Contents (57)
- Prologue
- 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
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- Also by Sharon Gosling
MacDonald must also have been aware of the true nature of the lighthouse, because as the builder he must have been the one to install this room in the first place. The original architectural plans for the tower were something else the room had hidden, curled within the fragile rolls of paper she pulled out one by one and opened out across the circle of white marble. Rachel’s hands had shaken the first time she’d unfurled one of the large scrolls and realized what she had in her hands. The spidery black ink had barely faded. There was little age spotting, despite the date she could see inscribed on the bottom corner.
1812.
This figure alone gave her goosebumps. If that were not enough, the initials beside the date further prickled at Rachel’s skin.
E.A.M.
These initials were on every one of the designs for the lighthouse tower, for which there were many. As far as Rachel could tell, they showed the progression from early idea to the final architectural blueprints that were used during construction. The last was crumpled in places, the paper far more pored over than its predecessors. In some places there were distinct fingerprints, and she could imagine the foreman of the works standing with the architect, one of them pointing to something on the map they were following in order to shape the folly. How many documents like this existed, which told such a clear story and in such pristine condition? There were notebooks, too, full of the same florid writing that was on the note, and Rachel quickly understood that beyond the camera obscura itself – for which there were also multiple designs – she had found a treasure trove of historical information that someone, probably tucked away in the corridors of a dusty museum somewhere, would delight in dedicating a good portion of their lives to cataloguing.
Cullen MacDonald had been no fool, and was an avid classicist besides. If he’d known what was up here, he must have known how valuable it was.
‘All those years of struggle and worry,’ Rachel found herself saying aloud to the small, empty room. ‘Cullen – why didn’t you ever tell anyone?’
She supposed the answer to that question lay within the mystery of the room itself, and so too the note, the explicit request for secrecy. Why was it so important that this place be sealed up and forgotten? Who had written the note? E.A.M. seemed to be the architect of the tower – which was in itself a surprise, since Cullen had always told her that James MacDonald had built it himself. The story Cullen had told was brief, glib and faintly deprecating. Rachel wondered now if it had also been a deliberate deflection from a truth her friend knew but had not felt was his to reveal.
Rachel wondered if she could discover it for herself in the time she had left. The answer must be there somewhere, amid this storm tide of paper. It would be good, she decided, if she could give Alan Crosswick a true accounting of the James MacDonald Tower. Any heir would want to know exactly what it was they had inherited, wouldn’t they? If there was no heir, if there was just an external buyer, the knowledge of this history – whatever the specifics would turn out to be – would surely be even more important.