Keeping the World Away Read Online Free Page A

door of No. 7 was shut for the last time, but nobody did, and nobody looked back. ‘Where are we going?’ Winifred whispered. Tenby meant nothing to her. She was only five, and had never been there. ‘Beside the sea,’ Gwen said, feeling that was all she needed to know. Beside the sea. But when they got to Tenby, glimpsing the tawny sails of the fishing smacks, they found that their new home was not exactly beside the sea. It was not one of the tall yellow houses above the harbour but was up a dreary side street off the Esplanade, one in a row. The paint was peeling off the window frames and it had a shuttered, dingy look. No one said anything. They were afraid to offend their father by expressing their dismay. Silently, they entered the house which seemed dark and crowded with mahogany furniture. It was a tall house, with a basement and three floors and attics above. ‘Soon we will be settled,’ their father announced, but there seemed no comfort in his words. Gwen hardly dared to climb the stairs behind her father. On and on he went, never turning to look at her and Winifred, never speaking. ‘Wait,’ was all he said, when they reached the top landing. He opened the doors to the three attics, looked in them, and then gestured that the girls should enter the middle one.
    There was a lot to be thankful for. Gwen kept telling herself that. For a start, there was light, two skylights without blinds. And the walls, though papered, had bland, creamy-coloured flowers wandering across a pale yellow background. There was cracked and horrid linoleum on the floor, but the two rag rugs, one beside each bed, were pretty. There was a small chest of drawers, and above it a painting in a gilt frame. It was of a boy wearing a red velvet suit. He was standing with his hands in his pockets, one foot resting on a dog. Gwen shuddered. Her father noticed, and to her surprise said, ‘You may take it down.’ He took it down for her and carried it away. The nail it had hung on looked odd above the blank square below. She would draw something herself to hang there.
    The first night was hard. Nothing felt right, and they all longed for the morning when their father would go to the office and they could escape onto the beach. But he did not go. When Gus asked at what time he would be leaving he said he would not be going to an office again, ever. He would work at home. The news appalled them. They stared at him. They could not work it out. Father always went to the office. He had impressed upon them many times how hard he worked, how necessary it was for him to work to cater for their many needs. What would happen now? ‘You will go to school,’ he told them. ‘It is being arranged. Until then, we will take walks.’ So they put coats on and followed him out, and he walked ahead, as he always did, his carriage rigidly upright, his nose in the air, and they half-ran to keep up. At least they were outside and nothing was so bad. The sun shone, the sky was nearly all blue. Once they got to the Esplanade the sight of the sea lifted their spirits. ‘Breathe deeply, in, out,’ their father said, and they stood in a line and did what he said, in, out, many times . Down on the beach, where they were then permitted to go, they ran away from him, Gus leading, shouting and yelling and chasing the seagulls. The tide was out and there were patches of hard sand where Gus drew pictures with a stick he picked up. Gwen and Winifred looked for shells, collecting them to take home, and Thornton gathered up seaweed and popped it. All this time, their father stood where they had left him, watching, but there was something unusually patient about him. He did not bother them.
    *
    There were caves under the crumbling town walls, dangerous places where the boys went. Gus had told Gwen about them, how dark they were, how damp to the touch the rocky sides felt, how strange the smell of putrid sea water. The boys took candles into the caves and lit them and