Rosa By Starlight by Hilary McKay

Author:Hilary McKay
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Macmillan

CHAPTER SIX

A DAMP DAY IN VENICE

Rosa, alone in a strange dining room, in a strange hotel, in a strange city, in a strange country, in a world of strangers, clutched her twenty euro note while guilt washed over her like waves from the wake of a passing ship. Her aunt and uncle, who had been so unexpectedly, generously kind, were gone. They had sailed out of the room, and she, Rosa, hadn’t even said goodbye. Should she jump up and run after them? Was it allowed?

Rosa wished she knew the rules. She’d never stayed in a hotel before. She didn’t even know how to leave the table. It was covered in breakfast plates and coffee cups and sticky knives and spoons. At home you took your plate to the sink, rinsed it under the tap and stacked it in the dishwasher. At school you loaded your things onto your plastic tray and carried it to the washing-up trolley. Never, in either place, did you leave anything for someone else to clear away.

How did people manage in hotels?

Shyly Rosa glanced around and saw that she was the last one in the dining room. Every other table was clear. At each door stood a guardian. Signor Mancini at the entrance, the giantess, Signora Mancini, at the kitchen door.

I’ll tidy up like at school, she decided and, fumbling a little, stuffed away her twenty euros, gathered together the empty plates, stacked the coffee cups, collected the spoons and forks and knives, nearly knocked over the vase with the daisy, caught it just in time, and picked up the whole pile. Then, very self-consciously, and much too aware of her bulging cardigan pockets, she walked carefully towards the kitchen.

‘Grazie,’ said the giantess, seizing the plates and handing them to some unseen person behind. ‘Grazie . . .? Grazie . . .?’

And once again she had Rosa by the shoulders, shaking out words like coins from a money box, ‘Grazie . . .???’

‘Rosa,’ said Rosa, at last understanding that she was being asked for her name. ‘Rosa . . . Rosa Mundi.’

Oh, why had she said that? What would her aunt and uncle say if they found out? Would the giantess tell?

Perhaps she wouldn’t. She didn’t seem remotely surprised or interested.

‘Grazie mille, Rosa Mundi,’ she said, and then there was a pause. It was Rosa’s turn to speak, and it seemed to her that she couldn’t turn away without at least acknowledging the stolen picnic in her cardigan pockets. So, with enormous bravery, she glanced down at them and then up at Signora Mancini’s waiting face and said, ‘Grazie, Signora Mancini. Grazie mille.’

Signora Mancini stepped back in surprise, from the kitchen behind came a burst of applause, and Rosa, thankful but unable at that moment to bear any more Italian, turned and ran from the room. Perhaps, she thought, she might still have time to call goodbye to her aunt and uncle.

Back up the three flights of stairs she raced, then fumbled for her key, pushed open the door and dashed to the window.

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