The Secret History - Donna Tartt [101]
“Hah. I picked one of the racy ones myself. Ever been to France, Richard?”
“No,” I said.
“Then you better come with us this summer.”
“Us? Who?”
“Henry and me.”
I was so taken aback that all I could do was blink at him.
“France?” I said.
“May wee. Two-month tour. A real doozy. Have a look.” He tossed me the magazine, which I now saw was a glossy brochure.
I glanced through it. It was a lollapalooza of a tour, all right—a “luxury hotel barge cruise” which began in the Champagne country and then went, via hot air balloon, to Burgundy for more barging, through Beaujolais, to the Riviera and Cannes and Monte Carlo—it was lavishly illustrated, full of brightly colored pictures of gourmet meals, flower-decked barges, happy tourists popping champagne corks and waving from the basket of their balloon at the disgruntled old peasants in the fields below.
“Looks great, doesn’t it?” said Bunny.
“Fabulous.”
“Rome was all right but actually it was kind of a sinkhole when you get right down to it. Besides, I like to gad about a little more myself. Stay on the move, see a few of the native customs. Just between you and me, I bet Henry’s going to have a ball with this.”
I bet he will, too, I thought, staring at a picture of a woman holding up a stick of French bread at the camera and grinning like a maniac.
The twins were studiously avoiding my eye, Camilla bent over Bunny’s shirt, Charles with his back to me and his elbows on the sideboard, looking out the kitchen window.
“Of course, this balloon thing’s great,” Bunny said conversationally, “but you know, I’ve been wondering, where do you go to the bathroom? Off the side or something?”
“Look here, I think this is going to take several minutes,” said Camilla abruptly. “It’s almost nine. Why don’t you go ahead with Richard, Charles. Tell Julian not to wait.”
“Well, it’s not going to take you that much longer, is it?” said Bunny crossly, craning over to see. “What’s the big problem? Where’d you learn how to iron, anyway?”
“I never did. We send our shirts to the laundry.”
Charles followed me out the door, a few paces behind. We walked through the hall and down the stairs without a word, but once downstairs he stepped close behind me and, catching my arm, pulled me into an empty card room. In the twenties and thirties, there had been a bridge fad at Hampden; when the enthusiasm faded, the rooms were never subsequently put to any function and no one used them now except for drug deals, or typing, or illicit romantic trysts.
He shut the door. I found myself looking at the ancient card table—inlaid at its four corners with a diamond, a heart, a club and a spade.
“Henry called us,” said Charles. He was scratching at the raised edge of the diamond with his thumb, his head studiously down.
“When?”
“Early this morning.”
Neither of us said anything for a moment.
“I’m sorry,” said Charles, glancing up.
“Sorry for what?”
“Sorry he told you. Sorry for everything. Camilla’s all upset.”
He seemed calm enough, tired but calm, and his intelligent eyes met mine with a sad, quiet candor. All of a sudden I felt terribly upset. I was fond of Francis and Henry but it was unthinkable that anything should happen to the twins. I thought, with a pang, of how kind they had always been; of how sweet Camilla was in those first awkward weeks and how Charles had always had a way of showing up in my room, or turning to me in a crowd with a tranquil assumption—heartwarming to me—that he and I were particular friends; of walks and car trips and dinners at their house; of their letters—frequently unacknowledged on my part—which had come so faithfully over the long winter months.
From somewhere overhead I heard the shriek and groan of water pipes. We looked at each other.
“What are you going to do?” I said. It seemed the only question I had asked of anyone for the last twenty-four hours, and yet no one had given me a satisfactory answer.
He shrugged, a funny little one-shouldered shrug, a mannerism he and his sister had in