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Authors: Victoria Fox
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darling?’
‘You’re a delicate flower, my dear.’
‘I can’t imagine it,’ said Olivia, tucking into a bread roll. ‘Me, I couldn’t be cooped up for any length of time. When I was in London it did my head in being trapped indoors all day... I surf, so I’m used to the fresh air.’
‘ You surf?’
‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘Well, nothing, I suppose.’ Susanna considered it. ‘Only it’s not very ladylike.’
Cato’s eyes were flashing. ‘I think it’s rather sexy. I say, perhaps we should get you out on a surfboard, Mole.’
‘Over my dead body!’
‘You should try sometime,’ offered Olivia. ‘I’ll teach you, if you like.’
Susanna went to pour scorn on the suggestion before Cato supplied wolfishly:
‘You can teach me.’
‘I think she offered to teach me ,’ Susanna huffed, snapping a grissini in two.
The oysters arrived, a majestic array of rocky shells, bolstered by wedges of sunshine lemon, their flesh pearlescent in the candlelight and doused in sweet shallot.
Cato seized a mollusc and threw it back. ‘Go on, girl,’ he encouraged Susanna, who took a suspicious sniff. ‘Down the hatch!’
‘These look awfully slimy,’ she observed. ‘Are they alive?’
Olivia lifted hers and it vanished down her throat. ‘Not any more.’
Susanna was horrified. Olivia laughed, and put her elbows on the table.
Charlie stole a glance at her. She was unembellished in a plain dress, her auburn hair loose, and she wore no make-up. In the shimmering light her cheeks were soft as apricots, and her eyes were the colour of the sea. Around her neck was a delicate gold locket.
He had kept the picture. He didn’t know where it was now—gathering dust in a box with all his old school stuff, probably. Remembering it felt strange, deceitful somehow, as she sat beside him.
The summer before he left for Harrow, Adrian and his gang had been in the common room, scrapping over a piece of paper, pointing at it and laughing. There had been some disagreement over its contents, a round of jostling and teasing, before the pretty boy capitulated and tossed it in the bin. Charlie had retrieved it after they’d gone, flattening it and smoothing down the creases. Straight away he had recognised the OL initials in the bottom right-hand corner.
It had been the most wonderful drawing. A map of Lustell Cove done in sharp, determined pencil, incorporating the beach and the Steep, the moors and the cliffs, with three big fat Xs scratched in red crayon at the foot of the bluff, where a sailboat was coming in to land, armed with treasure-seeking pirates. What had struck him wasn’t just how good it was, how talented the artist, but with what care it had been done. She had done it for Adrian, and he had thrown it away.
Susanna was attempting to sip her oyster from its shell. She looked like a mother bird returning to the nest, a regurgitated worm dangling from her mouth.
‘Suck it up, Mole, come on now!’
In a slurp it vanished. Susanna shuddered.
‘She’s trying to like them,’ explained Cato. ‘There’s the most terrific pressure to serve them at dinner parties.’
Susanna smacked the table with her hand. ‘That’s it!’ she cried.
‘What in heaven’s—?’
‘We’ll have a party,’ she announced. ‘At Usherwood! We’ll invite everybody! Get the gang down from London, I’ll do the place up, get designers in—-caterers too; it’ll be the society event of the decade! Oh, can we, Cato, can we?’
Cato stroked his chin. ‘I don’t know about that, Mole...’
‘The town could come,’ she said recklessly, turned to Charlie for support, whose face was distraught. ‘Lustell Cove. Let’s see what your precious public makes of that! Oh, it’ll be wonderful. You know how easily bored I get when I’m not working. It would be a treat for me to plan something like this, a pet project—’
‘Let’s not get carried away...’
‘It’s not happening.’
The force of Charlie’s
‘You’re a delicate flower, my dear.’
‘I can’t imagine it,’ said Olivia, tucking into a bread roll. ‘Me, I couldn’t be cooped up for any length of time. When I was in London it did my head in being trapped indoors all day... I surf, so I’m used to the fresh air.’
‘ You surf?’
‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘Well, nothing, I suppose.’ Susanna considered it. ‘Only it’s not very ladylike.’
Cato’s eyes were flashing. ‘I think it’s rather sexy. I say, perhaps we should get you out on a surfboard, Mole.’
‘Over my dead body!’
‘You should try sometime,’ offered Olivia. ‘I’ll teach you, if you like.’
Susanna went to pour scorn on the suggestion before Cato supplied wolfishly:
‘You can teach me.’
‘I think she offered to teach me ,’ Susanna huffed, snapping a grissini in two.
The oysters arrived, a majestic array of rocky shells, bolstered by wedges of sunshine lemon, their flesh pearlescent in the candlelight and doused in sweet shallot.
Cato seized a mollusc and threw it back. ‘Go on, girl,’ he encouraged Susanna, who took a suspicious sniff. ‘Down the hatch!’
‘These look awfully slimy,’ she observed. ‘Are they alive?’
Olivia lifted hers and it vanished down her throat. ‘Not any more.’
Susanna was horrified. Olivia laughed, and put her elbows on the table.
Charlie stole a glance at her. She was unembellished in a plain dress, her auburn hair loose, and she wore no make-up. In the shimmering light her cheeks were soft as apricots, and her eyes were the colour of the sea. Around her neck was a delicate gold locket.
He had kept the picture. He didn’t know where it was now—gathering dust in a box with all his old school stuff, probably. Remembering it felt strange, deceitful somehow, as she sat beside him.
The summer before he left for Harrow, Adrian and his gang had been in the common room, scrapping over a piece of paper, pointing at it and laughing. There had been some disagreement over its contents, a round of jostling and teasing, before the pretty boy capitulated and tossed it in the bin. Charlie had retrieved it after they’d gone, flattening it and smoothing down the creases. Straight away he had recognised the OL initials in the bottom right-hand corner.
It had been the most wonderful drawing. A map of Lustell Cove done in sharp, determined pencil, incorporating the beach and the Steep, the moors and the cliffs, with three big fat Xs scratched in red crayon at the foot of the bluff, where a sailboat was coming in to land, armed with treasure-seeking pirates. What had struck him wasn’t just how good it was, how talented the artist, but with what care it had been done. She had done it for Adrian, and he had thrown it away.
Susanna was attempting to sip her oyster from its shell. She looked like a mother bird returning to the nest, a regurgitated worm dangling from her mouth.
‘Suck it up, Mole, come on now!’
In a slurp it vanished. Susanna shuddered.
‘She’s trying to like them,’ explained Cato. ‘There’s the most terrific pressure to serve them at dinner parties.’
Susanna smacked the table with her hand. ‘That’s it!’ she cried.
‘What in heaven’s—?’
‘We’ll have a party,’ she announced. ‘At Usherwood! We’ll invite everybody! Get the gang down from London, I’ll do the place up, get designers in—-caterers too; it’ll be the society event of the decade! Oh, can we, Cato, can we?’
Cato stroked his chin. ‘I don’t know about that, Mole...’
‘The town could come,’ she said recklessly, turned to Charlie for support, whose face was distraught. ‘Lustell Cove. Let’s see what your precious public makes of that! Oh, it’ll be wonderful. You know how easily bored I get when I’m not working. It would be a treat for me to plan something like this, a pet project—’
‘Let’s not get carried away...’
‘It’s not happening.’
The force of Charlie’s
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