The Butterfly Box(56)
‘Oh for goodness’ sake, Pa, go and scratch somewhere else,’ Ingrid sighed, inhaling her cigarette once again in a gesture of dismissal.
‘On that not so pretty subject I might add that animals with fleas are not
hygienic to have in the house. I am being driven mad by scratching and no amount of bathing will relieve me. The hedge pig has to go.’
‘Hester, you’ll have to let Prickles go,’ she sighed.
‘What an unimaginative name for a pet,’ said Nuno disapprovingly, straightening himself up. ‘With a name like that he’s not worthy of being invited into the house in any case.’
Federica was fast becoming a regular visitor to the Applebys’ rambling manor. At least her name was Italian so she was immediately embraced by Nuno who remarked that with a name like that she was not only ensured great beauty and charm but also a touch of mischief which, he added imperiously, was as vital as a dash of Tabasco to the most enticing spaghetti napoli.
Hester was thrilled to have found a new friend. She had always trailed behind her elder sister, Molly, who bossed her around because she was older and cleverer then dismissed her when she found better company at school. Federica made Hester feel important. She cycled eagerly up the lane to see her almost every day and gratefully allowed her to take the lead. They indulged in childish games without the inhibitions that crept in when Molly was around.
They clambered down the cliffs to the hidden bays and coves where they would find caves to hide in and share secrets. The sea was different in England, dark and murky, filled with seaweed and smelling strongly of salt and ozone. But Hester showed Federica how to love it, how to build castles in the thick sand and how to find shrimps and crabs in the many rock pools that collected during the high tides. They built a raft for the lake, fashioned fishing rods out of sticks and toasted marshmallows on the fires they were only allowed to build if supervised by an adult. As winter thawed into spring and the days lengthened and warmed, their friendship blossomed with the apple trees.
Sam had O levels to take at school. He didn’t do much work. He didn’t need to. He was by far the cleverest boy in the school and looked on most of the other children as either slow or just plain stupid. He rarely read the books he was supposed to, preferring to read nineteenth-century French authors such as Zola, Dumas and Balzac that his grandfather Nuno gave him. He still managed, somehow, to come top of every class, even maths, which he didn’t consider himself very good at. With sandy blond hair, large intelligent grey eyes and a smile that curled up at the corners, he was charismatic and arrogant. He
knew he was different from everyone else.
So Federica fancied him. He had smiled to himself in amusement and then forgotten all about it. Most girls fancied him. What other boys failed to realize was that girls liked boys who excelled. Whether they excelled on the games field or in the classroom, it didn’t matter. Girls wanted boys who were commanding and confident. Boys who shone.
Sam shone. He didn’t enjoy football or rugby - he hated group activities. He was good at tennis but only played singles. Doubles bored him. He liked to run around and get as exhausted as possible. He bored easily of girls, too. He wasn’t unkind. In fact, when he liked a girl he was romantic, phoning them and writing to them. His intentions were always good. But rather like a new book, once he had read it he moved on to the next.
His mother told him that his behaviour was only natural in a young man of his age. ‘Sow your wild oats, darling,’ she said, ‘one day when they’re tamed oats you’ll be glad that you did.’ Nuno said that women weren’t worth wasting his time on and gave him more books to read. “‘Alas! The love of women! It is known to be a lovely and a fearful thing,”’ he said, to which Sam dutifully replied, ‘Byron, “Don JuanHis father, on the odd occasion that he emerged
out of his philosophy books, advised him to go for the more mature woman, as there was nothing more unattractive than a man who didn’t understand the complexities of the female body; an older woman would teach him the art of good love.
So Sam was determined to find an older woman. The girls he knew were far too young to hope for anything more than a kiss. A kiss was fine, up to a point. He had now reached that point. The point where his loins ached with a longing that was beginning to distract him from his schoolwork and drag his mind off his much-beloved nineteenth-century French literature. He found himself thinking about sex at the most inopportune moments, like in a car or on a train, usually when he wasn’t alone to indulge in his private fantasies. If he didn’t find a woman soon he’d go out of his mind with frustration.