Free Beyond paradise by Copyright Paperback Collection (Library of Congress) DLC, Elizabeth Doyle

shoulders, "it is simple truth. My love for you is as true as the glint in your pale eyes, and nearly as powerful as the beauty of your.. . delicate ..." He could not resist a rather crude surveillance of her tall, slim figure. Her delicate what? He could not mention her pert breasts, nor her luscious hips, nor even her minuscule waist. "Your delicate cheek " he said at last.
    His choice of anatomy brought a bright smile to her lips. When Arlette smiled, she seemed to light up the beach more brightly than all of the fiery lamps which steered the path of elaborately dressed courting pairs. "No, I'm not really very pretty," she said, hoping to hear more.
    "But you are," he insisted, touching her blushing cheek. "You are ... a piece of starlight come to earth."
    Arlette had to prevent herself from fidgeting selfconsciously. She did not like having his hand upon her face, for she feared some of her white makeup would come off on his finger, revealing the imperfections of her skin. She feared he would notice the plumpers she wore to make her face look fuller. She feared he would see her for what she was—just a woman, and not a piece of starlight. "I have

    Elizabeth Doyle
    been meaning to ask you something," she began, with a great deal of trepidation.
    "No, no," he said, his long wig of black ringlets dusting his shoulders at the shake of his head, "do not ruin the moment with something so meaningless as speech."
    "But I really wanted to ask—"
    "Life is so full of questions," he said, "and I, but a mortal, have so very few answers."
    Her eyes narrowed a bit. "Well, I think you'll have the answer to this one. I wanted to ask you, why is it that you always want to meet me here, but you never will escort me from home? If my parents knew how I sneak from my bedroom to meet you ... well," she bowed her head, "they would cast me out."
    Etienne winced internally. This again? "Ah, well, you see, I..." Etienne's smile brightened as his thoughts raced. "I... feel that we have a special kind of love."
    She lifted her chin to take a curious peek at his eyes.
    "Yes," he said, "a very special kind of love. The kind where ... where we are beyond mere convention, where we need not pander to trivial rites of passage, where ..."
    "There's a special kind of love in which we don't need to meet one another's family?"
    "Yes, yes. It's the ... the most powerful kind there is. It's the kind that makes soldiers go to battle for a woman, the kind that makes princes betray their thrones, the kind that makes ..."
    ".. . women be sent away to the country to give birth in private?" she speculated. "Etienne, are you married?"
    "Married?" He laughed. "Why ... why .. ." His laughter became exaggerated and loud. "What a silly thing to say!"
    Arlette's eyes narrowed. "I think you are," she said, aghast.
    Etienne grabbed her elbow before she could turn to flee.

    BEYOND PARADISE
    71
    "You have no idea how wrong you are," he told her. "Nothing could be further from the truth"
    Arlette felt tender under his grasp. Though he was a slim man, and not at all a handsome one, with his long, narrow chin and crooked teeth, he had a way of making her feel feminine and beloved. From a distance, she would never have found him so tempting. But the more she had met with him, the more often he had spoken with her and touched her, the more she had become blinded to his looks, and drawn instead to his charm and prowess. She wanted to believe his story. "You're not married?" she asked cautiously, her eyes drooping weakly to the path beneath their feet. Couples were winding around them, trying to avoid the confrontation, trying not to let it interrupt their own romantic evening.
    "Of course not," he laughed. "I am only betrothed."
    She spun around to flee.
    "Wait!" he called, refusing to let go of her elbow. "It is only a marriage, not a funeral. I do not plan to stop meeting other ladies."
    She closed her eyes against impending tears of humiliation, and continued to pull.
    "Hear