Ice - Anna Kavan [53]
The full skirt swirling, a silky shimmer like moonlight on violets; the bright, heavy hair swinging, scintillating with violet highlights. I followed, touched her hair with the tips of my fingers, felt it ripple with life. Her arms had a soft satin sheen, the skin smooth and scented, a chain of violets round the thin wrist. I put my arms round her and kissed her neck. Instantly her whole body tensed in violent resistance, she twisted herself away. 'Don't touch me! I don't know how you have the nerve. . . .' Her voice seemed to fail on the edge of tears, then rose again thinly: 'Well, what are you waiting for? Why don't you go? And don't come back this time. I never want to see you again, or be reminded of you!' She pulled off her watch and a ring I had given her, flung them wildly in my direction; began trying to unfasten her necklace, hands at the back of her head, the raised arms giving her slight body a hint of voluptuousness it did not really possess. With an effort I refrained from embracing her again, pleaded with her instead. 'Don't be so angry. Don't let's part like this. You must know how I've felt about you all this time. You know how I've always followed you, forced you to come with me. But you've said so consistently that you hated me, wanted nothing to do with me, that I've finally had to believe you.' I was only being half honest, and knew it. Tentatively I took her hand; it was stiff, unresponsive, but she did not take it away, let me go on holding it while she gazed at me fixedly. With doubt, criticism, accusation her eyes rested . . . serious, innocent, shadowed eyes; the hand behind her head still engaged with the necklace; the glittering hair, the scent of violets, close to my hand; then the grave voice. . . . 'And if I hadn't said those things, would you have stayed with me?'
This time it seemed important to speak the whole truth: but I could not be certain what that was, and in the end, the only true words seemed to be: 'I don't know.'
Immediately she became furious, tore her hand out of mine; the other hand tugged at the chain round her neck, broke it, beads shot all over the room. 'How can you be so utterly heartless—and so brazen about it! Anyone else would be ashamed . . . but you . . . you don't even pretend to have any feelings . . . it's too horrible, hateful . . . you simply aren't human at all!' I was sorry, I had not wanted to hurt her: I could understand her indignation, in a way. There seemed nothing that I could say. My silence enraged her still more. 'Oh, go on! Go away! Go!' She turned on me suddenly, pushed me with a force for which I was unprepared, so that I stumbled back, ran my elbow into the door. It was painful, and I asked in annoyance: 'Why are you so anxious to get me out of the room? Are you expecting somebody else? The owner of that open car you were in?' 'Oh, how I loathe and despise you! If only you knew how much!' She pushed me again. 'Get out, can't you? Go, go, go!' She took a deep breath, lunged at me, started pounding my chest with her fists. But the effort was too much, she abandoned it at once and leant against the wall, her head drooping. I saw that her shadowed face looked bruised by emotion, before the bright hair swung forward, concealing it. There was a brief pause, long enough for me to feel a chilly sensation creep over me; the adumbration of emptiness, loss ... of what life would be like without her.
Action was needed to drive away this unpleasant feeling. I put my hand on the door knob, and said, 'All