The Hidden Target by Helen MacInnes Read Free Book Online

think he will be here next year. I think he’s deciding right now to take off like a bird. And why not?” Nina ended gloomily. “He’s free. Free to do what he likes.”
    “That mad friend of his—Tony Something or other—”
    “Shawfield.”
    “Well, if I were James I’d take Shawfield up on his offer. Imagine—around the world in eighty days in a camper. Isn’t that something?” Madge’s eyes were filled with dreams.
    “Yes,” said Nina, “it’s wild.”
    “So why isn’t he jumping at the chance?”
    “Because he has more sense than we have. You heard him: he’d have to find out what kind of camper, what kind of route, what kind of arrangements, what kind of people his friend was corralling for a trip like that.”
    “You take the fun out of travelling.”
    “Well,” Nina said, the expert on foreign countries, “you just don’t step on a flying carpet and away you go. There are visas and inoculations and officials at frontiers.”
    “But you loved every moment of it, didn’t you?”
    Yes, thought Nina, I loved every moment of it. Geneva, Paris, Rome, Venice... But you can’t go travelling alone. What’s the fun in that? “Look—don’t get angry—you always do, you know, but not this time, Madge. I’ve got some spare cash, so let me lend you—”
    “No.” Madge’s voice was sharp.
    “But I can’t go travelling by myself. The two of us would have a wonderful time. You know we always laugh at the same things. And it’s only a loan.”
    “No.” Madge’s voice was less on edge. “I get my bank statement tomorrow. I hope. Or the next day. Then I’ll know how I stand.” Probably cut off at the knees, she thought. Still, I might juggle something around. I could sell my books; and my winter coat—that would save me packing it home. “Tomorrow, he said he’d meet us for lunch if we didn’t mind. Do you?”
    “No.”
    “But will you be there?”
    “Perhaps. Will you?”
    “Yes,” Madge said. “I like him. He’s different.” Then, as they turned the corner away from the busy street and headed towards a quiet green square, she remembered to ask, “Are you keeping that date with Barry and Jack tonight?” Nina had been undecided at breakfast.
    “I think I will. You’re included, you know.”
    “Can’t possibly.” Madge hefted the books in her arms. “I’ll be cramming all the rest of this day—and every day for the rest of this week.”
    “Except for lunch, of course,” Nina suggested. She might smile, but she was feeling that elder-sister attitude worrying her again. She didn’t like the role yet someone had to look after Madge, the perpetual innocent. Not that James Kiley was any real danger: he’d take one look at student life, recall his Berkeley days, and be off to wider horizons. Wider horizons... She looked around her, everything neat and quiet, buildings solid and asleep, iron railings. An attack of summer fever, she thought as she repressed a sigh.
    In silence, the two girls climbed the steps into the hall of the Women’s Residence. “Irish stew,” Nina said as the smell of cooking hit them. “If it boils for so many hours, why is there always so much water in the gravy?”
    They fell into silence again and climbed to the second floor. Nina halted at her door. “I’m going to start packing.”
    “A bit early, aren’t you?” Madge called over her shoulder. Nina shrugged, went into her room, four walls which she had tried to brighten with her posters, a back-view window blocked from sunlight by the opposite houses. “Couldn’t be too soon,” she answered both Madge and herself. But of course it wasn’t possible to start packing: trunk and suitcases would have to be hauled up from some lower depths. Even gestures were thwarted, she thought as she stared at herself in the small looking-glass. Could be worse: her eyes could squint, her front teeth could be broken, her hair could be thin and falling out in patches.
    Then she looked down at the letter