The Return of Lord Conistone by Lucy Ashford

Author:Lucy Ashford [Ashford, Lucy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4603-4960-1
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2011-09-04T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

Bentinck had caught up with Verena as she left the house, making her jump when he said, ‘Maybe I should come with you on your walk, ma’am? It’s getting late’.

‘Nonsense, Bentinck! It’s only four o’clock, it won’t be dark for hours! Anyway, I told you you’re dismissed!’

‘Not till tomorrow,’ he replied calmly.

‘As far as I’m concerned,’ returned Verena, ‘your duties are over as from now!’ She ordered him to go to the south meadow, telling him that some suspicious-looking characters had been reported there earlier. ‘Possibly French spies,’ she warned. That did the trick; it got him heading in completely the opposite direction, while she set off westwards to Stancliffe Manor.

Whenever they used to visit Stancliffe as children, Verena had hated how she and her sisters were told always to curtsy and be silent before the Earl, to speak only when spoken to. The last time she had been here was a little over two years ago, during her father’s final summer in England. She’d known he was going to Portsmouth that very night on his travels again, so she’d walked across the fields to meet him and waited for him outside the big, forbidding house.

Usually her father and the Earl talked for hours about places they’d visited overseas, for the Earl too had voyaged abroad. But that last time, Verena had heard sharp voices drifting out from the open window of the Earl’s study.

‘You are a fool, Sheldon!’ the Earl had exploded. ‘You married a silly, empty-headed fool of a wife and you cannot expect me to bail you all out!’

Verena, listening white and shocked, could hear no more. When her father came out, they walked home in near silence. He just said, in a low voice, ‘I have to go away again this one more time, Verena. But believe me, when I come home I will be rich and we will be beholden to no one!’

* * *

Suddenly, as she turned to take the footpath that led to Stancliffe Manor, she stopped.

Was she mistaken? Or did she remember that as her father set out to visit the Earl that last time, he’d carried his diary with him, the slim red leather-bound volume in which he’d recorded every detail of his travels? She’d assumed he had it with him when he died—that was why she’d always told Lucas she had no idea where it was.

But did he have it with him when he came away from Stancliffe?

She couldn’t remember. All she remembered was the hurry he’d been in to get away. His bags had already been packed, and he had lost no time in heading straight for Portsmouth, to sail away that very night, for ever.

Now Stancliffe Manor was in view, at the end of a long, chestnut-lined driveway. The skies were growing leaden again and she quickened her step. Through the grounds ran a river, which had been dammed half a century ago to form a picturesque lake with several wooded islands connected by ornamental footbridges. On

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