The Numbered Account Read Free

preoccupied; when Julia said—‘Well, that’s that’—after talking to the bank, he put in a word.
    â€˜What about Watkins’s passport?’
    â€˜Oh Lord!—I never thought of that. I don’t for a moment suppose she’s got one. Will they be shut now? What are we to do? We shan’t have much time to rake up a Minister of Religion or a Justice of the Peace to vouch for her.’
    â€˜I think I’d better ring up the office. They will probably be able to fix it.’
    â€˜Could you? Would they?’ Julia said, immensely relieved. She was also happily surprised by Colin’s helpfulness.
    â€˜I expect so. What’s her Christian name?’
    â€˜No idea,’ and ‘May,’ Julia and Edina said simultaneously.
    â€˜Just May? May Watkins? What a name for that old dragoon.’
    â€˜Yes, May,’ Edina repeated firmly. ‘Her mother doted on old Queen Mary. Endless girls in Watkins’s generation were called after “Princess May”.’
    â€˜All right—though it sounds pretty silly to me. Now you girls can clear out. I’ll tell you what happens.’
    Julia and Edina obediently removed themselves; they sat on a new teak seat on the terrace, in the westering sun, looking out over the drifts of daffodils in the rough grass round the lawn, where the pink candles on the great horse-chestnut were just coming into flame—its lower boughs drooped down to the ground.
    â€˜How funny that Colin should lend a hand like this,’ Edina said, ‘after being so sour when Philip ragged him about Switzerland.’
    â€˜I was just thinking the same thing,’ Julia replied. ‘But anyhow, what a boon! That office of his can fix anything. Still, I do wonder what’s behind it—it isn’t a bit like him.’
    A window was thrown up behind them.
    â€˜Where shall May’s passport be sent?’ Colin’s voice enquired.
    â€˜My flat. No, my club; of course the flat’s shut.’
    â€˜That grisly place in Grosvenor Street?’
    â€˜Yes.’ The window was slammed down again.
    â€˜Good for him,’ Julia said.
    Presently Colin appeared on the terrace.
    â€˜All fixed, darling?’ Julia asked.
    â€˜Yes, darling darling.’
    This was another piece of youthful nonsense, dating from the long happy holiday summers when Colin was at Eton, and Julia at a finishing school in Paris; they used the word ‘darling’ then as a sort of call-note, like a bird’s special note of alarm, for any secret thing between them. This had irritated old Mrs. Monro even more than their speaking Gaelic at meals, but it warmed Julia to hear Colin use the old silly re-duplication now. And when he said, ‘Come up to the azalea glen—they’re all out, and you haven’t been yet,’ she agreed at once.
    â€˜She ought to pack,’ Edina said.
    â€˜Oh, I’ll pack tonight.’ The two young people went off up the avenue, arm-in-arm.
    The azalea glen at Glentoran when in flower is something to see. The banks of a narrow ravine, down which a small burn runs, were planted long ago with azaleas which have grown to an immense size; the great rounded bushes overhang the water, sprawl above the path, below the path, and even encumber the small wooden bridges which here and there span the glen—fallen blossoms are carried away by the clear noisy water. It is a most beautiful place, full of all shades of colour from cream to coral; the scent, with its hint of incense, is almost overpowering. And here, on a rather decrepit wooden seat—Philip Reeder had not yet extended his new teak benches as far as the glen—Colin and Julia sat and talked; and what Julia privately expressed as ‘the nub’ emerged.
    â€˜If you’re really going to Switzerland anyhow, darling, I thought you mightn’t mind doing something.’
    â€˜For you?’
    â€˜Well yes, in a way.’