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“I am thinking of those Germans.” She laughed too —
quietly and indifferently, as happy people do at trifles that do
not concern them. They had passed the Forum in the morning
and sat down a moment on the high pedestal of the Focas pillar,
talking in whispers. Beneath them lay the crumbled ruins,
gilded by the sun, and small black tourists rambled among the
stones. A newly married German couple were walking by
themselves, seeking solitude in the midst of the crowd of
travellers. He was fair and ruddy of face, wore knickerbockers
and carried a kodak, and read to his wife out of Baedeker.
She was very young, plump, and dark, with the inherited stamp
of hausfrau on her smooth, floury face. She sat down on a
tumbled pillar, posing to her husband, who took a snapshot of
her. And the two who sat above, under the Focas pillar, whispering
of their love, laughed, heedless of the fact that they were
sitting above the Forum Romanum.
“Are you hungry?” asked Helge.
“No; are you?”
“No — but do you know what I should like to do?”
“Well?”
“I should like to go home with you and have supper. What
do you say to that?”
“Yes, of course.”
They walked home arm in arm through small side streets.
In her dark staircase he drew her suddenly to him, and kissed
her with such force and passion that her heart began to beat
violently. She was afraid, and at the same time angry with
herself for being so, and whispered in the dark: “My darling,”
to prove to herself that she was calm.
“Wait a moment,” whispered Helge, when she was going to
light the lamp, and he kissed her again. “Put on the geisha-dress;
you look so sweet in it. I will sit on the balcony while
you change.”
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