Cassandra

his Chapter is dedicated to Scary Bear Hair, who taught me how to write dialouge, a relief to all of my readers, I expect!

“This will be fine,” Says Sir Peter dismissivly and waves away the pretty girl in her starched maid's outift.

Fine doesn't do this room justise by any means. I look around the huge hotel room, awe struck. It is light and airy, with vast, high domed ceiling and two massive widows, floor to ceiling and dressed with cascading silky curtains. The walls are cream coloured and the carpet is thick and soft, the furtinture is immaculate and looks unused, I can hardly belive that we're still in London, this is not the war ravaged city that I know, this is polished, perfect and beautiful. Vases of flowers stand on small tables dotted around the huge room, filling the room with their sweet, light floral scent.

The only thing that is bothering me is the bed, a huge double bed, but just one bed. I am about to raise the point with Sir Peter that we're not yet married and therefor there is no chance that we will be sleeping in the same bed, when I see another door which leads off to the bathroom. It is bigger than the kitchen at Maudie's. Again, pale coloured (must be horrific to clean!) There are massive, fluffy, peach coloured towels hanging on a towel rail, and along the marble sink are little peach coloured soaps. Instinctivly I want to put them in my suitcase to take home for the girls, but then I remember that I won't being seeing them again for such a while. Leading off the bathroom is another room, smaller, with a single bed, the walls are papered with a delicate swirling blue pattern. This room is simpler but more feminine, I feel much more comfortuble in here.

I wander out into the main room again and open the huge wardrobe, pulling fimly on the cut-glass handle to get it open. The door swings open and I'm shocked at what I see. Dresses, lots of dresses. Stuningly beautiful dresses. Silks, Satins, Wild Silk, soft cotton, linen and cashmere. I have never seen such beautiful clothes, my breath is almost taken away and I timidly run my fingers over the fabrics.
“Sir Peter?”
He looks up from his armchair in the corner of the room, folds down the newspaper and looks up at me,
“What?”
“There is something wrong, someone has left all of their clothes in this wardrobe. Shall I go downstairs and tell somone?”

He smiled, “They are yours, you silly goose” He laughed.

This confused me, “Mine?” I asked.

“Well I couldn't very well take you all around the world dressed like a scruffy child, now could I?” He smiled again, not unkindly. He crossed the room and stood next to me, looking at the wardrobe.
“Do you like them? I would so like to see you looking as you did when I first saw you.”

My face fell. “A scruffy child? How can you say such a thing! I'm an orphan! Not everyone has the money to throw around on clothing, there has been a war on you know!”

Anger flashed in his face, he looked furious, he took a deep breath, stepped back and replied, coldly, “I am aware that there has been a war on Cassandra, more so than you I would imagine. Tell me, where were you during Dunkirk?”

I clamp my hand over my mouth, suddenly realising what I've said. “I'm sorry Sir, I didn't mean it like that, only that..” I gabble.

He cuts me off. “From now on you will dress only in the clothes that I provide for you.”

I raised my chin defiantly. “I want to wear my clothes, Maudie made them for me”

“And it shows” He replies shortly.

My eyes well up with tears, those hot childish tears that are so close to the surface when one is so young. “I will wear what I want!”
He remains infuriatingly calm, refusing to rise to my temper. “You cannot eat in the Hotel Resturant dressed like that, it will not do.”

“Then I shall not eat!” I reply, stupidly.

“Fine, Cassandra. Upon your own head be it.”


The clock in the bedroom says that it is ten o'clock, two hours Sir Peter went downstairs to supper, and left me here, sitting on the end of the bed wearing my lumpy cardigan. I have read the newspaper, bathed, written letters to each of the girls back at Maudies and lain on the bed looking at the celing for twenty miniuts. Sufice to say that I am really quite bored, and worst of all if I wasn't so proud I could have gone todown to supper in one of those beautiful dresses. I don't think that I've ever been so hungry in my life, rationing was one thing but my gosh, this is just horrid.

The door opens and Sir Peter strides in, dressed imaculately in his dinner jacket. Alright, my cardigan would have been horribly out of place, but I could not go around wear the clothes he bought me after he had insulted Maudie's clothes, could I?

“Did you have an enjoyable evening, Cassandra?” He asked.

Everything about him began to infuriate me, fueled by my empty stomach I start too feel even more petulent. His insesent use of my full name was driving me to distraction, Cassie, was that really so hard to manage? I sum up all my corage and summon the worst word I know, the one that the boys at Maudie's used to shout at other boys, hidden behind the dustbins.

“Bugger off!” I cry, for some reason I do so with my eyes closed and my hands screwed up in fists. Sir Peter is unimpressed, to say the least.

“I'll teach you to speak to me like that” He retorts quickly, and before I know what is going on he ha unbuckled his belt and is across the room and has by arm twisted behind my back. “Bend over the bed.” He demands. I look up into his face, straight into his eyes. I have seen his belt, folded over in his hand and I know what is going to happen if I don't fight him.

“No.”

He twists my arm further until I cry out in pain. “Over the bed, Cassandra.”

“I'm not some soilder in your army, you can't just order me around like this, I'm a person, I have feelings too!”

As soon as I mention the world soilder, his face flushes and his body stiffens, he twists my arm further behind my back and pushes me roughly onto the bed. His face is above mine. Livid, I twist like an angry cat, then, furiously I spit into his face.
Wiithout pausing for thought he brings the back of his hand down across my face, hard. For a moment we both look shocked, then I burst into tears and he gets up. Moments later I too am on my feet. “I hate you,” I cry recklessly, I pick up the first thing to hand (a book of poems, hard backed) and throw it at him, it catches him on the side of the head, he looks at me, almost unbelivingly, then his anger catches up with him, “I order you to calm down this instance Cassandra”
“My name, is Cassie. Cassie, why will you not understand that?”
“You will do as you are told, Cassandra,” He replies, shaking me strongly. I wriggle and struggle away from him but he holds me steadfast, strangely he brings me into his chest, holding me tight, but now he is embrasing me.
Eventually I stop struggling and he gently stokes my hair, then he lifts my chin and looks at my face, my cheek is still throbbing from his fist.
“I'm sorry. I shouldn't have hit you like that.” He gently ran his fingertip over my cheek.

I paused, thinking my words through throughly. “But you were you going to belt me?” I ask, tentativly.
He nodds, “That is different, a man has a right to discipline his fiancée, but not to knock her around. However I know that you are a young girl, emotional and foolish sometimes,and so some allowances will be made. But make no mistake, if there is ever a repeat of tonight's performace, I will take my belt to your backside so hard that you will not sit down for a month. Is that clear?”

I start to smile, but it hurts my sore cheek. Instead I lean up and kiss him gently on the lips.

“Time for bed now,” he says, I do not argue.


The next morning we sit at breakfast, he drinks coffee and I nibble delicatly on a crossient, wearing a beautiful yellow cotton sundress, cut dareingly low on my bust. my lumpy cardigen lies folded upstairs, banished to the bottom of my suitcase. When I think of it I feel a little guilty, but as I look at the matching shoes, the guilt is eased a little. After all, I am here for Maudie and the girls. Arn't I?