due darling, when the next book's finished. A bigger one if The Chelsea set sells well'.
'Suppose id does't.'
'Mr Dwight says it will. He ought to know.'
'My uncle would start me at twelve hundred.'
'But,darling how could you come then to St. Tropez'
'Perhaps we'd do better when you come back.'
She said harshly 'I mightn't come back if The Chelsea set sells enough.'
'Oh.'
She looked at me and the party of Japanese gentlemen. She finished her wine. She said, 'Is this a quarrel?'
'No.'
'i've got the title for the next book - The Azure Blue.'
i thought azure was blue.'
She looked at him with disappointment. 'You don't really want to be married to novelist, do you?"
'You aren't one yet.'
'I was born one - Mr Dwight says. My powers of observation...'
'Yes you told me that, but dear, couldn't you observe a bit nearer home? Here in London.'
'i've done that in The Chelsea Set. i don't want to repeat myself.'
The bill had been lying beside them for some time now. He took out this wallet to pay,but she snatched the paper out of his reach. She said 'This is my celebration.'
'What of?.'
'The Chelsea Set of course. Darling, you're awfully decorative, but sometimes- well, you simply don't connect.'
'i'd rather ... if you don't mind ...'
'No darling. this is on me. And Mr. Dwight of course.'
He submitted just as two of the Japanese gentlemen gave tongue simultaneously, then stopped abruptly and bowed to each other, as thought they were blocked in a doorway.
I had thought the two young people matching miniatures, but what a contrast in fact there was.
The same type of prettiness could contain weakness and strength. Her Regency counterpart, I suppose, would have born a dozen children without the aid of anaesthetics, While he would have fallen an easy victim to the first dark eyes in Naples. Would there one day be a dozen books on her shelf? They have to born without an anaesthetic too. i found myself hoping that chelsea Set would prove to be a disaster and that eventually she would take up photographic modelling while he established himself solidly in the wine-trade in St.james's. I didn't like to think for her as the Mrs. Humphrey Ward of her generation-not that would live so long Old age saves us from the realization of a great many fears. I wondered to which publishing firm Dwight belonged. I could imagine the blurb he would have already written about her abrasive power of observation.
There would be a photo, if he was wise on the back of the jacket, for reviewers, as well as publisher, are human, and she didn't look like Mrs.Humphrey Ward.
I could hear them talking while they found their coats at the back of the restaurant. He said, 'I wonder what all those Japanese are do here?'
'Japanese?' She said, 'What Japanese darling? Sometimes you are so evasive I think you don't want to marry me at all.'