Loves of Yulian Read Online Free

on one foot and fallen off.
    Then I found that I could wrap one hand around one of the lines by which the boats would be lowered. Holding tight to this line, I kicked out blindly with my foot. I felt it hit some target and heard a cry from one of the brothers. His hands released me immediately, as he grabbed for his eye. His brother let me go as well, as the first boy burst into loud sobs. In a moment they were both running back the way we had come, the sobs warning me that I would not be greeted with cordiality on my return.
    I took my time on the way back, and, true to my fears, found the one brother sitting in his mother’s lap, a napkin full of ice against his eye, the other in his father’s lap. Seeing me arrive, Mother and M. Gordet both stood up. M. Gordet gripped me firmly by the elbow, and I was marched down to our cabin and told not to come out.
     
     
    There were two other Polish-speaking people on board, a Mr. Kosiewicz and his wife, Mrs. Irena. The woman looked a little younger than Mother, and they were both very good-looking. Mr. Kosiewicz was tall and thin, with wavy blond hair and blue eyes, and Mrs. Irena had long chestnut hair that fell in thick waves onto her shoulders, soft looking cheeks, and large, green eyes. She was taller than Mother and even more beautiful, which Mother as much as admitted.
    “That woman is so beautiful,” I heard her say to M. Gordet, as we saw the couple dance to a phonograph record in the lounge, before dinner. This was the day after my affair with the Dutch brothers, and I had not been allowed to leave Mother’s side all day.
    “They’re Polish, you know, Basia,” M. Gordet said and Mother said, “Oh, I didn’t know that. They look like professional dancers, don’t they?”
    The two were pressed very close together, and they moved like one person.
    Then M. Gordet whispered something in Mother’s ear, and I saw her eyebrows go up a little. “Well, it’s wartime, you know,” she said.
    I understood what she was saying. It wasn’t as though M. Gordet didn’t know that the Germans had occupied Poland and France and were, right then, bombing England. It was just that saying, It’s wartime , meant that certain things were all right, which wouldn’t have been all right in peacetime. But what all that had to do with the current situation, was a total mystery.
    “And they look very much in love,” she added, with a little laugh. I tried to guess what it was that M. Gordet had whispered in Mother’s ear about the two, but came up empty.
    When the record stopped playing, Mother said, “Why don’t we invite them over for a drink with us, George,” and M. Gordet got up and crossed the dance floor to where the two were standing. They spoke for a moment, then the three of them walked back to our table.
    “Mme. Padowicz, may I present Mr. and Mrs. Kosiewicz,” M. Gordet said, though he had a lot of difficulty pronouncing both names , “and this is Madame’s son Julien .”
    I stood up, as I had been taught, and shook hands firmly, with both of the guests, trying to look each directly in the eye. As I had discovered with many other grownup men around Mother, Mr. Kosiewicz did not shake my hand firmly or look me in the eye. His attention, I could see, was on Mother. But his wife gave me a warm handshake and looked at me from under her eyelashes with what, to me, was clearly an expression of shyness. I didn’t know that grownups could be shy as well.
    “I understand you and your wife are Polish,” Mother was saying, in French, to Mr. Kosiewicz. “My son and I are from Warsaw, but M. Gordet doesn’t speak Polish.”
    Now I could see exactly what it was that held Mr. Kosiewicz’s attention. It was Mother’s diamond ring. It was, I knew, the ring that Lolek had given her as an engagement present, and it had two large diamonds set side by side. The two were exactly alike and each one was as big as just about any diamond I had ever seen. I had seen the ring attract