Ellis Peters - George Felse 13 - Rainbow's End Read Free Page B

or bad, by writing textbooks and works on education. George had never needed much assurance that Toby would prove one of the world’s assets in the end. The very fact that he hared back here at every opportunity to reassure Jenny was reassurance enough for George, too.
    ‘Here he is!’ proclaimed Toby, clarion-voiced, homing in on his elders with huge satisfaction. ‘The gaffer who put me away! But for Mr Felse you’d never have had the pleasure of my acquaintance, think of that!’
    They were as pleased as he had known they would be. Sam was a large, clumsy, shy man with a simple face and a complex mind, clean-shaven, rosy and benign. Jenny was small and svelte and dark, possessed of a natural style that did wonders for mail-order clothes. They were both as proud of Toby as of their own single offspring, and showed it a good deal more openly, since he was not really theirs.
    ‘And what have you done with Bossie tonight?’ asked George. Bossie was James Boswell Jarvis, the one shoot of this promising stem, and approaching thirteen years old. ‘Heaven knows you couldn’t wish a baby-sitter on him, not without risk to life and limb, but I’ll bet there’s some sort of Praetorian guard hovering. How do you get round it?’
    ‘What can you do with an egghead like Bossie?’ demanded Jenny, between resignation and complacency. ‘Sylvia Thomas comes in as
his
guest, and plays him game after game of chess until we get home. Mostly he wins, but sometimes he gives her a game out of chivalry. He’s a bit sweet on Sylvia.’ Sylvia Thomas was a farmer’s daughter, eighteen and very pretty.
    ‘He’d have to be,’ agreed Toby positively, ‘or he’d mow her down in half a dozen moves.’
    ‘And what are you doing, these days?’ George wanted to know. ‘Playing, you said, but you haven’t said what or who. And as far as I can gather, it’s something that keeps you on the move.’
    ‘Oh, sorry, I forgot you couldn’t very well know about it. Thespis, that’s us! We’re a travelling theatre. We’ve got three wagons that put together into a rather ramshackle auditorium, but mostly we like to play outdoors, little festivals, all that sort of thing, and improvise according to what ground we can get. There’s seven of us to do everything. I’m general dog’s-body on lights, staging, scenery, whatever comes along, and sometimes I play, too. Mostly I do the adaptations, to get by with so few of us. Schools, as well. It’s all grist. After all, that’s where I got the bug.’ And he beamed upon Sam with so much satisfaction that George felt himself partaking of his friend’s justification. ‘I write plays for us, too. Bursting with social criticism, as if you wouldn’t guess! But funny, too, I hope. Blame Sam – I’ve gone legit!’
    And blessedly, that was the plain truth. There went one danger to society, rapturously transmuted into a danger to nothing more precious than the establishment, which is quite a different thing. And funny, too! Nineteen, not yet out of the bud. George moved on dutifully to his next encounter, much encouraged. The only adverse note was Toby’s last remark, as he looked round the furious animation and expensive furnishing of the hall, and wrinkled his straight, fastidious nose, and knotted his mobile and mischievous mouth in a grimace of distaste at so artful a display of taste. ‘It does seem a pity,’ said Toby with detached regret. ‘We had some good times here. Nobody ever really
minded
us.’
     
    George found himself brought up by a tide in the restless sea of the hall, close behind a pair of tweed-clad shoulders that topped his own by at least two inches, spare, wide and straight, carrying practically nothing but bone and sinew and leathery hide, and topped by a tall brown neck and bleached, straw-coloured head. The tweed jacket smelled of resin, fungus-bearing woodland, and late summer greenery. The head was reared and still, braced like a pointer on a spot across the