The Brave by Nicholas Evans Read Free Book Online Page B

Ireland they would call a lurcher. She had a rough brindle coat and the biggest heart of any dog he'd known. He knelt and let her nuzzle his face while he rubbed her neck and her ears and told her he'd take her out for a walk in just a moment. She followed him into the kitchen and stood watching while he poured himself a glass of milk. The answering machine on the divider was flashing red, telling him there were four messages. He hit the play button and, as he waited for the tape to rewind, pulled out his cell phone. He'd switched it off for Troop's talk and forgotten to switch it back on. There were two voice mails.
    All six messages were from Gina. They hadn't talked in more than a year. Her voice sounded strained and increasingly anxious at not being able to get hold of him. She didn't say why she needed to talk with him so urgently, but there was no need. He knew there could be only one reason. Danny. Something must have happened to Danny.

Chapter Four
    THE CAST STOOD in line with their hands still joined, the crimson velvet curtain in front of them masking for a moment the glare of the lights. It was their fourth curtain call and the applause seemed to be growing with each one. Diane's chest was heaving with pure exhilaration. She could feel the adrenalin coursing through her veins. She was dizzy, her body alight. She glanced at Gerald to her right and he grinned at her and squeezed her hand and at that moment the curtain began to lift again and she turned to face the dazzle of the footlights and the vague impression of the audience beyond.
    They were cheering now, calling bravo! And even through the glare she could see that people in the stalls and the dress circle were getting to their feet and holding up their hands to clap above their heads. She waited for Gerald, from whom the cast took their lead, to step forward. Only this time, he released her hand and started to clap and so did the rest of the cast and Diane realized that they were applauding her, that this call was for her, just her. It was the first time it had happened. She stepped hesitantly forward and for a moment just stood there with her hands at her side, beaming and glowing and almost in tears. Then she bowed and curtsied and the audience roared.
    Fortune's Fool was only in its second week and she still couldn't quite believe the reception it was getting. None of them could, not even Gerald who had a string of West End hits to his name and every night had a crowd of fans at the stage door, begging for his autograph. The run was completely sold out and the critics had been little short of ecstatic. Even that notorious old curmudgeon Harold Hobson liked it. Most of all, they liked Diane. "In her West End debut as a leading lady," Kenneth Tynan wrote in The Observer, "Diane Reed is little short of electrifying... a presence so luminous, it almost threatens to eclipse her fine fellow players."
    John, the playwright, a walking redefinition of misanthropy who, in rehearsal, had never once smiled nor barely addressed a word to her, had sent her the most extravagant bunch of roses she'd ever seen. With it came a slightly worrying note saying he was already at work on a new piece that Diane had inspired in him, with a part only she could play.
    Gerald, who was supposed to be the star of the show, had reacted to her theft of his limelight with remarkably good grace and a noticeable stepping-up of his monthlong campaign to gain access to her knickers. Perhaps he felt she owed him it.
    It had become a ritual that he came to her dressing room after every performance with a half-bottle of chilled champagne and two glasses. And that was where he was now, still in his make-up, his ample backside propped against the edge of her dressing table, while he watched her remove her make-up. They had both shed their costumes and were now in bathrobes, his by far the more sumptuous—burgundy satin, piped in black, tailor-made for him at some extortionate shop in Jermyn