Juliet Armstrong - Isle of the Hummingbird

by Juliet Armstrong

  But presently her thoughts were sent sharply in quite another direction. A plane from Jamaica had come in, and a gay, laughing, noisy crowd streamed into the crowded lounge. She found herself eyeing them eagerly, and soon, thrilled and not altogether surprised, she saw Hugh coming along.

  'I must go and speak to him,' she decided quickly. 'I don't care what anyone thinks!'

  But before she had moved one step in his direction something happened to keep her rooted to her place, between Anne-Marie and Peregrine.

  Someone had come to meet Hugh—someone whom he quite obviously expected. And that someone was Leoni, the smiling youth who sold goods in the boutique attached to Polydore's hairdressing establishment.

  She had only seen this Leoni once before. For it had happened, with a little manoeuvring on her part, that various friends had taken Aunt Isabel to her recent hairdressing appointments. But because he was associated in a business capacity with the woman from Venezuela who had tried to gatecrash into her cabin on the way out from England—Senora Blavona—his face was stamped on her mind.

  There was something disturbing in Hugh's relationship with these people. He had declared, certainly, that his work required him to meet his firm's customers on a social basis. But there had been something very odd in the way the Blavona woman had spoken to her, that morning when she had left Aunt Isabel to Polydore's ministrations.

  Sitting there in her desk just outside the salon, she had behaved in a manner very much at variance with her official capacity. She had been downright insolent, referring to Hugh in that mocking tone as 'our mutual friend'.

  'If Hugh gets in touch with me,' she thought, '—and goodness knows if he will—I shall ask him to tell me all he knows about that boutique, and the people who work there. Even warn him, perhaps, of my feeling that there's something definitely phoney about them.'

  Ten minutes after losing sight of the two men there came the booming message that the plane from London was arriving. There was a fresh stir of excitement, and after a while the Gilberts appeared, beaming—and bestowing kisses and hugs all round, Bryony being included in all this hearty embracing.

  Peregrine, as amused and surprised as was Bryony herself, when Ronald gave her a smacking kiss on each cheek, remarked wryly that he would never have dared to take such a liberty.

  'Oh, I can't discriminate—all these pretty girls—the sight of them goes to my head!' Ronald told him cheerfully. 'Besides, I'm in a state of great excitement. My first visit to the Caribbean—and Carnival.'

  Yvonne, though a shade less exuberant than her husband, was looking radiant, and her manner to Bryony was so sweet that Bryony felt thankful she had decided to fall in with Peregrine's plans, rather than with Hugh's.

  'I've had several letters from the family saying what a success you are, and how you fit in so marvellously with everyone,' she told Bryony. 'It makes me very vain about my feminine instinct. I just knew that you'd be the right one, even though you were short by years of the canonical age Peregrine had laid down!'

  Peregrine, helping with the bestowal of the luggage in the larger car, heard this, and raised his eyebrows.

  'You talk as though I had had nothing to do with engaging Bryony,' he said, with a slight, ironic smile. 'The mercy was that Bryony, for her part, decided to take a chance with a somewhat unusual and demanding job, and come to us.'

  Bryony coloured and laughed at this.

  'This hardly seems a moment for a speech,' she remarked. 'But the Gray family have been pretty nice to me.'

  Up at the house there was still more excitement, as Tina and Solomon, with Gloria and Pearl hanging on to them, came out into the drive to greet 'Mis' Yvonne' and her husband from England, whom they had not yet met.

  Tina's keen eyes suspected, as Bryony's hadn't, that Yvonne was expecting a child, and there were whispered congratulations and joyous chuckles over this. Altogether, indeed, a gloriously happy homecoming.

  Again Bryony was touched by the way she was swept into the family circle. She had been here barely two months, but already had the sense of 'belonging'—so much so that it startled her sometimes to reflect that time was quickly passing, that when next year's

  Carnival came round she would probably be back in England.

  The Gilberts were delighted with all the arrangements she and the girls had made for their welcome, and with the festive dinner which Tina had prepared. And afterwards, when they sat in the drawing-room, drinking coffee and listening to distant calypsos played on steel drums, Anne-Marie, encouraged by Yvonne, brought out her portfolio of drawings. The latest was the sketch she had made of Bryony, and Yvonne was genuinely impressed with this.

  'When you're a little older, Anne-Marie,' she said, 'you must come over to London and stay with us for a year or so and go to art school. You've real talent.'

  Anne-Marie's hazel eyes sparkled.

  'I'd love that! I could help you in lots of ways. And I'd be able to see Bryony sometimes.'

  'What about me?' Sally's tone bordered on the peevish. 'Have I to stay put for the rest of my life— just because I can't draw or paint, or do anything clever like that?'

  'You wouldn't think of staying to look after me, Sal?' Peregrine, sitting near her, slipped his arm round her waist.

  She eyed him broodingly.

  'I bet when you've got Anne-Marie and me off your hands you'll be finding someone to marry—if you haven't done so already!'

  Peregrine tweaked her curly hair.

  'Don't let's look too far ahead. Perhaps when I'm about forty-five some lady of similar age will take pity on my shyness and lead me to the altar. You never know.'

  'You do not, indeed,' Yvonne commented enigmatically. 'And well before you're forty-five, I should say.' But Anne-Marie, her thoughts far away, demanded eagerly: 'Shall I really have to stay at St. Monica's and take tiresome A levels? Couldn't I take them in England?'

  'How can I tell you wouldn't copy Yvonne and find a husband over there—get married in London, the way she did—with only the most distant relatives there, and A levels thrown to the wind?'

  Peregrine was half smiling as he spoke.

  'How can you be so unreasonable, Perry? About being at my wedding, I mean! Ronald couldn't get enough leave to make it worth while having it over here. I was longing for you all to come to England.'

  Yvonne spoke reproachfully, but Ronald put in breezily: 'We didn't have the spare money for our passage, either. But things have looked up since then. If they continue to prosper we'll be coming over for holidays every year or two.'

  'Anyway, if you all desert me, I shall still have Chris.' Peregrine sounded philosophical. 'He's determined to join me in practice here. Doesn't want to live anywhere else in the world.'

  And with this, conversation began to flow around this absent and dearly loved brother.

  They all went to meet him at the airport the following evening—all, that is, except Bryony, who had a hunch that Hugh would be ringing her up. But she hung about the house and garden in vain, her nerves on edge. The only calls came from patients—none of them in urgent need—and in a couple of hours the family were back, bringing May Wicker too, to stay over Carnival.

  Chris gave her a hug—watched sardonically by Peregrine. And she had, suddenly, the most reprehensible thought. What would it be like to be kissed by Perry—not in this brotherly fashion, but in the way Hugh had kissed her more than once—with passion?

  Startled and ashamed—and horrified at the idea that Peregrine might somehow make a guess at this shocking aberration—she forced her face into such severe lines that he asked her with kindly concern if she was feeling well, or if anything had happened to trouble her. She shook her head, her poise recovered by now, and reflected on what his reactions might have been if she had answered: 'I'm starved for kisses. It sends my imagination straying in all sorts of odd directions—even in yours!'

  And then, cut off from the rest of the family for a moment, he said something totally unexpected.

&nbs
p; 'A sweet profile—but rather a hard expression in your eyes. That's what I thought about you when I first saw you. But since you've been here the sweetness has spread to your whole face. What's the matter, Bryony?'

  'You make me sound like a sticky-mouthed child eating bread and honey,' she retorted lightly. 'Of course there's nothing wrong, Perry. I'm a little tired, that's all.'

  'I don't wonder, after the way you've worked to make a success of things for our visitors. We'll make it an early night for all of us, so that we'll be fresh for Carnival.'

  But they lingered on as usual for a while after dinner, and Yvonne made Anne-Marie show Christopher her drawing of Bryony. And Christopher, to everyone's pleasure—except, perhaps, Sally's—had something constructive to say. He told them enthusiastically that one of the biggest Canadian weeklies was running a competition for artists under the age of eighteen. It was open to girls and boys of all nationalities, and there were several classes and several prizes. It would be well worth Anne-Marie's while to enter— the sketch, he thought, was quite the best she had ever done—and if she would pack it up for him, he'd take it back to Montreal with him on Ash Wednesday, and see that it reached the office of the paper safely. The competition closed within a few days; there was only just time for her to enter.

  Bryony was, perhaps, the only one who noticed that Sally did not share in the general thrill, and she made her good-night to her especially warm.

  'You've been a wonderful help to me, darling,' she said. 'I don't know what I'd have done without you. No one arranges flowers as beautifully as you. I heard Yvonne saying so to Ronald—that she recognised your touch, that you'd been a witch with flowers ever since you were a child.'

  But Sally was not to be comforted.

  'It's kind of you to say so. But I'm the stupid one of the family. Everyone knows it really.'

  And before Bryony could remonstrate on such a ridiculous mis-statement of fact she had broken away and gone off to bed.

  On Sunday afternoon some of the larger schools, including St. Monica's, were giving their own Carnival displays to audiences of friends and relations.

  Both Anne-Marie and Sally thought it necessary to lament loudly that they were not taking part in adult bands. School affairs, they declared, were insipid and ought to be confined to the juniors. They also grumbled a little, though not in Perry's hearing, at the impossibility of inviting Frank and Bernard— having by now recovered from their fright at the prospect of becoming involved in the affair of the raided garage.

  It struck Bryony that Anne-Marie, at least, was halfhearted over this particular grievance. She seemed more interested now in her chances of a successful career in art than in boy-friends, and had dashed off, with Christopher's encouragement, two lively water- colour sketches of the tropical fish costumes which she and her sister were to wear.

  Whatever their moans, both girls were delighted, in their hearts, at having so many members of the family to watch their show. And when, helped by Yvonne and Bryony, they were dressed and ready to start they thoroughly enjoyed the chorus of congratulation which came from the whole household, and submitted graciously to having their photographs taken in colour.

  The whole affair, staged in the school playground, was an eye-opener for Bryony. She had imagined that Anne-Marie and Sally, in their fantastic and beautiful costumes, would outshine all the other girls in their class. Certainly none were arrayed more artistically or in better taste, but she blinked as she saw the costly materials and extravagant designs that had gone to the making of some of the dresses.

  What would the average English schoolgirl and her parents think of such amazing creations? And what would these radiant damsels, perfectly poised, and moving around without a trace of self-consciousness, think of a gala occasion at some boarding-school in England?

  She murmured something of her astonishment to Yvonne, who laughed.

  'These school displays seem wildly extravagant to me now, after living in London. But they are only hors d'oeuvres. Even tomorrow, when the island is en fete, it's as though one had reached the entries, because it's Ol' Masque and people are wearing their last year's costumes. Shrove Tuesday provides the real banquet—with positively staggering spectacles.'

  To everyone's sharp disappointment—Bryony's included—Peregrine had to work, after all, on Monday evening, and the parties were rearranged. Christopher found two friends and made up a six with May Wicker and his young sisters. And Dr. Leonard, the senior partner in the firm of doctors, was roped in to partner Bryony.

  She had volunteered to stay at home in case Peregrine needed her, but no one—Peregrine least of all—would hear of this. Tina would attend to his needs, and if by any chance she let him down, he could very well manage for himself—'or appeal to Laura Forrest's tender mercies', so Yvonne remarked under her breath.

  'After all, if you're going back to England when your twelve months is up you may never have another chance of seeing Carnival. Though I suppose,' and she eyed Bryony thoughtfully, 'you might stay on a bit longer if you didn't feel that a job of this sort was wasting your time.'

  'I don't think Peregrine means to ask me,' Bryony told her casually.

  'Well, if he does want to keep you for another year he can hardly tie you down to this having no boyfriends idea.' Yvonne sounded amused, but impatient, too.

  'Oh, he's getting more liberal notions,' Bryony assured her, and told Yvonne something of her shipboard friendship with Hugh—of Peregrine's near- insistence that she should go out with him when invited.

  'You're doing him good,' was Yvonne's verdict. 'He needs to limber up a bit. It's wonderful of him, of course, to give Anne-Marie and Sally this lovely home. But if he's going to worry all the time about their coming to a sticky end, he might just as well have taken dear Laura's advice and sent them to boarding- school.' And she added with an impish grin: 'That's what she wanted him to do with me—with all of us, in fact. And we all know why!'

  As she dressed to go out that night, in rose-coloured organdie, Bryony reflected on Peregrine's clear assumption that the contract he had made with her must be kept to the letter—that he must provide her with a return passage at the end of a year's work in his household.

  Perhaps he thought a change of housekeeper would be good for Anne-Marie and Sally. Or perhaps, for all the kind things he said, he felt that an older woman would really manage better.

  Certainly he would need someone to take her place—unless he followed the course which his sisters glumly prophesied and installed Laura as the mistress of his home.

  Bryony was by no means sure that she would want to go back to England when her year was up. Trinidad, little as she had seen of the island, had begun to throw a spell on her. The warmth and the sunshine, the feeling that hustling and bustling was pointless, the green hills studded with flowering trees, red and pink and golden, the sounds of cockcrow at dawn and calypsos at night, the lacy-edged blue waves lapping lazily on silver shores—these and so many other things went to make up an enchantment she had never known before.

  Even Port-of-Spain, crowded with cars and people, and throbbing in the heat, held magic. All the talk and laughter, the vivid colours of the clothes, as one strolled down Frederick Street—how different from anything one had known at home. It would take her longer than a year to tire—for impressions to grow stale.

  The thought came to her then of something Hugh had said to her on board ship about the ease she would have in finding a congenial, well-paid job in the island. Perhaps if the Grays did not Want her when her twelve months were up she might try to get a permit to undertake other work.

  She wasn't sure. Helping a valuable doctor in a more or less unofficial capacity just for pocket-money was one thing. Entering the labour market was quite another. Besides, she didn't care for the notion of enlisting Hugh's help over the matter. The company he kept didn't appeal to her.

  And then she gave herself a mental shake. What was she doing, looking all those months ahead? It was quite ridicu
lous. She really didn't know what had come over her.

  She was the first to finish dressing, and on her way to say good-night to Aunt Isabel, who was turning in early with a new book and a tray of light refreshments, she ran into Peregrine, who gave her a startled look.

  'Goodness me, Bryony,' he exclaimed, 'It makes me madder than ever that I've got to hang around for Mrs. Smith's twins to arrive. I only hope Leonard will appreciate you. He's far too old, though.' He paused, then added: 'You ought to be going out with your friend Hugh Woods.'

  'He did ask me I' The words slipped out. 'He arrived in Trinidad on Friday.'

  'Why on earth didn't you tell me? Do you suppose I'd have been mean enough to embarrass you about going?'

  'I didn't look at it that way. I thought that with the Gilberts and Chris arriving to stay I might be needed.' She spoke frankly but with a certain shyness, and then ended awkwardly: 'Perhaps I was conceited to think myself of any importance. But after all, I am your housekeeper.'

  'You're certainly important to us all—to each and every one of us. I mean that literally. But I won't have you making this kind of sacrifice for us. How do you suppose I'll feel taking you to watch the Carnival tomorrow evening, knowing all the time you'd far rather be with this chap Woods?'

  'Hasn't it occurred to you I might feel the same way—aware that you'd much prefer to take Mrs. Forrest? That it's only on Yvonne's account, because she can't bear Laura, that you've invited me instead?'

  Her embarrassment had changed to a sudden gust of anger, and for a moment it seemed that he, too, would flare up.

  'We're getting rather too personal,' he said a little stiffly. 'But let's be practical. Is it too late for you to tell your friend you can go with him tomorrow, after all? Can you contact him?'

  She thought of that strange little shop in Port-of- Spain. They would know there where he was staying. But the notion of applying either to the Blavona woman or to Leoni was out of the question; it filled her not only with distaste but with an irrational fear.