White Boots by Noel Streatfeild Read Free Book Online Page A

saying.
    â€œWhen I get the chance I’ll have a word with Mrs King about Harriet, or maybe with Mr King, he’s the one for seeing things reasonably. It would be a wonderful thing for Lalla if you would allow Harriet to come back to tea sometimes after the skating. It would be such a treat for her to have someone to play with.”
    â€œHarriet would love it, but I am afraid it is out of thequestion for some time yet. I’m afraid coming here and walking home will be about all she can manage. The extra walk to and from your house would be too much for her at present.”
    â€œThere wouldn’t be any walking. We’d send her home in the car. Mrs King drives her own nearly always, and Mr King his own, so the chauffeur’s got nothing to do except drive Lalla about in the little car.”
    Olivia laughed.
    â€œHow very grand! I’m afraid I’ll never be able to ask you to our house. Three cars and a chauffeur! I’m certain Mrs King would have a fit if she saw how we lived.”
    â€œLot of foolishness. Harriet’s a nice little girl, and just the friend for Lalla. You leave it to me. Mrs King has her days, and I’ll pick a good one before I speak of Harriet to her or Mr King.”
    Walking home Olivia asked Harriet how she had enjoyed skating. She noticed with happiness that Harriet was looking less like a daddy-long-legs than she had since her illness started.
    â€œIt was gorgeous, Mummy, but of course it was made gorgeous by Lalla. I do like her. I hope her Aunt Claudia will let me go to tea. Lalla’s afraid she won’t, and she’s certain she won’t let her come to tea with us.”
    â€œYou never know. Nana says she has her days, and she’s going to try telling her about you on one of her good days.”
    Harriet said nothing for a moment. She was thinking about Lalla, Nana, and Aunt Claudia, and mixed up with thinking ofthem was thinking about telling her father, Alec, Toby and Edward about them. Suddenly she stood still.
    â€œMummy, mustn’t it be simply awful to be Lalla? Imagine going home every day with no one to talk to, except Nana, who knows what’s happened because she was there all the time. Wouldn’t you think to be only one like Lalla was the most awful thing that could happen to anybody?”
    Olivia thought of the three cars and the chauffeur, and Lalla’s lovely clothes, and of the funny food they had to eat at home, and the shop that never paid. Then she thought of George and the boys, and the fun of hearing about Alec’s first day on the paper round, and how everybody would want to know about Harriet’s afternoon at the rink. Perhaps it was nicer to laugh till you were almost sick over the queer shop-leavings you had to eat, than to have the grandest dinner in the world served in lonely state to two people in a nursery. She squeezed Harriet’s hand.
    â€œAwful. Poor Lalla, we must make a vow, Harriet. Aunt Claudia or no Aunt Claudia let’s make friends with Lalla.”

Chapter Four

L ALLA’S H OUSE
    LALLA’S HOUSE WAS the exact opposite of Harriet’s house. It was not far away, but in a much grander neighbourhood. It was a charming, low, white house lying back in a big garden, with sloping lawns leading down to the river. Where the lawn and the river joined there was a little landing stage, to which, in the summer, Lalla’s Uncle David kept his motor launch tied. Lalla’s rooms were at the top of the house. A big, low room looking over the river, which had been her nursery, was now her schoolroom, and another big room next to it, which had been her night nursery, was now her bedroom. As well there was a room for Nana and a bathroom. Her bedroom was the sort of bedroom that most girls of her age would like to have. The carpet was blue and the bedspread and curtains white with wreaths of pink roses tied with blue ribbons on them, and therewas a frill of the same material