Читать книгу Auntie Robbo - Ann Scott-Moncrieff - Страница 7

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In the evening when Hector came down after his bath he found the drawing-room empty; he sat down cross-legged on the sheepskin rug in front of the fire and began his supper. From the dining-room, across the passage, came a murmur of conversation between Auntie Robbo and Merlissa Benck, still at dinner. By and by the murmur divided itself into two distinct voices, becoming shrill and staccato on the one hand and a deep growling grumble on the other. There seemed to be a bit of an argument going on. Hector listened apprehensively. However, he felt there was nothing he could do about it, and he went on eating stolidly. Now there came intervals of painful silence, and then the voices would break out again in their respective keys, as if both ladies had been drawing breath, glaring at each other across the table, and then bursting forth again. During one of these pauses the dining-room door was snapped open and Auntie Robbo's voice came with great finality: "I tell you the whole thing is ridiculous, quite ridiculous," and presently she swept into the drawing-room ahead of Merlissa Benck.

Auntie Robbo was at her most magnificent, flushed and excited, anger adding fire to her brown cheeks and faded eyes. She was wearing one of her grandest evening dresses: a purple taffeta one nipped in at the waist, spread out into a fan-shaped train. It was festooned with bunches of net and white rosettes and from the corsage hung two twinkling tassels of diamonds. Auntie Robbo wore this confection right regally; she loved her clothes as she loved her food.

"Catch," she said to Hector, tossing a little bunch of black grapes onto the rug beside him. "They're very good this time, not a bit sour."

Merlissa Benck came waddling in, looking like a ruffled and well-pecked hen; her face was harassed and moist. She sat down by the fire, crossed and uncrossed her plump legs, and shrilled with an affection of ease:

"So here you are, Hector. Having a nice simple supper by the fire while we two old ladies have been feasting next door."

"Yes," said Hector, eyeing the handkerchief which she was twisting and untwisting in her lap. He felt quite sorry for her.

Auntie Robbo began to pour out coffee. "What do you think, Hector," she said in her old calm voice, "your stepmother thinks it would be nice to adopt you."

Hector dropped his piece of bread jam-side down on the sheepskin rug, and for an instant his face was suffused with horror. Then he said blankly: "Oh!" bending to pick up the bread.

"Just look what you've made him do!" cried Merlissa Benck. "You quite startled the little chap. I should never have broken the news to him like that."

Poor Hector stared at her now. "It's not all settled, is it?" he gulped.

"No, no! Not quite. But it can be just as soon as you like, dear." She darted a triumphant glance at Auntie Robbo, but Auntie Robbo was bent over the coffee tray.

"Black or white, Miss Benck?"

"Oh, white, if you please." She was quite sure of herself now. She tucked the handkerchief away in her bag, and leaned forward confidentially to Hector. "You see, it all began with our little conversation this morning. When I pointed out to your great-grand-aunt what a good thing it would be if you were to go to school and how anxious you yourself were for it, she wouldn't treat the matter seriously at all. She wouldn't even discuss schools with me. Now was that fair? So I just said—blunt is almost my middle name, as your poor father used to tell me—I just said: 'Very well, if you can't see your way to doing your duty by the boy, I will. I don't mind adopting him.'"

Merlissa Benck leaned back, staring at Hector.

"That was very nice of you," he managed to say.

She glowed at him.

"Yes, wasn't it?" said Auntie Robbo mildly. "And she's got simply heaps and heaps of money, far more than me, all of which she will leave to you if you will become her adopted son.''

Hector looked at Merlissa Benck with a new respect. It seemed impossible that such a dull-looking person, wearing such ugly clothes, should have a lot of money.

"Your great-grand-aunt," pursued Merlissa Benck, "said that you were entirely free to choose for yourself. Of course she is your legal guardian, but I flatter myself that I can be something more to you—after all, I am not so very much older than you—more of a friend"—Merlissa Benck's voice became soft and blurred with emotion—"and more of a mother."

She stopped and looked at Hector. Hector shuffled uncomfortably and then he saw that there was no way out but the one way.

"Well, the truth is," he said in a flat voice, "I don't think I really want to go to school."

He watched anxiously as Merlissa Benck's cheeks blew out, growing a pale lavender with rage. Auntie Robbo stirred her coffee noisily, saying in a benevolent helpless sort of voice: "There you are, you see, Miss Benck."

"It's preposterous," shrilled Merlissa Benck. "The boy isn't of an age to decide for himself. He doesn't realize how his future depends on it. Here he is wasting the best years of his life on a doting, selfish old woman—no, I won't apologize, I will speak the truth——"

"Yes, yes, do, please," urged Auntie Robbo.

"Oh, you are impossible!" shouted Merlissa Benck, and bursting into tears she ran out of the room. They cocked their heads, listening to her sobbing all the way up the stairs and along the passage. A door slammed, and they turned slowly to look at each other in dismay.

Auntie Robbo brought out a big red handkerchief from a pocket in one of her lacy underskirts; she mopped her forehead. "I couldn't help it, Hector. It wasn't my fault really."

Hector jumped up and hugged her. "I think you managed it very well," he said. "Here, have one of my grapes."

Auntie Robbo chuckled. "I didn't even have to play her. It was like lifting a salmon out in the off-season. All the same, it was the only thing to do."

"I suppose it was. I never said I wanted to go to school, and what on earth made her think I would be adopted by her? Why, we hardly know her yet."

"We've known her since yesterday, but it seems a great long while."

"I think she's daft," said Hector finally, rubbing a bit of jam into the sheepskin rug. "Shall I get out the chessmen?"

"Yes, a nice quiet game," agreed Auntie Robbo. "That'll take our minds off our troubles."

When the quaint carved red and white figures were arranged on the board, Auntie Robbo murmured: "She can hardly want to stay after what's happened."

Hector merely nodded, absorbed in his first move.