‘Stop
it, Mother. I’m too hot!’ Annabel pushed the bedclothes away as her mother made another attempt to cover her up.
‘But, darling, I must make you decent.’
‘Leave her, Mother. You will only make her condition worse.’
His mother looked up at him distractedly, and, at that moment, his sister drew up her legs and began to writhe furiously. Her mother sprang away as Annabel kicked out and sent the sheets and blankets flying. They slithered to the floor, Annabel’s foot caught in her nightgown and, as she gave one final kick, the fine fabric tore from the neck almost to the waist.
‘Annabel!’
His mother darted forward and pulled the torn edges across his sister’s body but not before Gerald had seen the ugly red stain which started midway down her neck then ran down to spread out over and almost encompass her right breast. He had known the blemish was there, of course. When Annabel was a small child, the mark had been like a faint pink blush above the collars of her baby clothes. As she got older she was able to wear higher collars and Gerald had almost forgotten about it.
However, he had had no idea that the birthmark was so extensive, nor that its colour had intensified so angrily over the years. Poor old Annabel, he thought. That will spoil her chances.
He glanced at his mother and suddenly realized why she was so fond of those high, boned collars. She’d been wearing chokers or something like them for as long as he could remember. He wondered what his father thought about it, how it made him feel. But then perhaps he hadn’t seen it very often. Women like Violet Sowerby almost certainly preferred the dark.
‘Nella, come here.’ His mother had succeeded in covering Annabel with the top sheet, and she turned as the little crookback appeared carrying a basin of water. There were some towels folded over her arm. ‘Put the water and the towels on the table and go and fetch a clean nightgown for Miss Annabel. Gerald, would you wait on the landing for a moment?’
‘Mother, I really must go.’
‘Must
go? Why?’
‘My friends are waiting for me.’
‘But I want you to look at Annabel.’
‘I’ve looked at her.’
‘Gerald, please be serious!’
‘I am being serious. I don’t think there’s very much wrong with her. She has obviously eaten something that has disagreed with her and that, as well as making her bilious, could have given her a slight fever.’
‘A slight fever!’
‘Yes,
slight.
At least it was until you covered her with blankets and got Nella to build up the fire.’
‘But she had to be kept warm.’
‘No, she ought to have been cooled down.’
‘But, Gerald—’
‘You wanted my advice and I’m giving it to you. Nella must bathe Annabel in the cool water I asked her to bring, then you can make her comfortable in a clean nightgown.’
Nella had already dipped a flannel into the basin and was wringing it out. Gerald stopped talking and watched, fascinated, as the skeletal fingers grasped and squeezed the cloth. Her bony wrists twisted in opposite directions until every drop of excess water had been extracted. Nella was much stronger than she looked.
‘Gerald?’ His mother was staring at him and he was suddenly infinitely weary of the whole episode.
‘Give her only water to drink. Don’t pile the bed up with extra blankets and don’t put one more lump of coal on that fire!’
‘But—’
‘If you won’t take my advice, ask Father when he comes home.’
He turned brusquely and made for the doorway but then paused and frowned. Annabel had been quiet while he had been talking. Too quiet. She hadn’t even objected when Nella had approached her with the flannel and towels.
Perhaps she really was ill, Gerald thought. Perhaps he ought to stay until his father came home. He didn’t want any trouble from that quarter, any accusations of neglect. How aggravating.
He looked over his shoulder towards the bed. His sister was sitting up amongst the pillows again, but she had both hands wrapped around her body and she was clutching herself as if she were in pain. Her eyes were glassy. Gerald turned and took a step back into the room. At the same moment his sister groaned and was sick all over the bed. The little crookback stepped aside neatly, but his mother had not been so fortunate. Her red dress was covered in yellowy-green, evil-smelling gobs of vomit.
‘Annabel?’ Gerald hurried to her side and she looked up at him. Her eyes were moist but her cheeks were already a better colour. The blotches had gone, to be replaced by an even, rosy pink. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
‘It’s all right, Gerald. You can go out with your friends. I feel much better now.’ Brother and sister smiled at each other as their mother hurried from the room.
‘Nella,’ Violet Sowerby screeched, ‘come to my room and take my dress away to be cleaned. But first you must see to Miss Annabel.’
‘Will you be all right, now, Annabel?’ Gerald’s mood had lightened now that the prospect of having to do something about his sister’s condition had been removed.
‘Yes, really. You may go to Alvini’s.’
‘How do you know that I go there?’
‘Oh, everybody’s older brothers go there, all the time. I think you go there every night, just about. But, Gerald?’
‘What now, nuisance?’
‘One day you must tell me what goes on there.’
‘Perhaps, Annabel, perhaps. But now, forgive me if I don’t give you a brotherly kiss before I go. The fact is, odious child, that you stink.’
Annabel hurled one of the stained and foul-smelling pillows at him and they both laughed. Gerald turned to go and nearly collided with the little crookback. The wet flannel she was grasping dropped on to his polished evening shoes.
‘You fool,’ he snarled, and then stopped when he saw the look on her face.
She was looking at me like that when I woke up this morning, he remembered. She detests me. The misshapen little monster is not just angry with the world in general, it’s me she hates. But why? I’ve hardly ever spoken to her. What can have happened to make her loathe me so?
Chapter Nine
‘Frank, you must go and help your brother.’
Gianfranco Alvini looked up and frowned. He was studying a diagram of the human circulatory system. His papers and medical textbooks were spread out across the green chenille cloth. The pool of bright light cast by his reading lamp did not extend to the person standing at the opposite side of the table. He sat back, blinking. As his eyes adjusted to the dimmer light of the overhead gasolier, he saw his mother looking at him anxiously. He sighed and she seemed to shrink into herself at this sign of his displeasure. But she persisted.
‘Please, Frankie.’
Maria Alvini had been nearly forty when Frank’s older brother, Valentino, had been born twenty-four years ago but now, were it not for her severely styled white hair, it would be hard to guess that she was much older. She had never been a conventional beauty but she had good bone structure and expressive eyes.
Her husband, Alfredo, many years younger than she, had needed money to turn his ice-cream parlour into a high-class restaurant, and Maria’s prosperous father, who had no sons of his own, had seen him as a good investment. Maria had loved Alfredo; she had been a good wife and it was her tragedy that he had died before her.
Now, she stared unwaveringly at the younger of her two sons; the unrelieved black of her widowhood giving her fine-boned, sallow features a dramatic appearance.
Frank closed his eyes for a moment and rubbed the muscles at the back of his neck with the fingers of one hand. Then he flexed his shoulders and stood up, lifting his jacket from the back of his chair.
‘I am sorry to interrupt your studies,’ his mother said. ‘I know how hard you work and how much it means to you to succeed. But who else can I send?’
‘No one. Of course I’ll go. What is it this time?’
‘He is with those young men again. The same who were here last night - and nearly every night. The ones who think it is clever to make fun of him. They have invited him to their table. Mr McCormack does not want to offend them - they are good customers - but he thinks Valentino should be persuaded to come away. He sent Jimmy up to tell me.’
‘Valentino is drinking?’
His mother shrugged and raised her hands in a helpless gesture of acknowledgement. At times like this she looked wholly Italian; yet her own mother had been English; a wealthy confectioner’s daughter whose inheritance had been the start of the family fortune.
‘Tell Valentino that if he comes up now, I will make hot chocolate for him, hot chocolate and a slice of cake -
torta di cioccolata.’
His mother smiled as she followed her younger son to the door.
‘You treat Valentino as if he were a child.’ Frank could not hide his impatience and his mother looked wounded.
‘He is a child.’
‘He’s twenty-four years old.’
‘You know what I mean.’
Frank looked at her. She was small and he was only of medium height. There could be no denying that they were mother and son: they had the same spare build, the same mobile features. But now his mother’s eyes were huge with emotion, and Frank saw the glitter of tears.
‘Don’t cry, Mamma. I know what you mean.’
He was just about to open the door when she grasped his arm. ‘I love you equally, Gianfranco, you must believe that. But Valentino needs me more than you do.’
‘I know that.’
‘And, after all, you are the lucky one.’
‘Lucky? Explain.’
‘Oh, I know Valentino is the heir. Your father did not live long enough to see ... to realize that his firstborn, his handsome boy-child, did not mature quite as he should into manhood. But you - you inherited your father’s intelligence. I think that is much more valuable.’
‘Perhaps.’ Frank smiled wanly. ‘And now I must go and bring my big brother home to Mamma.’
Jimmy Nelson was leaning against the bannister. Madame Alvini never allowed the staff from the restaurant to enter the family’s private quarters on the top floor of the large old building in the Haymarket. After the young waiter had knocked and murmured his message through a half-opened door, he had waited patiently at the head of the stairs.
‘Well, then, Jimmy.’ Frank’s expression was weary. ‘Are you going to help me carry the master upstairs?’
When speaking to her staff or to tradespeople, his mother had always referred to her husband as ‘the master’ and since he had died she had transferred that title to his elder son. The staff went along with the pretence although they knew that it was Madame Alvini herself who ran the business, helped by her younger son, Frank.
‘I don’t think it’s come to that.’ Jimmy grinned. He was only fifteen but was already much taller than Frank. He was thin and undernourished-looking; the bony wrists protruding beyond the celluloid cuffs of his shirt appeared to be extra large and out of proportion to his spindly arms. His pale unformed features were touchingly childlike, in spite of the downy growth of pale blond hair that he was desperately encouraging on his upper lip.
‘How much has he had to drink?’
‘Not much. Mr McCormack’s been keeping an eye on the situation - seeing that your brother’s glass gets filled up with water and taking the wine away from him. But the young gentlemen have ordered spirits, and the restaurant’s getting busy now that the Palace is out. Mr McCormack thought I’d better come for you.’
‘Quite right.’
By now they had descended one flight of stairs and were on the floor where the private dining rooms were situated. Frank noticed that so far only one was occupied, its door closed. If a door was closed, no member of the restaurant’s staff would blunder in without knocking first. Customers who booked private rooms expected discretion.