Flames Coming out of the Top by Norman Collins Page A

where she was, her dark, handsome eyes playing into the room. Then she came forward, holding out a hand tipped by long, blood-red nails. When she was by him he discovered that she was as much drenched in perfume as Señor Muras himself. It was, at that moment, as he caught her eyes, that he recognised her as the closely-guarded convent schoolgirl on the boat. She had certainly emerged all right; what he had seen had evidently been the last day of the chrysalis stage.
    â€œMy daughter, Carmel,” Señor Muras said proudly. “This is Mr. Dunnett.”
    â€œHow are you?” she said. “I’ve been just crazy to meet you. I saw you on the boat, but you wouldn’t recognise me.”
    â€œHow do you do?” Dunnett replied.
    Señorita Muras smiled back at him. “Oh my,” she said. “You
are
English. Do you know, if anyone else said ‘How-do-you-do’ like that it’d be a snub? But when you say it it’s perfect.”
    â€œI’m glad you think so,” Dunnett answered.
    â€œThere you go again,” Señorita Muras exclaimed. “You sound as though you were snubbing the whole time. But I know you’re not. I think it’s lovely hearing English spoken. I do really. We heard a lot of it in Hollywood.”
    â€œThat wasn’t real English,” Dunnett replied.
    â€œI’ll say it was,” Señorita Muras answered. “There was one actor lived over by the convent had an accent you could hitch a horse to. He used to wear a black coat and striped trousers even when he was only in crowd scenes. He was
very
English.”
    â€œWell, you’re very American, aren’t you?” Dunnett asked.
    â€œMe?” Señorita Muras enquired in astonishment. “Oh no, I’m not American. Everyone at the convent thought I was awfully foreign; and there were all sorts at that convent. There were Chilenos and a Cypriot in my dormitory.”
    â€œSo you’ve only just left school, have you?” Dunnett asked.
    Señorita Muras did not bother to reply. Instead she came over and led him to the couch. Her hand was cool and soft to the touch. “You tell me about London,” she said. “You know it, don’t you?”
    â€œI live there,” Dunnett replied.
    â€œSay, are those Ripper murders still going on? I read a series about them.”
    â€œNo: they’re done with now; that’s ancient history.”
    â€œThat’s swell, but what about Buckingham Palace— have you ever been over it?”
    â€œIt isn’t open to the public, you see,” Dunnett explained.
    â€œWell, what about Bond Street?”
    â€œI know Bond Street all right.”
    â€œIs it very smart? Is it smarter than Paris?”
    â€œI’ve only been to Paris once. It didn’t look very smart to me then.”
    Señorita Muras paused. “You know the Old Curiosity Shop?” she asked. Dunnett nodded.
    â€œAnd Albemarle Street where Lord Byron limped downstairs?”
    Dunnett nodded again: he had not the least idea what she was talking about.
    â€œI can’t have too much of that sort of thing,” she told him. She indicated a spot vaguely in the region of her heart. “Antiquity gets me there every time.”
    A contemplative look came into her eyes as she thought about the past. She took a cigarette out of the box beside her and without saying a word accepted the match which Dunnett struck for her. Antiquity had evidently affected her pretty deeply and she sat where she was, scratching patterns on the silver top of the cigarette box with the point of her finger nail.
    Dunnett was not sorry that the first rush of conversation was over; on the Señorita’s part it consisted so much in askingquestions to which the actual answer appeared to be unimportant. And he had a curiously uneasy feeling that Señor Muras was watching. When he turned round he found that this was so. Señor Muras was