This has happened to you before.If it happens again, as I can't be expected to wrestle with a savage and desperate smuggler single-handed, I will go upstairs and lock myself in my room till you leave the house.Why did you say this to me?""Oh, just for nothing, out of a full heart.""If your heart is full of things like that, then my dear friend, you had better take it out and give it to the crows.No! you said that for the pleasure of appearing terrible.And you see you are not terrible at all, you are rather amusing.Go on, continue to be amusing.Tell me something of what you heard from the lips of that aristocratic old lady who thinks that all men are equal and entitled to the pursuit of happiness.""I hardly remember now.I heard something about the unworthiness of certain white geese out of stuffy drawing-rooms.It sounds mad, but the lady knows exactly what she wants.I also heard your praises sung.I sat there like a fool not knowing what to say.""Why? You might have joined in the singing.""I didn't feel in the humour, because, don't you see, I had been incidentally given to understand that I was an insignificant and superfluous person who had better get out of the way of serious people.""Ah, par example!"

"In a sense, you know, it was flattering; but for the moment it made me feel as if I had been offered a pot of mustard to sniff."She nodded with an amused air of understanding and I could see that she was interested."Anything more?" she asked, with a flash of radiant eagerness in all her person and bending slightly forward towards me.

"Oh, it's hardly worth mentioning.It was a sort of threat wrapped up, I believe, in genuine anxiety as to what might happen to my youthful insignificance.If I hadn't been rather on the alert just then I wouldn't even have perceived the meaning.But really an allusion to 'hot Southern blood' I could have only one meaning.Of course I laughed at it, but only 'pour l'honneur' and to show Iunderstood perfectly.In reality it left me completely indifferent."Dona Rita looked very serious for a minute.

"Indifferent to the whole conversation?"

I looked at her angrily.

"To the whole...You see I got up rather out of sorts this morning.Unrefreshed, you know.As if tired of life."The liquid blue in her eyes remained directed at me without any expression except that of its usual mysterious immobility, but all her face took on a sad and thoughtful cast.Then as if she had made up her mind under the pressure of necessity:

"Listen, amigo," she said, "I have suffered domination and it didn't crush me because I have been strong enough to live with it;I have known caprice, you may call it folly if you like, and it left me unharmed because I was great enough not to be captured by anything that wasn't really worthy of me.My dear, it went down like a house of cards before my breath.There is something in me that will not be dazzled by any sort of prestige in this world, worthy or unworthy.I am telling you this because you are younger than myself.""If you want me to say that there is nothing petty or mean about you, Dona Rita, then I do say it."She nodded at me with an air of accepting the rendered justice and went on with the utmost simplicity.

"And what is it that is coming to me now with all the airs of virtue? All the lawful conventions are coming to me, all the glamours of respectability! And nobody can say that I have made as much as the slightest little sign to them.Not so much as lifting my little finger.I suppose you know that?""I don't know.I do not doubt your sincerity in anything you say.

I am ready to believe.You are not one of those who have to work.""Have to work - what do you mean?"

"It's a phrase I have heard.What I meant was that it isn't necessary for you to make any signs."She seemed to meditate over this for a while.