“Permit me to be sorry.”
“Sure,” the second waiter said. “And what the hell difference does it make? Be happy, my Colonel, and be happy, my Lady.”
They got down into the gondola and there was the same magic, as always, of the light hull, and the sudden displacement that you made, and then the trimming in the dark privacy, and then the second trimming, as the gondoliere started to scull, laying her partly on her side so that he would have more control.
“Now,” the girl said. “We are in our home and I love you. Please kiss me and put all love into it.”
The Colonel held her close, with her head thrown back and kissed her until there was nothing left of the kiss but desperation.
“I love you.”
“Whatever that means,” she interrupted.
“I love you and I know whatever that means. The picture is lovely. But there is no word for what you are.”
“Wild?” she said. “Or careless or unkempt?”
“No.”
“The last was one of the first words I learned from my governess. It means you do not comb your hair enough. Neglectful is when you do not brush one hundred strokes at night.”
“I’m going to run my hand through it and make it unkempter still.”
“Your hurt hand?”
