The Book of Lies. James Moloney

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       Chapter 2 Lord Alwyn

      MARCEL WAS STILL THINKING about the strange little girl when he entered the kitchen with Dominic, and even after Mrs Timmins had given him his first job. “Robert, would you take those jugs of milk into the dining room?” she asked.

      Hearing that false name made him hesitate, but he wasn’t sure what to do about it yet. Dominic was carrying a tray laden with freshly baked bread and the aroma reminded him of how hungry he was. He followed Dominic into the dining hall, where other children were already busy setting out plates and arranging a motley assortment of chairs around the long table. He looked for the girl among them but couldn’t see her. Had he imagined the whole thing?

      The dining room was dark and cool after the sunny courtyard. A fireplace, freshly cleared of last night’s ash, was built into the far wall. Its homely scent of wood-smoke hung in the air. The high ceiling and bare stone floor made the room rather noisy, but it was the happy noise of children eager to fill their growling bellies.

      All the children seemed to have their own place to sit around the table and Marcel was left out until Hugh and Dominic made room between them. Mrs Timmins took her place at one end of the table and Albert at the other. They all lowered their heads and recited a simple prayer, but as soon as the last word died on their lips, hands shot out to the plates of bread.

      Marcel wasn’t the only one to hold back. The tall girl he had seen spilling the water watched the snatching hands all round her. There was something proud about her, as though she were waiting to be offered the plate. Finally she took a piece and bit into it delicately. No wonder she had been sent back by the family in the village, Marcel thought. He watched her for a moment and saw with a grin that hunger made her dainty bites come a little too rapidly for good manners.

      She might be careless with a bucket, but not with her appearance, he noticed. Her long tresses, now loosened from their ponytail, stretched almost to her waist and she had stroked them to a brassy sheen. Pale freckles from working in the sun dotted her nose and cheeks, but they couldn’t hide what a pretty girl she was. How much prettier she would be if she didn’t spend so much time scowling.

      Meanwhile, Mrs Timmins began listing names around the table. “I don’t think you met the girls before. That’s Sarah and beside her is Dorothy. We call her Dot because she’s small and round.”

      “I am not,” the girl retorted, but the others only laughed. They seemed to do that a lot around this table.

      More girls’ names followed, Kate and Lizzy. When it was her turn, Marcel was officially introduced to Nicola. She offered him a stiff smile, said, “How do you do,” and went back to her delicate eating.

      He barely noticed her rudeness, because he was looking for a particular face, and so far he hadn’t found it.

      “Oh, and I shouldn’t forget Beatrice, wherever you are, little one,” said Mrs Timmins.

      “Here she is, next to me,” called the girl named Sarah, and at last Marcel spotted her. “We call her Bea,” Sarah explained to him.

      “So now you’ve met us all, Robert,” said Mrs Timmins, taking charge again.

      But his name wasn’t Robert. The little girl from the hideaway under the vines was real after all and so was the name she had given him. His head was spinning. He felt like he had been born only an hour before.

      “No, my name is not Robert.”

      The frantic eating slowed as every eye turned first towards him and then to Mrs Timmins.

      “But only this morning you told me it was,” she said, alarmed.

      “I was wrong.”

      “You’re playing tricks with us,” said Mrs Timmins, forcing a smile. “That’s it, I’m sure. You’re playing a little game.”

      “No, it’s not a game, and I think you know my real name already. It’s Marcel, isn’t it?”

      If the eating hadn’t entirely stopped around the table, the low murmur of talking certainly had. The faintest blush of self-reproach touched Mrs Timmins’ cheeks. There was fear in her face too. “How did you come by this new name?”

      “I can’t explain,” he said. It shouldn’t be Marcel who had to explain at all. How could she help this sorcerer to steal away his life with a sweep of his hand?

      Mrs Timmins rose from the table. “Come with me,” she ordered. He followed her into the kitchen, where she sat him in a chair and drew another up close. “Now, tell me. How did you hear this name? Did you find it written somewhere?”

      He shook his head.

      “Did someone tell you?”

      He didn’t want Bea to get into trouble. “No,” he assured her. “It just came to me, from inside, as though it had always been my name.”

      The concern in her features deepened. She looked perplexed, but more than anything she seemed afraid for him. “What do you remember?” she demanded. “You must tell me how much СКАЧАТЬ