The Magus - John Fowles [89]
locked for a strange few moments in a more serious look. It must have been transparently excited on my side. She looked so young, so timidly naughty. She gave an embarrassed yet mischievous smile, as if she should not have been there, had risked impropriety. "Has Neptune cut your tongue off?" "You look so ravishing. Like a Renoir." She moved a little further away, and twirled her _ombrelle_. I slipped into my beachshoes and, towelling my back, caught her up. "I prefer you without the silver bow." She raised a finger to her lips, banning the subject, then smiled with a sort of innocent sideways slyness; she had a remarkable gift for creating and diminishing distance by an intonation, a look. She sat down on a low projecting piece of rock that was overshaded by a pine tree, where the precipitous gulley ran down to the shingle; then closed her sunshade and pointed with it to a stone beside her, a little away from her, in the sun, where I was to sit. But I spread my towel on the rock and sat beside her in the shade. I thought how ridiculous it really was to pretend that she was in some way "psychic"; the moist mouth, the down on her bare forearms, a scar above her left wrist, her slim neck, her loose hair, an animated glance she turned to give me. "You're the most deliciously pretty girl I've ever seen." "Am I?" I had meant it; and I had also meant to embarrass her, But she simply widened her smile and stared back at me, and I was the one who eventually looked down. "Do we still have to... keep to the rules?" "If you want me to sit with you." "Who's the other girl?" "What other girl?" Her innocence was charming; no natural and so false; an irresistible invitation to take nothing seriously. "When am I going to meet your brother?" Her prettily lashed eyes flickered modestly down and sideways. I hope you did not venture to think he was really my brother?" "I ventured to think all sorts of things." She sought my meaning, for a moment held my eyes, then bit her lips. For no reason at all I began to feel less jealous. "Wouldn't you like to bathe?" "No. I cannot swim." "I could teach you. It's very easy." "Thank you. I do not like sea water." Silence. She shifted a pebble with her shoe. It was a pretty buttoned shoe of grey kid over a white silk stocking, but very old-fashioned. The hem of her dress came within three of four inches of her ankles. Her hair blew forward, clouding her face a little. I wanted to brush it back. "You speak like a Scandinavian sometimes." "Yes?" "'I cannot swim.' 'I do not like.'" "What should I say?" "I can't swim. I don't like." She made a little pout, then put on a very creditable foreign accent. "Does it mattair eef I am not Eenglish?" Then she smiled like the Cheshire Cat; disappearing behind her humour. "Does it matter if you tell me who you really are?" "Give me your hand. I will read your fortune. You may sit a little closer, but you must not wet my dress." I gave her my hand. She held it tightly by the wrist and traced the palmistry lines with the forefinger of her free hand. I was able to see the shape of her breasts at the bottom of the opening in her dress, very pale skin, the highly caressable beginning of soft curves. It was strange; she managed to suggest that this hackneyed sexgambit--one I had used myself on occasion--was rather daring, mama-defying. Her fingertip ran innocently yet suggestively over my palm. She began to "read." "You will have a long life. You will have three children. At about forty years old you will nearly die. You are quite sensitive, but you are also very treacherous. There are... there are many treacheries in your life. Sometimes you betray yourself. Sometimes you betray those who love you." "Why do I betray?" She looked seriously up at me. "The palm says what is. Not why it is." "Can I read yours?" "I have not finished. You will never be rich. Beware of horses, strong drink and old women. You will make love to many girls, but you will love only one, and you will marry her and be very happy." "In spite of nearly dying at forty." "Because you nearly die at forty. Here