A Spear of Summer Grass - By Deanna Raybourn Page 0,44
impressive cuts.
Anthony Wickenden held my hand a moment too long. “I must apologise for bleeding on your shoes in Nairobi. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is my wife, Jude.”
He drew forward a woman who might have been the loveliest creature I had ever seen if she’d given a damn. She would have done any showroom in Paris proud, and I could imagine her dressed in the latest fashion, leaning on the arm of a duke as she swept into the opera house. But instead she was here, in a colonial backwater, and the closer I looked, the more provincial she seemed. Her hair was badly cut and styled even worse. It had been crammed hastily into a snood and she was wearing an evening gown that looked as if it had come out of the closet of a plump octogenarian and altered badly. A moment later, I realised why.
Behind her was her aunt, presented as Sybil Balfour. “Call me Tusker,” she ordered, thrusting out her meaty hand. She was wearing a gown very similar in cut to Jude’s, only this one was straining at the seams. Jude’s had been awkwardly taken in and it hung badly on her tall, slender frame. Tusker was half a foot shorter and almost twice as wide, although her bulk seemed to be entirely muscle and when she shook my hand I would swear I heard the bones crack. “Welcome to Africa.”
“Thank you so much,” I said to her, and then to the company at large, “Thank you all for such a warm welcome.”
Helen beamed at us, then at Rex’s gentle cough, remembered to introduce Dora as well. We nibbled on tiny hot sausages and made small talk as Rex handed around fresh drinks.
“What’s this?” It was a champagne glass, but the liquid inside was foaming instead of bubbling. I peered at the murky colour.
“That is a Black Velvet, champagne with stout. Not a very pretty cocktail, I admit.”
“It looks like somebody tried to bottle evil.” But I had drunk worse. I took a sip and rolled it on my tongue. It was creamy and heavy and musky. “Not bad.”
He gave me a wink and moved on.
As soon as we’d finished our drinks, Helen whisked everyone into the dining room. “Now, I realise we’re odd numbers—only six men for seven women, so one of you gentlemen will have to take on two ladies,” she said with a waggish expression.
“Thirteen at table,” Bianca said darkly.
“Don’t be absurd, Bianca. That’s a peasant superstition,” Helen returned sharply. Meanwhile, Rex had solved the problem quite neatly by offering an arm each to Dora and to me and making it seem as if we were doing him a tremendous favour.
The table was set as beautifully as any in England—in fact, the entire house might have been spirited over by fairies, and I placed myself firmly in Helen’s good graces by telling her so.
“Oh, you are sweet!” she said breathily. “I designed it, you know. Well, I helped Rex. He’s so clever,” she added with a coo down the table in his direction. “We shopped for months in Paris and London to get just the right furnishings. Wait until you see my bathtub—pink quartz! So audacious it was even featured in Tatler. Of course, it took ages to have it all shipped over, but it is absolutely my dream house, right to the last detail.” She promised to give us a tour later, and then dinner was served.
The food was good and the wine impeccable, but something seemed slightly off with the company. There were undercurrents of tension I didn’t quite understand. In any close group of people there are bound to be secret resentments, and this group was closer than most. With the exception of Ryder and a few farming families, they represented the whole of white society in the little valley. There would be unspoken alliances in such a gathering, and doubtless unspoken annoyances as well.
But little things could fester in the African heat, and I wondered if any small thorn prick had been left to turn septic. I watched Bianca’s small dark eyes following Gervase with a feverish intensity. When she touched him, there was ownership in those caresses. I also saw Jude and her aunt Sybil work hard not to exchange a single word the entire evening. I was only a little surprised Jude was still living with her husband after he had beaten her. I had known my share of