Why hadn’t he? Kay knew—because, if he had, there would have been still time for her to turn him back. The persistent mouth-organ boy, he was always quite certain that he had only to make up his mind and he’d get his desire. She didn’t like him any the less for that, but——.
No, she wouldn’t be there to meet him. She had excused herself to Peter and had accompanied him to the sun-baked pier, at which the steamer called on its way from Lerici to Spezia. She had waved and waved till he was nearly out of sight—then she had fled.
Why? She couldn’t say—couldn’t say exactly, but very nearly. She had forbidden her mouth-organ boy to come—and he was coming. She was secretly elated to find herself defied. After all, she didn’t own Italy, and——. But Harry wasn’t making the journey to see Italy, nor to see Peter. She was well aware of that—Peter wasn’t.
So she had persuaded one of her fishermen friends to sail her across the gulf to Porto Venere. Down there in the sleepy harbor he was waiting, his brown eyes lazily watching, his ear-rings glittering, his fingers rolling cigarettes, not at all perturbed but wondering, with a shrug of his shoulders, why she so long delayed.
And Harry, he too would be wondering, thinking her unkind. Peter had probably brought him back to San Terenzo by now. They would have been on the lookout for her directly the steamer rounded the cypressed headland. When they hadn’t found her on the pier, they would have made haste to the yellow villa in which they lived, which had been Shelley’s. And again, they hadn’t found her. She could imagine it all—just what had happened: Peter’s discreet apologies, and Harry’s amused suspicion that he was being punished. His laughter—she could imagine that as well; he always laughed when he was hurt or annoyed.
Kay clasped her hands. It was rotten of her not to go to him. All day she had wanted to be with him. He had traveled all the way from London to get a glimpse of her. And yet, knowing that, she sat on in the ruined castle, while the reluctant day, like a naughty child at bed-time, saffron skirts held high, stepped lingeringly down the purple hills, keeping the sun waiting.
She was trying to arrive at a conclusion. To Peter she was everything—more than ever this past year had taught her that. He made no plans for the future in which she was not to share. It was just as it had been when they were girl and boy—he seemed to take it for granted that they were always to live together. The thought that she should marry never entered his head. Save for the mouth-organ boy, it would not have entered hers.
But the mouth-organ boy! Long ago, when she couldn’t see him, she had heard him playing in the tree-tops. It was something like that now. Since she had left England, his letters had followed her. Sometimes she hadn’t answered them. Sometimes she had answered them casually. Sometimes she had had fits of contrition and had written him volumes—compact histories of her thoughts and doings. It made no difference whether she was punctual or neglectful; like a familiar friend in unfamiliar places, his handwriting was always ahead of her travels, waiting to greet her.
“What does he say?” Peter would ask her.
Then she would read him carefully edited extracts—nice polite information, entirely innocuous. Peter hadn’t guessed. He mustn’t.