Читать книгу Forbidden Area онлайн

47 страница из 62

She said, "Thanks, Raoul," and walked with him to his car. She felt better. It had been bitterly lonely, there for a moment.

They were crossing Arlington Bridge when he said, "Doing anything tonight, Katy?"

"Yes. I've got a heavy date with a couple of books on biophthora."

"That's a big word."

"It has a big meaning. The destruction of life--all life, that is. It's from the Greek."

"Katy, why don't you relax for twenty-four hours? How's about driving up to my place in the mountains?"

"I'm not playing any one night stands this season."

He drove in silence until they reached Dumbarton Road and pulled up in front of the red brick apartment building, saved from ugliness and uniformity by shrubbery and vines, in which she lived. Then he said, "I'll make you another proposition. Let's get married."

She had realized that one day he would ask and she would have to answer. At first there had been lunches in the Pentagon cafeterias, and then dinners at Hall's and Herzog's and Normandy Farms, and then dancing at the Shoreham. There had been a quite proper professional weekend visiting the Crageys in Charlottesville. She had been invited to dine at the Walback home, a marble mausoleum big as an embassy, on Massachusetts Avenue, and she had been presented to his mother, an authentic Washington cave dweller. Yet now that the question had been put she found herself off guard, with no answer ready. In a city where unmarried young women outnumber eligible males three to one, this was unfortunate. "Are you serious?" she asked, to gain time.