Octavia Read Online Free Page B

the dearest little cherry tree on one side and quite a big apple tree on the other, and two flower beds edged with terracotta tiles and simply full of flowers, and a lawn like a meadow, all tall grass and buttercups. But bestof all was the view beyond the wall, for the garden sloped down to the edge of the heath and there was an enormous blue lake just outside the gate simply asking to be explored or paddled in – or even swum in. What fun!
    Her cousins were sitting on a wooden seat under the cherry tree with the baby’s pram parked in the tall grasses alongside them. Cyril was scowling and the baby was fully absorbed in hitting the side of the pram with his rattle but Emmeline looked up and called to her. ‘’Lo, Tavy.’
    ‘Are we to go in now?’ Cyril asked.
    ‘I don’t think so,’ Octavia told him. ‘They said I was to stay out here with you.’
    ‘I don’t see why we have to stay here the whole time,’ Cyril said, kicking a flowerpot. ‘It’s not fair.’
    ‘Because we do,’ his sister told him firmly. She was very nearly eleven and a quarter now and two superior years older than Cyril, so she knew how a little brother should be treated. ‘They’re carrying the furniture in and they don’t want us under their feet. It’s no good getting ratty, Squirrel. You’ve just got to put up with it. They’ll let us in presently. Ma promised. Make room for Tavy. I tell you what, let’s play cat’s cradle.’
    Cyril stood up and kicked the flowerpot into the middle of the lawn. ‘Pooh to cat’s cradle,’ he said. ‘That’s a baby game. I don’t want to sit on a rotten old seat all day, playing cat’s cradle. I want to see inside the house. What’s the good of bringing us here if they’re not going to let us in? I don’t see why I should spend my half term sitting in a rotten garden. I’m going to climb that tree.’
    ‘It’s not a rotten garden,’ Emmeline said, pulling the string into its first pattern ready to start the game. ‘It’s lovely. And mind you don’t fall. Your turn, Tavy.’
    Octavia was just as eager to see the house as he was but she had greater patience, and besides, she knew she had to be good or Papa wouldn’t take her to see the Jubilee. So she settled herself onto the seat next to her cousin and lifted the string into its next pattern. ‘Fish in a dish!’ she said.
    ‘You’ve cut out two goes,’ Emmeline said, much impressed. ‘How did you do that?’ Then the baby dropped his rattle over the edge of the pram and began to cry for it so she had to stop to attend to him. ‘There it is, Podge! Don’t cry. There it is.’ But he went on crying even when the rattle was put in his hand and in the end she had to undo his reins and lift him out to comfort him. ‘Isn’t he a little duck?’ she said, bouncing him on her knee.
    ‘Quack, quack!’ Cyril mocked from the apple tree.
    ‘Don’t take any notice of your brother,’ Emmeline advised. ‘He’s just being ratty. I think you’re a darling and so does Tavy. When I grow up I’m going to have lots and lots of babies.’
    ‘When I grow up,’ Cyril said, in his most superior way, ‘I’m going to be a famous explorer and travel all over the world discovering things. I’ll bet they won’t say I can’t come into the house then .’
    ‘They won’t let you be an explorer if you don’t do as you’re told,’ his sister said scathingly.
    ‘That’s all you know!’ Cyril said, climbing higher. ‘You don’t have to do as you’re told if you’re an explorer. You just have to explore and find new countries and do daring deeds. You two can stay at home and have babies but I’m going to be important. So there.’
    ‘I’m going to be important too,’ Octavia said, stung by his scathing tone.
    ‘No you’re not.’
    ‘I am too. I’m going to change the world.’
    He looked down on her from the twin heights of male superiority and the apple tree. ‘Girls can’t change the world,’ he said.
    ‘Why