Read Online Mandrake by Susan Cooper - Free Book Online

the word ‘lady’ brought anger whipping away astonishment. How had they known about that dead affair? ‘Get out,’ Queston said. He put his hand on the butt of the gun where it rested against the table, and saw the man’s eyes narrow. Suddenly he felt an extraordinary undercurrent of menace; the man’s impregnable confidence was that of one backed by an enormous weight of organized authority.
    ‘You will be hearing from us, Mr Queston.’ His eyes slid away again with the same other-attentive air as before. He stepped out past the dog, who lay on the doorstep; she put back her ears, but did not growl.
    The man gestured at her, and said over his shoulder: ‘They should all be sent back to Scotland, where they belong. It will be seen to, soon enough.’
    ‘The breed’s Welsh, as it happens. And she came from a farm two miles from here.’ Queston’s retort came automatically triumphant, like a child’s jeer, before he had realized quite what he had heard. But while he realized, the man had gone, and he saw only the dew glinting on the wet red blackberries and filigree cobwebs laced between the leaves, in the small jungle that cut off the cottage from the road.
     
    The milkman’s van did not come until the sun was dropping into the trees. Queston heard its clattering engine, and waited at the door.
    ‘George! Where the hell have you been? I’m gasping for a cup of tea. Have the cows run dry?’
    George was an amiable, dim-witted youth, vainly seeking sophistication in a leather jacket and black jeans. He wore them in all weathers, and the air now was close and hot. He mopped his red, large-featured face. ‘Three pints?’
    ‘That’s right. Got any eggs?’
    ‘Dozen?’
    ‘I’ll come to the van. What made you so late?’
    George seemed uneasy, his eyes vacant and dazed. His rural drawl was more impenetrable than usual. ‘Men in the village, from the office. Couldn’t get owt sooner.’ He put down the cartons of milk and made off towards the road. Queston followed, and took the tray of eggs that the boy thrust at him.
    ‘Come and have a cuppa,’ he said impulsively, surprised to find himself grasping at a chance of company. ‘It must be the end of your round.’
    ‘Can’t,’ George said. He climbed into the driving-seat.
    ‘Thanks all the same. Gotta get home.’ He looked out furtively at the fields edging the road, as if expecting something to pounce. ‘That’s right. Home.’
    Queston stared at him. Was the boy drunk?
    ‘What did you mean about men in the village from the office? Was it some census chap from the Ministry of Planning?’
    George reacted as if the words were some unutterable blasphemy. He jerked suddenly in his seat, and hastily started the engine. He said a third time, barely audible: ‘Gotta get home.’
    Queston stepped back, puzzled, but as the engine belched the boy leaned across the nearside window and shouted to him over the din. He looked across Queston’s shoulder, without meeting his eyes. ‘Shan’t be calling any more, Mr Queston. Sorry. Not allowed. You’re beyond the line. Have to come and get your own milk, if you like.’
    Queston opened his mouth to argue, but the van began to move. He caught a last glimpse of George’s hot, confused face, and heard him call: ‘You’re beyond the line.’
    He went back to the cottage, carrying the eggs. Beyond what line?
     
    The night was airless and hot; as he lay in bed the darkness pressed insistently round him as if it caught away his breath. Yet September was half gone already. Every year it had been the same, since he came to the cottage. The summers long, hot, longer every year, the cauldron of sunshine cooling only when the first autumn mists began.
    And even the nights hot, that was the strange thing. He had grown accustomed to heat in the last twenty years; but to a heat that died into vicious cold at night when summer was past its peak. Not this, now: this was different. The nights were hot, without wind,