It was divinely simple. She had lost nothing of her old skill and in a few seconds her feet touched the sanded path and she was swallowed up in the overgrown darkness of the garden. The path that followed the course of the stream down to the tiny beach passed quite close to her balcony and she found it without trouble. She was hot after her climb and she sauntered unhurriedly down the sandy slope to the water beneath an overhanging canopy of leaves. The path was like a tunnel, filled with exotic scents, with a lighter patch at the far end, but underneath the trees it was pitch dark.
Suddenly, Marianne came to a stop and listened, her heart beating a little faster. She thought she had caught the sound of a light, furtive footfall behind her. It occurred to her that someone might have seen her come out and followed her and she was tempted to turn back. She waited a few seconds, uncertain what to do, but she heard nothing more and the sea seemed to beckon to her, cool and inviting. She walked on, keeping her ears open and treading as softly as she could but there was no further noise.
'I dreamed it,' she told herself. 'My nerves must be all on edge.'
By the time she got down to the beach, her eyes had grown accustomed to the darkness. There was no moon but such a multitude of stars that the sky was filled with a milky radiance that threw a faint light on the sea. Quickly she slipped off her clothes and clad only in her long hair, ran straight into the sea. As she plunged forward into the water, she almost cried aloud for joy as the blessed coolness enveloped her. Her parched body seemed to melt and liquefy. She had never known such a delicious bathe. When she remembered swimming as a child in the river that ran through the park at Selton, or from some empty cove on the Devon coast, it was in much colder water, cold enough, frequently, to bring the tears to her eyes. This was just cool enough to be life-giving and caressed her skin like silk. It was clear, too, so limpid that, splashing like a puppy dog, she could see her legs moving under water like a paler shadow.
She rolled over on to her stomach and set out to swim towards the middle of the little bay. Her arms and legs fell automatically into the remembered rhythm and she moved easily through the water, pausing from time to time to float for a moment on her back with eyes half-closed, revelling in her delight. She decided that she would swim until she was tired, a healthy, physical tiredness after which she would sleep like a child.
It was during one of these periodic rests that she became aware of a soft, regular splashing. It was coming closer and she identified the sound at once. Someone else was swimming in the bay. Raising herself up out of the water she peered through the darkness and made out a shadowy figure coming towards her. There was someone there, someone who had followed her, perhaps. She remembered the footsteps she had thought she heard earlier, on the way down. Realizing suddenly the foolishness of coming down to bathe alone like this in the middle of the night in a strange country, she turned to swim back to the shore, but the mysterious swimmer changed direction to cut her off. He was swimming fast and powerfully, clearly seeking to intercept her, and if she continued on her present course in a few more minutes he would have succeeded.
In sudden panic she reacted idiotically and in an attempt to frighten off what she thought must be some unknown enemy, she cried out in Italian:
'Who are you? Go away!'
Her voice died away in a gurgle as she swallowed a mouthful of salt water, but the stranger did not pause. He came on silently towards her, in a silence that was the most frightening part of the whole thing. Then Marianne lost her head completely and tried to escape by swimming straight ahead, making for one of the points of the bay in the hope of reaching land and so eluding her pursuer. Such was her terror that it did not even occur to her to wonder who it was. It crossed her mind that he was probably only a Greek fisherman who could not understand her and might have thought she was in danger, but she dismissed the idea at once. When she had first caught sight of him he had been swimming slowly and quietly, making as little noise as possible, advancing on her almost stealthily.
The shore was closer now but the distance between the two swimmers had also diminished appreciably. Marianne was beginning to tire. Her movements were growing sluggish and her heart was thumping painfully in her breast. She knew that she was nearly at the end of her strength and that she had no choice now but to sink or let him overtake her.
Suddenly, she saw, directly in front of her, a minute crescent-shaped opening, paler than the surrounding rocks. Summoning up her last, remaining strength, she forced her limbs into one last effort but the man was gaining on her. He was close behind her now, a great black shadow with no distinguishing features. Terror stopped her breath and, at the very instant two hands reached out towards her, Marianne went under.
She returned to consciousness and to an awareness of strange sensations. She was lying on the sand in inky darkness and a man was holding her in his arms. He, too, was naked for she could feel the texture of his skin next to hers, smooth and warm but strongly muscled. She could see nothing at all, except perhaps a thickening of the darkness before her face, and when she stretched out her arms, instinctively, they touched rock to the side and above her. She was in some kind of low, narrow cave in the rocks. She tried to cry out, seized with a sudden terror at finding herself immured in this crevice in the rocks. A firm and burning mouth stifled her cries. She tried to struggle but the arms tightened round her, holding her still as the unknown man began to caress her.
Sure of himself, he made no attempt to hurry. His hands were gentle but subtly experienced and she knew that he was seeking to rouse her to the pitch where love becomes an irresistible fever. She tried to set her teeth and stiffen her muscles but the man had an extraordinary knowledge of the female body. Her fears had evaporated long ago, and now Marianne could feel long, shuddering waves of pleasure stealing up through her body. Still the kiss went on, that, too, strangely skilled, and Marianne found her breath sucked from her and her spirit weakening… It was so strange, this making love with a shadow. Little by little, she felt the weight of a tall body, full of strength and life, and yet it seemed to her that in some curious way she was making love with a ghost. Witches in the olden days who claimed to have had intercourse with the devil must have felt like this. She might have thought that it was nothing but a dream if that other flesh had not felt so warm and solid and but for the faint yet altogether earthly smell of mint which clung about the person of her unknown lover. Moreover, he was gradually attaining his ends. Possessed by the most primitive desires, Marianne was moaning now in his arms. The insistent waves of pleasure were mounting within her, higher and higher, overwhelming her… When, at last, the man allowed his long control to break, she burst like a red sun.
Two voices cried out together. That, and the chaotic beating of his heart was all that Marianne heard of her invisible lover. The next instant, he had risen, gasping, and was gone.
She heard the pebbles shifting under his running feet and raised herself quickly on her elbow, in time to see a tall figure dive into the sea. There was a tremendous splash, then nothing more. The man had not uttered a single word.
When Marianne crept out of the hollow in the rocks which the stranger had chosen to shelter them, she felt light-headed but physically curiously calm. It astonished her that she should feel so happy. She felt no shame or guilt for what had happened, perhaps just because the man had vanished so swiftly after making love to her, and had vanished so completely. No trace of his presence remained. He had simply melted into the night and into the sea whence he had come, as the morning mist is dissipated in the first rays of the sun. Who he was and where he came from, Marianne would probably never know. He was most likely a Greek fisherman, as she had first thought. She had seen many since landing on the island, beautiful and untamed as clouds in the sky, and still carrying about them a little of the aura of the old gods of Olympus who had been skilled at catching mortals unawares. He must have seen her go down to the beach and enter the water and it had been instinctive for him to follow her. The rest had been inevitable.