The Eunuch's Ward (The String Quartet) Read Free Page B

shouted and whistled again.
    It had an immediate effect. I had enough room to grab Rosie by the arm and pull her out. Some vague memory told me that there was a wooden bench to the right of the shed, by the patch planted with sunflowers and red currants. In between the fleeing children, I dragged Rosie there to vomit in peace. I say peace but what I really mean is undisturbed. She was shaking all over, her lower jaw was rattling alarmingly. Having no idea what to do next I let her stomp around in circles, flailing her arms one minute, hugging herself another, shivering and muttering something incomprehensible. Eventually, I noticed the water tap on the side wall of the shed. It took a long time and quite a bit of strength to get Rosie close enough, but once I managed to collect cold water into my palms and pour it first over her neck, then over her face, she calmed down. She even bent down and stuck her head under the tap. A few minutes later, with her hair and the back of her top completely wet, she let me lead her to the bench. As Rosie sat down I was just about to sigh a sigh of relief when she screamed and jumped up on her feet again, shaking her hand.
    ‘He did it on me,’ she shouted. He did it on my skirt. He did it on me.’ Just like the boy in the shed a few minutes ago she was trying to shake a blob of slime off her hand.
    Which brings me back to my virginity tests. In those days, there was no way that I would have willingly taken part in any kind of sexual activity or even looked at a boy without shuddering. My father worried about nothing. Rosie and I swore never ever to have anything to do with the opposite gender.
    Never ever!
     

Chapter 4
     
    Queen Matilda wasn’t offering A Levels, and I had to be sent elsewhere. If any of the top six-form colleges were to accept me, I had to do exceptionally well in my last year of junior school and get straight As at GCSE exams. I didn’t know why my father had chosen the Caroline String High School for Girls but I didn’t particularly mind. It was in London, in Belgravia, no distance at all from our penthouse along Chelsea Embankment. It would have been even better if both Rosie and I could board at the school, or if Rosie came to share the flat with me, but neither was an option. Rosie’s parents wanted her to join them at their own place near Barbican, and my father wouldn’t hear of boarding. Eleanor String, the great granddaughter of the founder, wasn’t anywhere strict enough by his standards.
    ‘Ugh!’ I kicked the leg of his desk with my toe and instantly regretted it. ‘Could you be a little less Armenian, please? When in Rome...’
    I stormed out as I often did in those days. I was fifteen and with little prospect of enjoying myself that summer. A week in Athens where my father had attended a conference and my mother and I appeared by his side at every photo opportunity because that was good for business was followed by a fortnight in a hotel Acapulco that turned out into a succession of never-ending cocktail parties. Back at Hartsfield again, only to find out that my father had volunteered my services to some youth project for all of August. That too was good for business, apparently.
    The project was taking place in a school in Alton, only about five miles from our house. It was run jointly by the Probation Service and the Department of Education to improve school attendance by problem youths. The boys, for there were no girls at all, ranged between eight and fourteen, almost as old as I was and centuries wiser. I was given a form to fill, listing my skills and talents in order of excellence. For instance, swimming 5 stars, archery 4 stars and so on. I gave myself five stars for absolutely nothing, I simply wasn’t a five star person, but I did admit to a few awards in archery and fencing. The project didn’t run to the equipment required for either sport, and the organisers didn’t think that teaching the already over-combative boys new fighting