The Flight of Gemma Hardy_ A Novel - Margot Livesey [126]
I tried to come up with an answer and then gave the best possible one: tears.
“There, there,” said Pauline. “I didn’t mean to upset you. Would you like something to read?”
When I nodded, she disappeared and returned ten minutes later with a stack of books: an Agatha Christie, a Georgette Heyer, a book about Highland Perthshire, and Rider Haggard’s King Solomon’s Mines. I had read this last at Claypoole, and I seized it with delight. In the midst of so much turmoil Haggard’s dramatic story remained unchanged.
The next morning I begged Hannah to let me get up. At first she said not without consulting Pauline, but when I persisted, she said what harm could it do so long as I promised to go back to bed the moment I felt poorly. She brought my clothes, which had been washed but not ironed. I dressed slowly—I was weaker than I had expected—and, keeping firm hold of the banister, descended the stairs.
“In here,” Hannah called. I stepped through the nearest door and found myself in a smaller, cosier version of the kitchen at Blackbird Hall. Hannah was sitting at the table, reading the newspaper. “Sit, sit,” she said as she stood. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine.”
“The traditional invalid’s reply.” She aimed her chin at me. “Really?”
I confessed that I had counted the stairs, and that when I moved too quickly everything blurred. As I spoke something nudged my leg. A black Labrador was gazing up at me with soulful eyes. I stroked her glossy head.
“Emily, don’t be a nuisance. She’s called after Emmeline Pankhurst and, like her namesake, I’m afraid she can be pushy. You’re light-headed. We’ll ask Dr. Grady about that when he comes by. For now let’s get you some breakfast.”
“There’s no need,” I said, meaning the doctor. But Hannah was already at the stove. As she stirred the porridge, she said the town was lucky to have a doctor, a dentist, and almost everything else one might need: shops, a school, a cottage hospital, and a library. “And of course,” she added, “our famous Birks.”
“Birks?” At Claypoole the girls had often called each other a stupid birk.
“Birch trees,” said Hannah, gesturing towards the window, although there were none in sight. But the Birks of Aberfeldy, she explained, was a gorge just outside the town where the Falls of Moness tumbled down the hill. Robert Burns had immortalised the place in a song. “When you’re better,” she concluded, “we’ll walk up there. It’s lovely at this time of year.” She set a bowl of porridge on the table and again reminded me not to eat too fast.
I had worried that, now that I was upright, I would have to give an account of myself, but Hannah announced she was going to her pottery. “If you need anything, come and find me.” Then she left me in the company of Emily and two cats, one calico, one grey. Under their combined gazes, I ate the porridge slowly, avoiding the lumps.
When I had finished, I washed the bowl and the saucepan and set out to explore. Downstairs, besides the kitchen, there was a small room with a cluttered desk and bookshelves and a living-room with a view over the garden to the hills. The stairs went up the middle of the house to a landing where they divided. To the left four more stairs led to my room and a bathroom; to the right were two more bedrooms, each with a double bed and a fireplace. The one with the carelessly made bed and hastily drawn curtains I guessed to be Hannah’s. In the other room the books were stacked neatly on the bedside table, the clothes folded on a chair.
I fetched King Solomon’s Mines and lay down on the sofa in the living-room. With the grey cat at my feet and Emily asleep on the hearthrug, I too soon drifted off. I woke to a hand on my forehead.
“Jean,” said Hannah, “this is Dr. Grady.”
“How do you do, young lady. You gave us quite a scare.”
With his flyaway hair and prominent Adam’s apple, Dr. Grady looked like a man in a hurry, but he set down his bag and, talking all the while to Hannah, examined me in a leisurely fashion. “I was in that pool just below