Angelo strung paper lanterns on wires between branches of the fig tree. The children were fogged with sleep, but bravely kept their heads up, waiting for the fireworks he had said would be set off over the sea. Neither of them remarked that the sea was hidden by the hotel; they trusted Angelo to produce the sea as he produced their dinner. Walter’s nephew slept with his eyes wide. Angelo’s lanterns were reflected in his eyes — pinpoints of cobalt blue.
From the table they heard the crowd at the harbor, cheering every burst. Colored smoke floated across the dark sky. The smell of jasmine, which ordinarily made Walter sick, was part of the children’s night.
“Do you know my name?” said the little boy, as Angelo moved around the table collecting plates. “It’s Johnny.” He sighed, and put his head down where the plate had been. Presently Angelo came out of the house wearing a clean white pullover and with his hair well oiled. Johnny woke up as if he had heard a bell. “Are you taking us to the harbor?” he said. “Now?”
Mary, Johnny, and Angelo looked at Eve. It was plain to Walter that these children should not be anywhere except in bed. He was furious with Angelo.
“Is there polio or anything here?” said Eve lazily. Now it was Walter’s turn. The children — all three — looked at him with something like terror. He was about to deny them the only pleasure they had ever been allowed; that was what their looks said. Without waiting for his answer about polio, Eve said the children could go.
The candles inside the paper lanterns guttered and had to be blown out. The Osborns smoked conscientiously to keep mosquitoes away. In the light of a struck match, Walter saw his sister’s face, her short graying hair. “That’s a nice lad,” she said.
“The kids are mad about him,” said Frank.
“They are besotted,” said Eve. “I’m glad. You couldn’t have planned a better welcome, Walter dear,” and in the dark she briefly covered his hand with hers.
The family lived in Miss Cooper’s house as if it were a normal place to be. They were more at home than Walter had ever been. Mornings, he heard them chattering on the terrace or laughing in the kitchen with Angelo. Eve and Angelo planned the meals, and sometimes they went to the market together. The Osborns took over the household food expenses, and Walter, tactfully, made no mention of it. Sometimes the children had their meals in the kitchen with Angelo and the hamster and the cat. But there was no order, no system, to their upbringing. They often dined with the adults. The parents rose late, but not so late as Walter. They seemed to feel it would be impolite to go off to the beach or the market until Walter’s breakfast was over. He was not accustomed to eating breakfast, particularly during the hot weather, but he managed to eat an egg and some cold toast, only because they appeared to expect it.
“Change has got to come in South Africa,” said Eve one morning as Walter sat down to a boiled egg. The family had eaten. The table was covered with ashes, eggshells, and crumbs.
“Why at our expense?” said Frank.
“Frank is an anarchist, although you wouldn’t think it at times,” said Eve, with pride.
Married twelve years and still talking, Walter thought. Frank and Eve were in accord on one thing — that there was bad faith on all sides in South Africa. They interrupted each other, explaining apartheid to Walter, who did not want to hear anything about it. Frank repeated that no decent person could stand by and accept the situation, and Eve agreed; but she made no bones about the real reason for their having left. They had failed, failed. The word rolled around the table like a wooden ball.
So Frank was an anarchist, was he, Walter thought, snipping at his egg. Well, he could afford to be an anarchist, living down there, paying next to no income tax. He said, “You will find things different in England.”
“An English farm, aha,” said Frank, and looked at Eve.
“Just so long as it isn’t a poultry farm,” said Walter, getting on with his revolting breakfast. The egg had given him something to say. “I have seen people try that.”
“As a matter of fact, it is a poultry farm,” said Eve. Frank’s face was earnest and red; this farm had a history of arguments about it. Eve went on, “You see, we try one thing after the other. We’re obliged to try things, aren’t we? We have two children to educate.”
“I wouldn’t want to live without doing something,” said Frank. “Even if I could afford to. I mean to say that I’m not brainy and it’s better for me if I have something to do.”
“Walter used to think it better,” said Eve. She went on, very lightly, “I did envy Walter once. Walter, think of the money that was spent educating you. They wouldn’t do it for a girl. Ah, how I used to wish we could have exchanged, then.” Having said this, she rounded on her husband, as if it were Frank who had failed to give Walter credit, had underestimated him, dragging schoolroom jealousy across the lovely day. Frank must be told: Walter in Hong Kong in a bank. Walter in amateur theatricals, the image of Douglas Fairbanks. He was marvelous in the war; he was burned from head to foot. He was hours swimming in flames in the North Sea. He should have had the Victoria Cross. Everyone said so.
The two children, sitting nearby sorting colored pebbles they had brought up from the beach, scarcely glanced at their courageous uncle. The impossibility of his ever having done anything splendid was as clear to them as it was to Walter. He agreed with the children — for it had all of it gone, and he wanted nothing but the oasis of peace, the admiration of undemanding old women, the winter months. If he was irritated, it was only by his sister’s puritanical insistence on working. Would the world have been a happier place if Walter had remained in Hong Kong in a bank? Luckily, there was William of Orange to talk about. There was William of Orange now, stalking an invisible victim along the terrace wall. Up in the fig tree he went, with his killer’s face, his marigold eyes. “Oh, the poor birds!” Eve cried. “He’s after birds!” She saw him stretch out his paw, spread like a hand, and then she saw him detach ripe figs and let them fall on the paved terrace. She had never seen a cat do that before. She said that William of Orange was perfectly sweet.
“He doesn’t care what you think about him,” said Mary, looking up from her heap of stones.
“You know, darling,” said Eve, laughing at Walter, “if you aren’t careful, you’ll become an old spinster with a pussycat.”
Frank sat on the terrace wall wearing a cotton shirt and oversize Army shorts. He was burned reddish brown. His arms and legs were covered with a coating of thick fair hair. “What is the appeal about cats?” he said kindly. “I’ve always wanted to know. I can understand having them on a farm, if they’re good mousers.” He wore a look of great sincerity most of the time, as if he wanted to say, “Please tell me what you are thinking. I so much want to know.”
“I like them because they are independent,” said Walter. “They don’t care what you think, just as Mary says. They don’t care if you like them. They haven’t the slightest notion of gratitude, and they never pretend. They take what you have to offer, and away they go.”