Free The Last One Left by John D. MacDonald Page A

fantasy that when he opened his eyes and saw the sleeping face of Francisca Torcedo y Sarmantar resting there in the crook of his arm, a face slender and delicate, marked by a thousand years of pride and breeding, he had the momentary conviction he had taken her by stealth, and should she awaken her eyes would go wide with terror and disgust, and she would sit up, arms across her delicate breasts, and scream and scream and scream.…
    He awoke her. She smiled at him. She stretched luxuriously, held her fist in front of a yawn, craned her head and looked at the clock, then sat up quickly. “Kelleeeee,
querido!
The time!”
    “I know.”
    And he got up sleepily and dressed, and bent over her and kissed her. She ran her fingers through his hair and patted his cheek.
    “Raoul, darling, do you think you can get off early enough to come take me to the Burton movie?”
    “I’ll try.”
    “Doesn’t she look to you—a little fat? Just a little?”
    “Very very fat. You are much better.”
    “You like a woman whose ribs show? You like these poor starved little breasts, like a school girl’s,
mi corazón?
”
    “They, and all parts of you, are an elegance, truly.”
    And now, in the slanting light of sunset, on the shallow porch, he perceived that elegance of her as she leaned against the post, hands in the skirt pockets, ankles crossed. In that convent school, patronizedby the daughters of the rich, they had been taught how to walk, enter a room, how to sit and rise gracefully. This training affected ’Cisca, the housemaid, only when she was in repose, he had noticed. She had somehow acquired the swift saucy walk of the shop girls, the extravagant conversational gestures of the hands, and the overly dramatic facial expressions they seemed to copy from the actresses they saw on television and in the motion pictures.
    No actress, he realized, no matter how dedicated, diligent and skilled, could have immersed herself so totally in a role. One could comprehend it only by accepting the possibility that Francisca had become quite another person. It was as though the top thirty points of intelligence quotient and the top segment of emotional quotient had been lopped off. The trivia of life contented her. She had the unshakeable cheer and happy spirits it was said one could expect when a successful brain operation was undertaken to cure an anxiety neurosis which would not respond to other treatment.
    Raoul Kelly tasted the bitter irony of this present relationship with her. And self-contempt. The government in Washington had wanted to set up a special study and investigation of the dynamics of the politics of poverty in Central and South America, the conditions which germinated seeds of revolt, riot and rebellion. But out of political opportunism the project had been killed in the Senate. Now a large foundation had taken over the project structure. They would base the project in California, and they had written him offering him a position of an importance which surprised him. He would be selecting, training and assigning field investigators, and directing the analysis of their reports.
    He had temporized, asking for more time. A Raoul Kelly could not have dreamed of taking such a position newly wed to the daughter of Don Estebán Torcedo, and could he have done so, her value to his new career would have been inestimable. How would they accept a Raoul Kelly married to a housemaid, very lovely of course,but withal a little cheap, shrill, trivial and a bit vulgar. And with absolutely no interest in his work, nor any comprehension of it. And with a frequent turn of phrase in English which would blanch the cheeks of the foundation types and the academicians.
    The question he kept asking himself was whether or not she had become less important to him now that he had possessed her. But, of course, there was the hidden side of the coin: How important and how necessary had he become to her? It was a question she evaded so completely it was