The Djinn Read Free Page A

“Perhaps you can read my future from cracked lobster claws.”
    “I’d rather
read your palms. Or even the soles of your feet. By the way, I don’t know your
name.”
    “Anna,” she
said. “Anna what?” “Just Anna.”
    I sniffed.
“That’s very mysterious.” “It’s not meant to be. It’s just the way it is.” “All
right, Just Anna,” I said. “Let me have a few words of condolence with my
godmother, and then we’ll go off and eat. Don’t get led astray by any strange
men.”
    “I think that’s
already happened,” she said smiling.
    I left her for
a while and made my way through the chattering guests to Marjorie Greaves and
her doleful consort. They were talking about the inferior quality of today’s
kitchen equipment, and it seemed to me that anyone would be grateful to be
rescued from a conversation like that
    “Marjorie,” I
said, taking her arm. “Can we just have a private word?”
    “Of course,”
she replied. “Excuse me, Mr. Gorst.”
    Mr. Gorst
mournfully raised his teacup of water. “Naturally, Mrs.
Greaves, naturally.”
    Marjorie
Greaves seemed distracted. Not grieving or particularly sad, but anxious and
thoughtful.
    “Is everything
all right?” I asked her. “Yon don’t have financial problems, do you? I mean, the house-”
    She shook her
head quickly. “It’s nothing to do with money. I’m quite all right for money.
There’s no need to worry on that account.”
    “Marjorie,” I
said seriously, “the house is kind of run-down.”
    “I know,” she
said. She wouldn’t look directly at me. “But it doesn’t matter.”
    “Doesn’t
matter? This is an old house. If you don’t look after it, it’s going to
collapse around your ears. All it needs is some repair-work on the roof and
some of those gutters fixed.”
    “It’s coming
down anyway,” she said quietly.
    I frowned.
“Coming down? I don’t understand.”
    “I am having it
demolished. When it is demolished, I shall sell the land for development. They
tell me that, providing it’s not down-zoned, I can build five houses to the
acre.”
    “Well,” I said,
“that’s your decision. I guess it makes sense. But I always thought you loved
Winter Sails. It’s a beautiful old house, Marjorie. It seems kind of sad to
tear it down.”
    She shook her
head. “It has to come down.”
    “What do you
mean-has to?”
    “I don’t want
to talk about it. It’s a personal decision, Harry, and I assure you it’s all
for the best.
    Now I think I
ought to talk to Robert before he leaves,”
    I held her arm.
Her skin seemed very cold through the thin black fabric of her funeral dress.
It’s always alarming to touch other people and find their body temperature
radically different from your own. Lake icy feet in bed or a
fiery sunburn.
    “Marjorie,” I
said, “I am your godson.”
    She looked up
at me at last, with those intent, black shrimp’s eyes. “Harry,” she said
quietly, “I really can’t explain.”
    I bit my lip.
“I think you ought to,” I advised her. “I mean, Marjorie, look at this room.
Where has the furniture gone? Where are the paintings?”
    “They were
portraits” said Marjorie. “We couldn’t have portraits.”
    “You couldn’t
have portraits? What do you mean?”
    Unaccountably,
Marjorie Greaves began to tremble. It wasn’t the deep spasm of sorrow or the
nervous twitch of exhaustion. It was hysterical, paralytic fear. She was like a
horse that senses a snake in the straw and shakes in terror.
    “You’d better
come outside,” I told her, guiding her as quickly and calmly as I could through
the gathered guests. From the other side of the room. Anna raised a querying eyebrow, but I stuck my hand up in the air with five
fingers spread, indicating I’d be gone for only five minutes. She shrugged and
nodded. At least my appetizing lunch date was secure, unless the miserable man
with his cup o£ water got in there while I was away, but there wasn’t much
chance of that.
    Outside,