Free The Self-Enchanted by David Stacton Page B

see anything. Either get it finished or get out. And get this muck cleared up,” he said, waving at the debris along the causeway. Then he walked away.
    Three days later he was back. Curt was supervising the finishers, heard voices, and glanced out his window. He saw Christopher and Sally.
    Christopher’s face was drawn into a deliberate mask and he moved as though he were not sure what he was doing. Sally also looked worn out and somehow scared. In the cold air she shivered, hugging her arms over her breasts, and her laughter was thin, nervous and abruptly choked off. The two of them came inside.
    “Well,” said Christopher, “now you’re in Barocco’s house.” He didn’t say it very kindly. “That should please you. You were dying to see it.”
    “You don’t have to talk that way,” she said.
    “I talk the way I please,” said Christopher. Sally looked at him speculatively and went on into another room. Christopher hurried after her, as though afraid to leave her alone. In the living-room they slid the glass panels apart and stepped out on to the balcony.
    The living-room was on the west side of the house, and the floor had been cantilevered out from the pylons, forming a suspended terrace about six feet wide, sloping slightly to the edge. The effect was of sliding out into space itself. Christopher went to the railing and looked down. The nature of the rock fault had made it advisable to set the house back from the edge of the cliff, so thatfrom the balcony a spiral concrete stair led down to the rock, which was supposed to be terraced.
    Christopher stood silhouetted against the mountains, his coat flapping, his hair hissing round his head, and glared across the valley at the steep blue sides of the mountains. Forcing himself to do so, for heights made him dizzy, Curt came to the rail and looked down. Fifteen feet below him he saw Sam Carson sitting on a rock, eating a sandwich. Christopher saw him, too, and a curious expression, half-malice, half-anger, came into his eyes.
    “Hey,” he called. “Carson. What the hell are you doing?”
    Sam stopped eating his sandwich and looked carefully up. “I’m eating my lunch,” he said.
    “Put it away. Why aren’t you working?”
    Sam deliberately bit into his sandwich and munched slowly.
    “Eat your blasted lunch in the lunch hour,” snapped Christopher.
    “I felt like eating it now.”
    It had been the design of the house that, though the edge of the cliff could not support the weight of the house, a terrace was to be built there, bounded by a retaining wall along the brink, spaced with stone seats. There was no sign of the wall.
    “What about the wall?” bawled Christopher.
    “I’m not going to build any wall,” said Carson, getting up and looking at Christopher defiantly. Hearing her father’s voice, Sally came forward to the rail and glanced down. Old Man Carson looked up at his daughter angrily. “You come down here,” he said. He obviously did not like to have to look up at his daughter. Sally moved automatically to the stair, but Christopher caught her arm.
    “Stay where you are,” he said.
    “You leave my daughter alone,” called Carson.
    “I wouldn’t be caught dead with your daughter,” snapped Christopher. “What do you mean, you aren’t building the wall?”
    “I mean what I say. It ain’t safe.”
    Curt coughed. “It’s right on the fault,” he explained. “I thought it better to let it go.”
    Christopher turned on him. “You did, did you?” he said. “And what makes you think you can make a decision without consulting me? I want that wall built.”
    “Not on my responsibility,” snapped Curt. “If it’s built, it will be on your personal order.”
    Christopher stared at Curt, and then, with a sudden decision, and an almost malicious expression, he again leaned over the rail. Sally had not stirred. She was still gazing down at her father. “What’s the matter, Carson,” demanded Christopher. “Are you