School for Love Read Online Free PDF

which he could look forward. For a week or two he dwelt on the new person who must be coming into the front room, but no one came and the hope began to fade. He wished very much that Mr Jewel came downstairs oftener, but the old man kept to his room and descended only for supper, which he ate rapidly without a word. Obviously things were not well between Miss Bohun and Mr Jewel, but there was no open quarrel; she merely ignored him, andwhen she was near there was about him something guilty, flustered, almost apprehensive. Felix was full of curiosity as to what Mr Jewel did about his other meals. One day he asked Miss Bohun. She kept silent, reflecting a moment, holding in her narrow spade-shaped chin so that two other chins appeared beneath it; then she lifted her face and said vaguely: ‘He makes tea in his room, I believe. He’s funny that way.’
    ‘Oh! . . . and what does he do all alone upstairs?’
    ‘I have not asked him.’
    The extreme coldness of this reply silenced Felix. But it was not only Miss Bohun that kept him at arm’s length – the atmosphere of the whole house seemed to him hostile. He was at home only with Faro or in the garden or at the cinema. He wondered sometimes if things would be any different for him anywhere. The centre wheel of his life was gone; he was at a standstill. He felt forsaken by the world, when, at last, something happened that changed the whole situation. He became a confidant. He was made to feel important and Miss Bohun, unexpectedly turning to him for sympathy, was revealed as nothing more monstrous than an unhappy old lady.
    It was the first morning of spring sunshine when, with Faro on his shoulder, he was drawn out to the glitter of the open air. There was a bench under the mulberry tree. Despite the cold, he settled down to work there. When he heard someone crossing the garden he looked up to see Nikky, wearing a most elegant overcoat with an astrakhan collar. Nikky let it hang open so everyone could see the fur lining inside; it was so long, it tripped him several times as he walked, but he held his delicate, pale face aloof, apparently unaware of being tripped. Felix, awed andadmiring, watched him as he went out through the back gate and crossed the stony wasteland beyond. Just as he was disappearing over the crest of the hill, Miss Bohun ran out, arms raised, and shouted: ‘Has Nikky gone?’
    ‘Yes.’ Felix pointed after him but it was too late to catch him.
    ‘Oh!’ Miss Bohun flung down her fists in exasperation, ‘I told him to clean the windows. He’s supposed to do the windows once a week, but he does nothing, nothing. All he wants to do is dress up in his father’s clothes and go out. It’s too bad. It’s so unfair to me.’
    Her voice almost broke, so when Felix returned to the house at lunch-time he was less surprised than he might have been to find her crouched at the table with rounded shoulders and drooping head. He stood looking at her, feeling the change in her. It was not only that she had a deflated look, there was something tearful about her although her eyes were dry. If she had been crying Felix could have asked at once what was the matter. Instead he had to stand uncertainly by the garden window and pretend to be looking at his books.
    Miss Bohun must have been conscious of him, for in a moment she sniffed and said: ‘She told me I was a wicked woman. I’d just gone out to have a quiet word about Nikky’s conduct when she flung at me – literally
flung
at me: “You could be an angel, but you’re really a devil.”’
    It was her stunned manner rather than what had been said that conveyed to him her sense of shock. He felt shocked himself. How cruel to say that to Miss Bohun – Miss Bohun who had befriended the Lesznos and given a home to him and Mr Jewel! She had been an angel to everyone.
    Miss Bohun sniffed again and continued: ‘She doesn’t mean it, of course; she
couldn’t
mean it. It was just temper, but it hurt me that she