The Rookery: An unputdownable Victorian crime novel (A Penny Green Victorian Mystery Book 2) by Emily Organ

Author:Emily Organ [Organ, Emily]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Storm Publishing
Published: 2024-11-04T00:00:00+00:00

Back at my lodgings, I made myself a cup of cocoa, sat by the fire and read some more of my father’s diary entries. I read them more thoroughly this time, searching the words for any clues to what Eliza had alluded to earlier that evening.

I travelled by mule from the Lebrija River to Bucaramanga, and from thence along a pleasant valley of sugar cane, coffee and tobacco to the small town of Piedecuesta, where the local people make cigars and straw hats. I collected some specimens of Epidendrum atropurpureum, which grows plentifully here, and continued my journey along a narrow mule track up to La Mesa de Los Santos, a plain 6,000 feet above the level of the sea.

Here the mighty condor can be seen, the span of its wings reaching up to ten feet. I observed one soaring without a beat of its wings for the best part of half an hour. Cattleya mendelii is to be found on the vertiginous rock faces which descend from this great plain. I have heard of orchid hunters dangling natives on ropes over these precipices in order to retrieve the beautiful specimens.

Unwilling to risk the life or limb of myself or any other man, I rode on to Los Santos and then Curiti, where the last portion of my journey was completed on foot. Before long, I came across a profusion of rose-coloured Cattleya mendelii among the ferns and bromeliads. After constructing a makeshift basket out of twigs, I collected as many plants as I could and prayed that at least a dozen would survive the heat of the journey back to the river.

I still felt certain that my father’s final visit had been to the falls of Tequendama. His diaries and drawings had been discovered by a search party in a hut not far from the falls.

I would need to return to the reading room and once again examine the map which Mr Edwards had found for me. La Mesa de Los Santos sounded like a magical place to me, and I pictured my father there watching the soaring condor. I closed my eyes and wished I could have been there to share the sight with him.

What had Eliza meant? And why had she refused to tell me?

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