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Master Robert, ah it is Borrows, isn't it? I don't think you mentioned your
guild. But we've been having a most interesting talk.'
`We've met before.'
`You have?
Well that's '
Annalise turned to face me. The lights of the Walcote House were behind her.
Her features were in shadow and her hair was like the light itself.
`What are you doing here, Robert?'
Her voice was soft, gently enquiring. Yet her anger was like a force against
my chest. And visiting Missy at World's End and what were you doing there
also, Robert? Why can't you leave my life alone?
There was a long pause. Slowly, I became conscious that
Highermaster George was still standing between us. He cleared his throat.
`Well ...' He offered her the crook of his elbow. `If you'll perhaps allow me
to lead the way?'
I followed them across the lawns to the marquee. Inside, in the trapped heat,
there were more drinks and trays and servants.
And could
Sir perhaps indicate . . . ? Or would Sir prefer . . . ?
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This particular
Sir was at a complete loss, but Highermaster George untangled himself from
Anna to help me find a place, and then sat by me under the lamplit grandeur.
Anna Winters was several tables away.
Anthony Passington, Greatgrandmaster Exultant of the Great
Guild of Telegraphers, arrived to applause at the raised top table where
Sadie and her mother, the painted prune, were already seated. Then everyone
stood, and Canon Vilbert intoned a prayer, which, like some tedious guild
anthem, seemed just about to round itself to conclusion when it gained fresh
wind. After all, there was so much you had to thank God for if you lived like
this. For a long time, I kept my head bowed and my hands pressed together.
Then I risked raising my eyes and saw that everyone else was staring into the
upper reaches of the marquee. It was an interesting revelation to me that the
people of the
Great Guild of Wealth didn't lower their eyes but looked straight up at
God when they prayed to him. After all, they were almost equals.
Anna Winters, what little I could see of her across two tables and through the
massive foliage of the flower display in front of me, was standing like the
rest. Further down my long table were the Bowdly-
Smarts. George was right. They did seem odious and ugly. The man had
a rat's pointed face. He and his florid wife seemed wrong inside their
clothes, whilst everyone else here fitted everything as tightly as a bud ...
The canon's voice ascended to another convulsion of adjectives, paused, and
then droned on again. Anna, I saw, peering around a huge centrepiece of
flowers to get a clearer view of her, was still gazing up into the air. If I
tilted my neck and squinted slightly, her face became one of the flowers in
the arrangement, although more perfect. Anna Winters
Annalise as a flower. Something I could grasp, pluck, control. But
everything about her, even her face, her pale simple beauty laid amid the
blurring petals seemed withdrawn from me. The air shimmered for a moment.
She was barely there. A space in my eyes.
My head fizzed with wine and hope. That cursed vase of flowers. I
don't know if I let out a small groan, but I sensed with the final amen that
Highermaster George and several of the other surrounding guests had glanced
towards me. People were sitting down now. Servants were presenting the first
course to the diners at the top table. I remained standing a moment longer in
the hope that I might get a clearer sight of
Anna. But the flowers were still obstructing me. Casually, I leaned forward to
brush a fern out of the way. But as my arm reached across the table I saw that
my fingers had become like smoke, were near-
invisible. I let out a yelp and the vase of flowers, although I was sure that
I hadn't yet touched it, exploded in a spray of glass and stalks.
Then I was sinking, or the table was rising, water was pattering everywhere,
and the white cloth was sliding back.
Faces clustered as I lay surrounded by cutlery on the floor, but only
Highermaster George registered any concern about my well-being.
The rest of them, as I swayed upwards protesting that I hadn't even touched
the vase whilst the table was mopped and cleaned and rearranged by servants,
regarded me with vivid distaste. A new and even larger arrangement of flowers
was then plonked on the table before me, even more effectively obscuring my
view of Anna.
OneofSadiesdiscoveries.
The whisper drifted with the clink of serving tongs. There were nods and
smiles. The flowers pulsed like faces; the faces were like flowers, like
Mistress Summerton's hothouse blooms Missy, whom I should never have
visited. One of Sadie's discoveries. Of course. That was me.
So began one of the worst nights of my life. Social embarrassment may seem as
nothing compared to mortal grief, the dull terrors of poverty, the agonies of
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physical pain. But being laughed at, being made to seem foolish that is
something which is unbearable even for the dogs on the street. The first
course consisted of the eggs of quails, which I,
distracted in my sopping clothes, attempted to scoop the meat from with the
end of one of the many spoons. Looking up as I detected a resurgence of
sniggers, I saw that the other guests were prying off their shells with their
fingers and eating them whole. After that, and dropping my offending spoon and
bending down to pick it up instead of leaving it for the maid, Highermaster
George did his best to anticipate my problems with discreetly murmured
instructions. But by then it was too late. I
could tell, as each new dish arrived, that the people on my and several of the
surrounding tables were far more interested in how I was going to tackle it [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
