Читать книгу Exile - Warwick Deeping - Страница 14

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Oscar Slade strolled out into the loggia of the Villa of the Flute and looked at the day. It was an immaculate day, one of those crystal mornings with the cypresses motionless as black obelisks, and the sunlight pouring down through the pines and cedars. Slade had his hands in the pockets of his grey flannel trousers, and a smile on his ironic face. He had breakfasted. He had written two pages of his new novel, playfully mordant stuff.

On a straw mat in a corner of the loggia a sandy cat was diligently licking three kittens that had been born two days ago, and Slade stood to watch the toilet. The mother cat’s sandy fur was the colour of red gold, and when Slade spoke to her she took no notice of him, but went on with her licking.

“It’s a hard life, old lady.”

Stooping, he picked up one of the blind children. He held its funny face against his nose, while the cat’s yellow eyes watched. Then she continued her ablutions as though she had complete faith in Slade the man.

Slade replaced the kitten. He was in one of his smiling moods, and his moods were many and variable. There were days when he looked and behaved like an irresponsible boy. At forty-one he could have worn the clothes of one-and-twenty, only he wore them more casually, and with more brim to his hat. His ties had an abandonment. He was both sleek and lean, and out of his brown face eyes of a rather startling blueness looked at life and saw himself in it. He had what Dr. Burt described as “a naked habit of mind.”

He went and stood in the sun, for the sun and the south suited both him and his work; his temperament was not English. His cheeks were rather flat; his lower lip protruded slightly; there was just a suggestion of smeariness about his eyes and his smile. And on this November morning he threw quick, faunlike glances at the world, his own particular world, and his nostrils were sensitive to its freshness. He asked for beauty, and sensuously so, purple juices, blue skies, and in the Villa of the Flute he possessed beauty. It had a history, a poignant, human perfume. A long, low, cream-coloured house with shutters of faded green, it lay in the valley above Tindaro, half concealed among its trees. The garden was unique, and Slade had taken care that it should not be too tidy. Fussiness was too English a virtue. He let things riot, and scramble and foam. Water gushed. There was a pool that reflected the sky and the trees, and was as mutable in its moods as Slade himself. From the loggia you could look down on a little classic open-air theatre surrounded by cypresses. Flowers and flowering shrubs grew as they pleased. The place was both hung with shadows and blazed upon by the sun. It was black and blue and gold.

Slade sat sideways on the balustrade of the narrow terrace, and taking off his hat, let the sun warm his face. He approved of the elder Landor’s attitude to life, but his pose was less sententious. It was better to be amusing than to be sententious. Slade liked digging the English world in the ribs, especially the English world of the hotels, its old colonels and city fathers and naval gentlemen, and those indomitable and lean women who climbed the hills and lunched on a roll, a hard-boiled egg, and a slab of Gruyère cheese. Nor did the world of the hotels approve of Slade. He was a smirking, supercilious, irreverent fellow. It disliked his smile and his clothes and his books. There were occasions when he used scent.

Slade, having sat in the sun for ten minutes, turned his face to the house and called.

“Lotta—Lotta.”

His voice was seductive or ironic when addressing a woman.

“Lotta—I want my stick.”

It was brought him, a little yellow cane that was almost like a switch, suited to his lean brown hands and restless movements. The woman who brought it had one of those impassive Italian faces, and two big black eyes that stared unblinkingly. She was handsome, a dark, sleek cow of a creature, but on this occasion her passivity was sullen. She was the female animal looking mistrustfully at man.

Slade took the stick and made a playful cut at her. The point caught her black skirt, and jerked it slightly to one side. Her face remained expressionless.

“I am going to Tindaro. I shall bring the Signor Frevick back with me to lunch.”

“The one who drinks a great deal.”

“Is that all that you can remember about him?”

Her stare seemed to relax for a moment.

“They all drink, but not so much as that one.”

Slade flicked at a fly which had settled on the balustrade.

“Pagan creature. For Mr. Frevick it had better be whisky. Whisky, Lotta, whisky.”

She said with her air of sullen passivity, “I understand.”