I remember one day coming in and finding them playing cards together.
Father had that look on his face which always frightened me—that intent expression which made his eyes glow like blue fires; there was a faint pink colour in his cheeks, and as I came in he scarcely looked up.
Roc got up from his chair, but I could see that he shared my father’s feeling for the game. I felt very uneasy as I thought: So he’s a gambler too.
” Favel won’t want to interrupt the game,” said my father. I looked into Roc’s eyes and said coldly: ” I hope you aren’t playing for high stakes.”
” Don’t worry your head about that, my dear,” said Father. ” He’s determined to lure the lire from my pockets,” added Roc, his eyes sparkling.
” I’ll go and get something to eat,” I told them, and went into the kitchen.
I shall have to make him understand Father can’t afford to gamble, I told myself.
When we sat over the meal my father was jubilant, so I guessed he had won.
I spoke to Roc about it the next day at the beach. ” Please don’t encourage my father to gamble. He simply can’t afford it.”
” But he gets so much pleasure from it,” he replied. ” Lots of people get pleasure from things that aren’t good for them.”
He laughed. ” You know, you’re a bit of a martinet.”
” Please listen to me. We’re not rich enough to risk losing money that has been so hard to come by. We live here very cheaply, but it’s not easy. Is that impossible for you to understand?”
” Please don’t worry, Favel,” he said, putting his hand over mine.
” Then you won’t play for money with him any more?”
” Suppose he asks me? Shall I say, I decline the invitation because your strong-minded daughter forbids us?”
” You could do better than that.” He looked pious. ” But it wouldn’t be true.” I shrugged my shoulders impatiently. ” Surely you can find other people to gamble with. Why do you have to choose him?” He looked thoughtful and said: “I suppose it’s because I like the atmosphere of his studio.” We were lying on the beach and he reached out and turned me towards him. Looking into my face he went on; “I like the treasures he has there.”
It was in moments like this when I believed his feelings matched my own. I was elated and at the same time afraid I should betray too much. So I stood up quickly and walked into the sea; he was close behind me.
” Don’t you know, Favel,” he said, putting his arm round my bare shoulder, ” that I want very much to please you?”
I had to turn and smile at him then. Surely, I thought, the look he gave me was one of love.
We were happy and carefree when we swam, and later, as we lay in the sun on the beach, I felt once more that supreme happiness which is being in love.
Yet two days later I came in from the market and found’ them sitting at the card table. The game was finished but I could see by my father’s face that he had lost and by Roc’s that he had won. I felt my cheeks flame and my eyes were hard as I looked into Roc’s face. I said nothing but went straight into the kitchen with my basket. I set it down angrily and to my dismay found my eyes full of tears. Tears of fury, I told myself, because he had made a fool of me. He was not to be trusted. This was a clear indication of it; he promised one thing and did another.
I wanted to rush out of the studio, to find some quiet spot away from everyone where I could stay until I was calm enough to face him again.
I heard a voice behind me: ” What can I do to help?”
I turned and faced him. I was grateful that the tears had not fallen.
They were merely making my eyes look more brilliant, and he should not guess how wretched I was.
I said shortly: ” Nothing. I can manage, thank you.”
I turned back to the table and then I felt him standing close to me; he had gripped my shoulders and was laughing.
He put his face close to my ear and whispered: “I kept my promise, you know. We didn’t play for money.”
I shook him off and went to a drawer of the table which I opened and rummaged in without knowing for what.
” Nonsense,” I retorted. ” The game wouldn’t have meant a thing to either of you if there’d been no stakes. It isn’t that you enjoy playing cards. It’s win or lose. And of course you c both think that you’re going to win every time. It seems absurdly childish to me. One of you has to lose.”
” But you must understand that I kept my promise.”
” Please don’t bother to explain. I can trust my eyes you know.”
“We were gambling . certainly. You’re right when you said it wouldn’t interest us if we were not. Who do you think won this time?”
” I have a meal to prepare.”
” I won this.” He put his hand in his pocket and drew out the statuette.
Then he laughed. ” I determined to get it by fair means or foul.
Fortunately it turned out to be fair. So you see I kept my promise to you, I had my gamble, and I own this delightful creature. “
” Take the knives and forks’ for me, will you please?” I said. He slipped the statue into his pocket and grinned at me. ” With the greatest pleasure.”
The next day he asked me to marry him. At his suggestion we had climbed the steep path to the Grotto of Matromania. I had always thought it the least exciting of the grottoes and the Blue, Green, Yellow and Red or the Grotto of the Saints were all more worth a visit, but Roc said he had not seen it and wanted me to take him there.
” A very appropriate spot,” he commented when we reached it. I turned to look at him and he caught my arm and held it tightly.
“Why?” I asked.
” You know,” he replied.
But I was never sure of him—not even at this moment when he regarded me with so much tenderness.
” Matromania,” he murmured.
” I’d heard that this was dedicated to Mittiromania known as Mithras,” I said quickly because I was afraid of betraying my feelings. ” Nonsense,” he replied. ” This is where Tiberius held his revels for young men and maidens. I read it in the guidebook. It means matrimony because they married here.”
” There seem to be two opinions then.”
” Then we’d better give it another reason for its importance. It’s the spot where Petroc Pendorric asked Favel Farington-‘to marry him and where she said …”
He turned to me and in that moment I was certain he loved me as passionately as I loved him.
There was no need for me to answer.
We went back to the studio; he was elated and I was happier than I had ever been before.
Father was so delighted when we told him the news that it was almost as though he wished to get rid of me. He refused to discuss what he would do when I had gone, and I was terribly worried until Roc told me that he would insist on his accepting an allowance. Why shouldn’t he from his own son-in-law? He’d commission some pictures if that would make it easier. Perhaps that would be a good idea. ” We’ve lots of bare wall space at Pendorric,” he added.
And for the first time I began to think seriously about the place which would be my home; but although Roc was always ready to talk of it in general, he said he wanted me to see it and judge for myself. If he talked to me too much I might imagine something entirely different and perhaps be disappointed—though I couldn’t believe I could be disappointed in a home I shared with him.
We were very much in love. Roc seemed no longer a stranger. I felt I understood him. There was a streak of mischief in him and he loved to tease me. ” Because,” he told me once, ” you’re too serious, too old-fashioned in many ways to be true.”