Certainly she was young enough (she said to herself) to
draw the eyes of those who cared for youth and beauty. There was not a
grey hair in the dark brown of her head, there was not a wrinkle--yes,
there were two at the corners of her mouth, which told the story of her
restlessness, of her hunger for the excitement of which she had been
deprived all these years. To go back to Cadiz?--oh, anywhere, anywhere,
so that her blood could beat faster; so that she could feel the stir of
life which had made her spirit flourish even in the dangers of the far-
off day when Gonzales was by her side.
She looked at her guitar. She was sorry she could not take that away
with her. But Jean Jacques would, no doubt, send it after her with his
curse. She would love to play it once again with the old thrill; with
the thrill she had felt on the night of Zoe's birthday a little while
ago, when she was back again with her lover and the birds in the gardens
of Granada. She would sing to someone who cared to hear her, and to
someone who would make her care to sing, which was far more important.
She would sing to the master-carpenter. Though he had not asked her to
go with him--only to meet in a secret place in the hills--she meant to do
so, just as she once meant to marry Jean Jacques, and had done so.
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