Rose in the Bud by Susan Barrie Page B

that she could barely thank him for taking the trouble to collect her, and all at once Edouard had become a complete stranger to her, cold, aloof, remorselessly detached, as if it was the simplest thing in the world for him to look upon her suddenly with complete detachment, and put her right out of his life.
    He hadn’t suggested another meeting, and as it was she who had insisted on being brought back from the palazzo she could scarcely blame him for that. But she did blame him for deceiving her about Arlette, and despite his denials it seemed to her reasonably certain that he had had some sort of an affair with her sister, and undoubtedly he must have admired her or he would not have wasted time painting her.
    She did not blame him because he had taken advantage of their brief acquaintance and made a certain amount of love to her. For after kissing her once he had made it quite clear that that was by way of experiment, and not intended to be repeated. It was the inevitable result of drifting for hours in a gondola at a time of night when there was nothing but magic on the waterways, and almost any young woman in such close proximity to a personable man might have felt tempted to allow him to kiss her before they parted.
    For that kiss neither of them was really to blame. But she had known perfectly well that when Edouard took her to his palazzo, and she knew perfectly well—or rather, perhaps, she hoped—that they were to be together again for hours, the possibility that he would kiss her again was rather more than a possibility. In the breathless moment when she walked away and discovered Arlette’s portrait amongst the stacked paintings against the wall she had expected him to follow her and take her back into his arms.
    She had been secretly craving for him to do that, with no real thoughts to spare for the paintings. But instead she had learned the somewhat brutal truth, that he was attracted by her but he didn’t want to become involved with her. He had no desire to become involved with any woman, and he had actually taken her to the palazzo to make that much clear to her. Or so he had said.
    Even after twenty-four hours she felt herself go hot all over when she recalled his exact words.
    “I tried, to make it clear to you last night, but I don’t think you were inclined to believe me. To-day I had every intention of making it clearer still ...”
    The flush was so painful that she felt as if it scorched her skin, and at the same time she felt a little sick as a result of pure humiliation. How obvious he must have thought her, an eager young woman unaccustomed to the romance and glamour of a place like Venice, and certainly quite accustomed to the attentions of someone who looked as Edouard looked, and whose life was lived on an entirely different plane from that which she inhabited herself.
    At first she must have amused him, and then she intrigued him ... perhaps because she reminded him of Arlette! The thought increased the humiliation.
    That a man should be attracted to her because she looked like her sister was like being forced to swallow a bitter pill.
    And then she remembered that she had been as distant as Edouard when they parted. She had been clever enough to conceal what she felt—the shock, and the spreading sensation of dismay—and at least he could not have received the impression that he had done her any serious harm. There had been as much indifference in her face when she turned it towards him as there was in his, and she had even managed to make her voice sound cool and indifferent when she said that final goodbye.
    For, somehow, she did not believe he would seek her out again.
    “Thanks for showing me Venice,” she said, without so much as a tremble in her voice, and with her small chin in the air. “I’m afraid I’ve used up a lot of your time, but at least I’ve seen more in a few days than I might have done on my own if I’d remained for weeks. And having seen so much I think