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For His Eyes Only(54)

By:Liz Fielding


                ‘You’re such a cynic, Darius Hadley.’

                Off the dangerous territory of recent history, he grinned. ‘A realist. Who’s going to challenge you if you say Jane Austen stayed one wet week in April and, confined to the house, spun a story to keep everyone amused?’

                ‘I have no doubt that some obsessive Janeite would know exactly where she was during that particular week.’

                ‘Really?’

                ‘I’m afraid so. They didn’t have email or Skype or television to keep them amused so they wrote long detailed letters to their family and friends telling them where they were, what they were doing. And instead of blogging, they kept diaries...’ She lifted her hands in a ta-da gesture.

                ‘Being caught out in a blatant lie might grab the house another headline. Mad Estate Agent Lies About Austen Connection?’ he offered. ‘You did say any publicity would be good publicity.’

                ‘I think you’ve had all that kind of “good” publicity you can handle and I’m trying to restore my reputation, not sink it without a trace so, unless you can point me to an entry in one your ancestors’ diaries along the lines that “Mrs Austen visited with her daughters, Cassandra and Jane. It rained all week, but Jane kept the children amused acting out scenes from a little history of England she has written...” we’ll save that as a last resort.’

                ‘You’re the expert,’ he said. ‘You’ll find the diaries in my grandmother’s room. She was writing a history of the house. I don’t know if she ever finished it.’

                ‘A history?’ She was practically speechless. ‘There’s a history! For heaven’s sake, Darius, talk about pulling hen’s teeth!’

                He grinned. ‘I’ve made the woman happy. If there’s nothing else?’

                ‘No... Yes...’ She fished in the picnic bag and produced a small plastic box. ‘Take Gary these cookies from me. They’re not as healthy as grapes, but they’ll help a cup of hospital tea go down.’

                * * *

                Tash let herself into the house, dealt with the alarm and then, as the Land Rover rattled into life, she turned and watched it disappear as the drive dipped and curved through the woods. It seemed a little early for hospital visiting, but he’d shown no interest in going inside the house and she suspected that it served as a useful excuse to avoid whatever it was that he didn’t want to talk about.

                Despite her airy assurance that she would be fine, it was a huge old place, undoubtedly full of ghosts and, as she opened the glazed doors that led from the entrance lobby into the main reception hall, what struck her first was the stillness, the silence.

                Out of the corner of her eye she saw something move, but when she swung round she realised that it was only her reflection in a dusty mirror.

                Heart beating in her throat, she looked around but nothing stirred except the dust motes she’d set dancing in the sunlight pouring down from the lantern fifty feet above her and, just for a moment, she was back in the studio with Darius holding her, limp, sated in his arms. Reliving the desperate frustration when that wretched guard had turned up.

                They were so not done.

                No, no, no... Concentrate...

                Beneath the mirror, an ornate clock on the hall table had long since stopped. Dead leaves had drifted into the corner of each tread of that dratted staircase. All it needed was a liveried footman asleep against the newel post and she would have stepped into the Sleeping Beauty picture book she’d had as a child.