13 French Street by Gil Brewer Read Free Book Online

“Admit it.”
    “I won’t admit anything.”
    “Verne told me about you—about how honest you are, to the point of mania, almost. All right, you’re like that. You’re too serious and you’re overhonest. Then you’re probably being tortured right now. You admit it!”
    I hit her. Across the face with the back of my hand. She moved with the blow like a boxer. I hit her again, the heel of my hand bouncing off her cheek.
    “Yes,” she said. “I was right. Do you see now why it was silly to wait? I was going to wait. Take my time. Because I didn’t want to frighten you off. Verne being your friend, and all that rot. Go ahead, hit me again. It won’t change anything.”
    “Only one day,” I said.
    “No. That’s just it, Alex. It isn’t one day. It’s over three years. Two years, anyway, and that’s long enough. Too long.” Something came into her eyes, something like tears, only they couldn’t be tears, and she walked rapidly away down the knoll.
    I watched her cross the creek, then I crossed. She didn’t wait for me until she was nearly through the orchard. Then she waited and we walked through the ankle-deep grass together.
    “Will you take my hand again?” she said softly.
    “No. I won’t take your hand. Now or ever.”
    She looked at me and smiled. “O.K. Straighten out now, Alex. I told you she had eyes like a cat. We’re in sight of the house.”
    • • •
    I closed and locked the door to my room and sat on the bed. I could still taste her lips, feel them, tremulous, surrendering, and offering and giving all at the same time.
    But this wasn’t all of it. I felt this wasn’t all. A kiss—a mere single afternoon kiss. Nothing more?
    God, yes. Too much more always. The all-impending more that lay even beyond imagination.
    As I stripped my clothes off, I realized I was soaked with perspiration. And I knew with a sensation of conscious guilt that the only reason I hadn’t taken Petra out there this afternoon was because she was Verne’s wife. I had wanted her, I wanted her now.
    I had come that close to taking her—beneath the sycamore, on the knoll.
    It was bad enough now. I had to leave. I couldn’t stay on, not with that … And yet, she pushed me away from her.
    “Because—not all at once.”
    I went in and took a shower and shaved and came back to the bedroom. I dressed. I put on a pair of crepe-soled shoes, the same gray flannels, and a clean white shirt. I looked through my shirts. They were all white. I wasn’t a very colorful fellow. Just a guy who had damn near attacked his best friend’s wife. No, not attacked. It wouldn’t have been that. Or would it?
    I was combing my hair when somebody knocked at the door. I opened the door.
    “Hello, Alex. This came for you. It was in the mailbox. I guess nobody looked this morning.”
    It was from Madge. In a white envelope. There was no perfume. Only a faint trace of powder, and a very faint smudge of lipstick where she had dampened the flap with her tongue.
    I felt her hand on my arm.
    “Don’t,” I said.
    “All right.” Her hand went away. She wore a white dress and it fitted like a white glove. With the black of her hair and eyes, and the dark red of her lips, and everything, she was a very beautiful woman.
    “I’m sorry I hit you.”
    “It’s all right. Only swollen a little. See?”
    “I don’t want to see.”
    “All right.”
    “But I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done it.”
    “You were talking to me that way, that’s all. It was the only way you could tell me without committing yourself by voice.”
    “Look out, or I’ll hit you again.” I didn’t smile and neither did she. We looked at each other, then I looked down at the envelope in my hand. I tapped it against my other hand.
    “So her name’s Madge?”
    “Yes.”
    “How nice. Is it too bad you had to meet me?”
    “No. It’s not too bad.”
    “You’re still trying not to admit it.”
    “I’m not trying not to do anything.”
    She smiled now and