Read Online Good Behaviour by Maggie O'Farrell, Molly Keane - Free Book Online Page B

rescue. When she heard that a marquess was coming to stay for the Cloneen Shoot and that
     there were no sheets for his bed because the key was lost, the fatal feeling came over her again, and she was off on her quest,
     with renewed triumph. From finding the key it was only a step into the linen cupboard with its quiet, ravaged hordes of sheets
     and pillow cases, tablecloths, napkins, braided curtains, and old printed stuff forgotten for years. ‘Rose,’ she said, ‘we
     must sort all this out, and
I
shall repair everything.’
    ‘Some wet day we’ll be at it,’ Rose said.
    ‘It’s pouring rain today – we’ll start now.’
    ‘Oh, Mrs Brock,’ Rose protested, ‘and his Lordship’s bed not made, and I have ducks to kill for the cook.’
    Mrs Brock knew that killing ducks was one of Rose’s skills and pleasures, but she held to her point, and kept control of the
     linen cupboard, discovering in it rare things and rotten things. Sorting and piecing together and darning, her hands never
     ran out of skill or tired of work.
    It was Rose who brought her Papa’s favourite pale tweed coat, gone at the elbows, frayed at the cuffs, for which he had an
     obstinate adoration. Mrs Brock spread the coat on the table, excited by its problem, and presently worked away in the haze
     of scents impregnating its stuff: turf smoke and burnt heather roots – it had been handwoven in a cottage. Through and beyond
     this rough base, other smells came faint and vaporous. Egyptian cigarettes stayed the most constant, defeating horses’ sweat
     in the coat-tails and hair oil in the collar. As the coat warmed under her hands and on her knees, a masculine presence enveloped
     and pervaded her.
    Papa noticed the miracle of repair performed on his old favourite. ‘So you did remember to have a go at Rose about this old
     coat, bless you. You know I love it,’ he said to Mummie. ‘Good old Rose – I knew she had it in her. Never gives her running
     unless she’s under the stick.’
    ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Mummie said.
    ‘Of course you do – you told me to throw it away.’
    ‘Yes, I wish you had. It’s not your colour, really.’ She looked into him, through him, lost in consideration.
    ‘Extraordinary.’ He lifted his arm, the wing of a jungle cock; he preened with pleasure in his old plumage. ‘I shall give
     her half a sovereign for this job,’ he said with firm intention.
    It was more than I could bear. ‘I know. I know who did it. Shall I tell you? Shall I?’
    ‘Yes, if you like.’
    ‘Mrs Brock. Can I have the half a sovereign for her?’
    ‘No, Aroon – you can’t. I can’t give Mrs Brock half a sovereign. What can I give her?’ he asked, appalled.
    ‘I don’t know, a bit embarrassing. Don’t ask me.’ Mummie drifted away. Her voice coming out of a distance, she said more clearly:
     ‘I wish she was as successful about your French, darling child. That would fill up her time.’
    ‘
Le-chêne-un-jour-dit-au-roseau
,’ I started to gabble.
    ‘
Roseau
,’ she corrected my accent – Mrs Brock’s accent – with a sort of pinching dislike. The word
roseau
sounded much prettier as she spoke it.
    I longed to be in the schoolroom, cheering and delighting Mrs Brock with the news of Papa’s gratitude and pleasure. But, for
     a matter of days, I kept it to myself. Somehow the whole affair was now tempered to a chill of silliness by Mummie’s attitude
     towards it – as if Mrs Brock had been giving herself a treat. However, what with my longing for importance, and my heart bursting
     with love, finally I could not resist the wish to please.
    It was on a ravingly glad day by the sea that I told Mrs Brock about Papa’s great pleasure. We drove the fat Iceland pony
     five miles to our nearest sea; the sun shone; the wind twined the long gold sands like feathers on a bird’s back. How seldom
     we got to the sea; how rarely we found so many cowrie shells, fat little wet pigs, scarce