Pure Juliet Read Online Free PDF

the hair of some dragon’s daughter. What had he done, that his aunt’s protegée should turn out to be his type again? His fatal and fascinating, irresistible type?
    And once more, he groaned in his heart, Oh, God. All that to go through again?
    But he had observed the everyday miniature drama going on in the shop, and, desiring to get Juliet to himself as soon as possible, strode inside and said to the girl scrabbling irritably among the scattered boxes: ‘I say – that’s a bit of a disaster. Can I give you a hand?’ in his most flirtatious tone, which gained much from the beauty of his voice.
    ‘I’m looking for a Size 4,’ said the assistant, instantly all sweetness.
    ‘Here you are – no sooner sought than found.’ Frank whisked up a box from the pile and held it out, smiling.
    ‘Thanks ever so.’ And she writhed away to Juliet, who was gazing, shoeless, out of the door.
    In two minutes the smaller size was on ( Runs in her tights , he noted. That wasn’t like any of the others ) and they were walking together down the high street.
    ‘Is that the lot?’
    ‘Pardon?’
    ‘Any more shopping to do?’
    ‘No, thank God.’
    ‘Why? Don’t you like it?’ ( Oh, those ‘walks’ with Ottolie or Fiona or Deirdre, walks which had always ended, somehow, in the smartest shop in whatever town they were staying . . .)
    ‘Hate it.’ Juliet was walking so fast that she was almost running.
    ‘Good – so do I.’
    They turned out of the high street into the quieter road leading to Leete.
    He hesitated, then went on: ‘I may be coming to live near here. At Wanby. It’s about four miles from St Alberics. Do you know it?’
    A shake of her head. She was walking through the pools of last night’s rain, heedless of the new shoes. Her manner was not encouraging.
    ‘I’m hoping Great-Aunt’s doctor, Dr Masters, will sell me two meadows he owns there, with a couple of old sheds. It’s as much “miles from anywhere” as a place can be in this terrible modern England’ – a glance at her; no reaction – ‘and if I get permission, I can make the kind of home there that I want.’
    ‘You’re lucky.’
    ‘Why? Haven’t you got the kind of home you want – with Great-Aunt?’
    ‘Sooner be by myself,’ she said.
    With Frank’s obsession with fays and water-sprites, went a passion for what was delicate and beautiful; in fact, obsession and passion fed upon one another, and it was not possible, it really was not possible, for him to experience the dawn of a satisfyingly painful love for a girl who showed no sign of interest in anything he said, splashed in new shoes through puddles, and looked – let him confront the fact – but for her hair, unhealthy and plain.
    ‘You lived in London before you came to my great-aunt, didn’t you?’
    A nod.
    ‘And there are five of you . . . you, and two sisters and two brothers?’
    ‘Yes . . . s’pose Auntie told you. And me dad’s dead.’ Her eyes ( Bright with anger, surely ?)were turned full on him.
    ‘In her letters, yes. She’s very fond of you, Juliet, you’re the daughter she’s always wanted. And when I telephoned her this morning to say I was back in England and coming to stay with her—’
    ‘You comin’ to stay?’ Unflattering dismay in the thin voice. ( Ah, the languorous note in the voice of Ottolie . . .)
    He laughed. ‘Don’t sound so horrified. I shan’t be in much, I’ll spend half my time over at Wanby, arranging things with Dr Masters and seeing the council . . . damn, I meant to buy a bicycle . . . Never mind, tomorrow will have to do. When I telephoned this morning, Great-Aunt told me that you had come to stay for a year. What—’
    ‘Won’t you get a car?’ she interrupted.
    Ha, a crack in the armour! Disappointing .
    ‘No, I hate the filthy things, for what they’re making of England. I wish every car in the world were at the bottom of the Pacific.’
    ‘You can get away in them,’ she said.
    They had turned down the