He frequently analysed the situation; it did no good, but it was natural to him.
Irma had never loved him, if she had, he would have given her love in return, for his nature was responsive and affectionate. As it was, he accepted the fact with gratitude. She had married him for one or other of the unnumbered reasons for which women marry men, any one of which is good enough till after the event.
The friction between their two natures was endless and incurable. It never found vent. It was never openly present, secretly never absent. Legard fell into the habit of taking things as they came, and cultivated the superficial philosophy of indifference....
But now, standing in the sun, watching two closed green shutters, he found that philosophy an imperfect reed to his hand.
CHAPTER II
Early frogs croaked in the Val de Menton, a fragrant acrid whiff of smoke from burning eucalyptus-wood floated up from the unkempt dwellings behind the hotel. The green shutters of the French windows were thrown back, and a girl appeared in the space between. She stood with her head slightly on one side, her hands in front of her, holding in them a branch of roses. As she twisted them to this side, and that, they reflected the sunlight through their pale yellow petals, hearts of orange, and ruddy-stemmed foliage, and gave a suggestion of gipsy colouring to her figure. She poised herself on the threshold of the window, with a little swaying motion like that of a bird upon a twig. Neither tall nor short, she had the indescribable quality of perfect proportion. From the soft, dark brown hair rippling back from her low forehead and drawn over the tip of the tiniest of ears, to the arched instep thrust slightly forward under the folds of some soft, maize-coloured gown, the paramount impression conveyed was that of race—the subtle something which distinguishes the true Arab horse even from the English thoroughbred; the something very old, quite inseparable, ungrafted, which one may see in the purest gipsy types, the purest Arab or Persian; that something which produces an absolute uniformity of line and of “tone.” The oval face in repose was stamped with a look of weariness, almost of sadness, an inherited look—as of one having played a game with fate and lost—which is seen so often in the Eastern, so seldom in the Western face. In the pallor of it was the slightest browning tint, the chance outcome of a long ago gipsy strain.
She smiled as she looked quickly about her with large, soft brown eyes, from under slightly arched, dark brows, and the lines of the mouth curved, and took to themselves two tiny dimples at the corners. There was no trace of the weary look in the face then; it was the very incarnation of light and life, as she sniffed the eucalyptus smoke luxuriously, and stretched like a little cat in the streaming sunshine. She gave a little nod to Giles, and stooped to pat the greyhound’s head pushed up against her dress.
“Dear boy,” she said softly, with the pretty childish lisp she used to her intimate beasts, “Did ’oo want ’oor cake? I’ll get him his cake, Giles.” She turned back into the room, and came out again with two large slices of cake. She laughed while the dog ate them, and looked first at him and then at Giles, with friendly, untroubled eyes.
“Sweet boy! How he loves cake!” she said.
Giles had not moved; he stood with his hands in his pockets, leaning against the wall, and frowning from the sun in his eyes.