Read Those Who Walk Away for Free Online

words. “No, I wouldn’t call it frightened. She was very fond of it. In a way. But not the usual way. I mean—I think she expected something fabulous out of it, something mystical. There is, of course, something mystical in it, but she wanted something more. And more and more.” This burst of eloquence finished him for a few seconds. Plainer words that he might have said became mixed in his mind until he no longer knew what they were. Trying to put it into words brought out the ludicrous side; Peggy thinking it would be ‘better’ if they changed their position in bed a little bit, whereas all had been perfect as it was, and trying to make any improvement ruined everything. Ray bit his lip in nervousness, and to keep from smiling.
    “That I can also imagine,” Inez said. “She liked it very much.”
    “Yes,” Ray said gratefully. “But somehow not in the right way. I never said that to Ed. It’s so difficult. Also I never tried to talk to Peggy about it. Or I think when I did once, she didn’t know what I meant, or I didn’t go far enough. You see, I blame myself there, for not talking to her, because I was so much older and certainly knew more about the world.”
    “Peggy seems to have known nothing about the world,” Inez said, tapping her ash into the tray from which the wind at once removed it.
    Inez’s words and the flat way she said them were the most comforting thing Ray had known since Peggy’s death. Then the vision of the red-filled bathtub came to his mind, as it did ten times a day. He saw, superimposed upon Inez’s yellow and tan clothing, the ugly white and red picture of the bathroom in Mallorca, Peggy’s long dark hair floating just under the surface at the back of the tub. She had not drowned, because there was not much water in her lungs, the police had said. And the tub had of course not been filled entirely with blood, because it was too full for that, but the colour had looked to Ray as if gallons of blood had run from her by some process of her will to give up life utterly, with a bang.
    “You loved her,” Inez said.
    “Yes, I certainly did. I’m sorry you never met her.” Ray hesitated, then pulled the folded scarf from his coat pocket. “This—it’s not hers. I bought it here yesterday. But it’s so like her. Like her personality. That’s why I bought it.”
    Inez smiled and touched the scarf with her finger-tips. “Decorative and romantic.”
    He said with sudden embarrassment, “In a way, it’s like a picture of her,” and put the scarf back into his pocket. “But I’m sure you’ve seen photographs of her.”
    “Did you keep other things of hers?”
    “No. Her clothes I gave away in the village—to poor people. I gave Ed her jewellery. Most of her things were in Ed’s apartment in Rome.”
    There was a silence. A string orchestra began to play something from South Pacific .
    “What do you feel guilty about?” Inez asked.
    “I don’t know. I suppose when someone commits suicide—the person or persons nearest them always feel guilty, don’t they?”
    “Yes, they do generally.”
    “If I am guilty,” Ray said, “and of course that’s possible, it’s for something I haven’t thought of as yet.”
    “Then you shouldn’t look guilty—as yet.”
    “Do I?”
    “Yes. It’s your manner. If you are not guilty, then you should not look guilty,” Inez said, as though it were quite simple.
    Ray smiled a little. “Thank you. I’ll try.”
    “If you leave tomorrow, would you give me a ring at the hotel first? If I’m not in, leave a message. ‘Everything’s all right.’ Just that. Would you?”
    “Yes.”
    “Or whenever you leave, ring me first.” Inez drank the last of her coffee.
    “What do you like about Ed?” Ray asked, feeling naive, but unable to keep the question back.
    Inez smiled and looked suddenly younger. “A certain courage that he has. He doesn’t give a damn about the world, what the world thinks. He has conviction.”
    “And