Snow White and the Giants Read Free Page B

palely tanned

flesh from ankles to armpit, uninterrupted.

When she had passed, I swung round, of course. However, whatever I'd seen

or thought I'd seen, all there was to be seen now, though I watched her

out of sight, was a very tall girl in an ordinary green dress, wearing

ordinary shoes. The only thing that was slightly unusual was that I

could swear she wasn't wearing nylons.

She did have, too -- and this was the first time I noticed it -- a

certain baffling elegance, or smartness, or neatness. As I said, she

wasn't a particularly pretty girl, and though not fat, she didn't have

a sensational figure. Yet there was something about her that reminded

me of the difference I had vaguely sensed when Sheila had pointed out

to me a woman in a Paris creation and a woman trying hard to look as if

she was in a Paris creation.

Whatever it was that women wanted to have when they dressed up, this

girl had it -- even if she had very little else to contribute.

As I walked on, for a moment an old shadow darkened my mind. Mentally I

was normal, indeed well above average. I'd been told after physical and

psychiatric examinations that there was no trace of psychosis or anything

in that terrifying area, no brain damage, no malformation. Yet no one

with a background like mine could escape occasional grim doubts and fears.

I dismissed the idea for a moment, only to find it creeping back when I

remembered that the only other person who had seen this kind of phenomenon

was Tommy. Maybe this was something that happened only to people like

Tommy and Dina and me.

Tommy had seen something -- once. I had seen something -- twice. And

Dina had seen something. Fairies, she said. Or rather, a "fairy ring."

Nobody else, apparently, had seen anything.

I went back to the office, called the Central Garage and gave instructions

about my car. Then I worked hard for all of an hour.

When the phone rang I answered absently, still able to concentrate fairly

successfully on insurance -- for the last time in weeks.

"Val," said Sheila, "now the electrician has to get into the summerhouse."

"Oh, hell," I groaned.

I should have known. The wiring in our house dated back with the rest of

the house, I strongly suspected, to the time of Queen Anne. I'd probably

have let it be as long as it worked, but a FLAG executive from London,

paying a semi-social call, happened to notice the wiring in the house

and hinted strongly that it was hardly the thing for the tocal insurance

manager to have an electrical system in his own house that constituted

a greater fire risk then a moat filled with crude oil. So we had called

in Mr. Jerome.

The cable out to the summerhouse was probably more dangerous even than

enything in the house itself.

Obviously Sheila had already asked Dina to let the electrician in. In

childish triumph, Dina saw how to score over Sheila after all. Dina had

promised to stay in the summerhouse till I got back. So she'd keep her

promise. Come hell or high water, she'd barricade herself in and stay

where she'd promised to stay.

"I can't come again," I said. "Can't he come back tomorrow?"

"He says if he doesn't finish today he won't get back for a week."

"Well, get her out," I said in sudden irritation. "Don't keep calling me."

"She's your sister."

"Sure, but you're there and I'm here. Surely you can outsmart someone

like Dina?"

"Get her out, you said?" Sheila retorted in a hard voice. "Okay. I'll get

her out. I'm bigger then she is, and older, and much tougher. I'll get her

out. And I'm going to enjoy it. I'm going to have the time of my life."

There was something unusually vicious about the click as she hung up.

I didn't care. I was fed up with Sheila end Dina. Why couldn't either

of them, just once, in their different ways, leave me alone? Sheila was

always with me, Dina was always with me. I couldn't settle down to my work

any morning or any afternoon with the slightest confidence that I wouldn't

suddenly