Free The Pumpkin Eater by Penelope Mortimer Page A

all that much. You know how it is. One gets so dreadfully bored.”
    â€œOh my goodness,” they sighed, lolling about over their beds and hitting their open mouths, “so
bored
, my deah, so too too too
bored
…”
    â€œOh, shut up,” I said, and sulked for the rest of the day, stalking about with my blazer collar turned up and my lower lip sagging, to show contempt.
    A few days later, when this tiff had been forgotten, Ireen found me in the library where I was sitting puzzling over a cross-section of a mighty liner in the
Illustrated London News
.
    â€œI’ve been looking for you everywhere,” she said. “I’ve just had the most awful news.”
    â€œWhat news?”
    â€œWell, you know we were going to Spain these hols — ”
    â€œYes. Well?”
    â€œAnd Roger was going to bring Brian and maybe the Maclarens were going to come with Eric and David — ”
    â€œYes. Go
on
.”
    â€œWell! Now it seems we can’t go because of this stupid old war! It just seems we can’t go and that’s all there is to it!” She threw a crumpled letter down on the green baize. “I just got this letter.”
    â€œWhat war?” I asked, disbelieving.
    â€œDon’t ask me! Some old General’s invaded it or something.”
    â€œInvaded what?”
    â€œSpain, you clot. I don’t know. Nobody ever tells you a thing in this place. I don’t see why we can’t go anyway. I mean nobody’s going to shoot
us
or anything, are they?”
    â€œOh no,” I said. “They wouldn’t be allowed to.”
    â€œWell, of course they wouldn’t. But Pa says it’s quite out of the question and we’ve just got to resign ourselves and go to
Littlehampton
.”
    â€œHow awful for you,” I said vaguely. I had never been abroad, and Littlehampton sounded rather distinguished to me.
    â€œAwful? I could die! Of course Roger won’t ask Brian
there
. I mean, there’s nothing to
do
in Littlehampton. Honestly, I could kill that Franco!”
    â€œWho’s he?”
    â€œThis old General who’s invaded Spain. I mean, it’ll probably ruin the rest of my life, not spending these holidays with Brian. I should think we might have got engaged quite easily.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” I said. “It’s jolly bad luck for you.”
    â€œWell, it’s all right for you. You’ve got
Him
to think about.”
    â€œYes,” I said fondly.
    â€œThere’ll be no one to talk to in Littlehampton and you know what the boys are like,
common
, and anyway Mummy’ll have her eye on me every minute. When I’m with Roger she thinks I’m safe, if only she knew. Oh, I hate that Franco, I hate him, I just hate him!” She plunged her face in her hands and appeared to cry. I was very sorry for her. It seemed brutal to be going home to the intense and uncertain pleasure of the rope-walk and organ loft, and although I had no intention of sharing them with Ireen it did seem to me that she might be quite harmless at the swimming baths or on bicycle rides or in the cinema. It might, in fact, make me seem more independent and casual to the clergyman’s son if I took a friend along (that’s what I would say: “I brought my friend along”). Also, although she would discover that he was only seventeen, she would certainly be impressed by his tweed jacket with the leather elbows and the nonchalant way he smoked Gold Flake, without coughing. Then, too, she would help to fill in the unendurable days when he was in one of his moods. We could even go and call at the Vicarage, if there were two of us. We might even be allowed up to his room.
    â€œWould you like,” I blurted. “Would you like to come and stay with us for a few days, I mean I know it’s not Spain or anything like that, but it might be a bit more fun than Littlehampton, I mean for a bit. Well, you could