A Swans - Eva Ibbotson

Their carriage was in the lead as they drove through the outskirts of the city, crossed the Avenida Eduardo Ribeiro—and turned into the square on which stood the Hotel Metropole.

“Oh, stop! Stop! Please stop!” It was Harriet’s voice, but scarcely recognizable. She had slumped forward on her seat, covering her face with her hands, and now she sank down on to the floor almost beside herself with fear.

“What is it? What is it, my dear?” Rom was amazed. Could this be the girl who had danced on the lily leaves?

“That man over there… Don’t let him see me! Oh, can’t we turn back, please… please …”

Rom looked out of the carriage window. A heat-flushed man in a topee and crumpled linen suit was sitting in a cab on the other side of the road. Around him was piled his luggage: a tin trunk, a number of nets and canvas bags, a holdall. His expression was disconsolate, not to say peevish, as he gazed over the head of the flea-bitten horse whose twitchy ears pierced a sombrero with a hibiscus flower on the brim and he was engaged in an altercation with the driver who, by frequent shrugs and wavings of the arms, indicated that he understood nothing of what was being said and cared even less.

In this apparition Rom recognized a familiar sight: a man recently landed from a liner, defeated by the Golden City’s inexplicable lack of hotels, wondering where he was going to lay his head—but nothing to explain Harriet’s terror.

“It’s Edward,” she said, fighting down a sob. “He’s come to take me back—my father will have sent him.”

“Is he a relation?”

“No. They wanted me to marry him, I think, but I never would have. But it means they know I’m here—my father may be with him too. Oh God, it can’t be over yet, it can’t!”

“That’s enough, Harriet.” Rom’s voice was deliberately harsh. “He seems to be alone and you are far from friendless—he can hardly carry you off by force.”

“We’ll help you! We’ll hide your declared Marie-Claude.”

Rom ignored this noble sentiment as he had ignored Harriet’s terror.

“Let me just get this clear, Harriet. Were you engaged to him?”

“No!”

“And he has no legal hold over you?”

“No, but—”

“All right, that will do.” He leaned forward and gave some instructions to the driver. “The carriage will turn around and take you to the back of the hotel. Meanwhile,” said Rom, opening the carriage door, “I think I will go and introduce myself to your friend.”

Edward had suffered since he had agreed to go in search of Harriet. It had been rotten luck finding that there was no British boat for a fortnight, so that he’d had to cross the Channel and trust himself to foreigners. Then on the voyage there had been the unscrupulous behavior of Isobel Brandon to contend with; Edward had not seen Mrs. Brandon on the recent visit to Stavely, but he had no difficulty in identifying the beautiful red-haired widow listed among the passengers—though why she should seek solace in her bereavement by traveling to the Amazon was hard to understand.

But his friendly gesture in introducing himself and reminding her of his mother’s acquaintance with the General had caused Mrs. Brandon to unloose on him—in a totally unbridled manner—her small son. “Go and ask Dr. Finch-Dutton,” Edward heard her say a dozen times a day—and presently Henry would appear to ask the kind of questions with which children and philosophers trouble their betters. Why do spiders have eight legs and insects six, Henry wanted to know. Do flying fish have souls? Why is there a green streak in the sky just before the sun goes down?… on and on and on.

Which did not mean that Edward was pleased to see him carried off the boat at Belem. There was no real harm in the child and the relief of traveling on alone had been vitiated by the appalling heat as soon as they left the fresh Atlantic breezes. And now in Manaus, where he had hoped for a cool bath and a chance to muster his forces, his troubles seemed only to have begun.

“Good afternoon.” Rom had reached Edward’s side and stood looking up at the cab with amused friendliness. “Can I help at all? Are you in trouble?”

“Oh, I say! Yes! That’s jolly decent of you. Didn’t expect to see a fellow countryman here,” said Edward. “My name’s Finch-Dutton—Dr. Edward Finch-Dutton, from Cambridge. The truth is, I’m in a bit of a fix. I’ve just come off the Vasco da Gama and spent the whole afternoon driving around trying to find somewhere to stay. I tried the Hotel Metropole, but it’s booked to the roof—so is the Europa, not that I’d put a dog there. And then that scoundrel”—he glared at the driver, busy spitting melon seeds into the road—“drove me to a place he said was a hotel—” But there Edward broke off, unable to speak of what had happened after he had asked for a room at Madame Anita’s. “And now he proposes to dump me and my luggage and charge me a perfectly ludicrous sum which I have not the slightest intention of paying.”

Rom turned and fired off half-a-dozen rapid sentences at the cabby, who became servile and explanatory. The Englishman had not understood: he had tried to tell him that the hotels were always full when a company was performing at the theater but the man would not listen. He himself had done his best, but he now wished to receive his fare and attend the festivities for his niece’s confirmation at which he was already overdue.

“Your niece’s festivities—which interest me little-will, however, have to wait,” said Rom pleasantly. “And if you don’t want to lose your license, you will stop spitting into the road.” He turned back to Edward. “Perhaps I can help. My name’s Verney, by the way. I’m on my way to the Sports Club to pick up a message; it’s quite a decent place, run by an Englishman—Harry Parker. They sometimes accommodate travelers for a few days—members of expeditions and so on. I can’t promise anything, but I daresay he might fit you in.”

“I used to know a Harry Parker at my prep school,” said Edward. “He kept a weasel in his tuck-box. Don’t suppose it’s the same chap.” But he brightened visibly at the thought of someone in this steam-bath of a city who might conceivably have been at Fallowfield preparatory school on the bracing and healthy Sussex Downs.

“You’re a zoologist, I see,” said Rom, giving the driver his orders and climbing over Edward’s collecting gear and large tin trunk—for Edward was not a person who traveled light or thought that field work excused one from appearing decently dressed for dinner.

“Well, yes. Entomology’s my field, actually. The Aphaniptera in particular. Fleas,” explained Edward. “I’m a Fellow of St. Philip’s.”

“So you’ll be staying a while?”

“Yes… Well, not too long, I hope. I mean…” He looked at the man who had come to his rescue. Handsome; a bit foreign-looking but obviously a thoroughgoing gentleman by his voice and his clothes, and the cab-driver had become positively servile in his presence. So Edward, who had manfully kept his secret on the long journey, now said, “I don’t mind telling you that I’m also here for another reason—not just collecting. I’m looking for a girl who has run away from home. A dreadful business. Her father’s the Merlin Professor of Classics, and I… well, before this happened I was interested in the girl myself. Not now of course,” he added hastily. “We think she’s with the ballet company which is playing here at the Opera House. As soon as I’m settled and have got rid or my stuff, I intend to start making inquiries.”

“What is her name?”

Edward hesitated, but his rescuer’s face as he looked out at the street showed only the most polite and casual interest.