"No?" His tone held mockery. "The difficulty is in me. . . . I don't want to want it."
His eyes continued to rest on her in ironic smiling.
"Signorina, what would you do if you wanted a cake, oh, such a beautiful cake, all white icing and lovely sugar outside . . . and within—well, something that was very, very bad for the digestion? Only the first bite would be good, you see. But such a first bite! And you wanted it—because the icing was so marvelous and the sugar so sweet. . . . And if you had wanted that cake a long time, oh, before you knew what a cheating thing it was within, and if you had been denied it and suddenly found it was within your reach——?"
He broke off with a laugh.
Slowly she asked, "And would you have to eat the cake if you took the first bite?"
His voice was harsh. "To the last crumb."
"Then I would not bite."
"But the frosting, Signorina, the pretty pink and white frosting!"
So bitter was his laugh that the girl grew older in understanding. She thought of the girl she had seen by his side in the restaurant, the girl whose eyes had been as blue as the sea and her hair yellow as amber . . . the girl who had angled for Bob Martin's money.
She remembered that Barry Elder had of late inherited some money.