Hester's Story Read Online Free

every visiting company and looked after the smooth running of the house as well, with Joan and Emmie coming in every day to do the cooking and cleaning.
    Hester closed her eyes as Ruby leaned over and kissed her cheek. She wasn’t a demonstrative woman and whenever she made an affectionate gesture, Hester was pleasantly surprised and pleased. There aren’t very many people I love in the world, she reflected. There’sDinah, who’s been such a loyal and lovely friend for so long, and Edmund and Ruby. They love me too, I think. Whenever she brought them to mind, Hester felt as though she’d found a small patch of warmth in a world that seemed to her increasingly chilly. Such a pity that Dinah lived in New Zealand and that their relationship had to be conducted mostly by letter. She chided herself for not including Kaspar Beilin among her nearest and dearest. Darling Kaspar, with his white-blond hair and extravagantly camp style had been her dancing partner for years. Fielding and Beilin were a pair always spoken of together. Since his retirement, a few years after her own, he’d taken up residence in San Francisco and Hester couldn’t help dreading what so many of her acquaintances were fearful of these days: AIDS. She shivered and closed her eyes. Make an effort, she told herself. You can’t worry about Kaspar now. There is too much to do here with the Festival about to begin. And now there’s Adam’s death as well. Hester was used to his not being a part of her life, but dead? It was as though a cold hand had gripped her heart.
    Ruby smiled at Hester as she was about to leave the room, saying, ‘I’ll be back in time for dinner. With George, if I can get him to stop what he’s doing in the lighting box. Will we see you then? Are you quite sure you won’t …’ Ruby paused to find the right word. ‘Brood on things?’
    ‘No, I won’t. I’ll be fine. I’ll just lie down on the chaise-longue for a while before dinner. Gather my thoughts.’
    Ruby closed the door behind her. Once she was alone, Hester reflected for the thousandth time on how lucky she was to have Ruby here with her, just as she had been for the past thirty-four years. Ruby understood her. She knew better than to jolly Hester along.She knew how important it was for someone to have time to think about things. Ruby was part of the family. What had she said to the journalist? The Wychwood family .
    *
    The members of the Carradine Company would be here in a few days. Hugo Carradine was an attractive young man, and Hester knew he was overjoyed at the commission. He was talented and successful and well-thought of, with a reputation, even at his age, as a bit of a perfectionist. Dancers, it seemed, were rather in awe of him and he was reputed not to take any nonsense from anyone. Well, there was nothing wrong with that. Hester admitted that she was a perfectionist herself and couldn’t really understand anyone who was satisfied with second best. Still, winning in an open competition hinges on such small things. She would never tell anyone that what gave Hugo her casting vote on a panel that was divided between him and another was his choice of music: Sarabande in F minor by Edmund Norland. Of course, he may have known that Hester and the composer had been good friends for many years. That wasn’t a secret, and if he’d done his research, he’d have found it out. What he couldn’t possibly have known, Hester thought, is what that piece means to me, or the circumstances in which it was written.
    She remembered the day Edmund had played her the opening melody, how he’d sat at the piano and said I’ve written something for you. Listen, Hester. All the sumptuous laziness of the East. Doesn’t it make you feel better just to hear it? No more Northern gloom for you from now on . She smiled.
    But it wasn’t only that, she told herself. Hugo was the best choreographer we saw. And I liked him betterthan any of the others, even without that private