Days Without Number by Robert Goddard Read Free Book Online Page A

world events was, appropriately enough, Howard Carter's discovery of the tomb of King Tutankhamun in 1922. He still dressed much as he had sixty years ago - in baggy tweed and corduroy and a cardigan whose pockets sagged under the weight of pipe, matches and tobacco-pouch. Smoking, combined with the effects of sundry archaeological expeditions over the years to North African wadis and West Asian plains, had left his face creviced like a dried river-bed. His hair - of which he still had a fine head - was yellowy grey, his eyes blue-green and magnified by the lenses of his glasses, on which Nick noticed a blurring galaxy of fingerprints and grease smears.
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    Only when the old man walked any distance - such as from the drawing room to the dining room - did his unsteadiness and shortness of breath reveal themselves. He clutched at chair-backs and door frames on the way, looking in such moments bewildered by his own feebleness. Then Trennor suddenly ceased to seem a place where he could be safely left to live out his days. The rambling layout and inadequate heating were bad enough. But there were also rugs curling at the edges and worn stair-carpet to be taken into consideration, not to mention the treacherously steep steps down to the cellar. Nick saw decrepitude wherever he glanced, in the sagging furniture and fraying curtains, in the dust laden display cases of Roman coins and pre-Roman skull fragments, in the faded photographs and oriental urns, in all the accumulated detritus of his family's past. Their very surroundings spoke of the need for change.
    For some time, however, that need was to go unmentioned. They had assembled, after all, to celebrate Andrew's fiftieth birthday. Pru had baked a cake, laid the dining table, prepared some vegetables and put a joint in the oven. All the family had to do was eat, drink and be as merry as they could contrive. The birthday boy himself had done little in the way of smartening up. Nor, come to that, had Basil. But their sisters had put on their contrasting party clothes - Irene one of her more elegant pairings of skirt and blouse, Anna alarmingly tight white trousers and a poppy-red off-the shoulder sweater, with one or other bra strap constantly on view.
    Conviviality prevailed before and during lunch, albeit conviviality of a brittle kind. Andrew put up a decent show of surprise at Nick's presence, pleasure at the presents he was given and general appreciation of the efforts being made to mark his mid-life milestone. Anna talked and laughed too much, Basil too little. Irene steered the conversation between rocks and shallows with considerable finesse. And Nick kept subtle watch on their father, who, it seemed to him, was keeping still more sutble watch on all of them.
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    But Michael Paleologus was also drinking at a pace somewhere between steady and stiff. Whisky had been taken before the birthday champagne. He had not stinted himself on the wine with lunch. And, as the meal drew to a close, he broke out the port. By then his subtlety had faded. And his reticence had begun to loosen.
    'We drank a toast to Andrew before lunch,' he announced. 'Now I'd like to propose another. Your mother was a good wife to me. I loved her dearly and miss her sorely.'
    'So do we, Dad,' said Anna.
    'I know, my girl, I know. It's to her memory I'd like to drink. She'd be pleased by this . . . gathering. Pleased that the family's still drawn together from time to time, back here at Trennor.' If the last four words had been written down, Nick felt, they would undoubtedly have been italicized. 'To your mother.'
    Glasses were clinked and port swallowed. Then Irene chimed in adroitly with a well-worn anecdote from her childhood. Andrew had taken her for a nerve-jangling spin on his motorbike one weekend, much to their father's horror. 'Good God, boy, what could you have been thinking of?' he was recorded as spluttering. Their mother had falsely insisted that she had given them permission, thus defusing