This Real Night Read Online Free

It is really extraordinarily kind of her, particularly at such a time as this, when she has just come back from Pau, and must have so much to do. But I would never think of intruding on her. She must have so many friends, and it must be pure kindness which makes her invite me. She cannot possibly have any real desire to meet anybody as uninteresting as myself.’
    ‘Nonsense,’ said Mr Morpurgo, ‘you were a celebrated pianist, and you are a remarkable woman. Also,’ he added, ‘you are the wife of an old and dear friend of mine. Of course my wife wants to know you. If she did not she would be stupid, and very distant from me, and she is not that. She is very intelligent, and very handsome, and very impulsive and warm-hearted.’
    ‘It is natural that your wife should be all those things,’ said Mamma. ‘Still, she is being far too kind. Why, she says she wants all of us. But we are such a troop! And Richard Quin is only a schoolboy, he is far too young to go out yet.’
    ‘No, no,’ said Mr Morpurgo, ‘you must all come. For one thing, it is absurd that you should none of you have ever been to my house.’
    ‘But we have,’ said Mamma.
    ‘No, never,’ said Mr Morpurgo. ‘Oh, I see what you mean. But that house in Eaton Place is not mine. It belonged to an uncle of mine who died some years ago, and my uncles and my cousins and I thought it saved trouble to keep it on. It is very handy when one or other of us want to close his town house, as it happened to me this winter, or if any of our relations from Paris or Berlin or Tangier turn up. Though as to that,’ he said, with the stern yet self-gratulatory air of a man who has struck on a thrifty notion, ‘the new Ritz Hotel is so pleasant that a suite there will really do them just as well. But my own house is quite a different matter. Look at the heading of the letter. I would like you all to see it, and never mind about Richard’s age. I want the whole of your family to meet the whole of mine, and anyway I don’t think he is more than a month or two younger than my Stephanie. If she is at luncheon there is no reason why he should not be there too. It may be a little dull for him but I hope Richard Quin will put up with that for once, to please me.’
    Richard Quin sat back on his haunches, yellow tulips strewn all round him, and smiled brilliantly. ‘I would do anything to please you.’ It was not humbug. He liked pleasing people as much as he liked playing games.
    ‘It is important that he should be there,’ said Mr Morpurgo over his head to Mamma, with a mystical air. ‘Have you thought of it, he is the only son in both our families? Oh, do not look so doubtful about the whole occasion. All things are in order, or I would not have brought you the invitation. My wife and I talked it over last night. She and my girls and their governess have been away at Pau for the last six months to be with her mother, who has asthma, and lives there now. She came back for twenty-four hours to tell me that her mother was better and that she intended to bring the whole party home in ten days’ time.’ He laughed. ‘I told you she was impulsive. She could not wait to tell me the news, she said that she felt suddenly that she must see me, and there she was. And now she is off again. How much I like it when she and my girls are back! To be with one’s wife and children and to entertain one’s friends, there can be nothing better. And you are the very first guests we will entertain. Well, I must go, and we will all see each other a fortnight from today. I chose a Saturday so that there could be no question of school for any of your young people.’ He rose, smiling, as if he had something pleasant to think of and wanted to hurry off and enjoy it all by himself. His black eyes, bright with their secret, fell on a heap of red carnations which Mary had laid on a tray, and his plump fingers shuffled among them till he found one of the more splendid flowers, broke its