A Girl in Winter Read Free

wrapped up a book and sent it to Wigan or Timbuctoo, when all she’s actually done is to put it on the shelves where it oughtn’t to be.” He laughed again, and pulled at his pipe, surrounding his head with blue, sweetish smoke.
    Katherine looked at him as if he were an insect she would relish treading on. “I apologize for the mistake,” she said furiously, “but I don’t think that——”
    “Well, well, Miss Lind, that’s how we have to spend ourtime,” Mr. Anstey interrupted halfway through what she had said. He sat in an ugly position and slapped his thigh ruefully, grinning at her with his face distorted sideways. “Worrying about fiddling little details that won’t matter in six weeks to you or me or anyone else, while the really important things go hang.” He made a theatrical gesture of resignation. This was another of his performances, that of the man forced to spend his time on things that were beneath his intelligence. “I’ve had work in this drawer now four years, original and it may even be valuable work on classification, waiting till I can spare a week or so…. Well, it doesn’t do to stop and think. That way madness lies, as whatyoucall says. All I can do, and all you can do, is to get on with the job in hand. That——”
    There was a tap on the door, and Miss Feather entered, glancing round as if she suspected there were more than two people in the room. Mr. Anstey at once put on his distant expression, saying in a preoccupied voice:
    “Yes, what is it, Miss Feather?”
    “I’m afraid one of the juniors is feeling badly, Mr. Anstey. She isn’t fit for work.”
    “And who is it, Miss Feather?” This was a third manner, that of the judiciary alert to learn all the facts of the case.
    “Miss Green. She really looks very ill.”
    “What’s the matter with her?” he demanded harshly. “Is she sickening for something, influenza or measles or——”
    “She has very bad toothache, and she wants to go home. I think it would be as well to let her. She won’t be much use here, really.”
    “Go home! It’s a dentist she ought to go to,” said Mr. Anstey contemptuously, as if detecting a subterfuge.
    “I think she will, if we let her go home first.” Miss Feather, perhaps alone on the staff, had the knack of keeping Mr. Anstey fairly close to the point: she inserted submissive , insinuating remarks that urged him gently back to the path she wished him to follow.
    “Where does she live? Is her mother on the telephone?” He picked up the directory, disregarding Miss Feather’s denial, and discovered she was not.
    “It’s quite a long way,” said Miss Feather. “I wonder if it wouldn’t be better to send someone with her. She seems almost likely to faint.”
    “Why not give a holiday all round?” agreed Mr. Anstey, with a crowing, hysterical laugh. “I’ll go with her myself if it means getting the morning off!”
    He laughed alone.
    “I think the best thing would be to send someone with her,” repeated Miss Feather, glancing furtively at the clock on the mantelpiece. Mr. Anstey, chuckling good-humouredly , stuck his pipe back into his mouth and turned again to his papers.
    “Yes, all right, all right,” he said with indulgent impatience , as if they had both been wasting his time. “Send someone with her. I don’t mind who. Send someone—ha, ha!—you’d be glad to get rid of for an hour or two.”
    They left him enclosed in his unbreakable belief that all things depended on him, and that he managed, despite an overwhelming weight of work, to administer every detail efficiently.
    When they were outside, Miss Feather said:
    “Perhaps
you
wouldn’t mind going, Miss Lind.”

3
    What would the Fennels think of this, Katherine wondered .
    She stood waiting in the entrance-hall of the library, three minutes later, as she had been bidden. This was a dim, unheated place, with double swing-doors leading outinto the street: two sets of glass doors lay on either side, to