Paradise Found by Dorothy Vernon Page B

napkin, transferring one to his plate and covering it with a large portion of the preserve. This task done, he inquired lazily, ‘What were you thinking about earlier to put that look on your face?’
    â€˜What look?’ she asked carefully, feeling a painful prickling in her cheeks.
    â€˜Before I made my presence known you were lost to the world—just staring as if you’d never seen a blade of grass, a tree, or a flower before.’
    She smiled, softening toward him. For a moment she’d thought he was referring to the way she had looked at him. There must have been some kindness in him that he had mentioned one and not the other. ‘It’s as if I never have seen any of those things before, at least not in their true perspective. I don’t quite know how to put. this, but a kind of wonder hit me, as if . . .’ Her brow furrowed in concentration. ‘Perhaps this sounds crazy. I’ve never been in a hospital and had a serious operation, the kind you don’t know if you’re going to come out of in one piece or not. But every morning when I wake up I have to rush out and stand on this balcony. The feeling I get is as though I’ve just come out of a deep anesthetic which I went into not knowing if I would ever see this lovely world clearly again, and when I come out I appreciate it more than ever, and it’s better than ever. I rub the blur of sleep from my eyes and I can’t believe the clarity of things, the brilliance of the colors and the sharpness of the focus. Can you understand at all what I’m getting at?’
    She couldn’t understand why it was important for him to know what she meant any more than she understood why the silence before he answered was like a cold finger touching her heart. There were many kinds of silences. Thinking silences. Golden sharing silences. Silences that hummed as sweetly as a song. And ominous silences that carried some deep dread warning. And no silence she had ever encountered before had been as ominous as this one.
    â€˜Yes, I do.’ The warmth on his face was replaced by bitter understanding. For a moment, a moment so brief that she could have imagined it and probably had, because she couldn’t think what she had said to put him out, his face was a carved mask, except for the living pain in his eyes. His heavy lids dropped. When they lifted he was wearing another mask, one that was all too familiar. He had on the mocking, taunting look which she had come to hate and wanted to scratch away with her long fingernails. Scratch it to the bone and never have to see it again. ‘What are you considering doing today? Or haven’t you got any plans except to sit and hold your fiancé’s hand?’
    â€˜I happen to find Tony’s company enchanting; I like to be with him. But I’ve never been to this part of the world before, so it’s natural that I should want to do some exploring. And that’s what I’m going to do today. Tony is very unselfish about it. He can’t accompany me, but he doesn’t stop me from going out.’
    â€˜I take the hint. Unfortunately, I’ve got other things to do today. Sorry about that,’ he drawled.
    â€˜I didn’t mean—’ She frowned, biting heavily on her lip. He had read something in her words which she had never intended. She didn’t want his company. She would rather dance all day with a snake than spend five minutes alone with him! Yet what had she meant, if she hadn’t been angling for Matt to take her somewhere?
    Back in her room, her simmering anger cooling as she took her morning shower and considered what to do, she told herself firmly, almost convincingly, that if she had wanted Matt to take her somewhere it was for his services as a guide and not for his infinitely disrupting presence. She supposed she could have bought this service by taking a conducted. tour. But although she was a born tourist, delighting