Читать книгу The Frozen Lake: A gripping novel of family and wartime secrets - Elizabeth Edmondson - Страница 23

‘Another foul evening,’ Ursula wrote in her journal that night. ‘No one except Aunt Angela is pleased to see Uncle Hal, it must be horrid for him to come home and find he’s about as welcome as a stray dog. I knew Eve was going to be at her sniffiest with him, she was moaning on to Daddy about what a nuisance it was Hal deciding to pay a visit just now, with Rosalind on the verge of her coming out and not needing to be associated with any doubtful characters. Any more doubtful characters, she means, since she feels that Mummy casts a cloud of unrespectability over the household and that it’s hard on Rosalind to be in any way connected with such a person. I don’t think Uncle Hal has any idea why Daddy wanted him to come to the Hall. I think he’s only come because of the frozen lake, otherwise he’d have stayed away. He’ll wish he had once Daddy and Roger start on him about those shares. They don’t think I know anything about it, in which case they shouldn’t talk so jolly loud. And Eve’s awfully cross that they need Hal’s agreement to make the sale, she’s so snobby about him being an actor. How old-fashioned can you be? Some actors are awfully grand. I don’t suppose Uncle Hal is or we’d have heard about him, but he doesn’t look like a down-and-out to me, which is how Eve seems to regard him. He looks jolly successful in my opinion, like someone who doesn’t give a button what people like Eve say about him. And he’s got a mocking look in his eye, I think he finds the whole situation amusing. I wish I did.’