Dreams of Another Day, page 2
One stone, pitched more efficiently than the rest, landed on the deck only feet away from them.
‘They’re stones,’ said Ming, horrified. Then her voice rose in a warning: ‘I say, Connie, do be careful.’
As she spoke yet another stone was sailing through the air towards them. Connie, blinking against the glare, ducked in the wrong direction. The heavy stone hit the side of her forehead with a noise that forced Ming out of her chair. As Connie collapsed on to the deck, bleeding and unconscious, Ming lurched forwards, feeling a sharp, pain in her side. Afraid that her scar might have started to leak, she knelt over Connie’s felled body, trying to shield her from the stones. Ming felt a hard glancing blow on her own shoulders and arched closer to Connie’s head, trying to tuck her own out of the way too. She felt faint and rather sick, but she hung on, desperately afraid that Connie might be badly injured.
‘Can’t someone help them?’ a frail voice called from further down the deck. Through her dread, Ming recognised it as belonging to a Mrs Sutherland, the wife of an elderly vicar who had conducted a service in the saloon on the previous Sunday morning.
‘Coming, my dear.’
Ming half-lifted her head to see the parson and his wife hurrying towards her through the crowd of shocked passengers. The sound of stones landing on the deck had stopped, although there were splashes to the stern of the boat and the angry shouts were still echoing over the water. Stewards were standing at the rails of the lower decks, shouting insults at the men on the shore.
‘Can we get her away from that rail?’ asked Mr Sutherland, taking off his panama hat as he arrived at Ming’s side.
‘I don’t think we need to actually,’ she said, realising that the boat had at last glided out of the range of the stone-throwers. As Ming moved away a little and tried to ease her shoulders, Mrs Sutherland caught up with her husband and lowered herself painfully on to the deck. She started to dab the blood away from Connie’s face with her handkerchief.
‘I don’t think your friend is too badly hurt,’ she said, looking up at Ming. ‘Just stunned.’
‘Oh, thank goodness.’ Ming leaned against one of the chairs and wiped the back of her hand against her forehead. Slowly the other tea-drinkers came to offer their help and advice.
‘It’s a mercy the cut is so near her hairline, Miss Alderbrook,’ said Mrs Sutherland. ‘Nothing will show even if it does scar. Let’s straighten her out. William, will you keep her cool? She’ll be all right in a moment.’
The parson knelt on the deck beside Connie and took off her buff linen jacket. He rolled it into a pillow which he slipped under her head, and then energetically plied his hat above her face, smiling at Ming.
‘That was awfully brave,’ he said shyly. ‘Weren’t you afraid of being struck?’
Ming, holding her right side with both hands, shook her head. It was clear that the scar was still intact, but it hurt and brought back horrible memories of the night of complete powerlessness and terror when her appendix had burst.
‘There didn’t seem much point worrying about it,’ she said, touched by his approval. ‘It had to be done. Was anyone else hurt?’
‘It doesn’t look like it. Just jolly bad luck that you two were on this side of the boat where they could get you. I say, they have hurt you, haven’t they? You look awfully pale. My dear.…’
‘No, it’s all right. I’ve just stretched a recent appendix scar a bit. It’s healed now, but I’m still not quite used to it. Don’t you think we ought to get some stewards to carry Connie to her cabin out of the sun?’
‘She’ll be coming round in a moment,’ said the vicar’s wife with certainty. She had taken some eau de Cologne from her capacious bag and was dabbing the unwounded side of Connie’s face with it. ‘Here we are.’
Ming saw that the muscles around Connie’s mouth were tightening and her eyelids beginning to move. She groaned and lifted a hand to her forehead. The vicar’s wife murmured reassurances as Connie felt the still-oozing blood and brought her fingers close to her eyes, obviously trying to focus on their redness.
‘It’s not too serious, Miss Wroughton,’ said the vicar, just as Ming was trying to explain what had happened.
‘I expect you’ve a horrid headache,’ said his wife more practically. The other two fell guiltily silent and the onlookers began to drift back to their chairs.
As soon as Connie was fully conscious the vicar helped her back into her chair and insisted that she drink some tepid tea. Connie, looking faintly amused despite the obvious pain in her head, obediently took the cup he held out. When she saw that Ming was frowning, she said:
‘Are you all right? Did they get you too?’
‘Not badly,’ she answered slowly. ‘But I can’t help wondering what it was all about. Surely it couldn’t have been because I refused to tip that man?’
‘Don’t be silly.’ Connie sounded both tired and impatient. ‘I tipped him for you. I expect they were just boys having a lark.’
She closed her eyes and put her free hand to her forehead again.
‘I shouldn’t touch it,’ said the vicar’s wife. ‘As soon as you’ve had your tea we ought to disinfect it and bandage it up. It’s important to cover it especially in this climate.’
‘I don’t think it was just a lark,’ said her husband. ‘There’s a lot of anti-British feeling about just now.’
When he caught his wife’s eye he flushed slightly. ‘Sorry, my dear. Mustn’t get on my hobby horse, I know. Why don’t you take Miss Wroughton down and see to her face?’
Ming was about to go with them when she turned back to the vicar to ask him what he meant to say. He looked at her and smiled.
‘My wife tries to stop me boring on about it all, and not many of our fellow-passengers agree with me, but I don’t think you can really blame these people for resenting us. After all, they are catastrophically poor and a lot of the population is frighteningly unhealthy as well as half-starved. The one undeniable asset they have is the Suez Canal and we and the French have made sure that the lion’s share of its profits comes to us. Who wouldn’t be angry?’
‘Yes, well, but,’ said Ming, who had often listened to her father’s views about the country, ‘we did buy the majority of shares in the Canal in eighteen-something and they had the money then. It is ours.’
‘That rather depends how you look at it,’ said the vicar. ‘But I mustn’t bore you – and I must go and dress for dinner.’ He smiled his charming, self-deprecating smile, leaving Ming frustrated and rather worried.
She went down later to see whether Connie needed anything and found her with a tray of soup and biscuits on her knees.
‘Are you really all right?’ asked Ming, pulling up the only chair in the cabin.
‘I’m fine. My head aches, but sweet Mrs Sutherland has given me some pills. She used to be a nurse, you know.’
‘Really? What luck! They’re both awfully nice. Well, if you really don’t need anything, I suppose I’d better get ready for dinner.’
‘You do that. But, Ming?’
‘Yes?’
‘When those louts interrupted us I was about to ask whether you’d consider giving us a hand with the magazine until you’ve settled on your new career of trouble-causing, whatever it might be.’
Ming stopped, half-way to the door of the wood-panelled cabin, and turned. She looked eager but a little doubtful.
‘Max and I have found that editing and organising it take so long,’ said Connie casually as though she had only just thought of it, ‘that we need more freelance contributors than we’d expected, but finding and commissioning them take yet more time away from our own articles.’
‘You mean you want a secretary,’ said Ming, her voice flattening as she spoke.
Connie laughed, wincing and laying her hand gently on her bandaged forehead.
‘I keep forgetting this. We don’t need any more secretarial help, but we do need more articles.’
‘But I’ve never written anything.’
‘Except speeches and letters and, I suspect, most of those articles that appeared under Roger Sillhorne’s name last year.’
As Connie spoke she watched Ming’s face and saw that she had been right. ‘Precisely! Why not start now and write me a few thousand words about cruising up the Nile? I’m supposed to be doing it, but after this afternoon’s performance, I’m not sure I’d find the right lyrical note.’
‘No,’ agreed Ming. ‘I don’t suppose you would. Perhaps I should try. You’d have to be ruthless, you know, if it wasn’t any good.’
‘Ah yes,’ said Connie with a smile that disguised her determination, ‘I can promise you that.’
‘Then I will have a go. Thank you. I’ll leave you in peace now. But do send for me if you need anything. I’ll look in before I go to bed.’
‘Thank you, Ming.’
Chapter Two
While Ming was in her cabin after dinner anointing her bruised and stiffening shoulder with witch hazel, her two elder sisters and a friend were talking about her as they listened to the rain splattering down on London.
All three of the sisters had the same fine bones, fair hair and remarkable dark blue eyes, and yet none of them could have been mistaken for either of the others. Margery, the eldest, who was always known as Gerry, hardly bothered about her clothes and tended to look preoccupied and often rumpled, while Felicity had an air of seductive confidence that made her seem more substantial than the others and added a touch of glamour to her good looks.
There were a few grey threads in Gerry’s hair but it had never occurred to her to have them dyed blonde again. Flixe, who believed in improving on nature whenever she could, was exasperated by her sister’s waste of her looks but rarely said so.
‘Have you heard from Ming yet?’ asked the third woman as she watched the two of them, amused by the differences between them and envious of the obvious affection they shared.
‘I doubt if the mails from Egypt will get us anything before Ming’s back herself,’ said Gerry rather crossly.
She liked Julia Wallington well enough and admired the fact that she was a successfully practising barrister, but she could never understand quite why Flixe was so fond of Julia or wanted to see so much of her.
They were sitting in the conservatory of Flixe’s house, which was comfortable and enticing despite the depressing weather outside. Instead of the usual white, Flixe had chosen a pale apricot paint for the woodwork, and the floor was covered in terracotta tiles. A selection of tattered but colourful Persian carpets added to the warmth, as did several efficient radiators. They enabled Flixe to grow a spectacular selection of luxuriantly flowering sub-tropical shrubs among the well-upholstered wicker chairs. There were even productive orange and lemon trees in huge unglazed terracotta pots, and the sweet spicy scent of their flowers filled the conservatory.
Flixe picked up a thermos jug of iced coffee and refilled their glasses.
‘I do hope the poor girl is recovering,’ said Julia, well aware of Gerry’s hostility but unable to do very much about it.
She was a tall woman with silvered dark hair and an attractive face that could look severe until her interest or her sympathy were engaged. Then her wide mouth would relax and her brown eyes lose some of their acuteness. There were people who were afraid of her, but others, like Flixe who knew her well, saw beneath her façade to the warmth and vulnerability that she usually kept hidden.
‘My husband had a burst appendix a year or two ago and I know how ghastly it can be,’ she went on, still trying to placate Gerry. ‘He was laid very low; couldn’t face the House of Commons for weeks. But he recovered in the end, and I’m sure Ming will too.’
Gerry smiled at her, grateful for her concern for Ming but irritated that she was there at all. She drank a little of the sweet, cold coffee and said nothing.
‘It seems so unfair that Ming should have had to put up with that as well as everything else,’ said Flixe, wishing that the other two could relax.
‘I’m sure she’ll cope with it,’ said Julia tentatively. ‘I’ve hardly ever met her, but she’s always seemed thoroughly in control, and I’ve never really understood why you’re both so protective of her. After all, she’s over thirty now.’
The two sisters looked at each other. For once there was an identical expression in their dark-lashed blue eyes. It was Gerry who answered.
‘That’s part of the trouble. She is far too much in control.’
‘Mmm,’ said Flixe, her eyes looking far beyond the luxuriant plants in front of her. ‘Ever since her twin was killed in the war, Ming’s kept all her difficulties to herself, and …’ She broke off and turned, almost helplessly, to her elder sister.
‘And they eat away at her,’ said Gerry quickly. ‘I know that sounds melodramatic, Julia, but it’s horrible to know that she’s miserable and not even be able to ask why, let alone do anything to help.’
Julia’s straight eyebrows twitched and she looked at Gerry with more sympathy – and more respect – than before.
Flixe got up from her chair again as though she were too restless to keep still. She picked up a long-spouted copper watering can and started to water her plants.
‘She’s hardly ever spoken about Annie since then. But it wasn’t only that: the war damaged other things in her, too.’
‘Poor Ming. And yet it’s ten years since it ended.’
‘I know,’ said Gerry, sounding heartfelt. ‘It’s a different world.’
‘Different, and yet …’ Flixe’s voice was almost dreamy. ‘And yet not such fun.’
‘Flixe!’
‘Don’t sound so disapproving, Gerry,’ she said with a laugh. ‘Horrible though lots of it was, we did have fun – even you.’
A smile was Gerry’s only answer to that before she turned back to Julia.
‘But Ming didn’t see any of that side of it. It seems desperately unfair; she’s much nicer than either of us, but we always seem to have better luck.’
‘Speak for yourself,’ said Flixe over her shoulder as she stood picking the dead flowers off a tall camellia. ‘I don’t think it’s luck as much as good management.’
As though to follow her sister’s lead back into frivolity, Gerry smiled as she put down her empty glass.
‘As the eldest I’m always right. You ought to know that by now, Flixe.’
Flixe turned back. The glossy dark leaves and bright pink flowers made a wonderful foil for her as she stood there in her full-skirted dress of cherry-coloured wool, but she seemed quite unconscious of the effect.
‘Not always, but this time you are right. There is something different about Ming. She’s … oh, kinder and a lot less selfish than either of us. But perhaps we do over-mother her.’
Julia, who had known the full warmth of Flixe’s compassion, smiled at them both as she stood up.
‘I ought to go. You two must have lots of things to talk about.’
Gerry heard an oddly wistful note in Julia’s voice and pulled herself together.
‘Not on my account, Julia,’ she said, looking down at her watch. ‘I must go and do something about dinner tonight. My husband’s got some old naval friends coming and they need more formal food than I usually cook. It was good to see you.’
She held out her hand and Julia shook it before lowering herself into the long wicker chair again. Flixe left her gardening to kiss her sister.
‘You may be the eldest,’ she said, brushing a hair from Gerry’s green jersey, ‘but sibling hierarchies don’t exist past twenty-one. Take care of yourself, old thing. You’re looking rather worn.’
‘Thanks a lot,’ Gerry said ironically. ‘Bye, Flixe. You’ve made a blissful garden here.’
‘I’ll see you out. I won’t be long, Julia.’
Julia lay back in the long chair and thought about the two sisters.
‘She was a bit spiky, wasn’t she?’ said Julia when Flixe came back after a long interval and stood beside her chair. ‘Was it just because I was here?’
‘No, I don’t think so,’ said Flixe, looking concerned. ‘I see her every weekend; she knows I hardly ever see you without either the children or the husbands.’
After a moment’s thought Flixe added: ‘If she sounded stiff, it was probably at the suggestion that we’re over-protective of Ming.’
Julia’s wide mouth twitched into a rueful smile.
‘Did I sound sharp? I am sorry. I suppose it’s because I have such a passionate desire for people to be what they really are instead of what other people think they should be.’
Flixe looked down at her with affection.
‘D’you see what I mean?’ Julia went on earnestly. ‘I didn’t want to annoy either of you, but I can’t help wondering whether your treating Ming as though she’s fragile will make her so. There must be real force concealed in her somewhere and it seems a pity that she should be protected against it. But I didn’t mean to criticise.’
‘I know.’ Flixe picked up the thermos jug and offered Julia more coffee, adding as she poured: ‘You spent a lot of time fulfilling other people’s expectations in the old days, didn’t you, Julia?’
Flixe put down the jug and went back to her fading camellia so that Julia would not feel compelled to answer. Piling the shrivelled flowers into a wide, flat basket, Flixe added:
‘And you’re probably right. We may overdo it. Having spent our early years furious that our mother had no interest in us as anything except products to do her credit, I suppose we’ve tried to give Ming what we missed.’
‘But she’s considerably more than grown up now.’ Julia’s common sense made Flixe smile ruefully.
