“‘Even the great man himself was shaken’, declaimed Henry from his chair by the table, ‘once writing how the sight of a single feather left him sick to the stomach!’
Flora continued her close examination of the wallpaper above the chest of drawers. She recalled when it was new, choosing this particular shade over others because it reminded her of cornflowers; choosing it because cornflowers reminded Flora of running in the fields with her sisters; choosing it because this big house with its large garden felt a long way from where Flora had been happiest. It was faded now, the once-pretty paper made greyish by the many years of Henry’s many cigars. Smoke from the one he enjoyed now filled the parlour unpleasantly, stilled and unmoving, unlike Henry, whose agitation was marked. Not long returned from his latest speaking engagement in London, and in common with the subjects of his much-celebrated specialism, Henry remained in full flight.”
