Read Online Under Gemini by Rosamunde Pilcher - Free Book Online Page B

she was by images that had nothing to do with shorthand and typing. It was as if a well-ordered house had suddenly been invaded and taken over by strangers. They had caught Flora’s attention to the point where she could think of nothing else.
    â€œThere’s a ground-floor flat going in Fulham. It’s very small, of course, but if it was just for yourself…?”
    â€œYes.” She should go and see it. It sounded perfect. “Yes. I’ll think about it.” And she stepped out into the street and continued on her way, aimless and preoccupied.
    Part of the trouble, of course, was that she was short of sleep and physically exhausted by the traumas of yesterday. It had been a hysterical evening. Flora and Rose had dined together at Seppi’s, finished the champagne, been presented with a second bottle, and sat over coffee until Seppi, with a queue of customers waiting for tables, had reluctantly had to let them leave. Rose had settled the bill with a credit card. The dinner cost more than Flora could believe possible, but Rose dismissed it airily. She said not to worry because Harry Schuster would settle the account. He always did.
    They then found a taxi and drove to the Shelbourne Hotel, where Rose made derogatory remarks about the decor and the staff and the inhabitants, while Flora, embarrassed and trying not to laugh, explained the inexplicable situation to the sad lady behind the reception desk. A porter was finally persuaded to haul all the suitcases back out into the waiting cab, and they headed for Cadogan Court.
    The flat was on the fourth floor. Flora had never dreamed of such luxury—so much carpeting, concealed lighting, and space-age plumbing. Plate-glass windows slid aside to allow access to a little balcony crammed with pot plants; a button could be pressed to draw the filmy linen curtains; in the bedrooms the carpets were white and about two inches deep (maddening if you dropped a ring or a bobby pin, Rose said), and the bathrooms all smelt of the most expensive soaps and oil.
    Flora was carelessly assigned a bedroom (pale blue curtains made of Thai silk and mirrors everywhere) and told to unpack, which she did, to the extent of taking out her nightgown while Rose sat on the bed.
    An idea suddenly struck Flora. “Do you want to know what your father looks like?”
    â€œPhotographs!” Rose sounded as though she had only just heard of such a thing.
    Flora pulled out a big leather folder and handed it over to Rose, and they sat together on the big bed, dark head against dark head, their twin reflections caught in mirrors all about the room.
    There was Seal Cottage, and the garden, and the wedding shot Flora had taken of her father and Marcia coming out of the church. There was the big one of him sitting on the rocks below the cottage, with a backdrop of sea and gulls, his face very brown and the breeze blowing his hair.
    Rose’s reaction was gratifying. “Oh, he’s great! Like some smashing film star with spectacles. I can quite see why my mother married him. And yet I can’t either. I mean, I can only imagine her married to a man like Harry.”
    â€œYou mean a rich man.”
    â€œYes, I suppose I do.” She peered at the photograph again. “I wonder why they got married in the first place? Do you suppose they had anything in common?”
    â€œPerhaps a mutual infatuation. They met on a ski holiday. Did you know that?”
    â€œNo kidding.”
    â€œSki holidays are a bit like ocean voyages, or so I’ve been told. Wine-like air and tanned bodies and nothing to do except physically exhaust yourself and fall in love.”
    â€œI’ll remember that,” promised Rose. She was suddenly bored with the photographs. She tossed them down on the silk bedcover and looked long at her sister. Without any change in the tone of her voice, she asked, “Would you like a bath?”
    So they both had baths, and Rose piled records