Some by Fire Read Free Page A

After several excursions souththey took out a mortgage on a modest semi not too far from the university and proudly presented the keys to their daughter. There were three bedrooms, so two other girls could share with her, which would take care of the bulk of the mortgage. Their only stipulation was that the cohabitants be female. Mrs Youngman knew all about students, she said, and the antics they got up to. Another girl from Melissa’s school, Janet Wilson, had also been accepted for Essex, so she was offered one of the rooms.
    Melissa took to university life like a dog takes to lamp posts. Towards the end of the first week one of the lecturers from the psychology department, Mr Kingston – ‘Please, call me Nick’ – saw her reading the noticeboard and drew her attention to an extracurricular talk he was giving about Aleister Crowley, the self-styled wickedest man in the world. It was in a smoky back room of a pub, and Nick introduced Melissa to the acquired pleasures of Courage bitter. Later that evening, on the sheepskin rug in front of his guttering gas fire, he eased her legs apart and introduced her to the more readily appreciated delights of casual sex. Melissa stared at the lava lamp on his bookcase, watching the globules of oil in their ceaseless monotonous dance, and said a little prayer of thanks that she hadn’t made it to Oxbridge.
    Next day, Saturday, her waist-length hair wentthe same way as her virginity, and a week later she had it cropped into stubble and dyed scarlet. The metamorphosis of Miss Youngman had begun. After the hairdresser’s she visited a tattoo parlour and asked to see some samples of his work. The first tentative butterfly on her breast was soon followed by a devilish motorcyclist on her shoulder blade and a sun symbol, better known as a swastika, where only a privileged, but extensive, few would ever see it. Her modest nose stud was considered outrageous in those days; far more so than the nose, eyebrow, navel and nipple rings she acquired in later years.
     
    Mr and Mrs Youngman grew worried about their daughter. They’d had the telephone installed so she could keep in touch, but after the first week the calls ceased to come. There was no phone in her house, so they couldn’t call her. They received a Christmas card, with a note added saying she was staying in Essex for the holiday, but there was no other contact between Melissa and her parents until, desperate with worry, they made a surprise visit on her in the middle of April.
    Janet Wilson answered the door. As Mr Youngman was the mortgagee there was little she could do to prevent him entering.
    ‘Is Melissa in?’ he demanded.
    ‘Er, yes,’ Janet admitted as her landlord pushedpast her, closely followed by Mrs Youngman.
    ‘Which is her room?’
    ‘First on the left,’ she called after them as they mounted the stairs, and stifled a gulp and a giggle with her fingers as she dashed into the kitchen, all the better to hear the imminent commotion.
    Melissa was in bed with her latest conquest. They’d met at a party the night before and arrived home just after daybreak, which comes late at that time of year in Essex. Melissa had worn her full war paint and had not had time to remove it before jumping into bed, so it had become somewhat disarranged by the subsequent activities.
    Mater and pater would still have been unimpressed with the poor man in whose arms they found their only child if they’d known that he was a pupil barrister with a highly promising future. They would have been even less moved to learn that he was a full-blooded prince, and back in his homeland was entitled to wear a red feather in his hair to demonstrate his royal connections.
    He pulled his Y-fronts on and jumped out of bed. He pleaded with them, for he was princely by nature as well as breeding, and a natural diplomat. He said he loved their daughter, had known her for a long time, wanted to marry her. His only mistake was to call her Miranda.
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