Alice-Miranda at Sea (9 page)

N
eville Nordstrom could not remember the last time he'd enjoyed such a good sleep. The gentle motion of the ship had sent him off almost as soon as his head hit the pillow. His mind was filled with dreams, which had fractured into a thousand tiny pieces as soon as he woke up – but he felt warm inside, like after a hot chocolate on a frosty day.

‘Good morning, Master Neville.' Henderson knocked and opened the bedroom door. Neville clutched the covers and drew them to his chin.

‘Would you like something to drink? Perhaps a glass of juice?' the steward asked.

Neville barely moved his head. He seemed to have the uncanny ability of shaking his eyes up and down.

‘Very good, sir. I'll leave you to get dressed then.' Henderson retreated from the room and set about preparing a tray with some juice and a shiny apple.

He was trying hard not to judge, but the boy was quite the strangest lad he'd ever encountered. And what was his obsession with that trumpet case? Henderson had to stop himself from laughing out loud when he noticed its outline under the covers at the bottom of the bed.

Inside the bedroom Neville waited a couple of minutes before he pushed back the covers and hopped out of bed. He walked across the room and peered through one of the portholes. From his cabin on the starboard side of the ship all he could see was miles and miles of endless ocean. He wondered for a moment what would happen if the ship struck an iceberg. Like the
Titanic
. He supposed that they would all die an icy death in the sub-zero temperatures of the Atlantic.

Dismissing the thought from his mind, Neville pulled his kit bag from the bottom of the wardrobe, opened it up and located a clean pair of underpants and his favourite yellow polo shirt. He'd caught Henderson trying to unpack his bag and managed to find enough voice to object. He wanted to have everything in one place in case he needed to leave the ship in a hurry – like in the event of an iceberg or something.

The lad pulled on his beige trousers and sat down to put on his shoes and socks. He stared at his grubby trainers. Neville's mother had suggested they go and buy a new pair last week but he'd told her not to worry. Now he rather wished he hadn't put her off. In the opulence of his cabin, they looked especially shabby.

He emerged from his bedroom hoping that Henderson would have left him some juice and gone away. But he hadn't. Neville stood clutching his case in the doorway.

‘Will you be dining with your mother in the Breakfast Room this morning, sir?' Henderson asked, holding back a grin.

Neville shook his head. He wondered why Henderson mentioned his mother. She certainly wasn't here.

‘Very well, Master Neville. Would you like me to bring you some breakfast then?' Henderson was starting to wonder if there was really something amiss with this unfortunate kid.

Neville moved his head ever so slightly. Henderson withdrew from the cabin and Neville sat down to look at the newspaper on the coffee table.

On page three Neville was surprised to see a face he recognised smiling out at him. He checked the name and wondered what the article was about. He wished he'd paid more attention in his Spanish language classes – there were only a few words here and there that he understood and none of it made any sense.

Neville checked the date on the paper. The pages didn't feel like newsprint. And he wondered how they would get the paper out here in the middle of the ocean anyway?

Neville thumbed through the rest of the paper, picking up the odd word here and there before flipping back to page three.

Henderson returned with a breakfast tray laden with pancakes and maple syrup, bacon and eggs, several boxes of cereal, milk, fruit salad and more juice.

‘I hope everything will be to your liking, Master Neville.' The steward sat the tray down on the small table for two which stood in an alcove at the end of the sitting room.

Neville sat at the table and glanced warily at the steward. Henderson decided that Neville might be more comfortable attending to his own breakfast, so he moved over to the couch and began to plump the cushions. It was then that he noticed the newspaper on the coffee table.

‘I am sorry, sir; I've given you the Spanish newspaper. We have them printed from the internet and I must have picked that up by mistake. He's a busy man.' Henderson pointed at the photograph.

‘W-w-what does it say?' Neville whispered.

‘Oh, he's heading to Spain,' Henderson replied.

‘W-w-when?' Neville stammered.

‘I think he's there tomorrow. A two-week tour – very unexpected – some business and then a holiday by the sea, it says.'

Neville gulped. His eyes spun and his brain felt like it was packed tightly with cotton wool. Without warning he slumped forward and his head glanced off the corner of the cereal bowl and hit the table with a thud. A trickle of blood began to ooze from his eyebrow.

‘Are you all right, Master Neville?' Henderson rushed to his side. But the poor boy was out cold.

A
lice-Miranda and Millie were seated with Millie's parents, her grandfather Ambrose and Mrs Oliver for breakfast. Hugh and Cecelia were yet to appear. Charlotte and Lawrence were holding court at a long table with over twenty of their friends vying for the happy couple's attention.

Alice-Miranda had given them a wave when she and Millie had entered the room. She would catch up with them later when they weren't quite so busy. Except that Alice-Miranda hadn't yet found an occasion when they weren't being mobbed by guests.

Alice-Miranda waved to Poppy and Annie who were sitting at an adjacent table. Their mother, Lady Sarah, was still looking a little off-colour.

‘Gosh your mother's cousin wears a lot of jewellery,' Millie commented.

‘Mummy says Lady Sarah has one of the best collections in the world,' Alice-Miranda replied.

‘Those diamond earrings are enormous. I wonder if she'll let me take a photo of her.' Millie picked her camera up from the table.

‘I'm sure that the guests don't need to be stalked by you and your camera, Millicent,' her father tutted. ‘Please put it away for a while.'

‘But Dad, those earrings are the size of ping-pong balls – no one will believe me if I don't . . .' Millie began.

Hamish was firm. ‘And Lady Sarah can wear earrings the size of bowling balls if she chooses – and she doesn't need you pestering her for a picture. You are not the ship's own paparazzo.'

‘Oh, I didn't think of it like that,' Millie replied.

Alice-Miranda giggled.

‘Imagine earrings the size of bowling balls. That would be like having three heads,' Millie chuckled.

Four waiters arrived and simultaneously deposited all manner of tasty treats in front of the hungry diners.

‘These look rather good,' Ambrose McLoughlin-McTavish commented as he dug his fork into the mountain of scrambled eggs on his plate.

‘Yes, I must agree,' Mrs Oliver praised.

‘Really?' Alice-Miranda stared at Dolly Oliver across the table.

‘And why ever do you say that, young lady?' Several rows of lines puckered on Mrs Oliver's forehead.

‘Because you hate having other people cook for you. Whenever we've been away before, you nearly always commandeer the kitchen by the second day,' Alice-Miranda informed the group. ‘I'm surprised you're not downstairs.'

There really wasn't anything Dolly Oliver didn't know about cooking. She'd been the Highton-Smith-Kennington-Joneses' family cook for the past ten years and with the Highton-Smiths for another thirty years before that. Dolly was renowned for her amazing food and her incredible scientific work too. Her product, Just Add Water Freeze-Dried Foods, was being shipped around the world, making important inroads into malnutrition. But just recently, since Dolly had been reacquainted with Millie's grandfather, Alice-Miranda had noticed a change in her. Almost as though, for the first time in her life, she was happy letting other people look after her – well just a little bit, anyway.

‘That's not entirely true, young lady.' Mrs Oliver looked over at Alice-Miranda. ‘I didn't go near Prince Shivaji's chef, Amir, when we were in Jaipur last year,' she said.

‘Well, that's only because he insisted on keeping a basket of spitting cobras beside the stove,' Alice-Miranda reminded her. ‘I wasn't going anywhere near that kitchen, either.'

Mrs Oliver snorted and turned to the rest of the table. ‘Oh dear, I do remember that. Amir's father was a snake charmer and he often had his son mind his serpents overnight. I was having a tour of the kitchen, wanting to learn all about the wonderful spices he was using when I got a little bit nosey and lifted the lid on the basket. You can only imagine my reaction when a full-grown cobra reared up and looked me in the eye.'

Everyone laughed at the thought of poor Mrs Oliver and the snake.

‘Well, I dare you to try and get a job in the kitchen on the
Octavia
, Mrs Oliver,' Millie challenged.

‘Why do you say that, dear?' the old woman quizzed.

‘We met the Head Chef, Vladimir, yesterday and he's fierce. His men are terrified of him,' Millie reported.

‘What a pity,' Mrs Oliver replied. ‘I so enjoyed that marinated lamb we had last night. I was planning to pop in and ask if he might share the recipe.'

‘Well, good luck,' Millie offered.

Jacinta appeared at the entrance to the room.

‘Would you like to sit with your mother and father this morning, miss?' a young crewman offered.

‘Are they here?' Jacinta looked perplexed. It wasn't at all like her mother to be out of bed before noon, let alone up and eating breakfast at the ungodly hour of 8 am.

‘Over there, miss.' The young man pointed towards Hugh and Cecelia, who had slipped into the breakfast room a few minutes beforehand.

‘Oh, they're not my parents,' Jacinta felt a sharp stab deep inside her stomach.

‘I am terribly sorry, miss,' the crewman replied, his cheeks turning red.

‘Yeah, me too,' Jacinta whispered. ‘It's all right, I'll sit with my friends.' She looked towards the adjacent table where Alice-Miranda was holding court.

N
eville's eyes opened and he wondered for a moment where he was.

‘Are you all right, Master Neville?' Henderson leaned over the boy who was lying on his back on the king-sized bed in his suite. ‘I've called for the doctor.'

Neville sat up. His gaze darted around the room, like a mosquito in search of a bare limb, before he realised that his case was in fact sitting on the bed beside him.

‘I know you're awfully attached to that instrument, sir, so I brought it back in for you.'

Neville swallowed hard and managed to mumble a soft thank you.

‘You're welcome. Now, how are you feeling?'

Neville rubbed his forehead and wondered why there was a towel wrapped around his head. He couldn't for the life of him remember what had happened.

‘We were just talking about J. Gatsby Grayson and then the next thing I knew you were face-down in your cereal. It was lucky I was here or you might have drowned,' Henderson went on, exaggerating somewhat as Neville's head had actually come to rest on the table.

At the mention of the name, the painful memory started flooding back. Neville couldn't believe it. How dare he leave the United States and travel all the way to Spain, of all places, just as Neville was leaving Spain, on a ship, risking his life to visit him and explain his amazing discovery?

Henderson interrupted the boy's thoughts. ‘You're looking awfully pale, Master Neville. Would you like a sip of water?'

There was a loud rap at the cabin door and Henderson left the bedroom to answer it.

‘Well, what is it?' Dr Nicholas Lush asked as he followed Henderson into the sitting room.

‘I think he fainted. His head hit the side of the cereal bowl. Did some damage, too. He chipped the bowl and I think there might be a small piece of Her Majesty's china embedded above his right eye. There was quite a deal of blood but I wrapped a towel around his head and laid him on his bed. He's just come around now,' Henderson explained to the doctor.

‘I suppose I should have a look at him.' Dr Lush walked through into Neville's bedroom. He glanced at Neville, picked up the boy's wrist, and then studied his watch. ‘So, you fainted, did you?'

Neville didn't know what to say, so he said nothing.

‘Well, how do you feel now?' Dr Lush asked. He placed Neville's arm back down beside him.

‘O-o-okay,' Neville stammered.

‘Get that grubby thing off the bed,' the doctor snapped, pointing at Neville's case.

Neville found his voice. ‘NO!' He reached out and pulled it in close and then pushed it under the covers beside him.

‘What's in it?' Nicholas Lush sneered. ‘A golden trumpet?'

Neville glared.

Dr Lush leaned forward and unwrapped the towel from around Neville's forehead. ‘Ah, yes, there does seem to be a piece of the Queen's china lodged just above your eye, young man. I think that will require some digging and then a stitch or two. I suppose we'd better have you taken up to the infirmary, where I keep my weapons.' Lush raised his eyebrows.

‘Weapons?' Neville rasped and started to shake. Henderson came to his rescue.

‘May I have a word, sir?' Henderson indicated towards the other room.

‘Make it snappy. This has thrown my whole day out.' Dr Lush followed the younger man into the sitting room. Henderson closed the bedroom door.

‘Doctor, I think Neville would prefer to stay here, if he might. I can keep an eye on him while you get whatever you need,' the steward suggested. ‘He's just about the shyest kid I've ever met in my life. He hardly ever says boo and when he does manage to speak it's one word at a time. I think he might have a complete breakdown if you have to take him to the infirmary. If it's all the same to you and you can do the work down here, I promise I'll watch him.'

Nicholas Lush didn't mind at all. He had loads to do – and attending to a slightly injured, non-communicative boy with a paper-thin constitution was not on the list.

There was much more fun to be had on deck, talking with all those lovely ladies.

‘Well, where are his parents?' Dr Lush asked. ‘I won't be doing anything until I have their permission. The boy will need local anaesthetic and stitches.'

Nicholas was painfully aware that Admiral Harding was quite the stickler for rules and regulations, and the last thing the good doctor wanted was any undue attention from the boss, who didn't seem to like him much at the best of times.

‘His mother's just across the hallway.'

‘Well, go and get her, or at the very least have her sign this.' Dr Lush pulled a notepad from his bag, scrawled an illegible sentence and tore off the top page. ‘I'll wait with the boy until you get back and then I'll have to get some more supplies from upstairs.'

Henderson walked across the hallway and tapped loudly on Ambrosia Headlington-Bear's suite door. There was no answer so he let himself in. The sitting room was swathed in darkness and the bedroom door was closed. He knocked gently.

‘Yes,' a husky voice called from within.

‘Good morning, ma'am.' Henderson peeked inside.

‘I need a coffee,' Ambrosia mumbled.

‘Very well, ma'am, but I need you to sign something.' Henderson stepped into the room. Mrs Headlington-Bear was lying under the covers, a sleeping mask shielding her eyes.

‘What? Are they going to charge me for room service?' she snapped.

‘No, ma'am, it's . . .'

‘Don't talk. My head is throbbing,' Ambrosia complained. ‘I've got a migraine.'

‘But, ma'am,' Henderson tried again.

‘Just give me the piece of paper and bring me some coffee.' Ambrosia sat up. She pushed the mask over her head and grabbed the pen from Henderson. Without even looking she scrawled a messy signature at the bottom of the page.

‘But Mrs Headlington-Bear, you should know what you're signing . . .' he began.

‘Is it life or death?' Ambrosia drawled.

Henderson tried again. ‘Well, no, not exactly. But it's about your child.'

‘My child? My child does perfectly well without me.' Ambrosia sank down into her pillows. She snapped the mask back over her eyes and pulled the covers above her head.

‘Leave,' Ambrosia snapped. ‘I need to sleep.'

Henderson retreated from Mrs Headlington-Bear's suite wondering what had just happened.

He walked back across the hallway to find the doctor drumming his fingers on the sideboard.

‘Well, did you get it?' Dr Lush demanded.

‘Yes, but I don't think she's in the running for any “Mother of the Year” awards,' Henderson said with a frown.

‘Not my problem.' Dr Lush pushed the piece of paper into his top pocket. ‘I'll be back shortly. But someone has to watch the boy for the next few hours,' he informed Henderson.

‘That's all right. I've only got him to look after, and his mother, and I know that she's got an extended booking at the spa this afternoon as I made the appointment myself.'

‘Very well then. I'll get my bag,' Dr Lush headed off.

Half an hour later, Neville was sporting two stitches, a blackening eye and a bump on his forehead. Henderson, who was taking his duties very seriously, had made himself at home on the sofa next to Neville's bed. Fortunately, the doctor had given the boy some rather strong pain medication, and he had quickly fallen fast asleep.

‘So what's so special about that trumpet of yours?' Henderson smiled to himself as he observed the tatty case perched beside his young charge. He'd been wondering about it ever since Neville had arrived on the ship and shown the old thing such undying devotion.

He might even have risked opening it and taking a peek, but not at that moment. He didn't want to be in any more trouble with the First Officer.

The steward walked back into the sitting room and ran his eyes along the bookshelves looking for something that might keep him awake for the next few hours.

‘
The Great Gatsby
.' Henderson pulled the book out. ‘Okay, Mr F. Scott Fitzgerald, what's all this about?'