1940-06-07 — Page 17

THE CHINA MAIL, JUNE 7, 1940.

EVE AND THE SERPENT

(Continued from Page 16) doxically enough, endeared him the more, rousing in her that mother in- stinct never wholly absent in a woman. It was all very difficult, wanted a lot of thinking out; but in privacy, not amid all this chatter.

Eric's

tamped angrily

Page

17

. snake to the

Annersley, apparently' deaf, went on, reached the gate. The viper struck with the speed of a cracking whip lash, straight at his carelessly swing- ing bare arm. And she used to love instinct compelled her, entirely against | I'll get him

his arms. Struck and reçoiled. Had her will, to make herself pleasant. But down the pk

it reached him? Had it?. Had it? It inwardly she grew more and more The veranderas pleasantly cool,

must have. A great and terrible re- angry, more and more hostile to her and Eve might have obeyed, If it had morse swept over her. She screamed husband, And now she had some not occurred to her that this would

again, went on screaming. cause for irritation. For all his suave lay her open to renewed attentions on politeness the Siamese was a master the part of the Siamese.

Annersley, through the gate' now,

In almost of the unpleasant art of "undressing a So she followed her husband, was swung round in a flash, woman, with his eyes," a process of some five yards behind as heap-one movement he struck à blow with She had just made up her mind to which Eve disliked being the victim proached the open gate in the garden his stick which brought the dance after all to distract her thoughts, at least with an Oriental.

fence, walking with the fixed unseeing down writhing and broken when Meade got up, made some excuse fault again! This accusation too was stare of a bewildered and angry man. ground, leapt back through the gate about dining early and left; but the unfair. Rather, than expose his wife But Eve saw. Saw the evil pale and caught her in his arms. look in his eyes, the pressure of his

to any insult, however imaginary, An- | brown head rise out of the foliage "Eve, darling, darling, it's alright." hand, said as clearly as the spoken nersley would have let the concession along the fence, saw the long, sinuous She clung to him, sobbing out broken word, "You've got to think of an ex-rip and told his Oriental host to go to body coiled like a spring, saw and re-incoherencies. "There, there, sweet- cuse, you've got to stay behind."

hell. But, having got his way, he had cognised the deadliest of Siamese heart. You were quite right not to sing "Don't think much of that lad," An- quite forgotten his temper, was bliss- snakes, the Daboia. And it was going out sooner. Brave little darling."

fully unaware of what was going on, to strike.

He kissed her as he had not kissed nersley said indifferently.

considered the interview highly satis- A medley of confused thoughts her for many years, and Leslie, Singa- hurtled through her brain, unendur- pore, anger, fear and fancied slights ably accelerated by the crisis. She vanished as though they had never must scream to warn him. No, he been. would turn, turn nearer those fatal It seemed unnecessary to explain fangs. He might be out of range. Si-that she had screamed before the lence would save him. Did she want to viper struck; only, her dry throat save him? "The serpent tempted me." had refused to emit the slightest She hated him. She would be free. sound. But she was very, very glad But anyhow... oh of it; and she snubbed Leslie Meade She would.

unmercifully when they got back to God! she must scream.

She screamed.

Singapore. Which was perhaps unfair.

Eve was up in arms at, once. "Why

not? He's very nice."

"Is he?" with the quizzical expres- sion that always irritated her. "Bit of a lounge lizard, I should say. Always poodle-fakin' around, dancin', and so on. Why doesn't he play games?"

"Don't be absurd, Eric. You can't judge a man by his games."

"There are worse methods." He rose to his feet. "Anyhow, see he doesn't play any of his games with you, m'dear." And went off to change, leav- ing her wondering as to whether he had really meant anything by that last remark.

Perhaps he had: at any rate, that night, as they were going to bed, she hinted tentatively that she should stay behind; and was met by a cheerful but uncompromising refusal. For this she had half hoped, but, having got it, she at once discovered that what she really wanted, above all things and at any cost, was to stay. in Singapore. She tried again with more determination. And even less result. Annersley re- fused even to discuss it, calmly went to sleep.

During the next 24 hours 'almost' became 'quite'. Annersley was never at his best catching a train, and Eve had always disliked the hot, tedious jour- She slept neys on Eastern railways.

badly through the rattle of the ex- annoyed still press and was more

when she discovered that they were to stop at Ban Patom on the way up to Bangkok, instead of on the way down. This meant turning out of a carriage which, having seemed the acme of dis- comfort all night, appeared at 5 a.m. to be the height of luxury, and pro- ceeding in an amazingly ramshackle more rest- car to a wooden shack

house than hotel. Eve tried to have u bath in two inches of doubtful water and a tin tub, tried to swallow some while breakfast; and was then left, Annersley went off on business, with nothing to do but brood. She might have read some of the many magazines had which Leslie, characteristically, provided for the journey; she might have amused herself with the visitors' book, an entertaining record of inex- of plicable visits by representatives half the nations on earth; but she was too bored. She might have gone for a walk but the Chinese hotel-keeper told her that Ban Patom was notorious for snakes, and Eve, unlike her remote namesake, was terrified of snakes. Só she just sat in the stuffy sparsely- furnished room and brooded to some

and purpose, becoming more bored and unhappy as the long, hot morning dragged on; till eventually she decided, recklessly mixing meta- phors in her misery, that she would throw her hat over the Rubicon

mora

as

soon as she returned to Singapore, give Leslie anything he asked for, run away with him (although an irritat- ing little voice inside her kept em- phasising that he would not ask that), never see Eric again. There limits to being neglected.

were

Just as she reached this momentous

decision her husband returned,

"Come on, m'dear, Cars' waitin'. You've got to come with me to see Phra Nangklau,"

.....

"What on earth for?" in an omin- ously quiet voice.

***Well,

eh. You see, m'dear,

I mentioned you were with me and he asked me to bring you round for a cocktail before lunch. Quite-civilised. Eton and Oxford."

Phra Nangklau received them with sleek urbanity, and Eve's innate social

factory, until after effusive farewells from Nangklau they got outside and his conciliatory, "Thanks awfully, m'dear. You helped a lot," was met with, "Oh, you make me sick. And your damned car has gone."

Annersley, halted as abruptly as if she had hit him in the face, looked at her, looked for the missing car. Then he said curtly, "He's probably pulled into the shade somewhere, stay here.

V

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84 PROOF

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