Pengarron Dynasty
Chapters (50)
- Cover
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- The Pengarron Sagas
- The Harvey Family Sagas
Cover
Dedication
To my brothers, Raymon and Ted, and my sisters, Sandria, Sylvia and Rosemarie, and their spouses
One
The house in St James’s Street, London, was well ablaze. Dense smoke and bright flames were curling out of all the downstairs windows and the screams of terror inside were competing with the noise of cracking and falling timbers and splintering glass as the windows exploded.
Rounding the corner from Jermyn Street, Luke Pengarron and his servant broke into a run.
‘God help us, Jack, Lord Longbourne’s house is on fire!’
They flew up the debris-strewn front steps and kicked and battered on the door. Anxious onlookers and ghoulish spectators were gathering, all too afraid to help.
When the door finally crashed open under their combined weight, the two men fought their way upstairs. There were signs that the house had been ransacked. Choking on the smoke and scorched by the terrible heat of the flames, they tore into the drawing room.
Luke gave a groan of anguish and pushed Jack back out of the room.
‘We can do nothing for Lord Longbourne. He’s dead.’ Stabbed through the heart, the particular mark of retribution of the Society. No knife protruded from the wound, and the flames, starting their deadly dance on the young peer’s feet, would burn away all evidence of the assassination. Two male servants who, no doubt, had gone to their master’s aid also lay dead.
‘Sophia! We must save her!’ Jack bawled above the din of the steadily collapsing house.
They heard screams coming from further along the corridor. Sophia Glanville was trapped in her room.
Without thought for their own safety Luke and Jack ran on through the inferno, leaping over the gaping holes left by burnt-away floorboards, thrusting aside anything in their way, even if it was on fire. When they got to Sophia’s room they found it had been barricaded. Heaving aside a heavy marble table, they burst in through the door.
Sophia and her maid, both coughing and choking, were huddled together on the far side of the room, next to an open window. Flames were eating away the centre of the floor and more tall, spiralling darts of orange-red were riding the bedposts and its flowing drapes.
‘Come to us!’ Jack yelled to them. ‘We’ll lead you to safety.’
‘Alex! Where’s Alex?’ Sophia cried, her fine face blackened by smoke and frozen with fear. ‘There were men, their faces were masked.’
‘Get her out, Jack. I’ll take the maid,’ Luke ordered, winding his neckcloth round his face so he might breathe better.