Лучшие истории о любви / Best love stories
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“Ailie.”
“Yes.”
“You heard about this afternoon?”
“What?” She leaned forward, tenseness already in her voice.
“Horace Canby crashed. He was instantly killed.”
She got up slowly and stepped out of the car.
“You mean he was killed?” she said.
“Yes. They don’t know what the trouble was. His motor – ”
“Oh-h-h!” Her rasping whisper came through the hands suddenly covering her face. We watched her helplessly as she put her head on the side of the car, gagging dry tears. After a minute I went for Bill, who was searching anxiously about for her, and told him she wanted to go home.
I sat on the steps outside. I had disliked Canby, but his terrible, pointless death was more real to me then than the day’s toll of thousands in France. In a few minutes Ailie and Bill came out. When Ailie saw me she came over swiftly.
“Andy” – she spoke in a quick, low voice – “of course you must never tell anybody what I told you about Canby yesterday. What he said, I mean.”
“Of course not.”
“Good night, Andy!” called Bill as they got into a taxi.
“Good night,” I said, and almost added: “You poor fool.”
II
At twenty-three I was entirely unconvinced about anything, except that some people were strong and attractive and could do what they wanted, and others were disgraced. I hoped I was of the former. [35] I was sure Ailie was.
I had to revise other ideas about her. In the course of a long discussion with some girl about kissing – in those days people still talked about kissing more than they kissed – I mentioned the fact that Ailie had only kissed two or three men, and only when she thought she was in love. To my considerable disconcertion the girl figuratively just lay on the floor and howled.
35
I hoped I was of the former – я
“But it’s true,” I assured her, suddenly knowing it wasn’t. “She told me herself.”
“Ailie Calhoun! Oh, my heavens! Why, last year at the Tech spring house party – ”
This was in September. We were going overseas any week now, and to bring us up to full strength a last batch of officers from the fourth training camp arrived. The fourth camp wasn’t like the first three – the candidates were from the ranks; even from the drafted divisions. [36] The addition to our company was Lieutenant Earl Schoen from New Bedford, Massachusetts; as fine a physical specimen as I have ever seen. He was six-foot-three, with black hair, high color and glossy dark-brown eyes. He wasn’t very smart and he was definitely illiterate, yet he was a good officer, high-tempered and commanding, and with that becoming touch of vanity that sits well on the military.
36
from the ranks; even from the drafted divisions – из рядовых; даже из призывников
We were doubled up in living quarters and he came into my hut. After a week there was a photograph of some Tarleton girl nailed brutally to the wall.
“She’s no jane or anything like that. [37] She’s a society girl; goes with all the best people here.”
The following Sunday afternoon I met the lady at a semiprivate swimming pool in the country. When Ailie and I arrived, there was Schoen’s muscular body rippling out of a bathing suit at the far end of the pool.
37
She’s no jane or anything like that – она не какая-нибудь там девица
“Hey, lieutenant!”
When I waved back at him he grinned and winked, jerking his head toward the girl at his side. Then, digging her in the ribs, [38] he jerked his head at me. It was a form of introduction.
“Who’s that with Kitty Preston?” Ailie asked, and when I told her she said he looked like a street-car conductor, and pretended to look for her transfer. [39]
A moment later he crawled [40] powerfully and gracefully down the pool and pulled himself up at our side. I introduced him to Ailie.
38
digging her in the ribs –
39
transfer – транзитный билет
40
he crawled – он подплыл кролем
“How do you like my girl, lieutenant?” he demanded. “I told you she was all right, didn’t I?” He jerked his head toward Ailie; this time to indicate that his girl and Ailie moved in the same circles. “How about us all having dinner together down at the hotel some night?”
I left them in a moment, amused as I saw Ailie visibly making up her mind that here, anyhow, was not the ideal. But Lieutenant Earl Schoen was not to be dismissed so lightly. He ran his eyes cheerfully and inoffensively over her cute, slight figure, and decided that she would do even better than the other.
While the afternoon passed he remained at her side. Finally Ailie came over to me and whispered, with a laugh: “He’s following me around. He thinks I haven’t paid my carfare.”
She turned quickly. Miss Kitty Preston stood facing us.
“Ailie Calhoun, I didn’t think it of you to go out and deliberately try to take a man away from another girl. I thought you considered yourself above anything like that.”
Miss Preston’s voice was low, but it held that tensity that can be felt farther than it can be heard, and I saw Ailie’s clear lovely eyes glance about in panic. Luckily, Earl himself was ambling cheerfully and innocently toward us.
“If you care for him you certainly oughtn’t to belittle yourself in front of him,” said Ailie, her head high.
It was her acquaintance with the traditional way of behaving against Kitty Preston’s na"ive and fierce possessiveness, or if you prefer it, Ailie’s “breeding” against the other’s “commonness.” She turned away.
“Wait a minute, kid!” cried Earl Schoen. “How about your address? Maybe I’d like to give you a ring on the phone.”
She looked at him in a way that should have indicated to Kitty her entire lack of interest.
“I’m very busy at the Red Cross this month,” she said, her voice as cool as her blond hair. “Good-by.”
On the way home she laughed. Her air of having been unintentionally involved in a contemptible business vanished.
“She’ll never hold that young man,” she said. “He wants somebody new.”
“Apparently he wants Ailie Calhoun.”
The idea amused her.
“He could give me his ticket punch [41] to wear. What fun! If mother ever saw anybody like that come in the house, she’d just lie down and die.”
41
ticket punch – билетный компостер