‘Rosalie,’ he said, half questioningly. Then he turned his cheek against the pillow like a contented child, and she saw that the look of strain had gone.

Alison stood there motionless for a long time, until she became aware of the iciness of the floor against her bare feet.

She crept back to bed, and lay for a while watching the moonlight slowly travelling over Julian. Then presently she pulled the bed-clothes over her head, so that he shouldn’t hear her crying.

CHAPTER VII

WHEN Alison woke next morning, Julian was evidently already up and dressed, for she was alone.

She looked round a little bewilderedly, slowly taking in the scene once more: the cold sunlight showing up the threads in the worn carpet, the picture of the cheerful young martyr smiling with the same fixed air of enjoyment, the brand-new suitcase labelled ‘Mrs. J. Tyndrum’, the unfamiliar masculine things on the narrow dressing-table, the tumbled bed where her husband had slept last night and dreamt of another girl.

Alison bit her lip. They were all like things in a stage drama. And she herself, she supposed, was the heroine of the drama.

She didn’t feel much like a heroine. Heroines were supposed to be courageous, and she didn’t feel courageous a bit. All she wanted to do was to press her face into the pillow and forget that the problem of living existed.

But one couldn’t get out of it that way, of course, and presently she got up and dressed and went downstairs.

‘Your husband’s out at the back there, talking to my boy Sam,’ the woman told her. ‘Did you sleep well?’

‘Yes, thank you,’ Alison said, not very thoughtfully, and she went out through the open doorway into the big yard. She wondered if she would ever get quite used to hearing Julian called ‘your husband.’

He was standing talking to a countrified young man who, presumably, was ‘Sam’. Julian was laughing a little at something that was being said, and Alison thought wistfully that he was really terribly handsome like that, with his head thrown back and those curiously light grey eyes of his narrowed against the sunlight.

Then he saw her, and immediately he held out his hand, with a smile which made her feel less isolated.

Alison came to his side, and he introduced her to Sam, who touched his cap.

‘Honeymoonin’, aren’t you?’ he said with an indulgent grin.

‘Yes, we are-honeymooning,’ agreed Julian calmly, and -perhaps as supporting evidence-he transferred his arm to Alison’s waist and drew her a little against him.

It made her feel happy and hurt all at once, and she remained perfectly silent while Sam and Julian talked a few minutes longer about farming in general.

‘If you like to go and have a look round, sir, you’re very welcome,’ Sam said. ‘I can’t come myself just now, but you go through that gate there. Breakfast’ll not be ready for. another ten minutes, I dare say.’

Julian thanked him and turned away with his arm still round Alison.

‘I think Sam’s nice,’ remarked Alison as they came out at the side of a field which stretched away in rain-soaked greenness to a row of bare trees, standing like skeletons against the November sky.

Julian looked amused. ‘Is that his name? How do you know?’

‘His mother told me.’

‘Oh. Yes, he seems a very good sort.’

Presently he said, ‘You’re not catching cold in this thin thing, are you?’ And he gently felt the sleeve of her suit.

"Oh, no.’ It was nice to have him concerned about her. ‘Did you sleep well, Julian?’ That came out a little shyly.

‘Extraordinarily well, thank you.’ He spoke rather as though the fact surprised him. ‘And you?’

‘Yes, thank you,’ Alison said quickly, not liking to think of how she had lain awake, and what had happened.

‘I thought so. You were already asleep when I came up, weren’t you?’

She didn’t say anything for a moment, and he said again, ‘Weren’t you?’

‘N-not quite.’

‘Not?’ He stopped, and turned her gently towards him. Alison blushed then, and at that he laughed softly.

‘Little Alison, I think you are the kindest and most tactful person I know.’ And he bent his head and kissed her with extraordinary sweetness.

‘Julian!’ It was so entirely unexpected that she couldn’t even kiss him back again, and, to her dismay, she felt the tears come into her eyes.

‘Why, my dear, what is it?’ he was slightly amused still, she knew, but there was a sort of half-startled tenderness too.

‘Nothing,’ she managed to get out.

‘But there is something. What is it? Don’t you like me to kiss you?’

‘Oh, yes. It’s only-’ Her voice dropped suddenly to a whisper. ‘It-it’s the first time you’ve ever done it, and- and-’ Her voice quivered into silence.

He remained perfectly still while she was speaking. Then he quietly finished her sentence for her.

‘-and with you it’s an actual need to have someone kind and affectionate, even if it’s only your official husband. Is that it?’

‘S-something like that,’ stammered Alison, tightening her hand nervously on his.

The next moment she was drawn right into his arms, and he was kissing her, first on her cheeks and then on her mouth.

‘Oh, Julian,’ she said again, and she gave him a long, sweet kiss in answer.

‘Does the bruise hurt less now?’ he asked softly.

‘Yes, thank you,’ whispered Alison very shyly.

He didn’t say any more after that, and presently they went back to the house for breakfast.

Alison enjoyed her breakfast. She enjoyed everything to do with this cold, bright November morning. It was a strange world, an exciting world-almost a beautiful world, even if she were on her honeymoon with a man who wanted another girl.

After breakfast, it seemed that fresh supplies of petrol had arrived, and they were free to go on their way.

‘I’m quite sorry to leave here,’ Alison said as she watched Julian put their cases into the car once more. She felt absurdly that no place would ever be so dear or exciting again.

Julian smiled and said, ‘Yes. It hasn’t been bad, after all.’ But he didn’t, of course, suggest anything so silly as their staying.

They drove nearly all day, and at night they stopped at one of the big luxury resorts on the Devonshire coast.

Julian seemed very anxious that she should have everything possible to make up for the spartan-like simplicity of the first day of their honeymoon; and, without consulting her, he engaged a spacious luxury suite at the best hotel.

Alison made no comment about it, but as she lay awake in her big, well-sprung bed that night, she thought wistfully of the cold, bare room she had shared with him the night before. And she thought she would willingly have exchanged the luxury here for the quiet, even sound of Julian’s breathing-even if he were dreaming of Rosalie.

‘I put through a call to Simon last night,’ Julian told her at breakfast next morning. ‘He sent you his love.’

‘Did he?’ Alison knew it was all quite lightly meant, and that Julian himself attached no significance to it, but, for some reason, it displeased her.

‘He had heard from Buenos Aires.’ Julian spoke without much expression.

‘Oh, yes?’ Her own small annoyance was forgotten in concern for him.

‘There doesn’t seem to be any chance of our going out there, Alison,’ he said with rather elaborate indifference.

‘Oh, Julian, I’m so sorry.’

‘Never mind.’ He set his mouth. ‘It’s no good kicking against the inevitable.’ But she saw that his eyes looked tired, and she guessed he had lain awake last night, thinking -of what?

Of Rosalie, she supposed. Waking or sleeping, he thought of Rosalie. And now they were to live in the same place, to meet her everywhere.

Alison felt suddenly that it wasn’t much good fighting any more. Fate or chance, or whatever it was, had her beaten.