Page:Angna Enters - Among the Daughters.djvu/503

 She sat up, an obedient child, and surveyed him over the thick china rim, uncertain what was expected of her now.

He opened the shutters wider and let in all the sun and she saw the old stones of the Louvre minding their own business.

The room was a clutter of papers and canvases and paraphernalia of painting. All a secret from her, but what did that matter? The night had not been as violent as some she had known but one thing she knew, after this nothing in life would be beyond it. This must be the way people feel in church. Giving to him was love, even though he might never ask her again. Why should he? She could never give him what he had given her, a life-giving inside her, with tenderness beyond the act of love. He had made her truly a part of him, it was like being reborn and nothing that had happened with others existed any more. The pull she had felt toward him had been true, and that was why all those other men had made her want to die. He was the childhood sweetheart the fortuneteller meant, and even if he let her go now she had learned that there really was such a thing as love the way Vida and her poets said. If you once felt it, you had been alive. If only he would let her stay and take care of him forever in return.

"It's past ten, don't you think you should phone Beman? He'll have the Surete after you."

"In some ways you're not romantic."

"Well, what's all this about how you must get to Lanvin's before the train."

"Oh, who cares!"

"You'll be disappointed when you get back to New York without some French gowns."

"In other words, you want me to go."

"There's nothing I want less."

"I'm sick of that show, I have a good understudy."

"You can't walk out on what you've worked for so hard, I won't let you."

He was trying to let her off easy. He didn't want her. She looked at his grave unrelenting face. Was he thinking of himself or her? Or had he been disappointed? Could that be? He was the answer to her search. It was strange and beautiful being born all over again. Making love was only part of it. She loved him even though he might never touch her again, or only her hand, or looked at her, or let her look at him. Together, or apart. This was her first and last Rh