Free Not That Sort of Girl by Mary Wesley Page B

said, ‘Does your mother’s cook still make those stupendous jellies?’ And to Nicholas he said, ‘I must rush up and change. Mother likes us to be ready to greet our guests.’
    This is where if I liked Nicholas better I would feign a pain and ask him to drive me home, thought Rose, but he would see through me. Why, oh why, do he and Emily make me feel so provincial? She followed Nicholas, Emily and the maid through the house, out through a side door, across a stretch of garden to the building which held the covered court. Here the maid left them.
    Nicholas and Emily took off their coats; Nicholas measured the height of the net, adjusted it, bounced several times on the balls of his feet, swung his racquet serving an imaginary ball.
    ‘Isn’t George an old comic,’ said Emily, swishing her new racquet. ‘What was that reference to jellies, Rose?’
    ‘I don’t know,’ said Rose, remembering with relief that Nicholas and Emily had not been at the party where George had disgraced her mother, but been in bed with mumps.
    ‘Let’s knock up,’ said Emily, swishing her racquet again. ‘Where are the balls?’
    ‘Here.’ Nicholas opened a box of new balls. ‘Come on, girls, I’ll take you both on.’
    ‘No, you and me against Rose and her father’s wonder racquet,’ cried Emily, ‘let Rose Freeling take on the Thornbys.’
    ‘Why not,’ said Rose, fiddling with her shoe laces, standing up to confront Emily, gripping her father’s racquet. The handle was too thick, intended for a man’s hand. It occurred to her that one reason she had so enjoyed George’s awful performance with the jellies was that Emily and Nicholas had not witnessed it; life unwitnessed by Nicholas and Emily was tolerable. Nicholas was already on the court practising his service. ‘Why don’t we play a single and let Rose ball-boy?’ Nicholas was furious with George for belittling his sister, snubbing him for his ineptitude at arriving early, and for having secret knowledge of Rose (what’s this about jellies? I must find out). He knew George only pretended to think this was Emily’s first visit; he had once overheard George tell another man that Emily was a pushy little tart who could do with taking down a peg. Hitting the ball as hard as he could, Nicholas vented his anger. Rose could be whipping boy.
    Stepping onto the court, Rose felt Nicholas’s enmity linked with Emily’s malice; she mistrusted them. She felt the spring in the wooden floor communicate itself to her legs. She swung her father’s racquet, returned Nicholas’s serve, enjoyed the whizz of the ball, the impact on the strings of the racquet, the feel of the sinews in her wrist reacting. ‘I’ll take you both on,’ she shouted on a rise of spirit.
    ‘Ho! Listen to her! All right, little Rose, we take you at your word. Shall you serve first?’ Nicholas patronised.
    ‘No, you.’ Rose stood ready near the back line.
    ‘No quarter,’ said Nicholas.
    ‘No quarter,’ answered Rose.
    Emily danced from one foot to the other near the net, looking mockingly at Rose.
    Nicholas served, putting all his strength into it.
    Rose returned the serve, flukily driving the ball hard and low. The strings of her father’s racquet parted with a twang. The ball, driven across the net with the combination of Rose’s strength and the weight of the racquet, thumped into Emily, hitting her hard between her breasts. Emily yelped. ‘My breast bone!’
    ‘Sorry!’ cried Rose. ‘Oh, look what I’ve done to Father’s racquet. Oh, bother, I’ll go and see whether I can borrow another from somebody.’ She ran lightly from the court, making her escape. Behind her, Emily groaned and Nicholas sympathised. I must get away, thought Rose, running across the garden and into the house. She doubled along a corridor and opened a door at random, shutting it quickly behind her. She was in Mr Malone’s library. There was a log fire burning in the fireplace, the smell of hyacinths dotted