Moonshine. Victoria Clayton

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      ‘Only, darling, if you sleep with people who’ve already contracted it. And even then it’s curable with penicillin. Your mother wouldn’t accept there was anything wrong, that was the trouble.’

      ‘She thought her hair was falling out because the hairdresser was too rough with it,’ said Fleur. ‘So she got me to wash it for her. I didn’t mind but there was so little left in the end it was rather a waste of shampoo. When her nose dropped off we made her go to the doctor but it was too late by then.’

      My eyes, which must have expressed the horror I felt, met Dickie’s once more.

      ‘You’re exaggerating, Fleur. As usual. It was the septum, darling, not the whole nose. Anyway, you’re upsetting Roberta.’

      ‘Am I?’ Fleur turned to me and gripped my arm. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t want to do that. I like you and I know Burgo does too. In fact, I think … Ah, well, let’s go and have lunch. I’m starving!’

      My appetite was only briefly affected by Fleur’s account of her mother’s illness. The salmon was delicious, caught by Dickie’s brother and sent down from Scotland the day before, the peas and tiny potatoes were from the garden, the cucumber from Dickie’s own frames. We had tiny alpine strawberries and cream.

      ‘How odd,’ I said, tucking into my second helping of strawberries, ‘to think that our house is only fifteen miles distant and yet it’s the opposite of this place: dark and dismal and ugly, where nothing seems to thrive but laurel and every member of the household is either angry or depressed. Even the weather’s better here. It was raining when I left home.’

      ‘Is it really that bad?’ Fleur paid attention to the conversation for the first time. She had been feeding bits of salmon to a cat under the table.

      ‘It’s terrible.’ Because Fleur seemed interested I told her about my parents and Oliver, Mrs Treadgold and Brough.

      ‘Perhaps there’s a spell on the place,’ suggested Fleur. ‘Perhaps your father is a wizard.’

      ‘Not a very good wizard, if so,’ I said, ‘or he’d conjure up some money.’

      ‘He may have. He just isn’t sharing it with the rest of you so he can keep you under his brutal thumb, poor, dejected and ill used, to satisfy his sadistic impulses.’

      ‘Now, darling, I don’t think you should speak so impolitely of Roberta’s father,’ said Dickie.

      ‘It’s quite all right,’ I said. ‘It’s a most interesting theory.’

      I guessed from Fleur’s expression that she was half serious. Her childlike face was dreaming, her bony wrists bent at right angles as she propped her chin on her clasped hands.

      ‘I wish I could do magic,’ she said. ‘I’d wish myself far away to an island covered with forest where I’d live like a savage, wearing a skirt of leaves, or perhaps nothing at all, and I’d eat nuts and berries and bird’s eggs – never taking more than one from the nest, of course – and I’d tame a wild goat and drink her milk from a wooden bowl I’d carved from a tree.’

      ‘How would you like cutting down the tree?’ said Dickie in a humouring sort of voice. ‘Remember how upset you were when I had those sycamores felled last year?’

      ‘I wouldn’t cut it down, silly.’ Fleur was scornful. ‘I’d just carve the bowl out of the trunk and leave the place to heal over. I’d have the cats and dogs and Stargazer with me, of course. And Burgo, natch. And you could come if you liked, Bobbie.’

      Her exclusion of Dickie was pointed. He stirred sugar into his coffee, smiling. It was impossible to tell if his feelings were hurt.

      ‘I’m not good at camping,’ I said. ‘I’d be nothing but a liability. I hate that dreadful ache you get in your hip joints from lying on hard ground. I frighten easily. I should spend all my time worrying what that peculiar rustling was, imagining a man with an axe creeping up on me – when I wasn’t worrying whether that tickling sensation on my leg was a leaf or a scorpion. And I’m pretty bad-tempered without a proper night’s sleep.’

      Fleur looked annoyed. ‘It isn’t always night on an enchanted island.’

      ‘Ah, no. But during the day I’d be hungry. I’m fond of nuts and berries but not invariably. And there wouldn’t even be those in the winter. Bark and roots don’t tempt me in the least. I’d rather stay here at Ladyfield. For me this is an enchanted place.’

      Fleur scowled. ‘What you really mean is that you’re sorry for Dickie and you think I’m a pig. Well, you’re right. I am a pig. But’ – she shot him a glance of defiance – ‘you shouldn’t treat me like a child. Don’t indulge me all the time. Of course I know I behave badly. Why don’t you tell me to shut up or at least look contemptuous? All right, take no notice. I’m being unreasonable again.’ She brushed away a tear and made an effort to smile. ‘Be careful, I might put a spell on you.’

      She really was a strange girl. I guessed part of the trouble was that she had put a spell on poor Dickie. His adoration was patent. But unless you are extraordinarily vain (and Fleur, I thought, was unusually without vanity for such a good-looking girl) being adored quickly becomes irritating and guilt-inducing.

      ‘Let’s go into the garden straight after coffee and look at the Temple to Hygeia,’ he suggested as though the conversation had not taken place.

      ‘We’ll go now,’ Fleur stood up. ‘We can take our coffee cups with us.’

      ‘You’d better let me bring the tray, madam.’ Mrs Harris, who had waited at table with admirable discretion, slid round the door with such alacrity I wondered if she had been listening. ‘The pattern’s been discontinued and it’d be a pity to spoil the set.’

      ‘Ha, ha! Come now, Mrs Harris.’ Dickie crinkled his face in pacifying smiles, his pale eyes kind and serene. ‘What does a little broken china matter?’

      ‘I haven’t actually broken it yet.’ Fleur’s face was cold. ‘But if I did that would be my business and no one else’s.’ She picked up the cat and left the room.

      ‘Never mind, Mrs Harris.’ Dickie began to get up, leaning heavily on the arms of his chair. ‘Least said, soonest mended, eh?’

      ‘Why don’t I carry the tray?’ I suggested.

      ‘I’d best bring it myself, to be on the safe side,’ she replied with a stiffening of her jaw. ‘The path’s quite uneven in places.’

      I saw that she was jealous of her office so I did not press the point.

      ‘Your stick, sir.’ Mrs Harris handed it to him. ‘What about leaving your coat, sir?’ She brushed a crumb from the sleeve of his tweed jacket in a manner that was almost maternal. ‘It’s getting quite warm. You don’t want to overheat.’

      ‘Thank you, I shall be all right as I am.’

      I could see from Mrs Harris’s expression that she thought he was very much all right as he was. And, looking at him through her eyes, I saw that his affability, his presumption of power in his own kingdom and his courtliness in exercising that power was attractive. But to a girl like Fleur probably these things СКАЧАТЬ