The Complete Ravenscar Trilogy: The Ravenscar Dynasty, Heirs of Ravenscar, Being Elizabeth. Barbara Taylor Bradford

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СКАЧАТЬ am at my wit’s end. I do not know what to do about Margot Grant. She is worse than ever, and I worry about Harry. My cousin is not a bad man, nor is he evil, like his wife. Actually, Henry is just a poor soul, out of his depth. We were such good friends when we were younger, spent much time together, and I was not only loyal to him, but a devoted cousin, his close friend, just as he was mine.

      The trouble with Henry is that he has always been the most pious of men, entangled with priests, full of devotion, wanting only to mingle with the clergy, and he made them his companions, listened to them, took their advice. And he loved to go to church, to study the Bible. His thoughts were always on God, not business, and it is still that way. Deravenels never really meant anything special to him. Nor does it now. Oh yes, he was, and is, proud to be the chairman, sitting in the seat once occupied by his magnificent father, and his grandfather before that. But he did not want to run the company, cannot run it, and he knows that now. He is not capable of it. This is the reason I call him the absentee landlord.

      He is a vague, distracted, lazy man; contemplating God is his favourite pastime, and so he lets the Frenchwoman do his job, at least he permits her to give orders to John Summers and James Cliff. They are devoted to her, but they do not follow her guidelines. They dismiss her orders. They are far too clever and smart for that, oh yes. Especially Summers. He takes after his late father—like him he is a handsome man, personable, intelligent. And ambitious. He means to take more and more power, I know that.

      I worry about Henry because he’s no match for her, or for them. He’s daft in the head, I believe. It has come back, the dementia, the illness which so incapacitated him seven years ago. For one year he was like a zombie; he was wandering around, as if in catatonic shock, or in a trance. Until they put him in an asylum for the insane. For treatment. But they lied to all of us in the company, said he was in a religious retreat.

      Long before his marriage to the Frenchwoman he made me his heir, because he knew full well I was the true heir, and the board asked me to take charge when he was put away. Put in a padded cell. And I did. I executed my duties well. Then, suddenly, he was back. He had made a remarkable recovery. And I stepped aside, which was only right.

      Within days she gave birth to her son, Edouard. Her heir. But was he Harry’s heir? Was he really his son? I doubt it; many doubt it. Henry Grant has always been a monk, lived like a monk. In every way. And the dates were doubtful. Everyone said so.

      I was never her enemy, not in the beginning. But she has always treated me as one, and over the years she has been foul, vicious to me and mine. And she has succeeded in turning me into her enemy. What a fool she is.

      And I fear for Henry, fear for his welfare. She has such dynastic ambitions. For her son. For herself. For John Summers.

      I have no proof, but I do believe he warms her bed at night, as his late father did before him. And surely her son is his half-brother. So Edouard does not have a drop of Deravenel blood in him. Does he?’

      Edward sat back, holding the book on his knee, staring into the flames, his thoughts racing.

      First of all, his father had confirmed Amos Finnister’s story that Henry Grant had been in and out of insane asylums. Well, at least once, according to this diary. But wasn’t his father also saying that his cousin had always been as mad as a hatter…daft in the head, those were his father’s words.

      Turning the page, Edward began to read once more, and then he realized that his father was now only writing about Ravenscar, and his great love for his ancestral home.

      He scanned the pages swiftly, genuinely wanting to know what his father had to say, yet anxious and impatient to move on to more important entries.

      There it was, a new entry on a new page, and the date was written very clearly: September the first 1902. Almost a year and a half ago.

      Holding the book tightly, Edward read his father’s words rapidly; from the very first line he felt an unexpected tingle of anticipation and excitement.

      ‘I have made my mind up. I am going to do something at last. I shall no longer procrastinate. I shall gather all of my notes together, notes made over the years, and I shall prepare my case. And I do have a case to present to the board of directors. Long, long ago, my ancestors made a new rule—that any director of Deravenels, whether a board member or a junior director, could present a case to them if he had a serious grievance against the company. I do. I have a complaint against Henry Grant. He is allowing Deravenels, one of the greatest trading companies in the world, to be run into the ground. By himself, a man who is daft in the head. I have the proof. I shall use it. I will assert myself. I will take what is mine to take. They cannot refuse to hear me. It is my right as a director, and as a Deravenel, which is even more important. I am going to fight them. I hope I shall win. I think I shall win. The board must remain neutral, and they know this; I believe there is enough neutrality among them to permit justice and fair play to prevail. I must find my copy of the company rules; all of those old documents are important. For back-up. The board won’t deny my petition to speak, but it is always a good idea to be prepared.’

      There was not a single doubt in Edward’s mind that his father had given him powerful weapons to fight the Grants; first, he had confirmed that Henry Grant was a damaged man, mentally deficient and unable to properly run the company. Edward knew enough about the company rules to know that Deravenels could not under any circumstances be run by ‘stand-ins’, as his mother usually called Grant’s cronies. There was that fact, to begin with; now there was the old company rule that gave a director the right to present a case to the board.

      Obviously, his father had never done what he’d vowed to do. But he would. By God, he would.

      Edward continued to read the diary for another hour, finding a lot more information that would be useful to them. But as far as he was concerned he had already found the most important.

      Later that evening, Edward and his mother discussed his father’s diary. They were both in agreement that he had some potent weapons in his hands now.

      She promised to find the old documents amongst which were the company rules; he told her all about Amos Finnister and his discoveries.

      They made their plans.

       NINETEEN

      Edward Deravenel knew he would always remember how he felt this morning as he mounted one side of the great double staircase that rose up from the central lobby of Deravenels.

      He felt different, felt like a new man.

      He was filled with pride; he was happy; his self-assurance was at its height. As he glanced around he felt reassured by this gargantuan building which in a sense was his, and where he now knew he would spend the rest of his life. He was secure in the knowledge that he would win…not only a battle or two, either. He would win the war. СКАЧАТЬ