Mrs. van Oudijck had promised to stay at Patjaram a few days longer;
and she disliked the prospect, really not feeling quite at home in
these old-fashioned Indian surroundings. But when Addie appeared
she thought better of it. In the deepest secrecy of her heart this
woman worshipped her sensuality, as in the temple of her egoism:
here the milk-white creole offered up all the most intimate dreams
of her rosy imagination and unquenchable longing; and in this cult
she had achieved as it were an art, a knowledge, a science, that of
deciding, for herself, at a glance, what it was that attracted her
in the man who approached her, in the man who passed her by. In one
it was his bearing, his voice; in another it was the set of his neck
on his shoulders; in a third it was the way his hand rested on his
knee; but, whatever it was, she saw it directly, at a glance; she
knew it immediately, in an instant; she had judged the passer-by
in an indivisible moment; and she at once knew those whom she
rejected--they were the majority--and those whom she approved--they
were many. And the few whom she rejected in that indivisible moment
of her supreme judgement, with that single glance, in that single
instant, need cherish no hope: she, the priestess, did not admit them
to the temple. To the others, the temple was open, but only behind
the curtain of her conventionality. However shameless, she was always
correct, her love was always secret; to the world, she was nothing but
the charming, smiling wife of the resident, a little indolent in her
ways, but winning everybody with her smile. When people did not see
her, they spoke ill of her; when they saw her, she conquered them at
once. Among all of those with whom she shared the secret of her love
there reigned a certain freemasonry, a mystery of worship; scarcely,
when two of them met, would they whisper a word or two, at a similar
recollection. And Léonie could sit smiling, milk-white, tranquil,
in the great circle, around the marble table, with at least two or
three men who knew her secret. It did not disturb her tranquillity nor
mar her smile. She smiled to the pitch of boredom. Scarcely would her
glance glide from one to the other, while she judged them once again,
with her infallible knack of judgement. Scarcely would the memories
of past hours rise hazily within her, scarcely would she think of
the assignation for the following day. The secret lay wholly in
the mystery of the meeting and indeed was never uttered before the
profane world. If a foot in the circle sought to touch her foot, she
drew hers away. She never flirted; she was even sometimes a little
tedious, stiff, correct, smiling. In the freemasonry between herself
and the initiated she disclosed the mystery; but, before the world,
in the circles about the marble tables, she vouchsafed not a glance,
not a pressure of the hand or knee.
She had been bored during these days at Patjaram, for which she had
accepted the invitation to the milling-feast because she had refused
it in past years; but now that she saw Addie approaching she was bored
no longer. Of course she had known him for years; and she had seen
him grow from a child into a boy, into a man; and she had kissed him
even as a boy. She had long ago judged him, the tempter. But now, as
he came forward with his halo of sunshine, she judged him once more:
his comely, slender animalism and the glow of his tempter's eyes
in the dusky brown of his young Moorish face; the pouting curves of
his lips, formed for kissing, with the young down of his moustache;
the tigerish strength and litheness of limbs which Don Juan might have
envied: it all dazzled her, made her blink her eyes. As he greeted his
mother's visitors and sat down, a volley of wordy gaiety ran round
that circle of languid conversation and drowsy thoughts, as though
he were casting a handful of his sunshine, of the gold-dust of his
temptation over them all, over all those women, mother and sisters
and nieces and Doddie and Léonie van Oudijck. Léonie looked at him,
as they all looked at him, and her glance fell upon his hands. She
could have kissed those hands of his; she suddenly became smitten
with the shape of his fingers, with the brown, tigerish strength
of the hands themselves: she suddenly became smitten with all the
young wild-animal vigour which breathed like a fragrance of manhood
from the whole of his boyish frame. She felt her blood throbbing,
almost uncontrollably, despite her great art of remaining cool and
correct in the circles around the marble tables. But she was no longer
bored. She had found an object to fill the next few days. Only ... her
blood throbbed so violently that Theo had noticed her blush and the
quivering of her eyelids. Enamoured of her as he was, his eyes had
penetrated her soul. And, when they rose to go to lunch in the back
verandah, where the babus had been squatting, grinding everybody's
different admixture of spices with pestles, in little stone mortars,
he whispered two words between his teeth:
"Take care!"
She started; she felt that he was threatening her. This had never
happened before: all who had shared in the mystery had always
respected her. She started so violently, she was so indignant at this
wrenching away of the temple-curtain, in a verandah full of people,
that her tranquil indifference seethed with anger and she was roused
to rebellion in her ever-serene self-mastery. But she looked at him and
she saw him broad and tall and fair, a younger edition of her husband,
his Indian blood showing only in his sensuous mouth; and she did not
want to lose him: she wanted to preserve his type beside the type of
the Moorish tempter. She wanted them both; she wanted to taste the
different charm of their respective types, that white-skinned Dutch
type, so very slightly Indian, and Addie's wild-animal type. Her soul
quivered, her blood thrilled, while the long array of dishes was
solemnly handed round. She was in a revolt such as she had never
experienced before. The awakening from her placid indifference
was like a rebirth, like an unknown emotion. She was surprised to
remember that she, at thirty, was feeling for the first time. A
feverish depravity blossomed up within her, as though bursting into
heady crimson flowers. She looked at Doddie, sitting beside Addie:
the poor child, glowing with love, was hardly able to eat.... Oh,
the tempter, who had only to appear!... And Léonie, in this fever of
depravity, rejoiced at being the rival of a step-daughter so many years
younger than herself. She would look after her; she would even warn Van
Oudijck. Would it ever come to a match? What did she care: what harm
could marriage do to her, Léonie? Oh, the tempter! Never had she dreamt
of him thus, the supreme lover, in her rosy hours of siesta! This was
no charm of little cherubs; this was the stark radiance of tigerish
enchantment: the golden glitter of his eyes, the sinewy litheness of
his stealthy paw.... And she smiled at Theo, with just one glance of
self-surrender, a very exceptional thing at the luncheon-table. As
a rule she gave nothing of herself in public. Now she surrendered
herself, for a moment, pleased by his jealousy. She was madly fond
of him too. She thought it delightful, that he should look pale and
angry with jealousy. And round about her the afternoon was one blaze
of sunlight and the hot spices stung her dry palate. Faint beads of
perspiration stood on her forehead and trickled down her bosom under
the lace of her kabaai. And she would fain have clasped them both,
Theo and Addie, in one embrace, in one blending of different lusts,
pressing them both to her amorous woman's body....