‘The little chap’s got a twinkle,’ said Soames.
‘Mercifully. Didn’t you spoil me, Dad?’
Soames gaped at a pigeon.
‘Can’t tell,’ he said. ‘Do you feel spoiled?’
‘When I want things, I want things.’
He knew that; but so long as she wanted the right things!
‘And when I don’t get them, I’m not safe.’
‘Who says that?’
‘No one ever says it, but I know it.’
H’m! What was she wanting now? Should he ask? And, as if attending to the crumbs on his lapel, he took ‘a lunar’. That face of hers, whose eyes for a moment were off guard, was dark with some deep – he couldn’t tell I Secret! That’s what it was!
Chapter Nine
RENCOUNTER
WITH the canteen accounts in her hand, Fleur stepped out between her tubbed bay trees. A quarter to nine by Big Ben! Twenty odd minutes to walk across the Green Park! She had drunk her coffee in bed to elude questions – and there, of course, was Dad with his nose glued to the dining-room window. She waved the accounts and he withdrew his face as if they had flicked him. He was ever so good, but he shouldn’t always be dusting her – she wasn’t a piece of china!
She walked briskly. She had no honeysuckle sensations this morning, but felt hard and bright If Jon had come back to England to stay, she must get him over. The sooner the better, without fuss! Passing the geraniums in front of Buckingham Palace, just out and highly scarlet, she felt her blood heating. Not walk so fast or she would arrive damp! The trees were far advanced; the Green Park under breeze and sun, smelled of grass and leaves. Spring had not smelled so good for years. A longing for the country seized on Fleur. Grass and trees and water – her hours with Jon had been passed among them – one hour in this very Park, before he took her down to Robin Hill! Robin Hill had been sold to some peer or other, and she wished him joy of it – she knew its history as of some unlucky ship! That house had ‘done in’ her father, and Jon’s father, yes – and his grandfather, she believed, to say nothing of herself. One would not be ‘done in’ again so easily! And, passing into Piccadilly, Fleur smiled at her green youth. In the early windows of the club, nicknamed by George Forsyte the ‘Iseeum’, no one of his compeers sat as yet, above the moving humours of the street, sipping from glass or cup, and puffing his conclusions out in smoke. Fleur could just remember him, her old Cousin George Forsyte, who used to sit there, fleshy and sardonic behind the curving panes; Cousin George, who had owned the ‘White Monkey’ up in Michael’s study. Uncle Montague Dartie, too, whom she remembered because the only time she had seen him he had pinched her in a curving place, saying: ‘What are little girls made of?’ so that she had clapped her hands when she heard that he had broken his neck, soon after; a horrid man, with fat cheeks and a dark moustache, smelling of scent and cigars. Rounding the last corner, she felt breathless. Geraniums were in her aunt’s window-boxes – but not the fuchsias yet. Was their room the one she herself used to have? And, taking her hand from her heart, she rang the bell.
‘Ah! Smither, anybody down?’
‘Only Mr Jon’s down yet, Miss Fleur.’
Why did hearts wobble? Sickening – when one was perfectly cool!
‘He’ll do for the moment, Smither. Where is he?’
‘Having breakfast, Miss Fleur.’
‘All right; show me in. I don’t mind having another cup myself.’
Under her breath, she declined the creaking noun who was preceding her to the dining-room: ‘Smither: O Smither: Of a Smither: To a Smither: A Smither.’ Silly!
‘Mrs Michael Mont, Mr Jon. Shall I get you some fresh coffee, Miss Fleur?’
‘No, thank you, Smither.’ Stays creaked, the door was shut. Jon was standing up.
‘Fleur!’
‘Well, Jon?’
She could hold his hand and keep her pallor, though the blood was in his cheeks, no longer smudged.
‘Did I feed you nicely?’
‘Splendidly. How are you, Fleur? Not tired after all that?’
‘Not a bit. How did you like stoking?’
‘Fine! My engine-driver was a real brick. Anne will be so disappointed; she’s having a lie-off.’
‘She was quite a help. Nearly six years, Jon; you haven’t changed much.’
‘Nor you.’
‘Oh! I have. Out of knowledge.’
‘Well, I don’t see it. Have you had breakfast?’
‘Yes. Sit down and go on with yours. I came round to see Holly about some accounts. Is she in bed, too?’
‘I expect so.’