Читать книгу The Plumed Serpent. Historical Novel - Life and Love after the Mexico Revolution онлайн

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‘I wonder,’ said Owen, ‘whether I ought to put on a dinner-coat. Really, I feel humiliated to the earth every time I put on evening dress.’

‘Then don’t do it!’ said Kate, who was impatient of Owen’s kicking at these very little social pricks, and swallowing the whole porcupine.

She herself came down in a simple gown with a black velvet top and a loose skirt of delicate brocaded chiffon, of a glimmering green and yellow and black. She also wore a long string of jade and crystal.

It was a gift she had, of looking like an Ossianic goddess, a certain feminine strength and softness glowing in the very material of her dress. But she was never ‘smart.’

‘Why you’re dressed up to the eyes!’ cried Owen in chagrin, pulling at his soft collar. ‘Bare shoulders notwithstanding!’

They went out to the distant suburb in the tram-car, swift in the night, with big clear stars overhead, dropping and hanging with a certain gleam of menace. In Tlalpam there was a heavy scent of nightflowers, a feeling of ponderous darkness, with a few sparks of intermittent fireflies. And always the heavy calling of nightflower scents. To Kate, there seemed a faint whiff of blood in all tropical-scented flowers: of blood or sweat.