Gentleman's Relish by Patrick Gale

panting in the sun like so many pink and brown seals.
    Families dressed in the evening. It would have been too cold to stay naked but Lara suspected it also had to do with hot gravy and knives and forks. Supper was served in a big chalet beside the lake and they all sat apart with their respective families. Then there was dancing to records or a lecture but Lara usually pretended to be tired so she could go to bed with a book instead. Her parents quizzed her about the new family and seemed reassured to hear Wolf had said they were from Zurich.
    â€˜Swiss,’ her mother said. ‘I was sure they must be.’
    Wolf’s parents were just as blond as he was. Theymust have been the same age as her parents nearly but they seemed far fitter. Her parents were both academics, grave and pale, helpless without spectacles whereas Wolf’s parents had muscles and looked like an advertisement for something to do with health and the outdoors.
    The next day her parents played them at badminton and, after dark, at bridge, so her mother must have decided they were All Right . Without clothes on one had to be more circumspect, apparently.
    Lara knew he was a bit older than her but had thought Wolf would take his cue from their parents and become her new friend. Something about the way he had touched her arms when showing her how to pitch and caught her eye and laughed when she hit Eileen on the head made her wake fully prepared to insult or cold-shoulder whatever playmates she needed in order to cement an alliance with him. But, after two days of childish company, he suddenly seemed more interested in Mr Johnson, or Johnson, as he called him imperiously.
    The Johnsons were the youngest couple in the camp. She was expecting a baby so wasn’t available for games so Mr Johnson, who was dark and handsome and worked as a PE instructor in a minor public school, was much in demand.
    Wolf needed to challenge him, for some reason, or at least to win his notice.
    â€˜Race me across the lake, Johnson!’ he shoutedat him. ‘Watch me dive, Johnson!’ ‘Johnson, how is my serve?’
    Mr Johnson was polite and obliging. He raced Wolf and Lara across the lake, easily beating them but complimenting them on their strokes all the same and showing Wolf how to splash less with his legs. He patiently watched Wolf’s repeated dives off the high board and spent some time helping him improve his tennis serve too but Lara could see he was uncomfortable, embarrassed even, at the Swiss boy’s bids for attention and she wasn’t surprised when he rowed his wife out to the Island after lunch. This was the one place children weren’t allowed and heavy with lurid mythology as a result.
    Wolf took control of the afternoon games as he had on the first two days. They played Masters and Slaves on the obstacle course and Vampires on the old tyres that dangled on ropes across the stream, but she could see, from the edge of spite that came into his commands, that he was unhappy. She still thought he was beautiful and she easily stayed on the right side of him by doing his every bidding faster and more tidily than the others so that he started calling her Tiger Cub, which she liked and hoped was a name that might stick. She had not forgotten, however, his odd foolishness in the morning and held back a part of herself in watchfulness.
    She fought genuine sleepiness after supper becausethere were charades that night. The Johnsons shone unexpectedly at the game, even pregnant Mrs Johnson, who was inclined to laugh too hard and get sweaty. Wolf’s family proved hopeless, either through insufficient informal English or a failure to understand that the game was meant to be amusing. Her parents were neither good nor bad, which was a relief.
    The next day it poured with rain. Several families donned clothes and drove off on cultural excursions , which would almost certainly involve the cinema, an entertainment the camp owners were far