Chapter Three
CHAPTER
THREE
Felicity was still feeling homesick. She hadn’t found anyone on her course she could think of as a friend. There was an older group of girls who took their work very seriously and a younger crowd who were just there because their parents had insisted. Felicity didn’t know where she belonged really. While she was there because of her mother, she didn’t want to waste her time: if she was going to be miserable, she wanted to have something to show for it.
Since Felicity’s first night on Sunday, her mother had been out every evening, and Felicity spent the time writing long letters home. But when she read them over before putting them in an envelope, she realised she’d have to rewrite them. If David caught a glimpse of one that said how dowdy her companions were and how chilly her mother was, he’d get in his enormous old Volvo and come to carry her back to Provence in days. And in spite of her loneliness, Felicity didn’t want that.
Her mother was at the theatre yet again – with a man who wasn’t Gerald – and on this particular night, she finally wrote a letter she was happy with, so she put on her coat to go and post it. Her mother had provided her with sheets of stamps and had told her how many of them she’d need to put on the envelope, and so she was all set for a little walk in the dark to post it.
Although the pillar box (as she had discovered it was called) was only at the end of the road, Felicity felt quite brave as she put the house key in her pocket and set out. She experienced a frisson of fear that was almost pleasurable. Mist from the river had crept up into the nearby streets, it was dark and the light from the street lamp made Felicity feel as if she was in a film.
She was on her way to the pillar box when a tall dark figure appeared out of the fog. She could barely hold back a scream as she pressed herself against the wall to get out of his way.
‘Oh, I’m so sorry, did I frighten you?’ The figure stopped walking.
Felicity recognised an upper-class twang in the figure’s voice. He had the kind of accent her mother definitely approved of.
‘Yes!’ she said. ‘You loomed up at me out of the fog. Oh,’ she went on as he came nearer the light. ‘You’re covered in mud!’
‘Yes, damn it,’ he said. ‘I fell over.’ He smiled. ‘Worse, someone has stolen my bike.’
‘That’s awful!’
‘Well, it’s inconvenient, but I originally found it in the river and repaired it, so it probably wasn’t really mine to begin with.’
Felicity was aware she was enjoying talking to someone roughly her own age who was, she could see now, extremely good-looking. ‘Don’t you say “finders keepers”? My stepmother told me it is an English expression.’
‘It certainly is!’ He laughed again; he seemed a merry person. ‘Maybe I should introduce myself. Oliver Ward.’
Felicity hesitated. ‘Félicité de Belleville.’
‘Oh,’ said Oliver. ‘You’re French?’
‘Half French. My mother prefers me to be called Felicity now I’m living with her.’
‘Where did you live before? With your father?’ Oliver seemed happy to ignore being covered in mud.
‘In Provence, in France. And yes, with my father.’
Oliver nodded. ‘Do you live nearby? Here in London, I mean.’
‘Very near. I’ve just come out to post a letter.’
‘I live on a barge. Upriver from here.’
‘Oh! That sounds – romantic.’
Oliver was amused. ‘It probably sounds more romantic than it is. She’s called Our Nora . But houses are easier.’
‘Perhaps,’ she said. Felicity had been inspecting Oliver during their conversation and the more she saw of him the more she liked him, in spite of him being covered in mud.
‘Listen – Felicity.’ Oliver suddenly seemed a little nervous. ‘Would it be possible for you to give me your telephone number? I’d like to ring you up, maybe take you out one day? I promise you I can look quite respectable.’ He paused. ‘I hate the thought of saying goodbye and never seeing you again.’
Felicity hesitated. Was it de rigueur to go out with young men you met in the street? What would her mother say, for example?
‘I was on my way to a party tonight,’ Oliver went on. ‘A party I should certainly have attended, only I was lured on to the riverbank and now of course I can’t go.’
‘Will there be consequences?’
Oliver nodded. ‘Alas, yes. But it can’t be helped. If I went back to the barge to change now it would be too late to get to the party. I haven’t got a bike, and I don’t have enough money to take a taxi.’
‘I have money. I could give – lend—’
‘No!’ said Oliver firmly. ‘I may be a bit of a harum scarum but I haven’t yet sunk to borrowing money from girls – especially ones I don’t really know.’
‘Is everything all right?’ called a female voice. ‘Is that you, Felicity?’
It was Violet. She was walking towards them looking stern, Felicity realised, and possibly a bit protective.
‘Everything is fine!’ said Felicity, quick to reassure her. ‘Oliver here has fallen in the mud and now can’t go to an important party.’
‘It’s perfectly all right. Worse things happen,’ said Oliver.
‘Do you know Oliver?’ Violet went on.
‘We’ve just met,’ said Felicity.
‘I scared Felicity,’ Oliver explained. ‘I appeared out of the fog like some sort of creature from a fairy tale. And not a happy one.’
Violet laughed and Felicity, relieved, realised she had been willing her to approve of her new friend. ‘That is unfortunate,’ said Violet. ‘Can anything be done about your party?’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Oliver. ‘I live in Chiswick. I can’t go home and get back in time.’
‘But it is only mud,’ said Violet. ‘I’m used to dealing with mud. I come from the country. Why don’t you come to my flat and we’ll see what we can do.’
‘Oh, what a good idea!’ said Felicity. ‘My mother is out and I couldn’t invite you back to our part – it’s the same house,’ she explained to Oliver, who seemed confused.
‘But I must post my letter first,’ said Violet.
‘I came to post a letter too,’ said Felicity. ‘I can take them both.’ Violet handed her the envelope she had been holding. ‘Oh, it’s to France! My letter is also to France!’
Then, thinking it might be considered rude to read the envelope of a letter you were posting for someone else, she ran along the road to the pillar box. When she had arrived in London she had been excited to see her first red box that was used to collect letters in. At home, in France, they gave the letters to the facteur when he came with that day’s post.
Soon the three of them were walking back along Cheyne Walk to the house where Violet and Felicity both lived.
‘Actually,’ said Oliver, ‘it’s unlikely you can do anything about the mud – it probably needs to dry first – but if I may be allowed to use the telephone, I can at least make my excuses to the hostess of the party. Then not appearing wouldn’t be quite so rude.’
He didn’t seem entirely convinced but neither Felicity nor Violet commented and soon they were climbing up the stairs to Violet’s flat at the top of the house.
A few minutes later Oliver was standing in the small hallway, obviously aware of just how dirty he was. He took off his shoes.
‘Maybe take off your coat as well?’ Felicity suggested.
‘That’s a good idea,’ Violet agreed. ‘But it’s your trousers that are the muddiest.’
‘I’m not taking those off,’ said Oliver.
Violet paused. ‘There is a very splendid man’s dressing gown in among the clothes that my godmother left here. Would you take off your trousers if you could put that on?’
Oliver considered. ‘Is it very flamboyant?’
‘I’m afraid it is.’
‘In which case, I’d be delighted.’
Violet left Felicity and Oliver to fetch the dressing gown and he smiled at her, somewhat awkward. ‘I wish we could have met in more auspicious circumstances.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you’re not going to like a boy who looks like a mudlark, which in fact is exactly what I am.’
‘What’s a mudlark? Is that something only English people can be?’
‘I doubt it but here it means I go on to the shoreline of the Thames when I can and find long-forgotten treasures. Sadly, it almost always involves getting filthy and I shouldn’t have been so foolish as to attempt it when I was on my way to a party.’
‘So why did you?’ asked Felicity.
‘There was a low tide. I couldn’t resist. I’m a fool.’
Violet came back. She had a dressing gown over her arm and something in a dry cleaner’s bag. ‘I found a few things. I’m going to leave them with you here, Oliver. The bathroom is through there. And now I’m going to make us a hot drink and a snack. Felicity?’
Violet ushered Felicity into the sitting room. There was a window that looked over the rooftops. ‘Oh! You can see the river!’ said Felicity. ‘It’s so near!’
‘It is. My godmother chose the best part for herself to live in, which is up here.’ She paused. ‘Are you hungry? Have you had supper?’
Felicity shook her head. ‘My mother has gone out for the evening and told me to make myself something. She would have asked Anna to do it but I’m perfectly capable of making an omelette.’ She smiled. ‘I’m half French, after all.’
‘Let’s go into the kitchen and see what we can find,’ said Violet.
‘This is what an estate agent would describe as compact and bijou,’ said Violet when the two of them were side by side in a space about the width of a railway carriage. ‘The larder at home is bigger than this. I don’t really think it is designed to cook in, merely to provide suitable canapés to go with cocktails.’
‘It seems very small to me, too, but maybe it is big enough for English people? My mother doesn’t cook at all.’
‘Some of us enjoy cooking, and although it is tiny, I could certainly produce a meal from here if I wanted to.’ Violet started opening and shutting cupboard doors. She soon produced a packet of tiny biscuits. ‘These are my favourites. They’re cheesy and salty.’ Soon, they were being poured into a dish. ‘Would you like a drink?’
‘I’d prefer not if it’s sherry. I find it very … dry.’
‘I have wine. My godmother left several bottles and said I should drink them.’
‘That was kind.’
‘She is, very. Now, if you can open the bottle’ – Violet handed Felicity a corkscrew – ‘I’ll make something more substantial than Cheeselets.’