Kingdom Lost by Patricia Wentworth Read Free Book Online Page A

annoyance.
    â€œI couldn’t understand any of it,” she said.
    â€œThank the Lord for that!” said Nicholas Barclay.
    â€œBut I want to understand everything !”
    â€œLittle girls don’t want to understand that sort of thing.”
    If he meant to divert her by calling her a little girl, he failed. She kept to the point.
    â€œWhat sort of thing?”
    Barclay’s skin was too leathery to reveal a blush, but he experienced some of the sensations which accompany the act of blushing.
    He said, “Er—”
    â€œWhat sort of things?” said Miss Valentine Ryven impatiently.
    Barclay said “Er—” again.
    Valentine looked at him severely.
    â€œWasn’t it a nice book?”
    â€œNo, my dear, it wasn’t.”
    â€œThen why did you have it?”
    â€œGosh!” said Barclay; he mopped his brow. “You stop giving me the third degree and hop along and get yourself another book.”
    â€œPerhaps that won’t be a nice one either.”
    It ended in Barclay consigning about half his library to the Pacific Ocean.
    In the intervals of reading novels Miss Ryven practised the art of wearing shoes and stockings. It was not an easy art. She could wear them, and she could walk in them; but she was robbed of two-thirds of her spring and grace. She practised daily, and Barclay gave her dancing lessons—like most fat men he danced extremely well—and Mr. Muir, who was not a great performer, was set to change gramophone records whilst Valentine, in Barclay’s arms, learnt to avoid treading on Barclay’s toes or tripping up over her own. He became daily less cheerful and avoided Valentine.
    It was not really very easy to avoid Valentine, because Valentine did not want to be avoided. When she had finished her dancing lesson with Barclay she wanted Austin to play deck quoits or to come and make a third at one of the card games for which she was developing a passion.
    They played poker and vingt-et-un for counters, Barclay delivering some really fearful homilies on the subject of girls playing for money.
    â€œI like his nerve!” said Austin after one of these sermons. “He’d go the limit any day of the week!”
    â€œWhat does that mean?”
    â€œWell, it’s like his nerve to lecture you about playing for money. His trouble is he can’t get people who’ll play as high as he’d like to.”
    â€œDoes he play high with you?”
    Austin laughed rather bitterly.
    â€œYou can’t get blood from a stone! I haven’t got a bean.”
    He found himself involved in an explanation of the word bean, with excursions into other synonyms for money.
    The days and weeks slipped by.
    The last day of the voyage found the weather still fair and warm. Austin had certainly not intended to watch the sunset with Miss Ryven. But things which we have not intended to do are apt to happen when an undercurrent of desire pulls against intention. He leaned on the rail and watched a yellow sun sink into a bank of haze.
    â€œDo you remember when we left the island?” Valentine spoke with her head turned away from him. She watched the haze brighten into smoke of gold.
    Austin remembered quite well.
    â€œYou never even looked at the island,” he said.
    â€œI didn’t want to look at it.”
    â€œNo—because you were glad to leave it behind. To-morrow you’ll be glad to leave us behind.”
    Valentine went on looking across the water. The gold dazzled. The sky was blurred.
    â€œWhy do you say that?”
    â€œBecause it’s true. You’re like that—you want to get on to the next thing. I don’t blame you.” He paused. Perhaps he expected a protest. When no protest came, he went on, his voice dropping and hardening. “I only hope you’ll like the next thing when you come to it—that’s all.”
    Valentine turned round. In the clear twilight he could see that her