Night Over Water - Ken Follett [107]
The steward turned to the Oxenfords, and Harry held his breath.
Lord Oxenford said: “Nine o’clock, I think.”
Harry suppressed a smile of satisfaction.
But Lady Oxenford said: “That’s too long for Percy to wait—let’s make it earlier.”
All right, Harry thought uneasily, but not too early, for heaven’s sake.
Lord Oxenford said: “Seven thirty, then.”
Harry felt a little glow of pleasure. He was one step nearer the Delhi Suite.
Now the steward turned to the passenger opposite Harry, the guy in the wine red waistcoat who looked like a policeman. His name was Clive Membury, he had told them. Say seven thirty, Harry thought, and leave me alone in the compartment. But to his disappointment Membury was not hungry, and chose nine o’clock.
What a pain, Harry thought. Now Membury would be here while the Oxenfords were eating. Maybe he would step out for a few minutes. He was a restless type, always up and down. But if he would not go of his own accord Harry would have to find a way to get rid of him. That would have been easy if they had not been on a plane: Harry would have told him he was wanted in another room, or there was a telephone call for him, or there was a naked woman in the street outside. Here it might be harder.
The steward said: “Mr. Vandenpost, the engineer and the navigator will join you at your table, if that’s agreeable.”
“Sure is,” Harry said. He would enjoy talking to some of the crew.
Lord Oxenford ordered another whiskey. There was a man that had a thirst, as the Irish would say. His wife was pale and quiet. She had a book in her lap, but she never turned a page. She looked depressed.
Young Percy went forward to talk to the off-duty crew, and Margaret came and sat next to Harry. He caught a breath of her scent and identified it as Tosca. She had taken off her coat, and he was able to see that she had her mother’s figure: she was quite tall, with square shoulders and a deep bust, and long legs. Her clothes, good quality but plain, did not do her justice: Harry could imagine her in a long evening dress with a plunging neckline, her red hair up and her long white neck graced by drop earrings in carved emeralds by Louis Cartier in his Indian period.... She would be stunning. Obviously that was not how she saw herself. She was embarrassed about being a wealthy aristocrat, so she dressed like a vicar’s wife.
She was a formidable girl, and Harry was a little intimidated by her, but he could also see her vulnerable side, and he found that endearing. He thought: Never mind endearing, Harry boy—just remember that she’s a danger to you and you need to cultivate her.
He asked her if she had flown before. “Only to Paris, with Mother,” she said.
Only to Paris, with Mother, he thought wonderingly. His mother would never see Paris or fly in a plane. “What was it like?” he asked. “To be so privileged?”
“I hated those trips to Paris,” she said. “I had to have tea with boring English people when I wanted to go to smoky restaurants that had Negro bands.”
“My ma used to take me to Margate,” Harry said. “I used to paddle in the sea, and we had ice cream and fish-and-chips.”
As the words came out he realized that he was supposed to lie about this, and he felt panicky. He should be mumbling something vague about boarding school and a remote country house, as he normally did when forced to talk about his childhood to upper-class girls. But Margaret knew his secret, and no one else could hear what he was saying above the hum of the Clipper’s engines. All the same, as he found himself spilling out the truth, he felt as if he had jumped out of the plane and was waiting for his parachute to open.
“We never went to the seaside,” Margaret said wistfully. “Only the common people went paddling in the sea. My sister