Lama [antikvár]

Chapter i I woke up on Christmas morning, looked out of the window across the wild boulder-strewn moorland to the turbxilent white-capped sea of Mount's Bay, and was uncomfortably aware of the part I had to play. 'Merry Christmas!' I said cheerfully. Too cheerfully. There was a second's silence. 'Merry Christmas!' said Jeannie, murmuring her greeting into the pillow. Some people have no feeling for anniversaries. They consider a happy anniversary as a duty occasion when it is remembered in time, or an annoying one when it is remembered too late. They are xmperturbed by sentimental anniversaries. They do not get bothered as some of us do by the thought: 'This time last year . . The bedroom at Minack, our flower farm near Land's End, is very small. If you stand in the middle, holding the handle of a mop, you can touch each wall. There are two windows, each the size of a dirmer plate when we arrived, but now enlarged so that they are casement windows; and one of them faces the moorland and the sea, and the other looks out on the square of grass which I call a lawn. There is a William and Mary chest of drawers wedged between the foot of the bed and one of the rough faced, white-painted stone walls; and there is a small dressing table for Jeannie, and a little walnut desk like a school desk where she keeps her papers. There was also, under the bed, a contraption like a window frame except that wire mesh acted as a substitute for glass. It was a cunning device. We had it made after Monty, of my book A Cat in the