Running from Scandal. Amanda McCabe

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      Chapter Three

      Emma smiled at the familiar sound of rusted bells clanking as she pushed open the door to Mr Lorne’s bookshop. It had been so long since she heard them, but once they had been one of the sweetest sounds in the world to her. They had meant escape.

      Could she ever find the same sanctuary in books again? The same forgetfulness in learning? Or did she know too much about what lay outside the pages now?

      As she closed the door behind her, she thought about the way people watched her as she walked down the street, silent and wide-eyed. She hadn’t left the grounds of Barton much since her arrival, wanting only the healing quiet of home. Days wandering around the rooms and gardens, reminiscing with Jane and playing games with the children, had been wonderful indeed. She’d almost begun to remember herself again and forget what she had seen in her life with Henry.

      But now Jane and Hayden had gone off to London, and without them and the boisterous twins the estate was much too silent. Emma needed to purchase some things for her refurbishment of her cottage and she needed reading materials for the quiet evenings at her small fireside. That meant a trip into the village.

      She hadn’t been expecting a parade to greet her, of course. She had been gone for such a long time and in such an irregular way. Yet neither had she expected such complete silence. They had looked at her as if she were a ghost.

      Emma was tired of being a ghost. She wanted to be alive again, feel alive in a way she hadn’t since her marriage to Henry fell apart so spectacularly in its very infancy. She just wasn’t sure how to do that.

      Mr Lorne’s shop seemed like a good place to start. Emma smiled as she looked around at the familiar space. It appeared not to have changed at all in the years she had been gone. The rows of shelves were still jammed full of haphazardly organised volumes, wedged in wherever there was an inch. More books were stacked on the floors and on the ladders.

      The windows, which had never been spotless, were even more streaked with dust than ever, and only a few faint rays of daylight slanted through them. Colza lamps lit the dark corners and gave off a faint flowery smell that cut through the dryness of paper, glue and old leather. Once Emma’s eyes adjusted to the gloom, she saw Mr Lorne’s bushy grey head peeking over a tottering tower of books on his desk.

      ‘Good heavens,’ he said. ‘Is it really you, Miss Bancroft?’

      Emma laughed, relieved that she really wasn’t a ghost after all. Someone could acknowledge her. She hurried over to shake Mr Lorne’s hand, now worryingly thin and wrinkled.

      ‘Indeed it is me, Mr Lorne,’ she said. ‘Though I am Mrs Carrington now.’

      ‘Ah, yes,’ he said vaguely. ‘I do remember you had gone away. No one pestered me for new volumes on plants any more.’

      ‘You were always ready to indulge my passion for whatever topic I fancied,’ Emma said, remembering her passion for botany and nature back then. Maybe she should try to find that again?

      ‘You were one of my best customers. So what do you fancy now?’

      ‘I’m not quite sure.’ Emma hesitated, studying the old shop as she peeled off her gloves. The black kid was already streaked with dust. ‘I’m refurbishing one of the old cottages on the Barton estate, but I’m not sure what I’ll do after that. I don’t suppose you ever did come across any old writings about the early days of Barton?’ Before she left home, Emma had been passionately involved in researching her family’s home, especially searching for the legendary Barton treasure. But nothing had ever come of it.

      ‘I don’t think so.’

      ‘Then maybe some novels? Something amusing for a long evening?’

      ‘There I can help you, Mrs Carrington.’ Mr Lorne carefully climbed down from his stool and picked up a walking stick before leading her to a shelf against the far wall. Just like always, she saw he had an organisational system understood only by himself. ‘These are some of the latest from London. But I fear I can’t help you decide what to do next any more than I can help myself.’

      Emma glanced at the old man, surprised by the sad, defeated tone on his voice. The Mr Lorne she remembered had always been most vigorous and cheerful, in love with his work and eager to share the books on his shelf. ‘Whatever do you mean, Mr Lorne?’

      ‘I fear I must close this place before too long.’

      ‘Close it?’ Emma cried, appalled. ‘But you are the only bookshop in the area.’

      ‘Aye, it’s a great pity. I’ve loved this shop like my own child. But my daughter insists I go and live with СКАЧАТЬ