Loving - Henry Green [81]
He followed after. 'I don't know,' he said, 'but I gave you a bit of a start. I saw.' 'Oh these jugs,' she began, 'they will tarnish. And when we're shorthanded like we are.' 'You give'm to me in the morning an' I'll rub'm up for you.' 'Not if you set Albert to it I won't.' 'Where did you get that notion?' he enquired. He was looking at her as he usually did nowadays, like a spaniel dog. 'I move around,' she answered. 'No. What I do for you I do for you,' he announced. 'Who'd you take me for?' 'Take you for? You're not so easily mistaken for anyone.' 'Just now,' he explained, 'you thought I was someone else.' 'You do want to know a great deal.' She was smiling. They stood close to each other. Then she reached up to finger a button on his coat. She poked at it as though at a bell. He did not seem to dare touching her. 'I'll have to be on hand each time you come up that's all,' he said. 'But what about your work?' 'Only when it's like now, when there's none of us about dear,' he appealed. 'You are silly,' she replied and gave him a quick kiss. 'But did he ever?' he asked still rigid. 'See here,' she said, 'you may have your Albert to do everything for you but I've not, I'm on my own.' She crossed over to the bed. 'Look,' she said. She took a black silk transparent nightdress out of its embroidered case. 'What d'you say to that Charley?' He gazed, obviously struck dumb. She held it up in front of her. She put a hand in at the neck so that he could see the veiled skin. He, began to breathe heavy. 'It's wicked that's all,' he announced at last while she watched. 'What?' she echoed. 'Not more than it was with mam'selle surely?' 'Ow d'you mean Edie?' ' "There's many a time I'd give her a long bong jour,"' she quoted. 'I never,' he said and took a step forward. 'That's you men all over,' she went on. 'Her?' he protested. He had gone quite white. 'Why you're crackers. That two pennorth of French sweat rag?' 'Now you're being disgustin' dear.' 'I can't make you out,' he said coming towards her. 'No,' she cried, 'you stop where you are. I'm goin' to punish you. What d'you say if we took this for when we are married? How would I look eh Charley?' And she held that nightdress before her face. 'Punishment eh?' he laughed. If it had been a spell then he seemed to be out of it for the moment. That's all you girls think of. Why holy Moses,' he added as if trying to appear gay, 'that piece of cobweb ain't for us.' 'Don't you reckon I'd look nice in it then?' She lowered the nightdress till he could see she was pouting. 'You'd appear like a bloody tart,' he said, then broadly smiled. She stamped her foot. 'Don't you swear at me of all people Charley. ' 'O. K.,' he said. 'Why,' she went on, returning to the charge, 'not above a minute or two ago you were puffin' like a grampus.' 'What's a grampus honey?' he asked and looked a bit daunted. 'Wouldn't you like to know?' she teased him. 'I can't make out why you want all this mystification,' he said. 'Honest you've got me so I'm anyhow.' 'An' so you should be Charley dearest.' 'Oh Edie,' he gasped moving forward. The room had grown immeasurably dark from the storm massed outside. Their two bodies flowed into one as he put his arms about her. The shape they made was crowned with his head, on top of a white sharp curved neck, dominating and cruel over the blur that was her mass of hair through which her lips sucked at him warm and heady. 'Edie,' he muttered breaking away only to drive his face down into hers once more. But he was pressing her back into a bow shape. 'Edie,' he called again. With a violent shove and twist she pushed him off. As she wiped her mouth on the back of a hand she remarked as though wondering, 'You aren't like this first thing are you?' This must have been a reference to the fact that when she called him with a cup of tea in the mornings he never kissed her then as he lay in bed. Or he must have understood it as such because, standing as he was like he had been drained of blood, he actually moaned. 'Why,' he said, 'that wouldn't be right.' 'Don't you love me in the early hours