Hugh asked of Joan in a low voice, with genuine concern, “Is it all right? Has he been drinking?”
Joan laughed, but mirthlessly. “Not a bit of it! He’s merely been a little put out with me lately, and this is the reaction. He couldn’t take it in why I hadn’t told him Ariel was here. But how could I dream he’d be interested? That it meant anything to him? And why, in heaven’s name, Hugh Weyman, didn’t you tell me that he had seen the Clare pictures and was exhibiting them? I don’t understand your secretiveness. It wasn’t like you. It was horrid.”
“But you were away. And I thought you knew, of course. I thought it was you yourself, Joan, who had got the old duffer interested. I was awfully grateful to you. I tried to tell you how grateful when we danced, remember? I went over there that night all primed to bless you, and thank you, for what I supposed, of course, you’d done.”
Joan looked away. She was pale, he noticed, and there were fine lines around her mouth and between her eyes. Nerves. But he had never before seen her destitute of the glow of complacency. It took him aback. “If only I had seen the pictures!” she murmured. “I would have talked them up to Michael. That goes without saying. He’d be the logical person, obviously. But you scarcely mentioned them, Hugh. And then Charlie Frye—the fact of him sponsoring them! That threw me off, naturally. How could I suspect that he’d stumbled on something really good? I was absolutely in the dark. And it was you who kept me there.”
“But I—” Hugh began. He was tempted to remind her how he had brought her “Noon,” the painting which Clare himself, dying, considered his masterpiece, and that she had laughed at it. But he did not want to distress her any more than she was already distressed, and so he hesitated and looked away toward Ariel.
She and the Russian were sitting facing each other on the little gilt sofa before the windows. They were in profile to the room, knee to knee. In fact, Ariel’s hands were palm upwards on the big man’s knees, while his own huge hairy hands held them there. Hugh had no excuse to interfere, for Ariel seemed contented. He caught words now and then from their hurried, eager talk: Gregory Clare ... Clare ... Father ... Gregory ... Genius ... Studio ... Beauty ... Art ... Color ... Sunlight ... Love ... Shells ... Life ... Father ... Shells ... Wind ... Death ... Genius....
Joan smoked cigarettes rapidly, lighting one from another, as Anne sometimes smoked but Joan seldom, and flicked the ashes onto the rug by her chair, for Hugh had neglected to provide her with an ash tray. He remained, with head turned, listening, as she too was listening, to the rough, deep voice mingling with the flattened, clear tones, over by the windows.
“What are you thinking?” Joan asked suddenly, but softly. What she really meant was, “Why don’t you look at me? Listen for my voice, not Ariel’s? You are thinking about me, only me, aren’t you? It would be strange if you weren’t.”
Hugh answered her spoken question dryly. “Beauty and the beast! An obvious and unescapable thought, don’t you agree?”
“Hugh!” She barely moved her lips to whisper the name. But although scarcely breathed, it was heavy with intended significance. He turned to her like a shot. Their eyes met. Hers darkened under his gaze, and the eyelids drooped, while her lips softened, opening just perceptibly. It was the old call, more sudden and direct than usual, and more unexpected, given the time and the place,—but effective. Flame glared against the blackness in Hugh’s suddenly quenched mind. His heart began its obedient thundering gallop....