Expecting Someone Taller (15 page)

‘Have you seen a white moth with pale blue spots on its wings?' asked the bird.

‘No,' replied Malcolm, ‘but I've got some peanuts if you're hungry.'

‘You can have enough of peanuts,' said the bird. ‘Anyway, I wanted that particular moth. We've got people coming round for dinner tomorrow.'

‘Good hunting, then,' said Malcolm. ‘Try round by the buddleias.'

The bird cocked its head on one side. ‘Thanks,' it said. ‘Good idea. Oh, and by the way.'

‘Yes?'

‘Don't underestimate Wotan, whatever you do. There are more ways of killing a cat, you know.'

‘What do you mean?'

The bird fluttered its wings. ‘Don't ask me, I'm only a bird. Besides, it's my favourite proverb.'

‘Hope you find your moth,' said Malcolm.

‘So do I,' said the blackbird. ‘Good night.'

F
losshilde was always beautifully dressed. She had been following fashion since the dawn of time, and her wardrobe occupied the space on the bed of the Rhine between Andernach and Koblenz. Not only did she follow fashion, she led it; she had been wearing figure-of-eight brooches when the Iron Age was still in its infancy, and it was her pioneering work that had given the ladies of sixteenth-century Europe the surcingle. In comparison, she thought, the twentieth century was drab, to say the least. Nevertheless, she had looked out a rather clever lemon-coloured pullover and a pair of black and white striped trousers which had, oddly enough, been in vogue at the height of the Hallstadt Culture. If you keep things long enough, she had learnt by experience, they eventually come back into fashion.

To add the finishing touches, she decorated her ears with Snoopy earrings and slipped over her slim wrist a bracelet of amber which had been given to her by the first King of the Langobards and which looked reasonably like tortoiseshell plastic. She would, she concluded, do.

‘Sorry I'm late,' she said, as she sat down beside Malcolm in Carey's.

‘You're not,' he replied. ‘You're exactly on time.'

‘Am I?' Flosshilde looked most surprised. She had always made a habit of being at least five minutes late for everything, especially dates and assignations. If she had subconsciously decided to be punctual, there was cause for concern . . .

‘I had a visit from Loge yesterday,' Malcolm said.

‘Loge?' Flosshilde's blue eyes opened wide. ‘What happened? '

‘He tried to frighten me, but I soon got rid of him,' Malcolm replied smugly. ‘He's not too bad when you get to know him.'

Flosshilde was going to say something about this, but she somehow decided against it. Instead, she smiled.

‘I know a funny story about him,' she said.

‘Is it the one about the Valhalla contract?'

‘Yes,' said Flosshilde, slightly annoyed.

‘Tell me anyway,' Malcolm said and, to her surprise, Flosshilde found that she wasn't annoyed any more. She told him the story, and he laughed.

‘You tell it better than he does,' he said.

‘Of course I do,' said Flosshilde. ‘I'm very good at telling stories. Have you heard the one about Hagen and the Steer-Horn?'

The name Hagen made Malcolm feel uncomfortable, and he wondered why she had mentioned it. Perhaps it was a sort of warning. Instinctively, he covered his right hand with his left, so as to hide the Ring.

‘Go on,' he said nervously.

As she told the story (which was very funny), Malcolm found himself looking at her rather carefully. He had done this before, of course, for she was well worth looking at, and once Malcolm had accepted that there was a future in looking at her it had become one of his favourite occupations.
But he was looking for something else now. She was, after all, one of Them, and he would do well not to forget that. To reassure himself, he flicked through her subconscious mind and was delighted to find that there had been developments. It irritated him that he could not read his own inner thoughts, but he had a fair idea of what they were, on this subject at least. In his life to date, he had met very few girls, and most of those had been friends of his sister Bridget. As a result, he had tended to fall in love with all the rest, just to be on the safe side. Since there had been no risk of the love being returned, this was strictly his own business and nothing to do with anyone else. Only since he had met Flosshilde had he become aware that this was a rather foolish thing to do, and he had been relieved to find that the Rhinedaughter had not inspired the usual romantic daze in him that he knew so well. Instead, once he had got over the shock of seeing what was in her mind and wondering if she could really mean him and not some other Malcolm Fisher, he had carefully considered whether or not he liked her. He did, of course, but that was because she was nice, not just simply because she was there.

Tentatively, he lifted his left hand and used it to pick up his fork. The Ring was visible again, but she did not even look at it. Suddenly, a terrible thought struck Malcolm. Bearing in mind the conclusions he had just come to, what was he supposed to do next?

 

Flosshilde had seemed rather put out when he had told her that he would be busy for the rest of the day, but the statement had been partially true. There had been a letter from a certain L. Walker, of Lime Place, Bristol, that morning, and it seemed that L. Walker was coming to Combe Hall to catalogue the library.

The library, which was huge and contained no funny books, had come with the Hall when Malcolm bought it, and he had left it alone. Books, the estate agent had told him, provide excellent insulation, and since the heating bills would be very considerable in any event, he might as well leave them there even if he had no intention of ever reading them. Ever since he had moved in, however, the English Rose had been nagging him to have the library professionally catalogued, so that Malcolm would be able to know at a glance what he was missing. He had strenuously resisted these attempts, but he supposed that his secretary had booked L. Walker before she left for her holiday and deliberately not told him.

He drove back to Combe and went into the house. The housekeeper had been lying in wait for him, and he was tempted to make himself invisible before she could persuade him to buy a new vacuum cleaner - she had been demanding one for weeks, although Malcolm knew perfectly well there were at least four in the house already. Perhaps she was starting a collection. But lately he had felt guilty about avoiding people who were, after all, his employees and only doing their jobs, so he stood his ground, like Leonidas at Thermopylae.

‘There's someone to see you,' said the housekeeper.

‘Who is it?'

‘About the library,' she said. ‘From Bristol.'

She made it sound as if Bristol was somewhere between Saturn and Pluto. But to Malcolm, who had been dealing with strangers from Valhalla and Nibelheim for what seemed like years now, Bristol sounded delightfully homely.

‘That'll be L. Walker,' he said. ‘Where did you put her?'

The housekeeper said the lady was in the drawing-room,
and Malcolm had walked away before he thought to ask which one. Eventually, he found the stranger in the Blue drawing-room.

L. Walker was about five feet four, roughly twenty-three years old, with long, dark hair and the face of an angel. Malcolm, who knew exactly what an angel looks like, having turned himself into one during an idle moment, felt a very curious sensation, almost like not being able to breathe properly.

‘Herr Finger?' said the girl. ‘I'm Linda Walker. I've come to catalogue the library. Ms Weinburger . . .'

‘Yes, of course.' Malcolm did not want to hear about the English Rose. He wanted to know why his knees had gone weak, as if he had just been running. There was a long silence while Malcolm tried to regain the use of his mind.

‘Could I see the library, perhaps?' said the girl.

‘Yes,' Malcolm replied. ‘It's through here somewhere.'

He found it eventually, which was good work on his part considering that he had just been struck by lightning or something remarkably similar. He opened the door and pointed at the rows of books.

‘That's it in there,' he said.

‘Well,' said the girl, ‘I think I'll start work now, if you don't mind. The sooner I start, the sooner I'll be out from under your feet.'

‘There's no rush, honestly,' said Malcolm quickly. ‘Please take as long as you like.'

The girl looked at him and smiled. Malcolm had come to believe that he was fairly well equipped to deal with smiles, but this was a new sort; not a happy, optimistic smile but a sad, wistful smile. It didn't say, ‘Wouldn't it be nice if . . .' like the stock delivery of a Rhinemaiden, but, ‘It would have been nice if . . .' which is quite different.

‘Thank you,' said the girl, ‘but I'd better get on.'

Malcolm began to feel that something he wanted was slipping through his fingers. ‘Where are you staying?' he asked.

‘At the George and Dragon,' said the girl. ‘I hope that's all right. Ms Weinburger booked me in there.'

‘You could stay here, if you like. There's masses of room.' As soon as he spoke the words, Malcolm wished he hadn't. There was something about this girl that made him feel like a predator, even though such thoughts had not crossed the threshold of his mind. The girl looked at him for about three-quarters of a second (although it seemed much longer). Then she smiled again, an ‘It's hopeless and we both know that, but . . .' sort of a smile.

‘I'd like that very much,' she said. ‘If you're sure it'd be all right.'

As far as Malcolm was concerned, it could go in the Oxford Dictionary as a definition of all right. ‘I'll get the housekeeper to get a room ready,' he said. ‘How long will it take you, do you think?'

‘About a week,' said the girl, ‘if I start today.'

‘But aren't you very tired, after your journey? How did you get here, by the way?'

‘I got the train to Taunton and the bus to Combe,' said the girl.

Malcolm was shocked to think of a girl like this having to travel by bus and train. He wanted to offer to buy her a car, but she would probably take it the wrong way.

‘Did that take long?' A stupid question, and none of his business. Why should he care how long it took? Oddly enough, the girl didn't say that. Instead, she answered the question.

‘Oh, about three hours. I missed the connection at Taunton, I'm afraid.'

Try as he might, Malcolm could think of no way of prolonging the conversation. He had no idea what he should say or do next, which was a pity, since he could imagine nothing in the world more important.

‘Well,' he said, ‘I'd better let you get on, then. See you later.'

He left the library and walked slowly back to the drawing-room, bumping into several pieces of furniture on the way. This was awful, and he could see that plainly enough. Real life had caught up with him at last; not in the form of a Customs man or the Inexplicable Phenomena Unit, which he could probably have dealt with, but the juvenile delinquent with the golden arrows who had been making a dartboard of his heart since his voice had broken. This was no Rhinedaughter out of the world of his own in which he had been living and where he was master, but a fellow human being, a person, a potential source of great unhappiness.

‘Oh God,' he moaned. ‘Not again.'

He sat down on the stairs and looked across at the library door. If he went away, he might miss her coming out, and that would never do. Then it occurred to him that he could make himself invisible and go and watch her cataloguing books, which must surely be the most wonderful sight in the world. He closed his eyes and was lost to sight.

 

Beside the unsalubrious waters of the Tone, Flosshilde stood and watched a seagull trying unsuccessfully to catch and eat an abandoned tyre. She knew how it felt, in a way, and out of pure sympathy she smiled at the tyre, which turned itself helpfully into a fish. The seagull, who had known all along that persistence overcomes all obstacles, devoured it thankfully, which was hard luck on the fish but nice for the seagull. You can't please everybody all the
time, Flosshilde reflected, and the relevance of this observation to her own case made her thoughtful.

Not that she had any logical reason to be anything but happy; but in matters of happiness, logic plays but a small part. First, it was annoying that Malcolm had preferred to spend the day with a stuffy old librarian than a gorgeous Rhinedaughter. Second, it was annoying that she should be annoyed. In fact, it was the latter irritation that was the worse, or so she hoped. The first unpleasant thing was merely a matter of her vanity (she told herself). The second unpleasant thing might have serious consequences for her career. An enamoured Rhinedaughter, like a blind chauffeur, is unlikely to progress far in her chosen profession. Try as she might, however, she was unable to feel greatly concerned about the prospect, and that was worse still . . .

‘Bother,' she said.

Wellgunde, who had been circling slowly under the surface, jumped up onto the bank. ‘Get you,' she said. ‘All dressed up and nowhere to go.'

Flosshilde put her tongue out, but Wellgunde ignored her. ‘I thought you'd have been out with your friend,' she said, shaking the water out of her hair.

‘Well, I'm not,' replied Flosshilde.

‘Playing hard to get, are you?'

At that particular moment, Flosshilde would have liked to be able to turn her sister into a narrowboat. ‘Haven't you got anything better to do?' she said wearily.