Read Online The Passing Bells by Phillip Rock - Free Book Online

shall have a quiet heart-to-heart talk with Mary and stop this nonsense before it goes any further.”
    â€œYou can’t tell the woman to leave and take her daughter with her. That wouldn’t be right.”
    â€œI won’t tell her to leave, just explain the blunt facts. She may be flighty, but she does have four sons who have minds of their own. She’ll understand Charles’s feelings and she won’t resent it one bit. Mary’s an old and dear friend and we’ve always been candid with each other.”
    â€œWell, all right,” he said in a pained manner. “Perhaps you’re doing the right thing.”
    â€œI will be doing the only thing.” She touched him gently on the shoulder. “I’m a mother and a woman. I understand Charles far better than you do at this period in his life. And what’s even more important, I understand Lydia.”
    â€œOh, I feel so glorious!” Alexandra shouted, bouncing up and down on the car seat.
    â€œSit still,” Lydia shouted back, “or you’ll fall out.”
    Alexandra settled down firmly in the leather seat, keeping one hand pressed on the crown of her hat. Lydia, frowning slightly, concentrated on adjusting the controls until the engine stopped its stuttering roar and settled into a smooth, powerful howl. They were past the village of Abingdon, racing along a narrow road which curved in a succession of lazy S’s through dense old woods and sunlit patches of hedgerowed fields.
    â€œGloriously happy!” Alexandra cried into the slipstream of wind buffeting her face. “Oh, Lydia, do you realize that by this time next year I might be having a baby! That is, if we have a short period of engagement. I don’t believe in long engagements, do you? Don’t you think they’re horribly old-fashioned?”
    â€œOh, do be quiet, Alex,” Lydia said in vexation. “You’re enough to make a saint swear. Honestly, you are.”
    The younger woman leaned closer to Lydia to keep from shouting over the noise of the engine.
    â€œI went into Mama’s sitting room last night after dinner and stole a long peek at her lists. Oh, Lydia, she’s inviting every devastatingly handsome bachelor in London.”
    â€œHow do you know they’re devastatingly handsome?”
    â€œI just know, that’s all. Not a one under six feet . . . all destined for greatness . . . And one of them will sweep me off my feet and into his strong ravishing arms.”
    Lydia rolled her eyes toward heaven. “What trashy novel did you steal that line from?”
    â€œJane Bakehurst—you don’t know her, she was my very best friend at school this year—well, she bought this book by Elinor Glyn. . . . Frightfully racy.”
    â€œAlex, you’re impossible. The sooner you get married, the better.”
    â€œI couldn’t agree with you more. I can’t wait to have babies, dozens of them—well, five at least—all fat, pink, gurgling things, and I shall stroll into the nursery every night with my devastatingly handsome young husband beside me, and Nanny shall parade them in front of us.”
    â€œAre you planning on having all five at one swoop?”
    â€œNo, silly, one at a time . . . a decent interval between each. But seriously, I believe marriage and babies to be a holiness. I truly do.”
    The countryside gave way to the suburbs—Epsom, Cheam, Merton, and South Wimbledon, rows and rows of little brick houses, and semidetached villas of mock Tudor design. The traffic became heavier when they reached Lambeth and Southwark: cars, lorries, buses, and ponderous horse-drawn wagons. They crossed the river via Westminster Bridge and so on into Mayfair. The House of Ferris, couturier, occupied an elegant Georgian edifice in Hanover Square. Lydia stopped in front of it, and a doorman dressed in the livery of a Victorian coachman hurried from the