Free The Diddakoi by Rumer Godden Page B

smile with your eyes.’ There could be no pretence in a
smile like that and he had felt heartened for Kizzy.
    Now he got up from the breakfast table and blew his nose on his handkerchief; his eyebrows were working as he took Kizzy to the library and sat down by the fire and, as he had always done, drew
her to him, but she stood, stiff and as unwilling as a block of wood. ‘It’s no good, Kiz,’ said the Admiral. ‘We have to go through with this, but I want you to know that
you will always be my girl, and Peters’ and Nat’s, and I want to make a bargain with you.’
    ‘What?’ whispered Kizzy. She was looking at his ring with the bird on the shield, remembering the first time she had seen it; now too, her eyes were hot with tears.
    ‘I will promise to look after Joe for you and you’ll come up every Saturday and spend the day with us; Miss Brooke says you can – Sunday as well if you like – but you must promise to do everything Miss Brooke tells you.’
    ‘And if I don’t?’ The words seemed to drop from Kizzy’s lips.
    ‘They may say we have taught you bad ways and won’t let you see us, which would be sad for us both. I should give your promise, Kiz. Promise you’ll do what Miss Brooke
says.’
    ‘I promise.’
    ‘Gypsy’s promise,’ said the Admiral. ‘Gypsies keep their word.’
    Kizzy nodded – but gypsies have a way of wriggling round it, as the Admiral ought to have known.
    Miss Brooke drove to the school to fetch Kizzy, but when Mrs Blount went to look for her, ‘Kizzy’s gone,’ she said, astonished. ‘I told her to wait for
you.’
    ‘Which is probably why she has gone.’
    ‘Do you think she has run back to the House? Poor you, having to chase after her,’ but Miss Brooke did not have to chase. She drove slowly along the lanes and there at the gates was
Kizzy, standing in the road, an uncertain lost little figure. When Miss Brooke stopped the car, Kizzy turned a small mutinous back, but there was something she learned at once about Miss Brooke;
like the Admiral, she did not ask questions. ‘Where do you think you are going? Why didn’t you wait for me as you were told?’ Instead, ‘Kizzy it’s time for tea,’
said Miss Brooke. ‘I can drive behind you, if you like, but if I were you I should get in.’
    ‘I won’t eat your food or drink your drink and I won’t talk to you,’ said Kizzy at the table.
    ‘That won’t be very interesting for either of us, will it?’ Miss Brooke answered in a calm voice.
    The table was drawn up to the window where there were hyacinths in pots. Miss Brooke had made cheese toasts, they were in a hot dish; the home-made currant buns had a spicy fragrant smell; there
was home-made raspberry jam and the tea was hot in the brown teapot, but Kizzy took from her pocket one of the two crusts she had saved from school dinner and put it on her plate. It was so dry she
could hardly bite it, but she did not touch the butter or jam. Miss Brooke did not seem upset but went on eating and drinking and, when Kizzy had finished, calmly cleared away. Kizzy heard her
humming as she washed up. She doesn’t care, thought Kizzy, and her heart sank. There did not seem anything for her to do so she sat down on the hearthrug and stroked Miss Brooke’s tabby
cat. She liked the cat.
    ‘His name is Chuff,’ Miss Brooke called from the kitchen. Kizzy withdrew her hand.
    Presently Miss Brooke came in; she did not, as most of her neighbours did, turn on the television and take out her knitting or sewing, but sat down, picked up a book and, careful not to glance
at Kizzy, began to read aloud.
    ‘ Once upon a time ,’ read Miss Brooke, ‘ there was a prince who hadn’t much money, but he had a kingdom, and though this was quite small, it was large enough to
marry on, and marry he would . . .’
    Out of the corner of her eye, Miss Brooke could see Kizzy’s attention was caught, perhaps because she was surprised – no one had ever read to her, just by