Читать книгу The Complete Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald онлайн

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He seemed to be laughing now as he talked.

“Oh, Lois, Lois, I was asking God for more then. I wanted the letters you’d write me and the place I’d have at your table. I wanted an awful lot, Lois, dear.”

“You’ve got me, Kieth,” she sobbed, “you know it, say you know it. Oh, I’m acting like a baby but I didn’t think you’d be this way, and I—oh, Kieth—Kieth——”

He took her hand and patted it softly.

“Here’s the bus. You’ll come again, won’t you?”

She put her hands on his cheeks, and drawing his head down, pressed her tear-wet face against his.

“Oh, Kieth, brother, some day I’ll tell you something——”

He helped her in, saw her take down her handkerchief and smile bravely at him, as the driver flicked his whip and the bus rolled off. Then a thick cloud of dust rose around it and she was gone.

For a few minutes he stood there on the road, his hand on the gate-post, his lips half parted in a smile.

“Lois,” he said aloud in a sort of wonder, “Lois, Lois.”

Later, some probationers passing noticed him kneeling before the pietà, and coming back after a time found him still there. And he was there until twilight came down and the courteous trees grew garrulous overhead and the crickets took up their burden of song in the dusky grass.