The Day of the Storm Read Online Free Page A

you interest, if it’ll make you feel happier, and now for God’s sake don’t let’s mention it again…” He was already reaching for the directory, behaving in an altogether efficient and un-Stephen-like fashion. “Have you got a passport? And nobody’s going to clamp down on you for smallpox injections or anything tiresome like that. Hallo? British Airways? I want to make a reservation on the first plane to Ibiza.” He smiled down at me, still fighting tears and temper, but already feeling a little better. There is nothing like having a large and kindly man to take over in times of emotional stress. He picked up a pencil and drew a sheet of paper towards him and began to make notes. “Yes. When? Fine. Can we have a reservation, please? Miss Rebecca Bayliss. And what time does it get to Ibiza? And the flight number? Thank you so much. Thank you. Yes, I’ll get her to the airport myself.”
    He put down the receiver and surveyed, with some satisfaction, the illegible squiggles his pencil had made.
    â€œThat’s it, then. You fly tomorrow morning, change planes at Palma, get to Ibiza about half-past-seven. I’ll drive you to the airport. No, don’t start arguing again, I wouldn’t feel happy unless I saw you actually walk on to the aeroplane. And now we’ll cable Mr Otto Pedersen—” he picked up the letter again—“at the Villa Margareta, Santa Catarina, and let him know that you’re coming.” He smiled down at me with such cheerful reassurance that I was suddenly filled with hope.
    I said, “I can’t ever thank you…”
    â€œI don’t ever want you to,” said Stephen. “It’s the least I can do.”
    *   *   *
    I flew the next day, in a plane half-filled with hopeful winter holiday tourists. They even carried straw hats against an improbably blazing sun, and their faces, as we stepped out into a steady drizzle at Palma, were disappointed but resolutely cheerful, as though, for certain, tomorrow would be better.
    The rain never ceased, all the four hours I waited in the transit lounge, and the flight out of Palma was bumpy with thick, wet clouds. But as we rose above them and headed out across the sea, the weather brightened. The clouds thinned and broke, disclosing an evening sky of robin’s egg blue, and far below the crumpled sea was streaked with the pink light of the setting sun.
    It was dark when we landed. Dark and damp. Coming down the gangway beneath a sky full of bright southern stars, there was only the smell of petrol, but as I walked across the puddled tarmac towards the lights of the terminal building I felt the soft wind in my face. It was warm and smelt of pines, and was evocative of every summer holiday I had ever spent abroad.
    At this quiet time of the year the plane had not been full. It did not take long to get through Customs and Immigration, and—my passport stamped—I picked up my suitcase and walked into the Arrivals Lounge.
    There were the usual small groups of waiting people standing about or sitting hunched apathetically on the long plastic banquettes. I stopped and looked about me, waiting to be identified, but could see nobody who looked in the least like a Swedish writer come to meet me. And then a man turned from buying a newspaper at the bookstall. Across the room our eyes met, and he folded the newspaper and began to walk towards me, pushing his paper into his jacket pocket as though it were no longer of any use to him. He was tall and thin, with hair that was either blond or white—it was impossible to tell in the bright, impersonal electric light. Before he was half way across the polished floor I smiled tentatively, and as he approached he said my name, “Rebecca?” with a question mark at the end of it, still not entirely certain that it was I.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI’m Otto Pedersen.” We shook hands and he gave