Stuart’s lips moved. If it were in prayer, then it was prayer of a very perverted form.
And Peter wondered, despairingly, if these were real females, or grotesque fiends sent by the night to torment them. They seemed to her fancy, preternaturally enormous. As never before, she craved now the bruise of Stuart’s lips, hard as iron; the lean, strong grip of his hands; tangible reassurance that he had indeed come back to her. If she could hold him as though he were a child, his head in the crook of her arm, if she could soothe those restless quick-moving limbs of his to a lulled content.... She glanced hopelessly at the two large women eating belated mince-pies from a paper bag. Then, in a low voice, asked Stuart if he had been present at Merle’s wedding. She had read accounts of it in the papers; it had been a magnificent function.
“Yes, I was there; so was the whole diplomatic world, ministerial, ambassadorial——”
“Never mind. Tell me about Jean de Cler.”
“He’s the right sort, I think,” Stuart granted handsomely. “Grey at the temples, distinguished, chivalrous; with that inborn ease of manner which marks the blue blood of the ‘ancien régime’—or something of the kind. He evidently adores Merle, and will spend his life cherishing her.”
“And she? Does she want to be cherished?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “She can’t help liking him—very much, I should say. And she’ll be in the milieu which suits her best. Probably she’ll think of us sometimes, and be tormented—but she was never quite a pirate, you know; she only wore the costume. The wedding-dress suited her better; I’ve never seen anyone look so beautiful.”
“Did you speak to her?”
“For one second I pressed near enough to offer my congratulations.”
“In what form?”