The Happy Prisoner Read Free Page A

would be back again with a bit more of her hair in curls and an alternative idea.
    â€œDon’t read too long,” she would say going out, and he would say: “Just going to finish this chapter,” and probably go on reading for another hour. Sometimes, when she drew back the curtains in her bedroom, she would see his light shining on to the lawn and would come down again to see whether he had gone to sleep with the lamp on.
    He hoped they would come in soon. He was very uncomfortable. There were crumbs in his bed and his dressing wanted changing and the pillow in the small of his back had knotted itself into a hard lump. Heather had washed him after breakfastwith a too dry sponge which did not rinse off all the soap, and Violet, coming in later, had set up his shaving things for him on the bed-table and had spilt some water which had now soaked right through the blankets and sheet to his pyjamas. He would also like to know what was for lunch before he started on the chocolate Bob had sent him from America.
    When his mother turned to come indoors, she waved and smiled in his direction, although she could not see him behind the mullions of the open casement. When she was working in the garden or sitting in a deck-chair under the cedar, she would look up from time to time and wave to show him he was not forgotten.
    She said something to Elizabeth, who also looked towards him. He was too far away to see her features, but the general effect was not unpleasing. Good.
    When she came into his room, he saw that she had china-blue eyes in a smooth, well-mannered face, neither pretty nor plain, but strangely unanimated. Yet it was not a lethargic face; it was alert and intelligent and healthy, but controlled beyond its youth.
    â€œThis is your new nurse, darling,” said Mrs. North. “Elizabeth Gray. This is my son—Oliver. You’re going to look after him for us, aren’t you?” Elizabeth stepped forward, avoiding, either by accident or deliberately, the hand with which Mrs. North was going to lead her up to the bed.
    â€œHow do you do?” she said politely, with a professional glance at the untidily made bed, the arrangement of the pillows and the plaster on Oliver’s chest where it showed under the open neck of his pyjamas. Being in bed gave you an advantage over people, Oliver always thought. Simply by turning your head, you could follow them as they moved about the room, conscious of your eyes. It was rather like being royalty. You waited at your ease for them to come to you, so much less at their ease because you were in bed and there was that hump under the quilt, which they were not sure whether they ought to notice or not. Even people whom he knew quite well were embarrassed when they first came to see him.
    This girl seemed completely self-possessed, but of course she was used to seeing people in bed and to humps under quilts. They smiled at each other gravely, summing one another up, wondering how they were going to like seeing so much of each other.
    â€œYou’ll find me an awful fraud,” said Oliver. “Nothing wrong with me. I’m afraid I’m a dead loss as a case, but I don’t suppose a bit of a rest will do you any harm.”
    â€œNow, Oliver,” said Mrs. North hastily, terrified that he might give the girl the wrong ideas, “don’t talk like that. It’s no use your pretending you can do things for yourself, because you know quite well you can’t. Miss Gray isn’t going to think you lazy or spoiled. She’s a nurse and she knows what a man with a heart may and mayn’t do. We’ve had a long talk about you already and I’ve explained your condition exactly, so you needn’t start trying to muddle her.” She turned to Elizabeth. “I told you, didn’t I? A shell splinter just grazed the outer muscle of the heart. They say it’s healing all right at last, but of course the least exertion