The Edge of Winter. Бетти Нилс

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СКАЧАТЬ Araminta couldn’t understand, and when he nodded, fetched a bottle and poured some of its contents into the mugs. ‘Brandy,’ said the dark man, ‘and get those wet clothes off—and the child’s, too.’ He went to a locker and pulled out a couple of sweaters and some blankets.

      ‘Use these.’

      Araminta didn’t say anything; not because she could think of nothing to say; there was a great deal she was storing up for a more suitable occasion—besides, her teeth were chattering too hard to make speech effective. She gave Mary Rose some of the hot tea and drank her own. The brandy sent a warm glow through her and she was on the point of remonstrating with their unwilling host when he urged the child to drink the rest of her tea, but he forestalled her with a quiet: ‘Yes, I know what you’re about to say, but we have an hour’s sailing before us and the sea’s choppy—she needs to sleep.’

      He swallowed his own tea, spoke to the older man and went on deck, to be followed at once by his companion.

      Araminta began to undress Mary Rose—luckily there was almost nothing to take off; the sweater was far too large, but it was warm and enveloped the child completely. She wrapped a blanket round her and saw with relief that she was already half asleep.

      It didn’t take her more than a moment to tear off her own sweater and put on the one she had been given. She was forced to turn up its sleeves to half their length, and it was so long that she debated whether to take off her slacks as well, but she decided against that; she wouldn’t look dignified, and she wanted to be that at all costs. She settled for damp slacks and her dignity, plaited her damp hair and longed for a mirror. The yacht was moving now, and just as its owner had said, the sea was choppy; she supposed it was the brandy which made her feel so unconcerned about it.

      Mary Rose was deeply asleep now and likely to remain so, what with fright and pain and brandy. Araminta pulled up a stool and sat by the couch, one arm over the child, and looked about her. She knew very little about yachts, but this one struck her as extremely comfortable; its furnishings were simple, but there was no lack of comfort. She fell to wondering who the owner might be and why he had spoken in a foreign tongue to the other man. She frowned a little; he had spoken fluent English to her, but now that she thought about it, there had been the faintest accent. The object of her thoughts came back at that moment, walking through the cabin without a word, to enter a cubby-hole at its end which presumably held radio equipment, for she could hear his voice speaking to someone, but when he came back it was obvious to her from his aloof expression that he had no intention of telling her anything. He said nothing, only opened a cupboard in the wall, took out a packet of sandwiches and laid them on the table beside her.

      Araminta ate two of them, for she was peckish. The walk had sharpened her appetite and then there had been the climb down the cliffs and some considerable time waiting beside the child. The sandwiches were excellent—smoked salmon and very fresh brown bread; she eyed the rest of them hungrily as she wrapped them up again, but Mary Rose might wake and feel hungry too. But she didn’t; not once during the rest of the rather unpleasant hour did she stir, and a good thing too, thought Araminta, for the sea was now quite rough and the wind had veered, slowing their progress. The elderly man had come below briefly to give her another mug of coffee and ask her, in his peculiar English, if she needed anything and was the little girl all right. She accepted the coffee gratefully, not moving from her stool, and wondered as she drank it if anyone had missed the child yet. Surely by now—she glanced at the clock and saw to her astonishment that it was almost half past eight; they must have been on the beach much longer than she had thought. Her father and Aunt Martha would certainly be wondering where she was, and Mary Rose’s parents would be frantic… Her thoughts were interrupted once more by the dark man, who stayed just long enough to tell her that they would be entering the harbour within the next few minutes. He disappeared as quickly as he had come.

      She knew almost nothing about sailing, but it seemed to her that the yacht was berthed very smoothly and in a few minutes both men came into the cabin; when the boat’s owner bent to pick the little girl up, Araminta observed urgently: ‘She’s very sound asleep. She’s all right, isn’t she?’

      His severe expression softened into a brief smile. ‘She’s a very little girl and she’s had a lot of brandy.’

      There was nothing she could answer to that; she picked up their damp clothes and followed him up on deck. It was raining still and very dark, and there was no sign of the wind easing. There were a few lights here and there, shining through the curtain of rain, but no one about. The three of them made their way silently down the small harbour’s arm and on to the quayside, the little girl cradled in the dark man’s arms, Araminta close at his heels and behind her the elderly man, walking stolidly into the rain.

      Araminta skipped a step or two and caught up with the leader of the party. ‘Where are we going?’

      ‘A pub—somewhere where there are people who will know whose child this is and where we can telephone.’

      ‘There’s the Lobster Pot just along here.’ She waved into the dimly lighted narrow street ahead of them, which ran round the harbour. ‘They’re…’

      ‘I know—I’ve been here before.’

      ‘How rude,’ said Araminta severely, and went past him to open the hotel door. It was in the side wall of the hotel and led straight into the downstairs bar. There were quite a number of people in it, among them her father and aunt, in deep discussion with the hotel’s owner, but they paused in mid-sentence when they saw her and her companions, and Aunt Martha, a formidable-looking lady with severe features and a well-disciplined hair style, made her way briskly through the throng around her and demanded briskly: ‘Araminta, where have you been? We’ve been very worried—and who are these people?’

      Her sharp eyes took in the child in the man’s arms and his companion and then returned to her bedraggled niece.

      ‘Sorry you were worried, Aunt,’ said Araminta, knowing that under the rather fierce exterior was a very nice old lady who loved her. ‘I found this little girl, and these gentlemen very kindly picked us up in their yacht and brought us back. The child’s leg is broken and this gentleman is a doctor, so if…’ she paused and looked at him, standing silently beside her. ‘If you would say what you want us to do?’ she asked him. ‘A room with a firm table—something I can use for splints, and someone to telephone for an ambulance to take the child to hospital and to discover to whom she belongs.’

      It was like being back at St Katherine’s, carrying out a consultant’s orders without waste of time. ‘There’s an office behind the reception desk, I’m sure the owner…’ She was already there, asking for its use and if someone would see about the ambulance. ‘Two sticks,’ she reminded herself aloud and heard the man chuckle; worse, he followed it with a: ‘You’ve more sense than I imagined.’ He spoke in a faintly mocking voice which made her grit her splendid teeth. But it was no time to consider her own feelings, so she pushed the table into a better position and went to fetch the variety of sticks offered as well as a splendid collection of scarves, ties and napkins to tie them with. She chose the most suitable of them, smiled briefly at her father, standing quietly in a corner, and went back to where Mary Rose, still mercifully tipsy, lay.

      She admitted to herself later that the child’s bony little leg had been expertly splinted, the ends of the bone brought into alignment before the splints were put on; probably they were in as good a position as they needed to be before the plaster was applied. It was a pity she would never know that; Mary Rose had been whisked off to Falmouth in the ambulance and the dark man had gone with her, while his companion had gone back to the yacht. Both men had said goodbye to her, the elder with grave courtesy, the younger with a curt brevity which allowed her to see that he couldn’t care less if he never saw her again.

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