The Greengage Summer Read Online Free PDF Page A

as far as we knew, who travelled. Father, of course, could not be said to live in Belmont
Road. Mr Stillbotham spent his winters in the South of France; we admired him for that and thought him distinguished with his silver hair, pince-nez, blue-and-white-striped shirts and bow-ties. We
also liked his manner to us which was full of courtesy and admiration—particularly for Joss.
    “ Standing with reluctant feet ,
    Where the brook and river meet ,”
    Mr Stillbotham would say when he saw her. Altogether he seemed a suitable person to advise us, and we approved.
    “You wish to visit your dead?” he asked when Mother told him about the battlefields. “They are not dead but liv . . .” but for the purposes of our visit Mother needed
them dead and she cut him short. “Can you tell us of an hotel, not too expensive, and near the cemeteries?” she said.
    “Les Oeillets at Vieux-Moutiers.” That was the first time we heard its name. “You will find plenty of motors at the station.”
    Saint Joan had been burned, it seemed, at Rouen. “But you can break your journey there if you go by Newhaven-Dieppe, which will be cheaper,” said Mr Stillbotham; “or if you
preferred it you could spend the afternoon in Paris.”
    Spend the afternoon in Paris! Saint Joan had not the slightest chance after that. “I shall see the Louvre,” said Joss. “Mona Lisa. The Winged Victory.”
    “I shall see the shops,” said Willmouse and, as always when he was stirred, his face went white.
    “Do you remember those strawberry tarts, little strawberries in syrup, that Father once brought back?” asked Vicky. “They came from Paris,” she said reverently.
    Hester and I, as usual, were far more ordinary; she would be happy buying postcards and taking snapshots with her Brownie camera, while I, the chameleon, would be with them all in turns.
“Well, you enjoy it more in that way,” said Mother. We were all equally excited.
    “If you listen to me . . .” said Uncle William, but nobody listened.
    “Very well,” said Uncle William. “When you get into trouble don’t ask me for help.”
    “We shall not need help,” said Mother, dignified; but the day before we left she was bitten on the leg by a horse-fly. “A little fly,” said Hester, “to do all
that!”
    When Mother took down her stocking in the train from Dieppe, the leg was swollen and the skin looked purple, green and blue. “Like a bruise,” said Hester. “Did you bruise it?
All over?” she finished uncertainly.
    Mother shook her head. She fumbled with her handbag as if she could not control her hands and she shivered although she was hot.
    “You are ill,” said Joss accusingly, and Mother could not deny it.
    It was altogether a disappointing as well as a dismaying day. From the train France did not look very different from England; it had the Constable, Peter Rabbit colours we had grown up with, and
in Paris we did not see the Louvre, nor the shops, nor eat strawberry tarts. We did not buy a single postcard, nor take a photograph; we waited in the waiting-room for Mother to get well. The
attendant in a dark-blue overall with a black crochet shawl came and looked at us, but we were too shy to speak to her. “Why didn’t you go to Cook’s? Lunn’s? The American
Express? Any of them would have helped you.” Uncle William has asked us that often, but Joss and I had then only one idea: to get Mother, the Littles, Hester, ourselves and our suitcases to
Vieux-Moutiers and Les Oeillets.
    There was a train at seven. I remember I went to a food wagon and bought rolls and sausage. I did not know what else to buy and Joss would not go. “But you are the eldest,” I
said.
    “You are the best at French,” said Joss cruelly.
    Like a herd we drew together and sniffed the sausage; we had not smelled garlic before and we gave it to the attendant; we ate the rolls.
    I remember when Vicky touched Mother’s leg, Mother gave a little scream and quickly bit her lips.