Page:Nigger Heaven (1926).pdf/151

 volumes on her table before she eventually chose David Garnett's The Sailor's Return. Back in the sitting-room, she slowly sipped her coffee, lighted a cigarette, and opened the book. Perfection is in unity; prefer one woman first, and then one thing in her: so read the first lines. She laid the book aside. What, after all, did she know about this man? Did Byron, she wondered, prefer one woman first? Was she first? Had there been others? Were there others now? Mary's blood pumped furiously from her heart as she thought what it would mean to her if he cared for another woman. She wanted him for herself and for herself alone. She wanted to possess him.

She permitted herself to slip into a half-somnolent meditation in which she gave herself over to the bliss of imagining what life with him would be like. Suddenly, with a start, she became wide-awake. Consulting her watch, she discovered that it was a quarter of eleven. There was a draught in the room. She remembered the open window and closed it. Then she returned to her chair and began to read: The Duke of Kent came safe into Southampton Docks on the tenth of June, 1858. On board of her was a mariner named William Targett, returning to his own country as a passenger, having shipped at Lisbon. He was. . . Mary