OCR Text |
Show 190 Beginning on such a pitch, the visit promised to be difficult, for the relationship between Mrs Satterwhite and her brother had always been uneasy. He admired her - - sensed that behind her controlled exterior lay a thrust for power as demanding as his - - at the wame time two dynamic egos were not always comfortable in each other's company. But she managed things well. Dutifully they went to the club, where she saw to it that his taste for good Scotch was satisfied; also, knowing that he and the Colonel were hardly compatible, she arranged for various officers to stand around; within an hour, in fact, the General had found the milieu he most enjoyed, the dim, smoky, softly musical murmur of a bar, where he was the center of a group of extrovert officers, bibulous, boisterous, easy to laugh, With that, things eased off. He staid at the club till midnight, and the next morning left to dip a fly in the Arita above Kusabe. The second morning Captain Menlove and a couple of the lieutenants took him to Morita Island, a day's work that yielded a splendid catch of bream, and the third day he tried out the hunting near Yoshige. Thereafter Mrs Satterwhite's duties were often passive: seeing that meals were ready, drinks set out, jeeps and staff-cars standing at the door. Oddly enough, even the weather accommodated. Always, Mrs Satterwhite thought bitterly, it was beautiful everywhere else- - only in her vicinity did it vent its spite - - but during the visit all was Nihon-bare: Japan-lovely. The sun rose round as a plum, rode upward through the morning |