thought of me. And you didn't feel the pain.
Yes, he whispered. I didn't feel the pain.I
I waited. He sat in quiet, drinking the Scotch again in a deep greedy gulp, and then he pushed the glass away. The tall muscular body was completely controlled by his elegance of spirit, moving with his polished gestures, and once again there came the measured, even tones of his voice.
We must go there, he said. We must stand on that hill over the sea. You remember the sound of the coconut palms in Grenada, that clicking sound as they moved in the wind You've never heard such music as you will hear in that garden in Barbados, and oh, those flowers, those mad savage flowers. It's your Savage Garden, and yet so tame and soft and safe! I saw the giant traveler's palm with its branches seemingly braided as they came out of the stalk! And the lobster claw, a monstrous and waxen thing; and the ginger lilies, oh, you must see them. Even in the light of the moon it must all be beautiful, beautiful to your eyes.
I think I would have stayed there forever. It was a busload of tourists which shook me out of my dreams. And do you know, they were from our ship They were the folks from the QE2. He gave a bright laugh and the face became too exquisite to describe. The whole powerful body shook with soft laughter. Oh, I got out of there then very fast indeed.
I went back out, found my driver, and then let him take me down to the west coast of the island, past the fancy hotels. Lots of British people there on vacation. Luxury, solitude-golf courses. And then I saw this one particular place-a resort right on the water that was everything I dream of when I want to get away from London and jet across the world to some warm and lovely spot.
I told him to take me up the drive so that I might have a look. It was a rambling place of pink stucco, with a charming dining room under a bungalow roof and open all along the white beach. I thought things over as I roamed about, or rather I tried to, and I decided I would stay for the tune being in this hotel.
I paid off the driver, and checked into a fine little beachfront room. They took me through the gardens to reach it, and then admitted me to a small building, and I found myself inside with the doors open to a small covered porch from which a little path went right down to the sand. Nothing between me and the blue Caribbean but the coconut palms and a few great hibiscus shrubs, covered with unearthly red blooms.
Lestat, I began to wonder if I'd died and all this wasn't the mirage before the curtain drops at last!
I nodded in understanding.
I sank down on the bed, and you know what happened I went to sleep. I lay there in this body and I went to sleep.
It's no wonder, I said, with a little smile.
Well, it's a wonder to me. It really is. But how you would love that little room! It was like a silent shell turned to the trade winds. When I woke in the middle of the afternoon the water was the very first thing I saw.
Then came the shock of realizing I was still hi this body! I realized I'd feared all along that James would find me and push me out of it, and that I'd end up roaming around, invisible and unable to find a physical home. I was sure something like that would happen. It even occurred to me that I would simply become unanchored on my own.
But there I was, and it was past three o'clock by this ugly watch of yours. I called London at once. Of course they had believed James was David Talbot when he'd called earlier, and only by listening patiently did I piece together what had happened-that our lawyers had gone at once to Cunard headquarters and straightened out everything for him, and that he was indeed on the way to the United States. Indeed, the Motherhouse thought I was calling from the Park Central Hotel in Miami Beach, to say that I had arrived safely and received their wire of emergency funds.
We should have known he would think of that.
Oh, yes, and such a sum! And they'd sent it right on,