grows too late.’ He gave a last admiring look at the room, taking in the ormolu clock, the figurines of shepherds and shepherdesses, the china cats, the miniature portraits, the framed photographs, the painted boxes, the small jugs and vases, and all the other mementoes of an uneventful life. ‘You have a delicate taste, madam. I salute you.’
After she had closed the front door she returned, flushed and excited, to her armchair where she went through the conversation word for word.
A short while after Mr Cadmus came up to the cottage of Miss Finch. She was at the door almost as soon as he had raised the knocker, but she waited for several seconds before opening it. She did not wish to be seen to have hurried. She had of course observed him entering the cottage of her neighbour, and had timed the length of his visit to Miss Swallow. She was naturally irritated that he had chosen to visit her friend first, but she was determined not to let her annoyance show. ‘Who is it?’
‘Your new neighbour, my dear lady. Mr Cadmus.’
She opened the door with a flourish. ‘Delighted. Come in, Mr—’
‘Cadmus.’
‘What an unusual name.’ She led him into her sitting room overlooking the front garden. It was not filled with clutter or with bric-a-brac, as he had expected, and instead gave the impression of simplicity or even severity. The walls were painted white, and a portrait of a young woman hung in a frame of green and gold. A sideboard of highly polished oak was matched by a circular table of the same material upon which stood a tall and stately vase of the deepest scarlet.
‘This is most enchanting,’ he said. ‘I see you are a woman of discernment.’
‘Well, I have been complimented before.’
‘Of course you have. I hope you will find these to your taste.’ He presented her with a box of chocolates subtly different from the one he had given to Miss Swallow; it was slimmer and longer.
‘And I do have a sweet tooth.’
‘I had hoped so.’
‘Sit where you like, Mr Cadmus.’ The chairs were in a modern style but, as he discovered, surprisingly comfortable. ‘I think mulled wine is best at this time of year. I make my own.’ She returned with two large silver goblets. ‘Now I need to know all about you. I don’t stand on ceremony. Where are you from?’
‘I come from an island, dear lady, in the Mediterranean—’
‘That is very interesting. What island precisely?’
‘The name would mean nothing to you.’
‘Let me be the judge of that.’
‘Caldera.’ He said the word very quickly.
‘I don’t know it.’
‘We are small. We are under two hundred persons.’
‘Rather like Little Camborne.’
‘Oh no, dear lady. Here you have all the blessings of lovely land. And your glorious gardens.’
‘Hard to keep up, I’m afraid.’
‘And yet so beautiful. I could weep.’
After he had gone she wondered whether she should telephone Miss Swallow. No, she could wait. She wanted to savour the exhilaration of this short meeting. For a while she sat with her head back, staring at the ceiling. I never asked him his first name, she realised.
Chapter 2
Montmorency
Millicent Swallow hated the Hammersmith house ever since she could remember. She was now thirteen, but her anger and resentment had grown. It was of dark grey stone with a decoration of red brick of no discernible pattern. She hated the fact that when relatives came to stay she was sometimes obliged to share a bed with her mother or even, worst hell of all, with her grandmother. She watched them when they washed their breasts in the kitchen sink, to save the hot water of a bath, and stared at her grandmother when she climbed upstairs with a chamber pot. She hated the smells of the two women when they took off their corsets. When they called out to her in the morning, ‘Millikin!’, she blenched. There was no way out of this. She was trapped in the little house, with all its smells and its dustiness.
She kept a budgerigar, Clementine, in a small cage in her bedroom. One afternoon her grandmother opened the the door to the cage, in order to clean it, and Clementine flew out. Pursued by the old woman the bird fluttered, and faltered, but eventually escaped out of the open bedroom window. Millicent had never forgiven the woman, and indulged in a hatred that was almost joyful in its intensity. She believed that her grandmother, out of malice towards her, had deliberately released the bird. But she took care not to show her anger. She remained outwardly polite and amiable. Her mother and grandmother had endless arguments and rows that led to screaming matches. In one of them an incautious reference gave her the impression that her real father had left home just after she was born. She was soon convinced that the two women had driven him away, so that now she was trapped with them. Her grandmother would hurl plates or saucers at her mother, whereupon her mother would walk out, shutting the door very loudly as the grandmother called after her ‘And what about the poor child?’ Millicent was always shaken by these episodes, which only increased her resentment and distaste for both women.
At the bottom of the little garden was a wooden shed that contained a miniature toy dog, gardening tools, a rusting lawn-mower and several half-empty tins of paint. It was here that Millicent would come when she wished to avoid the others in the house. She felt that she had concealed herself, and could spend long periods in solitary meditation. She had not yet outgrown the shaggy toy dog. He was still her friend and adviser. He sat astride one of the tins of paint, his four legs akimbo. His name was Montmorency.
‘They have become wild beasts again,’ she told him. ‘Screaming and carrying on. As if the neighbours can’t hear. Of course they can. I know Mrs Wilson pities me. But I don’t want pity. I want them to be arrested.’
‘And what would happen then?’ Montmorency asked her.
‘They would be sent to prison. That’s what I would like.’
‘You are talking about your ma and grandma.’
‘Call them mother and grandmother.’ She was silent for a moment. ‘What am I supposed to do?’
‘There is nothing you can do.’
‘But why should I be trapped? I have nothing to say to them. I want nothing to do with them.’
‘They are your family.’
‘I hate families. I hate mealtimes. I hate listening to the wireless. I hate them.’
‘But what would you do without them?’
‘I would survive. I’ll be old enough next year to leave school.’
‘And then what would you do?’
‘I
