阳光下的罪恶10

Three

Rosamund Darnley and Kenneth Marshall sat on the short springy turf of the cliff overlookingGull Cove². This was on the east side of the island. People came here in the morning sometimes tobathe when they wanted to be peaceful.

Rosamund said:

“It’s nice to get away from people.”

Marshall murmured inaudibly:

“M—m, yes.”

He rolled over, sniffing³ at the short turf.

“Smells good. Remember the downs at Shipley?”

“Rather.”

“Pretty good, those days.”

“Yes.”

“You’ve not changed much, Rosamund.”

“Yes, I have. I’ve changed enormously.”

“You’ve been very successful and you’re rich and all that, but you’re the same old Rosamund.”

Rosamund murmured:

“I wish I were.”

“What’s that?”

“Nothing. It’s a pity, isn’t it, Kenneth, that we can’t keep the nice natures and high ideals thatwe had when we were young?”

“I don’t know that your nature was ever particularly nice, my child. You used to get into themost frightful⁴ rages. You half-choked me once when you flew at me in a temper.”

Rosamund laughed. She said:

“Do you remember the day that we took Toby down to get water rats?”

They spent some minutes in recalling old adventures.

Then there came a pause.

Rosamund’s fingers played with the clasp of her bag. She said at last:

“Kenneth?”

“Um.” His reply was indistinct. He was still lying on his face on the turf.

“If I say something to you that is probably outrageously⁵ impertinent will you never speak to meagain?”

He rolled over and sat up.

“I don’t think,” he said seriously, “that I would ever regard anything you said as impertinent.

You see, you belong.”

She nodded in acceptance of all that last phrase meant. She concealed⁶ only the pleasure it gaveher.

“Kenneth, why don’t you get a divorce from your wife?”

His face altered. It hardened—the happy expression died out of it. He took a pipe from hispocket and began filling it.

Rosamund said:

“I’m sorry if I’ve offended you.”

He said quietly:

“You haven’t offended me.”

“Well then, why don’t you?”

“You don’t understand, my dear girl.”

“Are you—so frightfully fond of her?”

“It’s not just a question of that. You see, I married her.”

“I know. But she’s—pretty notorious.”

He considered that for a moment, ramming⁷ in the tobacco carefully.

“Is she? I suppose she is.”

“You could divorce her, Ken¹.”

“My dear girl, you’ve got no business to say a thing like that. Just because men lose their headsabout her a bit isn’t to say that she loses hers.”

Rosamund bit off a rejoinder. Then she said:

“You could fix it so that she divorced you—if you prefer it that way.”

“I dare say I could.”

“You ought to, Ken. Really, I mean it. There’s the child.”

“Linda?”

“Yes, Linda.”

“What’s Linda to do with it?”

“Arlena’s not good for Linda. She isn’t really. Linda, I think, feels things a good deal.”

Kenneth Marshall applied⁸ a match to his pipe. Between puffs⁹ he said:

“Yes—there’s something in that. I suppose Arlena and Linda aren’t very good for each other.

Not the right thing for a girl perhaps. It’s a bit worrying.”

Rosamund said:

“I like Linda—very much. There’s something—fine about her.”

Kenneth said:

“She’s like her mother. She takes things hard like Ruth did.”

Rosamund said:

“Then don’t you think—really—that you ought to get rid of Arlena?”

“Fix up a divorce?”

“Yes. People are doing that all the time.”

Kenneth Marshall said with sudden vehemence¹⁰:

“Yes, and that’s just what I hate.”

“Hate?” She was startled.

“Yes. Sort of attitude to life there is nowadays. If you take on a thing and don’t like it, then youget yourself out of it as quick as possible! Dash it all, there’s got to be such a thing as good faith.

If you marry a woman and engage yourself to look after her, well it’s up to you to do it. It’s yourshow. You’ve taken it on. I’m sick of quick marriage and easy divorce. Arlena’s my wife, that’sall there is to it.”

Rosamund leaned forward. She said in a low voice:

“So it’s like that with you? ‘Till death do us part?’”

Kenneth Marshall nodded his head.

He said:

“That’s just it.”

Rosamund said:

“I see.”

 

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