Applause (The Dudley Sisters Saga Book 2) by Madalyn Morgan (best authors to read txt) 📕

Bess came back into the room and sat next to Margot on the settee. ‘It’s been weeks now, Margot. Lying here day in day out, wallowing in self-pity, isn’t going to bring your friend back and it won’t make you feel any better about her dying either, believe me.’ Bess waited for Margot to say something, but she didn’t speak. ‘I’m sorry, Margot, but somebody has to say it. There isn’t anything Dad, me, Mam, or anyone else can say to make you feel better about losing your friends. But helping those who are worse off than you might help you to feel better about yourself.’

‘You’re right.’ Margot lifted her head from the cushion and sat up.

Bess put her arm round her sister’s shoulder and drew her near. ‘You were very lucky, you know. If you’d have been five minutes earlier…’ Bess shuddered. ‘It doesn’t bear thinking about. So, Miss Margot Dudley, remember how lucky you are and get on with your life. You only have one, get out there and live it!’ Bess glanced at the window. ‘Talking about getting out there, I’d better go, or it’ll be too dark to do any work. Will you be all right?’

‘Yes, you go.’ Margot got up and followed Bess out of the room and along the hall to the front door, where she watched her put on her wellingtons.

‘You know where I am if you change your mind,’ Bess said, opening the door and stepping out.

A gust of cold air blew in and Margot shivered. ‘Thanks, but I think I’ll stay in the warm,’ she said, and she closed the door.

In the living room, Margot knelt on the armchair under the window and stared into the rain. It was only three o’clock in the afternoon, but the sky was bulging with charcoal-grey storm clouds. It was so dark it could have been six, or even seven in the evening. Margot turned her back on the window. It was gloomy outside. It matched her mood. She threw herself onto the settee and read again the letter she’d received from George that morning.

‘Still here, Margaret?’

Margot jumped. She quickly put the letter back in her pocket. ‘My name is Margot now, Dad.’

‘You’ll always be Margaret to me. Margaret, after young Princess Margaret Rose, same as Bess after Princess Elizabeth.’

‘Hang on! I’m not allowed to be called anything other than Margaret according to you, but Bess has always been called Bess, even though she was christened Elizabeth. That isn’t fair.’ Margot thought for a moment. ‘You old fibber,’ she said to her father. ‘Bess and I weren’t named after Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret, they were born after us.’

‘Well I’ll be blowed.’ Margot’s father scratched his head. ‘The King must have named his daughters after you and your sister, then.’ Thomas Dudley laughed. ‘All right, I give in. Have it your own way, Margot, you usually do.’

‘Thanks Dad. You may not be royalty, but you’ll always be a prince to me – plus you’re the best dad in the world.’

‘So long as I keep letting you have your own way.’ Margot’s father kissed her on the top of her head. ‘But don’t expect your mother to call you Margot.’ He walked across to the kitchen and put his head round the door. ‘Where is she?’

‘No idea!’

‘Right, I’m off to the Hall to help Mr Porter clear out the old foaling stables. We’re going to turn them into a winter feed store for the livestock. It’s too wet to cart any more bales across the Acres to the store barn – besides, it’s almost full.’

‘Aren’t you supposed to be at the foundry today?’

‘I asked for a couple of extra days. With all this rain, Bess needs help up at Foxden. Why don’t you come up with me? See Mrs Hartley. The land girls have their tea about now. Come and say hello.’

Margot thought for a second. ‘All right! If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.’

Her father shook his head. ‘You’ve lost me.’

‘It’s between me and our Bess. Don’t ask!’

At the front door, Margot put on a small pillbox hat the colour of autumn leaves. She looked in the hall mirror and tilted her head this way and that until she was satisfied with the angle. Reaching up, she took her cream-coloured coat with red fox fur collar and matching trim from the coat hook. After giving it a shake, she swung it round as if it were a matador’s cape. ‘Perfect,’ she said, as the coat fell onto her shoulders. After sliding her arms down the sleeves, she reached for the door handle. ‘Are you coming, Dad, or what? If we don’t go now it’ll be too dark to do anything,’ she winked.

Thomas Dudley stood open-mouthed. ‘You can’t go up to the Hall in those shoes, Margot. You won’t get as far as the gate before those high heels--’

‘Kitten heels,’ she said. ‘Aren’t they lovely? They came from Paris.’

‘Never mind what they’re called, or where they came from. They’ll get stuck in the mud and break off, and then they won’t be any kind of heel. And what about your ankle? It’s only just got better. One twist and you’ll be back where you were three weeks ago. Where’s your common sense, child?’

‘Left it in London, I shouldn’t wonder,’ Margot’s mother said, striding through the gate. ‘Wait a minute and you can have my wellingtons. And when you see Bess, ask her to lend you some. She’s got half a dozen pairs up at the Hall. She’s bound to have some your size.’

Newspaper carpeted the front hall floor. Standing on it, Margot’s mother kicked off her wellingtons. ‘I’ll leave this paper down, so as you don’t