Read Online Emily by Jilly Cooper - Free Book Online Page B

what’s happened to old so and so, and who did so and so marry.
        Rory answered her in monosyllables; he had snow melting in his hair and paint on his hands.
        ‘Too awful,’ she went on. Did you know Annie Richmond’s father threw himself under a taxi in the rush hour in Knightsbridge?’
        ‘Lucky to find one at that hour,’ said Rory, looking broodingly at the snowflakes swarming like great bees on the windscreen.
        I giggled. Rory looked at me, and then noticed my hair.
        ‘Jesus,’ he said under his breath.
        ‘Do you like it?’ I said nervously.
        ‘No,’ he said and turned up the wireless full blast to drown Fiona’s chatter.
        Suddenly she gave a scream.
        ‘Oh look, there’s a telephone box. Could you stop a minute, Rory, so I can telephone Nanny.’
        Rory raised his eyes to heaven.
        She got out of the car and, giving little shrieks, ran through the snow. Through the glass of the telephone box I could see her smiling fatuously, forcing lop pieces into the telephone box. Rory didn’t reply to Charles’ desultory questions about shooting. His nails were so bitten that his drumming fingers made little sound on the dashboard.
        A quarter of an hour later, Fiona returned.
        ‘Well?’ said Charles.
        ‘She’s fine, but she’s missing us,’ she said. ‘She brought up most of her lunch but she’s just had two rusks and finished all her bottle, so Nanny thinks she’s recovered.
        Rory scurled off through the snow, his hands clenched on the wheel.
        ‘What b-awful weather,’ said Fiona, looking out of the window. ‘You really must start a family very soon, Emily,’ she went on. It gives a completely new dimension to one’s life. I think one’s awfully selfish really until one has children.’
        ‘Parents,’ said Rory, ‘should always be seen and not heard.’
        Punctuated by giggles and murmurs of ‘Oh Charles’ from the back, we finally reached the turrets and gables and great blackened keep of Downleesh Castle. The windows threw shafts of light on to the snow which was gathering thickly on the surrounding fir trees and yews. The usual cavalcade of terriers and labradors came pounding out of the house to welcome us. Walter Scott was dragged off protesting by a footman to be given his dinner in the kitchen.
        In the dark panelled hall, great banks of holly were piled round the suits of armour, the spears and the banners. We had a drink before going upstairs. Diney, Lady Downleesh’s daughter, who’d just got engaged, fell on Fiona’s neck and they both started yapping about weddings and babies.
        We were taken to our bedroom down long, draughty passages to the West Tower. In spite of a fire in the grate, it was bitterly cold.
        I found when I got there that my suitcase had been unpacked and all my clothes laid out neatly on the mildewed fourposter, including an old bone of Walter Scott’s and a half-eaten bar of chocolate I had stuffed into my suitcase at the last moment. On the walls were pictures of gun-dogs coming out of the bracken, their mouths full of feathers.
        I missed Walter. Sometimes in those awful long silences I had with Rory I found it a relief to jabber away to him.
        ‘Can he come upstairs?’ I said.
        ‘No,’ said Rory.
        In the bookshelves was a book called A Modern Guide to Pig Husbandry. ‘Perhaps I should read it,’ I said, ‘it might give me some advice about being married to a pig.’
        Across the passage were the unspeakable Frayns. They had already hogged the bathroom, and judging from the sound of splashing and giggling, it wasn’t just abath they were having. I realized I was jealous of their happiness and involvement. I wanted Rory to start every sentence ‘Emily says’ and roar with laughter at my jokes.
        I took ages over dressing, painting my face as carefully as Rory painted any of his pictures. My pink dress