Pushing her hands against his shoulders, she fought to catch her breath:
“My Rud!” she murmured. “My beautiful, glorious Rud!”
Automatically she now wound her arms around his head. He released her as with an effort of will:
“Take off your things,” he said, “and try to get some sleep. I’ll come back later.”
He went away. She undressed and brushed her hair with his brushes, washed her face and dripped into the basin some of the toilet-water which he used. She drew the curtains, behind which the noonday sun shone; and a soft crimson twilight filled the room. And she crept into the great bed and lay waiting for him, trembling. There was no thought in her. There was in her no grief and no recollection. She was filled only with a great expectancy, a waiting for the inevitability of life. She felt herself to be solely and wholly a bride, but not an innocent bride; and, deep in her blood, in the very marrow of her bones, she felt herself to be the wife, the very blood and marrow, of him whom she awaited. Before her, as she lay half-dreaming, she saw little figures of children. For, if she was to be his wife in truth and sincerity, she wanted to be not only his lover but also the woman who gave him his children. She knew that, despite his roughness, he loved the softness of children; and she herself would long for them, in her second married life, as a sweet comfort for the days when she would be no longer beautiful and no longer young. Before her, half-dreaming, she saw the figures of children.... And she lay waiting for him, she listened for his step, she longed for his coming, her flesh quivered towards him.... And, when he entered and came to her, her arms closed round him in profound and conscious certainty and she felt, beyond a doubt, on his breast, in his arms, the knowledge of his virile, over-mastering dominion, while before her eyes, in a dizzy, melancholy obscurity, the dream of her life—Rome, Duco, the studio—sank away....
THE END
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