Magic Flutes by Ibbotson Eva

Author:Ibbotson, Eva [Ibbotson, Eva]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Macmillan Publishers UK
Published: 2011-02-22T16:00:00+00:00

10

The firework display was going splendidly. A dozen barrels of wine sent down by Guy at the beginning of the evening had secured the enthusiastic cooperation of the villagers, now assembled on a strip of beach below the road. From the three islands in the middle of the lake, there erupted a succession of rockets, Roman candles and exotic set-pieces which trailed a blazing path across the sky, dimming the stars themselves. Chinese lanterns were strung between the trees, braziers with roasting chestnuts glowed on the shingle, and on a platform constructed near the bathing huts the orchestra played Handel.

‘My dear, you must have spent a fortune,’ said Nerine, standing with Guy and a group of guests, still in their evening clothes, beside the water’s edge. Like most of the younger members of the house party, she had come down to the lakeside after dinner, leaving the older people to watch from the comfort of the terrace.

Guy shrugged. ‘It is no good being stingy with fireworks,’ he said, watching with approval the coordination between David, Morgan and the head forester, who were each in charge on a different island.

Tessa, standing at the other end of the beach close to the wooden jetty which ran out across the darkness of the water, was watching with parted lips, her republican principles not noticeably outraged by this wanton display of extravagance. That she was looking extremely pretty was not her fault, for it had been her intention to miss dinner and slip down later, still in her working clothes. In this she had been foiled by her old nurse, who had never been interested in the question of whether Tessa was or was not grown-up, and had dragged her upstairs, immersed her in a bath, and released her in a long, full-skirted dress of cream taffeta, with satin pumps on her feet and a rose on a velvet ribbon around her throat.

‘Putzerl,’ said Maxi, who had been glued to her side all evening. ‘Tessa . . .’ The orchestra had come to the end of its piece and there was a lull in the pyrotechnics. Now was the moment. He took her arm. ‘I’ve been absolutely longing to talk to you alone—’

‘Hush! Listen, Maxi!’ Tessa had turned away from him, her gaze on the row of trees fringing the shore. ‘Don’t you hear it?’

Maxi did. A strange, coughing noise, then a low growl . . . And then a dark shape shambling out of the trees . . . pausing . . . the great head swaying in confusion and fright.

‘Oh, Lord, it’s Mishka!’ Tessa’s voice was breathless with concern. ‘He must have broken down the door. And Uncle Sava’s not here, he’s taken Frau Romola for a drive! They were going to watch the fireworks from High Pfaffenstein.’

‘The devil!’ Maxi was well aware of the danger. The Archduke’s bear had been found as a cub in a fair in Novgorod with a firecracker tied to his tail. Normally he was docile enough, but now .

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