Free Warleggan by Winston Graham Page A

bad knee, you are a patient and I know you well. I know what to do and I do it. And you think that man has confidence. But if I meet you in a drawing -room, you're not a patient but a woman, someone whose moods and manners I've never learned to understand. I don't know the right prescription for gallantry I never had leisure to learn it. I don't know how to flatter you , and if you laugh at me-as you not seldom do - I grow more tongue-tied each minute; and when you sharpen your wits on me, I feel a dullard and a clod. There's the explanation of it all. What I feel for you as a person doesn't waver b etween strength and weakness; it only wavers between hope and despair!'
    She had stopped looking at him and was staring across at the other edge of the glade. The curve of her throat gave him pleasure and pain. As he explained himself he had gained in confidence.
    He said at last: `And you?'
    She smiled a little' and shrugged. 'You want me to answer your question now?'
    `Yes.'
    `Perhaps this is our last meeting, so perhaps I can. Poor Dwight, have I laughed at you so often? Have I shown such perfect confidence and poise? You flatter me, you truly do. What elegance I must display! How graciously I've been taught .. '
    'I wasn't criticising you
    'I'm sure you would not dare, b ut let me explain my self. You say you spent all your time learning to be a physician, and so had no time for the: formal courtesies. I'm sorry for you. Dear, dear, I am. But do you know what I have spent my time learning to be? Why, an heiress, of course.'
    She leaned over on her elbow and looked at him. Her a uburn hair, tied with a ribbon at the back, lay on her shoulder.
    `An heiress must learn all the courtesies. She must learn to draw and paint and play a musical instrument even if she's tone deaf and only, makes horrid noises. She must know French and perhaps a little Latin; she must understand how to carry herself and how to dress and how to ride `and how to
    receive, the compliments of her suitors. The one thing she never learns is anything about the successful marriage she is being prepared for. So you see, dear Dr. Enys, it would not be surprising if she also gave the impression of being two persons and with some h igher justification than you. You say you don't know how to pay compliments to women or how to behave in the, best manner. But at heart you must know women very well. How different in my case. I don't know men at all. I'm expected to be in love at the touch of a hand or at a prettily turned compliment. But until I marry - if my dear uncles have their way - I shall know nothing of what a man is really like.' She paused and straightened up. `From hearsay, I know what happens when people sleep together. It does not sound excessively genteel. One, can take a risk in the gavotte and come to no harm. One should be a little more careful, I fancy, - before choosing a bed partner for the rest of one ’ s days.'
    There was a long silence. The confession had moved Dwight in a new way. It was a new Caroline he suddenly saw - not supremely sure of herself and contemptuous of his efforts to please, but as unsure in her own way as he was, and hiding her unsureness behind a mask of laughter and ridicule He was suddenly no longer infatuated but deeply in love.
    `And Unwi n?'
    `Unwin was a suitor ready-made. He came with all the possi ble, recommendations. And there was no lack of confidence within him, Dwight. He seemed to think I should be flattered at the idea of marrying, a seat in Parliament. Sometimes I caught him looking at me, and then I knew that he was interested in my money first, my body second, but myself, for myself, little at all.'
    `And I?'
    Caroline smiled at him queerly. `It is not very easy to
    say this to your face, is it? When we first met in Bodmin and quarrelled, I thought, there is a man who ... And again when you came to examine my throat. It was not that I liked you, it was that I felt-' She sat up. `No I can't tell you. Let's go.