Then, when the band started to pluck voluptuously at the heart-strings with Einmal kommt der Tag, he turned for the first time to Judith, crying:
‘We’ll dance to it, Judith.’ He jumped up. ‘What a tune! We’ll express our sentimentality.’
Mamma’s rasping little laugh of amusement sounded in her ears as she rose and followed him.
He put an arm closely round her and murmured:
‘Come on now. Perform! Perform!’—and they went gliding, pausing and turning round the empty floor, while everyone stared and the band smilingly played up to them. The rhythm of their bodies responded together, without an error, to the music’s broken emotionalism.
‘Once, Julian, you refused to dance with me.’
‘Ah, you were a little girl then. It would have been no use. Et maintenant, n’est-ce-pas, la petite est devenue femme? We shall get on very well.
After a silence he said:
‘You wear beautiful clothes. You carry yourself to perfection. You have an air.... There is nobody in this room to touch you. What are you going to do with it all?’
‘Oh, exploit it, exploit it!’