Chapter 3; Andrea von Gikkingken
Humbert bolted for the door, only it was more like flying. His feet hardly ever touched the ground – there was no clattering down the stairs, he jumped them. There was no pounding down the corridor; he reached the other end in two long, fast, strides.
His hand closed around the doorknob and he opened the door for his mother. She'd brought company. Humbert's other hand went to his tie, much like the hand of one facing the prospect of hanging reaches for the soon to be stretched neck.
Andrea was flanked by Humbert's Aunt Sarah and her daughter, Cousin Jemima, who was just a little younger than Humbert was himself. Andrea was wearing a green summer dress, the style of which had been quite fine in the 1940s, but was a bit out of place in the new millennium. Sarah was likewise dressed, only in pink rather than green, but at least Jemima had gotten away with wearing jeans and a large jacket over a white tank top. The slightly boyish look suited Jemima, with her close-cropped mouse-brown hair and mischievous hazel eyes.
Of course, while Humbert liked Jemima well enough and they always had something to talk about, her presence, along with that of both their mothers, did not bode well.
"Mother, Aunt Sarah, dear Jemima, this is a pleasant surprise, won't you come in?" he said, meaning the surprise was Jemima, he had known his mother was coming.
The three women entered, and Jemima gave Humbert her jacket – this was expected. Her jacket was hung on the hallstand beside Humbert's top hat. It was silk, and a gift from his mother. He only wore it when he went out on special occasions, like to his mother's house, which was on par with going to the opera in the strata of how dressed up a person should get for a thing.
Andrea von Gikkingken performed her inspection of Humbert's house while he made tea and served scones. He dreaded the moment of her finding the kitten, but it never came, and without a word, the matriarch sat down to four o'clock tea with the rest of them.
Humbert almost collapsed with relief. If his mother was silent, then she had found nothing to criticise.
"Humbert," the imperial middle-aged woman began, lowering her teacup from her lips. "You still don't have a sweetheart?"
The young man groaned silently. This is what he had been afraid of, before he had even known why Jemima's presence worried him; this was what he had been afraid of. His mother was trying to set him up with a "nice young gel" again, and now it was his cousin, Jemima.
"No Mother," he answered, maintaining a bland attitude to the annoyingly common question. "I haven't."
"What a coincidence, neither has Jemima," said his Aunt Sarah, feigning surprise. Of course, it was rehearsed. Jemima was the only one who wouldn't have any planned lines, she'd just been told to put on something nice and come.
"And she has no objections to you courting her, I'm sure," suggested Andrea, her tone half-suggesting, half daring anyone to defy her. No one had yet, except her husband, and that only when she had wanted him to clear out the garage, saying it was full of junk. Harold von Gikkingken had replied calmly that it was filled with antiquities, tools and things he wouldn't part with for all the world. Nothing had been thrown out.
Jemima had a shocked look on her face as the conversation took place, then turned an imploring look on Humbert, begging him to find a way out for both of them.
