A Swans - Eva Ibbotson

Neither of her friends went with her. Kirstin had joined the group of girls comforting Maximov—who needed to be told some twenty times an hour that he was not to blame for Simonova’s accident—and Harriet had decided to hurry back to the Metropole to see if the new doctor expected that afternoon held out any more hope.

The city was golden in the late afternoon sun. People sat in cafes on the mosaic pavements; children splashed in the fountains. Marie-Claude walked with pleasure, enjoying the full delights of window-shopping as experienced by those untroubled by any intention to buy.

Rejecting a pink and white striped silk suit, approving a blue organdie, she wandered along the Rua Quintana, crossed a busy square and paused by a kiosk at the edge of a small park overlooking the harbor where she bought a bottle of lemonade.

She was just selecting a bench on which to sit and drink it when she saw, coming down the steps of the porticoed police station, the gangling figure of Dr. Finch-Dutton. He was carrying a small wooden box and apparently dressed for traveling.

So he wasn’t away in the jungle as Harriet had thought. Strange… why had he made no contact? And what did he want with the police?

Repressing the natural instinct of flight so common in people acquainted with the Englishman, Marie-Claude studied him. He had entered the park by the other gate, sat down in a chair by the bandstand and now proceeded to take out of the wooden box something at which he stared with great intensity.

“Bon jour, Monsieur.”

Edward looked up, blushed, jumped to his feet. He had avoided all truck with the ballet company-complete surprise was the essence of his plan to snatch Harriet away—and he no longer felt capable of trusting anyone. But the sight of Marie-Claude, her face gilded by the rays of the westering sun, entirely overset him. Whoever had been responsible for Harriet’s eruption, it could hardly be this enchanting girl with her staggering facility in oral French. And lifting his hat, he eld out the glass specimen bottle he had been studying and said simply, “Look!”

Marie-Claude looked, gave a small shriek and retreated. Inside the bottle lay a large, dead reddish-brown worm with a great many baggy legs and two stumpy antennae.

“It’s Peripatus !” said Edward raptly, staring for the hundredth time at this miracle which he had been vouchsafed. “I found it this morning. You can’t imagine what this will mean to the head of my department. It’s absolutely crucial, you see—the missing link between the Arthropods and the Annelids.”

He launched into an account of the creature’s significance, while Marie-Claude’s jaw tightened in an effort not to yawn.

But there was no stopping Edward, who saw himself as a man sanctified ana set apart. For he had not meant to go into the forest again; he had been packed and ready, made his farewells at the Club when, with half an hour to wait before the cab was due, he had decided to go bug-hunting just once more.

And there on a damp patch of leaf-mold beneath a clump of kapok trees, he had found it!

Edward’s joy had at first been purely entomological. But no man can feel a rapture as intense as his without undergoing a general change in outlook. As he prepared Peripatus for the long journey home, Edward had seen himself as a man who had failed in magnanimity. Harriet, it was true, had to be apprehended; she had to be taken to the Gregory by force—there was no way out of that—but he had intended to have as little to do with her on the journey as possible. She would be aired and exercised like the prisoner she effectively was until he restored her to her father, and that was all.

But as he drowned the wriggling creature in alcohol, Edward had realized the pettiness of such thoughts. Once the ship was safely away and there was no question of Harriet making scenes or asking to be taken back, he would make it his business to help her… to heal her. He would go into her cabin… her dark, quiet cabin… he would let her weep; he would even put his arm around her and stroke her hair. There was no question of marriage now, of course, but there were… other relationships, thought Edward, seeing afresh his duty to this luckless and fallen girl.

“That it should happen like this,” he said now, holding up the bottle to the light. “On my last day!”

“Your last day?” said Marie-Claude sharply, putting down her lemonade.

“My last day… in the jungle, I meant,” said Edward, mopping his brow with his free hand. This wretched fever was making him stupid. It was most important not to reveal his movements to anyone. And anxious to confirm that Captain Carlos had done his work properly, he said, “You are dancing in Giselle tonight, aren’t you? All of you? Harriet, too?”

“Yes.” Marie-Claude sighed. “We are Wilis in three-quarter-length tutus and veils with much mist.”

“Veils!” said Edward, horrified.

“Only at first. We’re the souls of deceased girls who have been betrayed by men. It is extremely tedious.”

“Not a very long ballet, I believe?” asked Edward casually. “Curtain comes down about ten-thirty, I understand?”

“That’s right.” Marie-Claude’s suspicions were now definitely aroused. “Do you expect to be there?”

“No… no. Too much work to do, I’m afraid.” He looked down at the bottle once more and as always when he gazed at the wondrous worm, exaltation overcame caution. “You were always Harriet’s friend, I know,” he said. “So I want you to understand that in spite of all she has done—”

“Done?” put in Marie-Claude quickly. “What has she done?”

Edward, confirmed in his assessment of Marie-Claude’s virtue, said hoarsely, “I don’t want to talk about it… it was in the Sports Club… last week…”

Marie-Claude’s heart sank. He had been at the banquet then, this priggish oaf, compared with whom Monsieur Pierre was a dangerous libertine.

“But you will not be angry with Harriet?” she prompted and moved closer, in spite of the loathsome creature in its bottle, to look entreatingly into his face.

Edward swayed slightly, overcome by the scent of her hair and the sweetness of her breath.

“No. I was angry, I admit it; but not now. And I want you to know that I shall let no harm befall her. She will be safe with me.”

“With you?” inquired Marie-Claude, who had not missed Edward’s involuntary glance at the Gregory riding at anchor in the harbor below. “But you are leaving soon, I think? And Harriet is staying with the Company. So how will she be safe with you?”

Too late, Edward saw his mistake. “I spoke in general terms. When she is back in Cambridge I shall visit her, that’s all I mean. I shall not cut her dead.”

And afraid of giving himself away further, he replaced Peripatus in its mahogany traveling case and took his leave, walking away—a little unsteady with fever-across the park.

Left alone, Marie-Claude came close to panic. What she had heard could only have one explanation: Edward, shocked by Harriet’s performance at the dub, had decided to take her back to England by force. If he was acting alone the attempt would be futile, but if he had the support of the police…

Oh, God, thought Marie-Claude, blaming herself; what shall I do? She could warn Harriet not to dance tonight, to shut herself in her room—but what was to stop them following her there? She could speak to Dubrov, but he had scarcely left Simonova’s side since the accident. And it was only an hour until curtain-up…

Below her, she could see the ant-like passengers already making their way up the gangway of the Gregory . The ship left at dawn, everyone knew that. Then she started forward, staring intently across the water. Still under sail, lovely as a dream, the Amethyst was coming into harbor.