The Slightest Provocation by Pam Rosenthal

Author:Pam Rosenthal
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2010-03-09T16:00:00+00:00

He’d stayed behind to watch her walk down the footpath. And then to fiddle with his neckcloth, straining to catch his reflection in a windowpane.

She was right. Delicious as the day had been, they wouldn’t be able to continue in this way. Yes, they still enjoyed pretend fancies—and he’d already had some thoughts about the “contrivance” he’d be working up for their next time together.

But he also very much wanted to tell and ask her things. Real things. Trivial things. Cisterns. In the army, he’d known a chap who was an engineer. Interesting to try to explain it to her, though; all quite new.

Was that what happened when you grew up, made a place in the world for yourself?

Years ago when there’d been no other place for them, they’d found each other here in the cottage, away from the world’s gossip, petty rivalries, minor and not so minor injustices. Curious and alert, ignorant and volatile, they’d made a place for themselves where no one knew where to find them. Running, rambling, wrestling—touching, kissing, making love—fleet and changeable as the woodland creatures in the myths.

What, who, were they now?

He shrugged. Time to be getting back; he patted at his waistcoat pockets to make sure he hadn’t left anything behind.

His watch. No longer on the table where he’d left it. Must have gotten knocked off, rolled behind the book that had been peeking out from under the bed. He retrieved the watch and the book too. All the creatures of myth and legend, bound up in a witty, powerful, and thoughtful volume.

Mildewed almost to a brick. But when he did get it open, it opened to the very page.

They’d gotten quite proficient at kissing by that time. Kissing, and in truth, some other things as well. They weren’t children anymore.

Weren’t adults yet either. He needed to make something happen, and so he’d come here early, set the book out on the table.

“Hullo,” she’d said. “Been busy?”

He’d shrugged. “Rather. Bit of a problem with my Latin.”

“Let me see.”

The Tiresius story begins, as Ovid begins so many of his stories, with the gods at celebration. Jupiter is rather in his cups, jesting with his wife, Juno, as to whether . . .

“But you can construe this perfectly well, Kit. You know that what he’s asking is whether a man or woman gets more pleasure . . .” Her voice had trailed off.

“You were saying?”

“Voluptus . . . from making love.”

He’d tricked her into saying it.

“We shouldn’t be talking of such things,” she’d said, even while she’d allowed her wrist to be caught and immobilized.

They’d shared a level, if frightened, stare.

“Yes,” he’d said. “We should. We need to. And to do more than talk. About such things.”

And now, today, it seemed they’d come full circle. Now it was time to talk of everything else.

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