Cavendon Hall. Barbara Taylor Bradford

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       TWO

      The library at Cavendon was a beautifully proportioned room. It had two walls of high-soaring mahogany bookshelves, reaching up to meet a gilded coffered ceiling painted with flora and fauna in brilliant colours. A series of tall windows faced the long terrace that stretched the length of the house. At each end of the window wall were French doors.

      Even though it was May, and a sunny day, there was a fire burning in the grate, as there usually was all year round. Charles Ingham, the 6th Earl of Mowbray, was merely following the custom set by his grandfather and father before him. Both men had insisted on a fire in the room, whatever the weather. Charles fully understood why. The library was the coldest room at Cavendon, even in the summer months, and this was a peculiarity no one had ever been able to fathom.

      This morning, as he came into the library and walked directly towards the fireplace, he noticed that a George Stubbs painting of a horse was slightly lopsided. He went over to straighten it. Then he picked up the poker and jabbed at the logs in the grate. Sparks flew upwards, the logs crackled, and after jabbing hard at them once more, he returned the poker to the stand.

      Charles stood for a moment in front of the fire, his hand resting on the mantelpiece, caught up in his thoughts. His wife Felicity had just left to visit her sister in Harrogate, and he wondered again why he had not insisted on accompanying her. Because she didn’t want you to go, an internal voice reminded him. Accept that.

      Felicity had taken their eldest daughter Diedre with her. ‘Anne will be more at ease, Charles. If you come, she will feel obliged to entertain you properly, and that will be an effort for her,’ Felicity had explained at breakfast.

      He had given in to her, as he so often did these days. But then his wife always made sense. He sighed to himself, his thoughts focused on his sister-in-law. She had been ill for some time, and they had been worried about her; seemingly she had good news to impart today, and had invited her sister to lunch to share it.

      Turning away from the fireplace, Charles walked across the Persian carpet, making for the antique Georgian partners’ desk, and sat down in the chair behind it.

      Thoughts of Anne’s illness lingered, and then he reminded himself how practical and down-to-earth Diedre was. This was reassuring. It struck him that at twenty Diedre was probably the most sensible of his children. Guy, his heir, was twenty-two, and a relatively reliable young man, but unfortunately he had a wild streak that sometimes reared up. It worried Charles.

      Miles, of course, was the brains in the family; he had something of an intellectual bent, even though he was only fourteen, and artistic. He never worried about Miles. He was utterly loyal: true blue.

      And then there were his other three daughters. Daphne, at seventeen, the great beauty of the family. A pure English rose, with looks to break any man’s heart. He had grand ambitions for his Daphne. He would arrange a great marriage for her. A duke’s son, nothing less.

      Her sister DeLacy was the most fun, if he was truthful; quite a mischievous twelve-year-old. Charles was aware she had to grow up a bit, and unexpectedly a warm smile touched his mouth. DeLacy always managed to make him laugh, and entertained him with her comical antics. His last child, five-year-old Dulcie, was adorable; much to his astonishment, she was already a person in her own right, with a mind of her own.

      Lucky, I’ve been lucky, he thought, reaching for the morning’s post. Six lovely children, all of them quite extraordinary in their own way. I have been blessed, he reminded himself. Truly blessed with my wife and this admirable family we’ve created. I am the most fortunate of men.

      As he shuffled through the post, one envelope in particular caught his eye. It was postmarked Zurich, Switzerland. Puzzled, he slit the envelope with a silver opener, and took out the letter.

      When he glanced at the signature, Charles was taken aback. The letter had been written by his first cousin, Hugo Ingham Stanton. He hadn’t heard from Hugo since he had left Cavendon at sixteen, although Hugo’s father had told Charles his son had fared well in the world. He had often wondered about what had become of Hugo. No doubt he was about to find out now.

       April 26th, 1913

       Zurich

       My dear Charles,

       I am sure that you will be surprised to receive this letter from me after all these years. However, because I left Cavendon in the most peculiar circumstances, and at such odds with my mother, I decided it would be better if I cut all contact with the family at that time. Hence my long silence.

       I continued to see my father until the day he died. No one else wrote to me in New York, and I therefore did not have the heart to put pen to paper. And so years have passed without contact.

       I will not bore you with a long résumé of my life for the past sixteen years. Suffice it to say that I did well, and I was particularly lucky that Father sent me to his friend, Benjamin Silver. I became an apprentice in Mr Silver’s real-estate company in New York. He was a good man, and brilliant. He taught me everything there was to learn about the real-estate business, and, I might add, he taught me well.

       I acquired invaluable knowledge, and, much to my own surprise, I was a success. When I was twenty-two I married Mr Silver’s daughter, Loretta. We had a very happy union for nine years, but sadly there were no children. Always fragile in health, Loretta died here in Zurich a year ago, much to my sorrow and distress. For the past year, since her passing, I have continued to live in Zurich. However, loneliness has finally overtaken me, and I have a longing to come back to the country of my birth. And so I have now made the decision to СКАЧАТЬ