Ursy,â said Fabian. âWe want you to. Please do.â
She looked brilliantly from one to another of her companions. âButâit seems so queer. Itâs months since we spoke of her. Iâm not at all good at expressing myself. Are you serious, Fabian? Is it important?â
âI think so.â
âMr Alleyn?â
âI think so, too, I want to start with the right idea of your guardian. Mrs Rubrick was your guardian, wasnât she?â
âYes.â
âSo you must have known her very well.â
âI think I did. Though we didnât meet until I was thirteen.â
âI should like to hear how that came about.â
Ursula leant forward, resting her bare arms on her knees and clasping her hands. She moved into the region of firelight. âYou seeââ she began.
CHAPTER TWO
According to Ursula Harme
U RSULA BEGAN HALTINGLY with many pauses but with a certain air of championship. At first Fabian helped her, making a conversation rather than a solo performance of the business. Douglas Grace, sitting beside Terence Lynne, sometimes spoke to her in a low voice. She had taken up a piece of knitting and the click of the needles lent a domestic note to the scene, a note much at variance with her sleek and burnished appearance. She did not reply to Grace but once Alleyn saw her mouth flicker in a smile. She had small sharp teeth.
As Ursula grew into her narrative she became less uneasy, less in need of Fabianâs support, until presently she could speak strongly, eager to draw her portrait of Florence Rubrick.
A firm picture took shape. A schoolgirl, bewildered and desolated by news of her motherâs death, sat in the polished chilliness of a headmistressâs drawing-room. âIâd known ever since the morning. Theyâd arranged for me to go home by the evening train. They were very kind but they were too tactful, too careful not to say the obvious thing. I didnât want tact and delicacy, I wanted warmth. Literally, I was shivering. I can hear the sound of the horn now. It was the sort that chimes like bells. She brought it out from England. I saw the car slide past the window and then I heard her voice in the hall asking for me. Itâs years ago but I can see her as clearly as if it were yesterday. She wore a fur cape and smelt lovely and she hugged me and talked loudly and cheerfully and said she was my guardian and had come for me and that she was my motherâs greatest friend and had been with her when it happened. Of course I knew all about her. She was my godmother. But she had stayed in England when she married after the last war and when she returned we lived too far away to visit. So Iâd never seen her. So I went away with her. My other guardian is an English uncle. Heâs a soldier and follows the drum and he was very glad when Aunt Florence (thatâs what I called her) took hold. I stayed with her until it was time to go back to school. She used to come during term and that was marvellous.â
The picture sharpened on a note of adolescent devotion. There had been the year when Auntie Florence returned to England but wrote occasionally and caused sumptuous presents to be sent from London stores. She reappeared when Ursula was sixteen and ready to leave school.
âIt was Heaven. She took me Home with her. We had a house in London and she brought me out and presented me and everything. It was wizard. She gave a dance for me.â Ursula hesitated. âI met Fabian at that dance, didnât I, Fabian?â
âIt was a great night,â said Fabian. He had settled on the floor, his back was propped against the side of her chair and his thin knees were drawn up to his chin. He had lit a pipe.
âAnd then,â said Ursula, âit was September, 1939, and Uncle Arthur began to say weâd better come out to New Zealand. Auntie Florence wanted us to stay and get war jobs but he kept on cabling for