Brat Farrar by Tey Josephine

Author:Tey, Josephine [Tey, Josephine]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub

3

But Alec Loding’s main interest in the Ashby coming-of-age was to blow the celebrations sky-high. Indeed, he was at this moment actively engaged in pulling strings to that end.

Or, rather, trying to pull strings. The strings weren’t pulling very well.

He was sitting in the back room at the Green Man, the remains of lunch spread before him, and beside him sat a young man. A boy, one would have said, but for something controlled and still that did not go with adolescence. Loding poured coffee for himself and sugared it liberally; casting a glance now and then at his companion, who was turning an almost empty beer glass round and round on the table. The movement was so deliberate that it hardly came under the heading of fidgeting.

“Well?” said Loding at last.

“No.”

Loding took a mouthful of coffee.

“Squeamish?”

“I’m not an actor.”

Something in the unaccented phrase seemed to sting Loding and he flushed a little.

“You’re not asked to be emotional, if that is what you mean. There is no filial devotion to be simulated, you know. Only dutiful affection for an aunt you haven’t seen for nearly ten years—which one would expect to be more dutiful than affectionate.”

“No.”

“You young idiot, I’m offering you a fortune.”

“Half a fortune. And you’re not offering me anything.”

“If I’m not offering it to you, what am I doing?”

“Propositioning me,” said the young man. He had not raised his eyes from his slowly-turning beer.

“Very well, I’m propositioning you, to use your barbarous idiom. What is wrong with the proposition?”

“It’s crazy.”

“What is crazy about it, given the initial advantage of your existence?”

“No one could bring it off.”

“It is not so long since a famous general whose face was a household word—if you will forgive the metaphor—was impersonated quite successfully by an actor in broad daylight and in full view of the multitude.”

“That is quite different.”

“I agree. You aren’t asked to impersonate anyone. Just to be yourself. A much easier task.”

“No,” said the young man.

Loding kept his temper with a visible effort. He had a pink, collapsed face that reminded one of the underside of fresh mushrooms. The flesh hung away from his good Ledingham bones with a discouraged sla

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