She was a singer, wasn't she?" Doris nodded.
"And I think she was born blind, or lost her sight when she was three
or four years old. You described her to me as a tall, handsome woman
with dark, crinkly hair, and a mouth like red velvet."
"I don't think I said like red velvet, dear."
"Well, it doesn't sound like a woman's description of another woman,
but I think you told me that she had had love affairs, and it was that
that made me give her a mouth like red velvet. Why should she not have
love affairs? She was as much a woman as another; only one doesn't
realise until one hears a story of this kind what the life of the
blind must be, how differently they must think and feel about things
from those who see. Her lover must have been a wonder to her,
something strange, mysterious; the blind must be more capable of love
than anybody else. She wouldn't know if he were a man of forty or one
of twenty. And what difference could it make to her?"
"Ah, the blind are very sensitive, much more so than we are."
"Perhaps."
"I think Judith would have known the difference between a young man
and a middle-aged. There was little she didn't know."
"I daresay you're quite right. But still everything must have been
more intense and vague.
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