Page:The Eleventh Virgin.pdf/276



“Pm here,” she told him as he met her at the door of the little apartment on Thirty-fifth Street. He held a half-finished cigarette and an open book in one hand and with the other he closed the door behind her. He greeted het coldly, and resumed his seat in the armchair by the open window, The standing lamp by the side of him lit up a sullenly indifferent face.

June took off her hat and gloves and put them on a table at one end of the room. Then she slipped down on the floor by Dick’s side and put her head against his knee. Her trembling excitement had given way to a languorous feeling of happiness but every now and then a sharp feeling of fear swept over her. She clasped his knees so that he could not get up and he picked up his book again. She did not even take the trouble to see if he turned the pages, She did not care if he continued read- ing. She was with him again.

Finally he flung the book to the floor. “I thought you said you’d be here a week ago!”

The tenseness of her body relaxed. So he did care that she was late! He had been waiting for her.