No More Dying Then by Rendell Ruth

Author:Rendell, Ruth [Rendell, Ruth]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub, mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

It was just beginning to get light when he awoke to find the other half of the bed empty but still warm. She was sitting by the window, wrapped in her shawl, a big album with gilt clasps open on her lap. He guessed that she was looking, in the first light of dawn, at pictures of her son, and he felt a powerful black jealousy.

For what seemed a long time he watched her, almost hating the child who came between them and drew his mother away with a ghostly subtle hand. She was slowly turning the pages, pausing sometimes to stare downwards with a passionate intensity. A resentment which he knew was totally unjust made him will her to look at him, to forget the child and remember the man who longed to be her lover.

At last she lifted her head and their eyes met. She said nothing and Burden didn’t speak, for he knew that if he did it would be to say cruel indefensible things. They gazed at each other in the pale grey morning light, and then, getting up silently, she drew the curtains. They were of brocade, old and frayed but still retaining their rich plum colour and, filtering through them, the light in the room looked purplish. She dropped the shawl and stood still in this coloured shadow-light so that he might look at her.

Her red hair seemed to have grown purple, but the colour hardly touched her body, which was dazzling white. He gazed at her in a kind of wonder, content for the moment to do nothing but gaze. This ivory woman, still and smiling now, was nothing like his lascivious dream woman, or did she resemble the distraught and weary creature he had comforted to sleep. The child had almost vanished from his jealousy and, he believed, from her thoughts. It was hardly possible to imagine that this exquisite firm body had ever borne a child.

Only a little stabbing doubt remained.

“Not out of gratitude, Gemma,” he said. “Not to reward me.”

She moved then and came close to him. “I never even thought of that. That would be to cheat”

“To forget, then? Is that what you want?”

“Isn’t all love about forgetting?” she said. “Isn’t it always a lovely escape from - from hatefulness?”

“I don’t know.” He put out his arms to her. “I don’t care.” Gasping at the feel of her, here the slenderness and there the swell of flesh, he said breathlessly, “I shall hurt you. I can’t help it, it’s been so long for me.”

“And for me,” she said. “It will be like the first time. Oh, Mike, kiss me, make me happy. Make me happy for a little while . . .”

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