“Why?”
“Your contract. I’m here on approval.”
“Let’s forget it,” she said. “I’m learning. I’ve learnt so much about life since we met.”
Through the meal she amused him by speaking in broken English and misunderstanding whatever he said. When it was ended he offered her a cigarette. “No. You’re only trying to be polite, and tempting me.”
They drove across the river and up the Champs-Elysées to a theatre where they had seen Polaire announced. The performance had hardly commenced, when she tugged at his arm. “Meester Deek, it’s summer outside. We’ve spent so much time in seeing things and people. I want to talk.” From under the shadow of trees he hailed a fiacre. “Where?”
“Anywhere.” When he had taken his place at her side, “You may put your arm about me,” she murmured drowsily.
They lay back gazing up at the star-strewn sky. Their rubber-tires on the asphalt made hardly any sound. They seemed disembodied, drifting through a pageant of dreams. The summer air blew softly on their faces; sometimes it bore with it the breath of flowers. The night world of Paris went flashing by, swift in its pursuit of pleasure. They scarcely noticed it; it was something unreal that they had left.
“What’s going on in your mind?”
She didn’t stir. She hung listless in his embrace. “I was thinking of growing old—growing old with nobody to care.—You care now; I know that But if I let you go, in five years’ time you’d——” He felt the shrug she gave her shoulders. “Mother’s the only friend I have. You might be the second if—— But mothers are more patient; they’re always waiting for you when you come back.”
“And I shall be always waiting. Haven’t I always told you that?”