“How was it?” he asked her.
“Wonderful,” she smiled at him. “But I didn’t see any fish at all,” she told David.
“You probably wouldn’t in so much surf,” David said. “Unless you bumped into them.”
She was sitting on the sand with her hands clasped around her knees. Her hair hung, damp, to her shoulders and the two boys sat beside her. Roger lay on the sand in front of her with his forehead on his folded arms. Thomas Hudson opened the screen door and went inside the house and then upstairs to the porch to work on the picture. He thought that was the best thing for him to do.
Below on the sand, where Thomas Hudson no longer watched them, the girl was looking at Roger.
“Are you gloomy?” she asked him.
“No.”
“Thoughtful?”
“A little maybe. I don’t know.”
“On a day like this it’s nice not to think at all.”
“All right. Let’s not think. Is it all right if I watch the waves?”
“The waves are free.”
“Do you want to go in again?”
“Later.”
“Who taught you to swim?” Roger asked her.
“You did.”
Roger raised his head and looked at her.
“Don’t you remember the beach at Cap d’Antibes? The little beach. Not Eden Roc I used to watch you dive at Eden Roc.”
“What the hell are you doing here and what’s your real name?”
“I came to see you,” she said “And I suppose my name is Audrey Bruce.”
“Should we go, Mr. Davis?” young Tom asked.
Roger did not even answer him.
“What your real name?”
“I was Audrey Raeburn.”
“And why did you come to see me?”
“Because I wanted to. Was it wrong?”
“I guess not,” Roger said. “Who said I was here?”
“A dreadful man I met at a cocktail party in New York. You’d had a fight with him here. He said you were a beachcomber.”
“Well it’s combed pretty neatly,” Roger said looking out to sea.
“He said you were quite a few other things, too. None of them were very complimentary.”
“Who were you at Antibes with?”
“With mother and Dick Raeburn. Now do you remember?”
Roger sat up and looked at her. Then he went over and put his arms around her and kissed her.
“I’ll be damned,” he said.
“Was it all right to come?” she asked.
“You old brat,” Roger said. “Is it really you?”
“Do I have to prove it? Couldn’t you just believe it?”
“I don’t remember any secret marks.”
“Do you like me now?”
“I love you now.”
“You couldn’t expect me to look like a colt forever. Do you remember when you told me I looked like a colt at Auteuil that time and I cried?”
“It was a compliment, too. I said you looked like a colt by Tenniel out of Alice in Wonderland.”
“I cried.”
“Mr. Davis,” Andy said. “And Audrey. We boys are going to go and get some Cokes. Do you want any?”
“No, Andy. You, brat?”
“Yes. I’d love one.”
“Come on, Dave.”
“No. I want to hear it.”
“You are a bastard for a brother sometimes,” young Tom said.
“Bring me one, too,” David said. “Go right ahead, Mr. Davis, don’t mind me at all.”
“I don’t mind you, Davy,” the girl said.
“But where did you go and why are you Audrey Bruce?”
“It’s sort of complicated.”
“I guess it was.”
“Mother married a man named Bruce finally.”
“I knew him.”
“I liked him.”
“I pass,” Roger said. “But why the Audrey?”
“It’s my middle name. I took it because I didn’t like mother’s.”
“I didn’t like mother.”
“Neither did I. I liked Dick Raeburn and I liked Bill Bruce and I loved you and I loved Tom Hudson. He didn’t recognize me either, did he?”
“I don’t know. He’s strange and he might not say. I know he thinks you look like Tommy’s mother.”
“I wish I did.”
“You do damned plenty enough.”
“Truly you do,” David said. “That’s something I know about. I’m sorry, Audrey. I ought to shut up and go away.”
“You didn’t love me and you didn’t love Tom.”
“Oh yes, I did. You’ll never know.”