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
‘Tomorrow, I shall ask your aunt to ride with me to Vellanoweth. She has no plan to go there but she’ll not refuse, she goes at every other opportunity. She can hear me say a special farewell to the man who dares call me a bastard-crow before he leaves for his moorland dirt-farm.’
Twenty-Six
The rose garden at the manor was at its best. Set out in a rectangle, the beds were arranged in arcs and scallops, then four oval shapes around a central circle, every rose bearing both buds and fully opened blossoms, which filled the air with their strong intoxicating scents and gratified the senses with their dazzling colours.
Neglecting her dress by sitting on a corner of one of the dew-laden grass paths, Cordelia’s mind, however, was on the grape hyacinths she had picked before talking and walking with Morgan Kinver. Like the grape hyacinths he was not completely cultivated, yet not wild or uncouth. She liked his calm speech and thoughtful ways. She liked his clean smell better than the cologne Luke splashed on himself. More often Luke stank of spilled alcohol – he drank too much.
Cordelia was still smarting over his unjust anger with her. ‘Where the hell were you when Alicia fainted? Anything could have happened to her. Don’t you care?’ he had shouted. Who on earth had he thought he had been talking to? A bone-idle servant? A woman of the streets? Those were the sort of people who deserved such reproach. Not she, who worked herself tirelessly in running his house to a well-timed efficiency, so he was able to go about his writing undisturbed. And why must Alicia always come first? She did, every day and in every way, even if Luke said she did not. He must be in love with her. What other explanation was there for the way he cared about her comfort and her whereabouts, and the special way he smiled at her, the soft voice he kept just for her. He was always looking at her, when his mind wasn’t on his play it was on her.
All the devotion she, herself, had given him over many long years counted for nothing.
Well, I have another man interested in me now. How do you like that? she asked Luke’s arrogant image in her mind.
Before parting with Morgan Kinver after their walk, he had asked her politely, ‘May I take the liberty of asking to see you again?’
She had not replied and he had conceded his improper suggestion by dropping his eyes, stepping backwards and giving an apologetic bow.
‘Perhaps you will think about it.’
Perhaps she would.
‘Perfect, don’t move, hold that pose exactly as it is. Never have I seen a more beautifully melancholy expression in such a heavenly setting.’