Читать книгу The Forsyte Saga онлайн

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And he sat still, with his sneering smile, conscious that Irene was sitting still, and smiling too.

“Will she bow to him?” he thought.

But she made no sign.

Bosinney reached the end of the rails, and came walking back amongst the chairs, quartering his ground like a pointer. When he saw them he stopped dead, and raised his hat.

The smile never left Soames’s face; he also took off his hat.

Bosinney came up, looking exhausted, like a man after hard physical exercise; the sweat stood in drops on his brow, and Soames’ smile seemed to say: “You’ve had a trying time, my friend.... What are you doing in the Park?” he asked. “We thought you despised such frivolity!”

Bosinney did not seem to hear; he made his answer to Irene: “I’ve been round to your place; I hoped I should find you in.”

Somebody tapped Soames on the back, and spoke to him; and in the exchange of those platitudes over his shoulder, he missed her answer, and took a resolution.

“We’re just going in,” he said to Bosinney; “you’d better come back to dinner with us.” Into that invitation he put a strange bravado, a stranger pathos: “You, can’t deceive me,” his look and voice seemed saying, “but see—I trust you—I’m not afraid of you!”