◆ SpookStack

N the summer of 1952 Melinda Maclean and he her family spent a few gays in Paris. Then, in the new car Mrs. Dunbar had bought her, she drove to Normandy for a holiday. The howe they had rented at Glanville bore the grand name of Le Manoir de Madame des nN ‘Vaux and was in delightful countryside a few miles Aniand from Deauville. But it rained nearly every ‘ day and Melinda had neither the sunshine nor the rest her Gocter had prescribed, , My wife and I drove down “- to spend the week-end and : found It d{fficult to revive any of her real galety. afer that. wORDRE growing sitadity worse she and her mother decided tp cu; shor: the holiday and they Feiurned to Paris. ‘There again we caw a good deal ot Melinda. and there it was for the Brst time that she said she was Bpre Donald was behind the ten Curtain. She bad nothing to go on, but somehow, she said. she just knew, with the «Now for a ~- new, life "So she had really decided to remake her life, She was going to ke her mother end the children hd The mounta gi ane mun fina © wenilessly, would ook. far "Romanticising hersel? someweat younger than her sh yecre as 1 later discovered, sha d-ew @ be kad mony most admirable araphie picture of ‘the terrible] qualities—-and her natural gase\y ight she would be jn should bet }-and — spantancit: wi a Panis die. She and the chtidren. Lrevurn ataneity ould 0 She told me, were entirely deped-| But no. She was convinced fens upon’ Mrs, Dunbar and hina her marital life was detaiely would very fikely afarve because | aver never io begin again. The her mother's money died with on future for her ley in find ehor. ay it were. La zoo: bur wt Je" the ao? This was sonsense. Tt wax trac | THis was 3 problem, for she ha thet phe and ihe children were} ever done anv real work. living on Mrs. Dunbar, for Mac-| Tbe next day, September lean had left her nothing but] 195%. she lelt for Geneva. driving ; ° pana oy thet an ied, English eur advance on Megas and S° bin her now American cat. Otice since ne was! ft Is another example ‘of the Heuspended” ob June 4, Hol. feentradictions in Me tnda that is is apparent frail, sic! girl Bur she had a smail Medme of leould quite easily drive the long fog gad sometimes arduous 12-hour journey from Paris tp Geneva, uist fund established by her grandfather, and when her mother died she Would be reason. ably comfartabiy olf. Thay was clearly looking into the future. Th: 1 temains that, most fortunately for her a her children, financial worrjes at least were spared ber, Other worrles persisted and were indeed more real to her. She tele the children deg a “father.” “Tt would ba bad fo: them continually to ke brought up in a “mun-less” home. top, hen. after a few days, she yWent with considerable trepida- tion ty see the headmaster of the international school to arrange about sending the boys ther find to tefl him who they were. Afterwards, she wrote ‘te ber { aust “it was absolute agony him about Donald, but 7 fourse I had to da‘ it” And at the sume time she had ditteult, delicate task of ex. plain ing to Fergus and Donald nr. what bad happened fo ther father. * The boys started school, which telling felt of ould she remarry ? J suga®cted that when she had divoreed Donald she could easi remarry. “Wha would marry 9 notorious woman lke me with three smgil children ?” she asked, t The answer was obvious: lows mes would be only ghied tg marry her Melinda. slthough she had aged some “ten years intthe montis Since Maciesn went*of inio ihe unknown, was still an exceed. Ingiy attractive girl who. if she contd only emerge from the. black sepression which gripped Ret so ot mainly ia pouring rain, in one linda’s s they ike very Melinda looked ound She waa alse look: and without much sev: on for the job whic enable her’ to start But although — physic picked up a lithe. sp waa still very law anc me in the middie of a “2 tect so complete! since arriving here anc haw Tean summon up it takes to siatt a new She lool _. better At the beginning Melinda and her fa fate o little apie: found in the Ru most pleasant pa within sight of the and with @ lille p whieb the children i was in Geneva and went to see her setting. Melinda was a Hite « little elsted sbaut tf felt it would may : ference to their fife and te move as a sort uF “settling down” in Ge: T thought she leak: better than she had ¢ Seana eee