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suitor and allow you to set whatever pace you please. If you want to be one
of the few brides for whom [ a white dress is more than an obsolete
convention, so be it. We'll go to bed on our wedding night. I can wait until
then if you can.'
He tacked on the afterthought with a glinting look which suggested that he
doubted if she could.
'I I must go back and dress,' said Savanna, as his I gaze left her face and
moved downwards to where, while she was in his arms, the front of the
bathrobe had loosened, showing flesh which, although always visible at the
beach, somehow seemed more provocative indoors.
As she pulled the robe closer about her, Jago said, 'Yes, it is rather a strain
on my good intentions to have you here in my bedroom and, by the feel of it,
wearing nothing under that bathrobe. But you may as well finish your drink.'
He stood up and fetched it for her. 'Unless you don't care for it,' he added,
not rejoining her on the sofa but moving way to an armchair on the far side
of the brass and glass coffee table.
'No, I like it. I've never had rum before. I hope it won't go to my head.'
'I didn't give you very much. What about this picnic tomorrow? Have you
changed your mind? Will you come with me?'
'Yes, of course I will, now. But I think I ought to work j tomorrow morning.
There's the yellow trouser suit to j photograph, and the underclothes and
nightie.'
'I don't object to the trouser suit. But the other things no,' Jago said
decisively. 'From now on, the only person who is going to see you en
deshabille is me. Will you mind giving up your career for me?'
'But Jago, I can't not immediately,' she protested.
'Why not? Because of a contract?'
'No, nothing like that I'm a freelance. But 1 need the money I'm earning.
My family can't manage without it. I must go on modelling for a few years.'
'No, I don't want a part-time wife. I want you to travel with me. Looking
after your mother and brothers will become my responsibility.'
'Oh, no that's not fair,' she protested. 'I couldn't let you, and they wouldn't
feel comfortable being dependent on you.' .
'They'll have to adjust to it,' he said. 'Perhaps I should make it quite clear
that, even though you are very young, I'm not, and therefore I want to have
children as soon as possible. Does the thought that, a year from now, you
could be a mother disturb you?'
'I I don't really know,' she said hesitantly. 'Wouldn't it be nice to have a
little time to ourselves before we start thinking about a family?'
'I've done my thinking already. I want several children, and I want to have
them as soon as possible which, however enthusiastically we make love,
will not be this year,' he added. 'In your case, having children doesn't mean-
that you'll be tied down and hampered by them, as many women are. They'll
have a nannie to look after them.'
It seemed to Savanna an oddly down-to-earth conversation to follow so
swiftly on a proposal. But she said only, 'Yes, I suppose so,' and sipped the
rum float, and tried to feel a sense of reality, instead of the feeling that the
whole thing was a dream from which, shortly, she would wake up.
'As soon as we get back to England, I'll come and talk to your mother,' Jago
went on. 'Whatever burdens you've been taking on your shoulders will be
nothing to me, I assure you. You need have no compunction at transferring
them to mine. Both physically and financially, they're much broader than
yours are, my dear.'
'Yes, but even so . . .' she said uneasily.. 'Anyway, I certainly don't mean to
let Gerald get away with that ridiculously large cheque. To pay for those
negatives is silly. He can easily make up some reason to explain why he
wasn't able to develop and print them.'
'Let him keep it,' said Jago indifferently. 'It's little enough compensation for
losing his beautiful new discovery.'
'To me it seems a small fortune. Just how rich are you, Jago?' she asked him.
'Rich enough to buy you all those dresses you wore at the great house the
other night,' he said lightly. 'Why do you frown? My income should make
you happy. Most women enjoy spending money.'
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