The Forbidden Promise. Lorna Cook

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СКАЧАТЬ be a running theme in this room. Kate opened the cover slowly and carefully turned a few pages until she reached a page showing the Family Record. Trying to forget the argument outside, she became engrossed in what must be the Langley-McLay family Bible.

      The names of the family members varied in colour, the ink of the earlier ones now faded sepia, the more recent names still black. The dates started in the early 1800s and the italic looped and swirled handwriting changed as each new family member’s name was recorded with his or her birth date.

      Kate thought of the generations of children who had come and gone, grown old, married and moved away, gone to war and died, lived and inherited before passing it on to the next in line. She glanced at the second page of the Bible, as the dates moved into the First World War. One child was born soon after the war: Constance Amelia Rose McLay, born August 1919.

      But what struck her about this name over all the others was the black fountain pen mark that had been scored through her entire name. Whoever had crossed her entry through had done so with such forceful intention that the nib had gone through several of the sheets underneath.

      Kate’s first thought was that someone might have done this when Constance had died. But there was no date of death for anyone listed in the Bible – only births – and none of the other entries had been scored through.

      Constance Amelia Rose McLay stood alone in having been deleted. Kate shuddered suddenly and looked around. She suddenly wished she was anywhere else but here. With Liz talking in clipped tones to her son outside the door Kate looked back down at the name.

      She ran her finger slowly over the deep slice that the pen had made and wondered what kind of crime Constance McLay could possibly have committed that would see her name so meaningfully and forcefully removed from her family history.

       CHAPTER 4

       1940

      The smacking sound the Spitfire had made as it crashed had been nothing compared to the dreadful gurgle that emanated from the water as it sucked the plane down into its inky depths. The whoosh had been sudden. And then there was nothing but the waves as they crashed around Constance, before the loch became eerily still.

      Constance swam as fast as she could towards the middle of the loch, pausing to tread water and listen for a sound, any sound that might indicate the pilot was still alive. She pulled her dress up around her waist so she could kick her legs faster.

      He was dead. He must be. He’d been under the water for far too long, surely. She wished the clouds would part, allowing the moon to cast some light on to the dark water.

      She called out, even though it was hopeless. ‘Where are you?’

      Constance pushed her wet brown hair back from her face in order to see, although it was too dark to get her bearings. Her painstakingly pinned hairstyle was now loose and in soaked tendrils down her face.

      ‘Where are you?’ she called again. Foolishly, she believed if she shouted loud enough she might be able to summon him from the cold depths.

      From the darkness to her left the silence was broken. A loud splash sounded as he surfaced, suddenly, violently. He’d emerged but he was flailing, splashing and gasping desperately for air.

      Constance yelled that she was coming to help. The pilot was some distance from her and she didn’t know if he could hear her. He appeared unable to reply, his gasps turning to coughs as he expelled water from his lungs.

      She swam towards the noise, continuing to try to reassure him. As she swam into his view he swore, startled at her arrival. He appeared to be having a fight with himself.

      ‘Are you all right?’ Constance called. ‘Can you swim?’

      ‘Yes. No,’ he said between gasps. ‘Help. It’s drowning me.’ He was trying to undo his leather flight jacket and, in a panic, had his arms stuck in the wet material. Constance reached him and trod water as she wrestled the heavy flight jacket from him. As she held it in her arms the weight of it began to pull her down and she kicked with her legs to stay above the surface.

      He started kicking off his waterlogged boots and saw her struggling with the jacket.

      ‘Let go!’ he shouted at her.

      Constance hadn’t known why she’d still been holding the jacket but she released the leaden weight. Like his plane, it disappeared into the water.

      His panic seemed to rise as he struggled with his boots. Constance tried soothing him. ‘Stay calm. The shoreline isn’t far,’ she said as she trod water. ‘You must swim for it.’

      The pilot followed her as she swam. She could hear his harsh breathing and sporadic coughing as he struggled to swim with boots full of water. Constance’s love for swimming in the loch had worn off when she’d reached thirteen and Douglas had no longer been around as much to share in the fun. But she still knew the loch like the back of her hand. They were swimming away from the house, towards the far side of the wide loch where the wooden jetty jutted out. That shore was closer and after all the pilot had been through, Constance didn’t think he could swim all the way back in the direction from which she had come.

      She slowed to swim alongside the exhausted man, ready to drag him along if he should give up. But he continued. He asked only once how far away the edge was and after a few minutes Constance felt pebbles and sharp stones beneath her bare feet.

      She turned to take his hand, to pull him from the lake. Weak from his ordeal, he grabbed her hand willingly, stumbled at the shoreline and then lowered himself down, crawling on his hands and knees out of the water. He lay on his front, facing away from her, and breathed deeply.

      Exhausted, not from the swim but from panic, Constance fell down next to him. It was only as she sat still that she realised how cold she was and she began shivering. She hugged her bare arms but it was of little use whilst she was in wet clothes. The pilot turned to look at her, wide-eyed with shock, and then looked around at his surroundings. She could barely see his face in the darkness. His wet hair fell partly over his eyes, which were now trained on her face.

      When he finally got his breath back he asked, ‘Where in God’s name did you spring from?’

      Constance raised her hand and pointed across the water. ‘The house. But I was already down by the loch.’

      He nodded and looked to where she pointed. But Invermoray House, in blackout and so far away, was indiscernible. ‘Were you on your own?’

      ‘By the water, yes.’ She shivered.

      ‘You’re cold,’ he said as he forced himself onto his hands and knees again and then turned slowly into a sitting position.

      ‘Yes,’ she said simply. ‘Aren’t you?’

      ‘I suppose I am.’

      ‘We must get dry,’ Constance said as she stood. The thin fabric of her dress clung to her wet skin. Goose bumps covered her.

      ‘Where? To the house?’ he asked. ‘I’m not going back in that water to reach it.’

      ‘It’s СКАЧАТЬ