Free Fragile Blossoms by Dodie Hamilton

myself as any such being. I am a newsman and writer but beyond that a complete nobody.’
    ‘You’re too modest!’ Evie patted his arm. ‘I envy you, happy male that you are free to travel the globe from one end to the next without ever needing to put down roots. It must be so exciting.’
    ‘Don’t envy me, Lady Carrington. A news-man’s life can be exciting but more likely downright tedious. As for travelling there’s been many a place I wanted to put down roots but always found the present incumbent preferring his.’
    Evie laughed. ‘We do like to hold onto our own. Be it ee’r so humble, as the dear Queen would have it. Are you drawn to one country more than the next?’
    ‘I’m drawn to many but lethargic by nature I’d sooner it not beset by war.’
    ‘That limits your choices somewhat, Daniel,’ said John Sargent.
    ‘Yes, John, as I have found.’
    ‘And your stay here?’ Evie took his arm. ‘It is of peaceful intent?’
    He bowed. ‘Peace, Puccini, and the pleasure and privilege of an hour in Mrs Dryden’s company.’
    Julia looked up. ‘I beg your pardon?’
    ‘Ah mia culpa! ’ Evelyn bit her thumb. ‘In all the rushing about I forgot to say it was Daniel who asked you to sit not John. Do you mind terribly, Julianna?’
    ‘Not if it has been arranged.’
    Red faced, Daniel Masson stepped forward. ‘Excuse me, but that’s not right. Pushed at you like this it is an imposition.’
    ‘It’s alright,’ said Julia. ‘I am happy to sit for you.’
    ‘Are you sure? I wouldn’t want you uncomfortable.’
    ‘Ju-ju can’t be uncomfortable.’ Evelyn put her arm about Julia’s waist. ‘She is a statue, cool and quiet as marble and thus never at odds with the world.’
    The silence was broken by a shout. Freddie has arrived.
    Charles Dickens maintains every house has its secrets, London houses especially: ‘ an ancient city in an ancient land every footfall rattles somebody’s bones. ’ Friday evening the bones in Russell Square were surely rattling. Evelyn was a tipsy butterfly flitting from one guest to another and leaving them dazzled. Everyone was ill at ease. The most obvious tension was between Freddie and Daniel Masson. Tall, fair, and with natural grace both men were alike in looks. Tail-coats and white weskits, their apparel was similar, the only difference in the boutonnières , Freddie sporting a pink rose and Daniel white frangipani. That they had met before was apparent. They clipped hands and stepped back with such cold disdain one might’ve thought Evie’s drawing room a forest glade at dawn and a Second drawing attention to a brace of pistols.
    Uncomfortable, Julia retreated to the Hall and stood gazing at a mural, a representation of the Last Supper where the Lord Jesus Christ was depicted as a lion and the apostles grouped about him other animals.
    Daniel Masson joined her. ‘What do you think of this, Mrs Dryden?’
    ‘I think it rather splendid. A lion seems right for the Lord and St John as a deer. I always imagined him a gentle sort of fellow.’
    ‘And Judas, a Billy-goat?’
    ‘I’m not sure about that. My father had another view of Judas, a heretical view, I might add. His congregation was small and very conservative. If aired his opinion on many things would have sent him, and us, packing.’
    ‘I guess he knew when to draw a line.’
    ‘He did.’
    ‘My father was a business man. He saw everything through the mighty dollar. He knew one animal from another. In Judas Iscariot he would have seen a snake. What was it your father saw that sets his view apart?’
    ‘He saw a man more loyal than we are taught to believe.’
    ‘Ah well, I do see how that opinion might be seen heretical.’
    ‘My father had many such thoughts along that line. He would say the truth like the bible is open to debate, one must search for it.’
    ‘And the truth was important to him.’
    ‘Yes and to me.’
    ‘Then with that in mind, Mrs Dryden, I need to talk to you in