“Doing what’s expected of her,” said Mr. Duroy promptly.
“You’re right,” said André. “The unexpected is what’s fun.”
Mr. Duroy nodded at him approvingly.
It was all very well, thought Jane, for them to talk like that. Their lives were full of funny surprises. In three weeks they’d all be in Paris, where anything might happen. But the unexpected was never allowed to happen to her. If it ever did, thought Jane, she’d embrace it with joy. She’d fight for it, against the world, and hug it to her heart.
When the water was boiling they all began to eat their supper. The sun sank down behind the oak trees in a saffron sky and a silver glow hung over the eastern horizon. Almost immediately the great golden disk of the moon came up out of the lake. It rose, incredibly quickly, balanced a moment on the water’s edge, then floated, free, in the clear evening air. The sky was still quite blue. Jane could see Venus, through the tree trunks, low in the west, paled to a yellow candle in the afterglow. The colour faded quickly out of the world. The lake grew grey and the path of the moon more silvery. When Venus vanished in the sunset mists Jane could count seven stars, high overhead, piercing the pale sky.
Mr. Duroy lit his second cigar. André produced his cigarette. Mrs. Duroy lay flat on her back, her hands under her head, gazing spellbound at the moon.
“It is a night for a serenade,” said Mr. Duroy. And no one contradicted him.
“Sing, André,” said his mother after a brief pause. “Sing, or your father will!”
André smiled a little self-consciously at Jane.
“Do, André,” she said.
He was sitting cross-legged on the grass beside her. His strong, capable hands, sculptor’s hands, she’d heard his mother say, were crossed between his knees. His cigarette trailed negligently from his slender fingers. Without moving, his eyes upon her face, he suddenly began to sing. His light, young tenor soared softly up in the words of the old nursery rhyme.
“Au clair de la lune,
Mon ami, Pierrot,
Prête moi ta plume,
Pour ecrire un mot,
Ma chandelle est morte,
Je n’ai plus de feu,
Ouvre moi ta porte
Pour l’amour de Dieu!”
It was a serenade. Why, it was—it was a love song. Jane had never heard that note of tender entreaty in André’s voice before. Her eyes fell quickly before his own. His mother was looking at him a little anxiously.
“Magnifique!” said Mr. Duroy. “It is a splendid old song. And it always makes me think of rocking you to sleep.” He cast away his cigar. “You inspire me to emulation!”
“Georges!” said André’s mother warningly.
“Mine,” said Mr. Duroy imperturbably, “is a more modern ballad. In tune with the age. And very appropriate to the lady of my dreams.” In his booming bass, humming as he started like a great bumble bee, trilling his r’s as he continued, he slipped into the familiar cadence of “Daisy Bell”:
“Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do!
I’m half crazy, all for the love of you!
It won’t be a stylish marriage.
I can’t afford a carriage.
But you’ll look sweet
Upon the seat
Of a bicycle built for two!”
His voice was shaken with mock emotion. André’s mother and Jane were both laughing uproariously. André, however, sat very still, just smiling a little, his eyes on Jane’s face. Suddenly he sprang to his feet.
“Come walk on the beach,” he said.
Jane looked up at him questioningly. Then quickly at Mrs. Duroy. Her eyes were fastened on André and they had again that faintly worried look. André’s glance followed her own.
“It’s all right, isn’t it, Mother?” he said.
“Yes,” she said slowly. “Quite all right, of course. But don’t stay long. We must be starting home.”
Jane rose to her feet and set off with André across the beach. They plodded silently down to the water where the sand was dark and firm and the little waves broke softly on the shingle.
“Jane,” said André almost immediately, “do you realize that I’m—leaving you—next week?”
“Yes,” said Jane softly.
There was a little pause.
“Jane,” said André again, “I can’t go without—without talking to you.”
“Talking to me?” repeated Jane stupidly.
“Telling you,” said André. He was walking quickly along the beach, not looking at her. Jane was hurrying a little to keep up with him.
“Telling me?” she said.
Suddenly he stopped. He stood looking down at her in the moonlight.
“Telling you,” he said. “Though of course you know. Telling you that I—love you.”
Jane felt her heart jump, as if it skipped a beat. She felt terribly excited. And terribly happy.
“Oh, André!” she said.
“I—love you,” said André again.
She was staring up at him. His face looked very stern.
“Oh, do you?” she cried. “Do you, really?”
“Don’t you know?” said André.
Jane suddenly began to tremble, tremble uncontrollably, all over. She put out her hands to him, quickly. He clasped them in his own. Suddenly he seemed to realize how she was shaking.
“Jane!” he said, and his voice was suddenly tremulous. For a moment they stood staring into each other’s eyes. Then—
“Jane!” he said again, and took her in his arms.
“My love,” said André.
Jane clung to him desperately. Why, this—this was terrible. She was utterly shattered.
“Jane,” said André again, “look at me.”
Obediently she raised her eyes to his.
“You’re crying!” said André. Jane hadn’t known it.
“Jane—you do love me,” said André.
Jane only wept the more.
“Kiss me,” said André.
She raised her lips to his. The ground fell away from under her feet. The world was no more. Nothing existed but just—herself and—André.
“My love,” he said again.
She opened her eyes, then, upon his face. And there was the moon and the lake and the beach. The world hadn’t vanished, after all.
“André!” she said desperately, “What will we do?”
“You’ll marry me,” said André.
She pushed away his arms.
“André—I can’t. We’re too young.”
“You’re seventeen,” said André.
“Last month,” said Jane.
“I don’t care,” said André. “You’ll marry me.”
“André—I can’t.” The world was back indeed. Jane was thinking desperately of her mother—and Isabel—and, yes, even of her father. “They’ll never let me.”
“I’ll talk
