Shade by Neil Jordan Read Free Book Online Page B

subject.
    B-e-c-a-u-s-e “Because if I had a sister,” said Nina, “I wouldn’t need to talk to you.”
    “That’s not fair,” said Dolly.
    “Fair enough,” said Nina. “And when I have a sister, I definitely won’t talk to you. And no, that moany look won’t help you. In fact moaning will only make things worse.”
    “Who’s moaning?”
    Across the runnel of water, on the muddy bank now, the girl with bare feet in a thin yellow dress. The boy beside her, half her size, looking again at the mud oozing between his toes.
    Nina let herself swing for a moment and decided Dolly could no longer be simple Dolly any more, she needed a name. And the name came newly minted, fresh from Miss Shawcross’s Bible stories.
    “Hester, who do you think?”
    “Hester the doll?”
    “Hester the whine, Hester the moan, Hester the pester.”
    “Hester the pester,” the boy repeated. He shifted his position on the bank, to observe new emissions of mud whorl between his toes.
    “So why is she moaning?”
    “Oh questions, questions. You’re worse than Emily.”
    “Where’s Emily?”
    “Not telling.”
    And Nina diverted her gaze and swung higher, concentrating on the blue line of the horizon and the small red-roofed house. Until she was surprised by a splash. She looked down and saw the equally surprised waters rippling with a brown body swimming through them, like a thin frog in a yellow dress. The feet found solid ground and the head splashed upwards and Nina’s dress, as she swung, for she had determined now to continue swinging, brushed gently off the wet forehead with the plastered blonde hair.
    “No, tell me, where’s Emily?”
    “All right, you’re standing on her.”
    The girl jumped to one side. And Nina, who seemed to appreciate this affirmation of her imagination, allowed the force of gravity to slow her pendulum.
    “Sorry.”
    “And Emily doesn’t like to be trod on.”
    “I said I’m sorry.” The girl shifted her feet. Looked down at the empty grass. “What did I stand on?”
    “Her shoe.”
    “What’s her shoe like?”
    “Just like mine, actually.” Nina liked the sound of that word “actually,” and felt Miss Shawcross would have been proud. Then another word struck her, a word that put “actually” quite in the shade. “She’s my twin, actually.”
    “Sorry, twin.”
    “Her name’s Emily.”
    “Sorry, Emily.”
    Nina twisted clockwise in the swing, tangling the ropes above her, let Hester by the chestnut trunk come into view, let the whole world turn, and stopped by the thin girl in the yellow dress. She could see her ribs showing through the wet fabric.
    “She’ll accept your apology,” Nina said, “but only if she knows your name.”
    “Janie.”
    “Janie, this is Hester.” Nina raised her eyes, looked into Janie’s. Brown freckles around them, but the eyes were browner. “I’m Nina.”
    On the other riverbank, the boy began to howl.
    “And who might he be?”
    “That’s George. Shut up, George.”

8
    A TRANSFORMATION CAME over Miss Isobel Shawcross during the course of her first Friday evening off governess duties. It began in the lounge of the Old Court Hotel, with the consumption of a glass of Guinness and a gin chaser. The prim, stiff back gradually became a curved one, the decorous thin mouth acquired a downward turn and the pencil of lipstick began to spread towards the chin. After a fifth Guinness and yet another gin she made her exit from the Old Court Hotel, an exit most unlike her entrance ninety-five minutes earlier. The laced bootees didn’t walk so much as clump down the wooden stairs, one hand steadying itself on the brass rail, her stomach seemed to precede her progress, the curve of her back following it like an inelegant version of the letter S, which she had so diligently drummed into Nina two days earlier. S is for saint, S is servant, S is for sofa, Miss Shawcross had intoned, neglecting to mention S is also for slither, for Shawcross, not to