Free Lily and the Lost Boy by Paula Fox Page B

thinking of the millipede but of Jack. Just as they had left Giorgi’s, she had seen him standing outside the circle of men congratulating his father. His eyebrows had been drawn together, and she had noticed his fists, clenched tightly at his sides.

SIX
    â€œChildren, time to get eggs and bread, but, please, no more wildlife,” Mrs. Corey called from the kitchen where she and Mr. Corey were drinking their morning coffee.
    â€œYou can choose,” Lily offered Paul. She was standing in his doorway. He didn’t look up. “You get the millipede,” she said. He rested his chin on one knee as he tied his shoelaces so tightly his sneakers puckered.
    â€œThe laces will break,” she said. He shrugged.
    â€œWell, I’ll get the eggs then.” She lingered a moment, then went off. In the great open space of Poseidon’s temple a woman who was hanging up sheets waved and called a greeting to her. By the time she returned home, four brown eggs in her hands, she felt more cheerful.
    Paul left the house immediately after they’d finished breakfast. Mr. Corey shouted after him, “Paul! Come back and make your bed!”
    He raced back into the house, his jaw clenched. Lily watched him throw the blanket over his rumpled sheets.
    â€œWhere are you going?” she asked a little timidly.
    â€œI have things to do,” he muttered and ran down the hall and out the gate.
    Lily tried to read. After she’d read the same few sentences a dozen times and not gotten them into her head, she wandered into her parents’ bedroom. Mr. Corey was very carefully sharpening a short pencil with a kitchen paring knife. She had hoped they could talk together a couple of minutes before he started work, although she didn’t have anything much in mind. Mrs. Corey suddenly ran into the room.
    â€œGil, you pinched my knife! How could you! You have no respect for the grand meals that knife helps me turn out.”
    â€œI apologize,” Mr. Corey said, grinning and handing over the knife. “I’m simply trying to find things to do so I won’t have to write.”
    â€œI can help you with that,” said her mother. “You can begin with the laundry. First you heat the water.”
    Neither of them was paying her the least attention. She went back to her room. She wished the goats would run through it again. She was tired of the Persians and the Greeks and their endless warfare. She stared out the window at the mulberry tree. Was that the tortoise lying among its thick roots? Should she go and see? Well, she thought, she’d better get used to mornings without Paul. She was nearly positive he had gone off to meet Jack somewhere. She had hoped they wouldn’t meet him again, but they had. That was that. She decided to go to the museum. Maybe Christos or Nichos would be there. Though they were much younger than she and very shy, they were friendly and would talk with her.
    The museum stood in a corner of the agora. As she went toward it, Costa called out to her from across a field where broken columns lay partly hidden by tall grass and dog roses. He was holding up a scythe, from the blade of which dangled a snake like a thick brown vine.
    He had caught it for her, he said. Everyone in the village knew how scared she was of vipers. Mr. Kalligas, trying not to smile, had told her there was an old man who lived up on the mountain who would cure her if she was bitten. He had a forked stick that he placed so, Kalligas had said, jabbing her arm with two of his fingers, and the poison would be gone at once.
    She waved to Costa and told him she was on her way to visit his museum. She walked up the path, past the bird and the huge statue of the youth, and into the cool interior. There were only a few rooms, but they were filled to their ceilings with statues and columns and ancient pots and friezes and tablets. Very little was kept behind glass. She could pick up the shard of an ancient