Whisper Of Darkness
Whisper Of Darkness
Anne Mather
Mills & Boon are excited to present The Anne Mather Collection – the complete works by this classic author made available to download for the very first time! These books span six decades of a phenomenal writing career, and every story is available to read unedited and untouched from their original release. Beware the boss…As the third governess to take on problem child Anya Shelton, Joanna was expecting a little more gratitude from Anya’s father, Jake Sheldon. She can’t believe the antagonism she encounters from her frosty, classically handsome employer. How dare he treat her in such an unprofessional manner? Soon Jake’s reclusive ways raise more questions – why does he persist in cutting himself and his daughter off from the world? But something about the prickly Jake draws Joanna in, and she has to ask herself – why is she so concerned about him…?
Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous collection of fantastic novels by bestselling, much loved author
ANNE MATHER
Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the
publishing industry, having written over one hundred
and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than
forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.
This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance
for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful,
passionate writing has given.
We are sure you will love them all!
I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun—staggered by what’s happened.
I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.
These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.
We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is mystic-am@msn.com (mailto:mystic-am@msn.com) and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.
Whisper of Darkness
Anne Mather
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Table of Contents
Cover (#u23db74d7-513a-5015-bc95-ca66de23c4f1)
About the Author (#ue3275275-a80a-5142-81bd-70a6e7469f65)
Title Page (#u2a5abf43-ba4a-5525-babe-e98b28fa021b)
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#uab0e73da-f895-55c4-a58a-0a6601101f9c)
THE track to Ravengarth wound up over the rise, or so the bus driver had informed her, casting a rather amused glance at her high heels. It followed the contours of the low stone wall, narrow and pitted with tyre tracks, and treacherously slippy after the rain the night before.
‘There’s no proper road to Ravengarth,’ he had insisted, when she had protested she had been told otherwise, and the murmurings among the other passengers had convinced her that she was holding them up unnecessarily. She had climbed down, lugging her heavy suitcase behind her, and coughed in some resentment at its departing expulsion of fumes.
The road she was on was little more than a lane as it was. High hedges, thick with the fruits of autumn, hugged the ditches at either side, and the only sound after the bus had departed was the distant bleating of some sheep. It was remote, and isolated, and even slightly unnerving, a sensation Joanna was not at all used to feeling.
Stiffening her shoulders, she determinedly pushed such fanciful notions aside. There was no point in indulging in regrets. She was here. She had a job of work at last. And anything was better than the hand-to-mouth existence she and her mother had lived for the past six months.
Even so, as she began to climb the muddy track, sticking as close to the wall as she could to avoid the more obvious potholes, she couldn’t help a wry grimace at the realisation of how ill-prepared she had been to face a situation as this. Who would have thought that her education at an exclusive girls’ school, followed by an equally expensive sojourn at a finishing school in Switzerland, should have produced someone so evidently lacking in useful accomplishments? It was true that her schooldays had been dogged by reports that read: ‘Joanna is an intelligent girl, but she pays too little attention to her lessons.’ Or: ‘Joanna is very popular with her school friends, but she must spare more time for her studies.’ Nevertheless, her results had been only a little below average, and what use were ‘O’ or ‘A’ levels to someone who was destined to marry into a wealthy family like her own, and whose main task in life would be the running of her husband’s home?
At the top of the rise she stood for a moment, regaining her breath as she surveyed the distance she had yet to cover. The track wound down for a while, disappearing into a belt of trees, and beyond the trees she could vaguely see the chimneys of a house. That must be Ravengarth, she thought a little irritably. At least half a mile away. Couldn’t they have sent someone to meet her? There were not that many buses that ran from Penrith to Ravensmere. Surely someone could have taken the trouble to find out what time her train arrived.
Realising there was no point in wasting time in silent imprecations, she picked up her case again and began to descend the downward track. Although the climb she had just undertaken had been harder, she soon realised it was easier to keep one’s feet going up than coming down. Stones, seemingly embedded in mud, moved when she placed her foot upon them, and once or twice she had to snatch at the stone wall to keep her balance. Her temper was not improved by the knowledge that the mud would doubtless stain the navy blue suede of her boots, and it squelched sulkily beneath her, as if anticipating her eventual downfall.
By the time she reached the gate which opened into the copse, Joanna was hot and tired, and the autumn beauty of the surrounding hills made no impression on her irritated disposition. It was a cool September afternoon, and she had dressed accordingly in a belted coat of wine-dark suede over a sweater dress of a toning rose colour. Aunt Lydia had expressly said that she should be prepared for it being cooler in the Lake District, and she had taken her advice without question. Now, she felt she could have done without the warm clothing or the boots, though wellingtons would not have come amiss.
Beyond the gate, a notice reading: ‘Private Land. Trespassers will be prosecuted’ aroused only a moment’s interest. Obviously Mr Sheldon did not encourage visitors, and remembering what Aunt Lydia had told her about him, perhaps it was understandable. He had chosen to hide himself away from the world, and obviously he would not welcome intruders.
The birds in the trees all around her were making their preparations for the night, and protested loudly as her feet crunched on fallen twigs and other debris, left by the previous night’s rain. She supposed the lane was wide enough to take a Land Rover, and probably that was what one would need to get up that rutted track, but apparently Mr Sheldon’s staff were not cosseted in that way, and Joanna’s lips tightened as her case began to hang ever more heavily from her aching fingers.
Then two things happened so suddenly that seconds later the offending suitcase had fallen from her nerveless grasp. There was a shot, a distinct explosion of sound, that ricocheted round the copse with an ear-splitting blast that sent all the birds skyward in panic-stricken flight. Joanna knew how they felt. She wished she could escape in similar fashion. But instead she was forced to remain where she was, albeit shaking from the tips of her toes to the top of her head, and gaze at the diminutive figure that had sprung out of the trees just after the shot and now stood facing her in the middle of the track.
What was it? she asked herself, dry-mouthed, staring at the aggressive creature that confronted her, still gripping the smoking shotgun in its hand. No more than four and a half feet tall, dressed in filthy jeans and ragged sweater, a cap pulled down low over its eyes, she guessed it must be a poacher she had disturbed at his work, and judging by the size of him, little more than a boy.
Not that this reassured her. Nowadays children committed the most abominable crimes, and she was in no position to argue with a cartridge full of small shot. Somehow she had to convince him that she presented no threat to his livelihood, and to this end, she took a tentative step forward.
‘Stay where y’are!’
The voice was pitched low, but its message was unmistakable, and Joanna licked her lips and tried again.
‘I—if you’ll get out of my way, I promise I won’t mention having seen you,’ she said, in what she hoped was her best and most convincing tone. ‘Honestly, I’m not interested in what you’re doing. I just want to get on my way——’
‘—to Ravengarth,’ finished the boy gruffly. ‘Aye, I know all about that. But you can’t go to Ravengarth. You’re not welcome there. If I was you, I’d go back where I came from, before I point this gun in your direction.’
Joanna could hardly believe her ears. This simply could not be happening, she thought incredulously. Any minute now she would wake up to find Lottie by the bed with her breakfast tray, and Ravengarth and Jake Sheldon and his troublesome daughter would still be just an idea in Aunt Lydia’s neatly coiffured head. Nightmares like this were an occupational hazard, and in a day or two she would find someone who welcomed her services, who did not require certificates and diplomas to prove that she could teach good manners to their small offspring, or handle the kind of correspondence she had been receiving herself for years.
But it was no nightmare. Without thinking she took another involuntary step forward, and the woods rang again with the deafening roar of the shotgun. It dispelled for ever the thought that this might not be happening, and Joanna stepped back quickly, tripped over her case, and sat down heavily on a mouldy pile of leaves.
What happened then shocked her almost as much as the shotgun had done. The child, for it was obviously nothing more, started laughing, shrill peals of merriment filled the air that was still trembling after the explosion, and amidst her fear, and the dismay at the ruination of her coat, a surge of angry suspicion swelled inside her. She tried desperately to recall exactly what Aunt Lydia had told her about Antonia Sheldon, but all she could remember was her age—eleven years—and the fact that she had succeeded in ridding herself of three governesses in as many months.
However, before she could struggle to her feet and put her suspicions to the test, another figure strode out of the woods behind the child, a tall, equally threatening figure in the gloom cast by the trees, who grasped the barrel of the shotgun in a powerful hand, wrenching it out of the child’s grasp. At the same time, the man grabbed hold of the urchin before it could move, holding it securely by the scruff of the neck, as he transferred his attention to Joanna.
She, for her part, got to her feet with as much elegance as her shaking legs would permit her, brushing away the muddy leaves, and endeavouring to regain her composure. Aware of them watching her with varying degrees of hostility, she realised that until now she had not even speculated about the man who was to be her employer, but across the yards of track that separated them she was suddenly made aware that if this was he, he was not the prematurely-aged invalid she had imagined.
‘Miss Seton?’ The man was speaking now, ignoring the howling that had replaced the peals of laughter issuing from his prisoner’s mouth, and she nodded. ‘If you’re not hurt, perhaps you’ll follow me.’
Joanna gasped. That was it! No apology, no explanation; no offer to carry her suitcase that was as muddy now as her coat. He had simply turned away, propelling the screaming child ahead of him, the safely breached shotgun hooked over his free arm. Of course, he might have found some difficulty in handling the shotgun, the suitcase and the child, she acknowledged reasonably, but he didn’t even offer any regret at this deficiency in his capabilities.
Clamping her jaws together, Joanna hoisted her suitcase once more and set off in pursuit of her apparently unwilling rescuer. To add to her weariness, her legs were decidedly unsteady now, and resentment flared anew at this cavalier treatment. She was doing them the favour, goodness knows, she muttered peevishly. She didn’t have to come here. She didn’t have to stay. And if this was the kind of treatment the other governesses had had, no wonder they hadn’t stayed either!
They emerged from the trees above an incline, with a trout stream gurgling at its foot. Approximately halfway down the slope, the house she had glimpsed earlier clung tenaciously to the hillside, its grey walls mellowed by russet-coloured creeper. The track wound down to its stone gateposts, and set around the main building were stables and garages and the usual miscellany of outhouses. It was bigger that Joanna had expected, larger, but not so well-kept, and she wondered if they had the same problem with housekeepers as they had with governesses.
She had not yet seen the man’s face clearly. In the shadows of the wood it had been impossible to glimpse more than an impression of his features, and besides, she had been too shocked and disturbed to pay much attention to his appearance. He was tall and powerful, lean without being thin, with strong muscular thighs that swung him down the track without any apparent effort. Was this Jake Sheldon? she wondered, struggling after him. Could it be? She would know soon enough if he turned and let her see the scars which Aunt Lydia had said had driven him to take refuge in this remote and isolated part of the country.
The child was something else. She found it incredible to believe that the uncouth demon of the copse was in reality an eleven-year-old girl! What was her father thinking of, allowing her to run around in that state, and with a loaded shotgun in her hand? She could have killed herself. She could have killed Joanna! And after all, that was the greater of the two evils so far as Joanna was concerned.
The child’s cries had subsided to a muffled sobbing by the time they reached the gates of Ravengarth, but Joanna could not find it in her heart to feel sorry for her. She had to be crazy, brandishing a deadly weapon like that, and Joanna’s belief in her own capabilities suffered a distinct setback at the prospect of teaching such a child.
A pair of long-haired sheepdogs set up a noisy barking at their approach, bounding out to greet them with more excitement than aggression. They fawned around their master and his charge for a moment, and then came to inspect Joanna, apparently finding her equally acceptable. As watchdogs they were decidedly unprofessional, thought Joanna dryly, but as pets they were adorable.
The man let go of the child as they entered a gloomy entrance hall, unpleasantly scented with the smell of boiled cabbage, and administering a distinct slap to her small backside, bade her go and make herself respectable immediately. Then, as she scampered towards the stairs that curved round two walls of the hall, he turned sharply into a room on his left, asking Joanna to follow him.
Joanna did so, after setting down her suitcase with great relief. As she straightened, however, her eyes again encountered those of the child now leaning dangerously far over the banister rail, and the impudent contempt in that stare made her long to repeat the punishment her father had given, with interest. If she had to take this job, and in spite of her vain posturings she hadn’t much alternative, sooner or later Miss Sheldon would have to understand she was no longer dealing with some timid, self-effacing old lady.
The room into which her employer—she assumed he was her employer—led her was a library of sorts, although many of the shelves were empty of books, their places having been taken by folders of what appeared to be artwork. There were canvases everywhere, propped against the walls, and the bookcases, some even occupied the chairs where possible, and others were spread across the heavy mahogany desk that sat squarely beneath the long windows. The air was musky with the smell of oils, and faintly stale from the neglected shelves of books.
The man positioned himself beside the desk, deliberately, Joanna later decided. There was not much light from the overcast sky, but what there was fell fully on to his scarred and battered countenance, and she was left in no doubt that this was indeed Jake Sheldon.
‘Well?’ he said, as if challenging her with his appearance. ‘It’s not a pretty sight, is it? But then you knew that, didn’t you? Someone must have told you—have warned you.’
Joanna wondered if anyone had ever had a more peculiar introduction to a job. A child, who dressed and spoke and behaved like a boy—a particularly objectionable boy at that—and a man who had apparently been deprived of his manners in the same accident in which he had been deprived of his livelihood. They had said he was a brilliant mathematician, a skilled and accomplished engineer, a man with a computer for a brain. And what was he now? An indifferent farmer, a part-time painter, and the father of a child who was evidently free to do exactly as she liked.
And he was challenging her to dispute his appearance, to deny that it shocked her feminine sensitivities. His face was scarred, it was true, but it was by no means repugnant, and she wondered if he realised how time had mellowed old wounds and given his ravaged face a certain strength and character. Some women might even find his rugged features attractive, and Joanna realised that Aunt Lydia and her mother could have had no idea of how old he actually was. Aunt Lydia’s description had been vague at best, and because he had a nineteen-year-old son she had evidently assumed he was well into middle age. But Joanna, facing him in that revealing light, saw that he was probably on the right side of forty, and this was going to prove a most unsuitable arrangement if no other help was kept. If his expression had not been so grimly serious, she might have allowed a small smile to tilt the corners of her mouth, but the situation was still far too volatile to take such liberties.
‘Cat got your tongue?’ he enquired now, cynically, turning from the window to flick through the canvases on the desk, and she endeavoured to gather her thoughts.
‘My godmother told me you required someone to take care of your daughter,’ she ventured at last. ‘I assume that was your daughter who—greeted me on my arrival.’
His lower lip jutted as he surveyed her slightly dishevelled appearance. It was a full lower lip; it might even be called sensual. And Joanna was given the piercing appraisal of narrowed amber eyes.
‘I suppose I should apologise for Antonia, shouldn’t I?’ he remarked, as if considering the proposition, and the disarming amusement which had briefly dispelled her indignation vanished.
‘Perhaps she should apologise for herself?’ she retorted, controlling her resentment with difficulty. ‘And I would suggest she is forbidden to run wild with firearms in future.’
His shoulders stiffened. ‘Oh, you would, would you?’
‘Yes.’ Joanna drew herself up to her full height, but even then her five feet six inches fell far short of his superior measure. ‘I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request. She could have killed me in the woods. Obviously she doesn’t understand——’
‘She understands very well,’ he interrupted her harshly, the dark brows descending with ominous intent. ‘She’s known how to handle guns for the past two years—I taught her. You were in no danger.’ He paused, allowing his astonishing words to sink in. ‘You were, however, subjected to a certain amount of—intimidation.’
‘Intimidation! Is that what you call it?’ Joanna could feel the colour sweeping up her normally pale cheeks. ‘How was I to know who she was or what she was doing? She was filthy. She was wearing boy’s clothes. She could have been a thief—a poacher, disturbed at his work!’
‘I see you have a vivid imagination, Miss Seton. That’s—unfortunate. I would have preferred someone a little more—unimaginative.’
His hesitation before using that particular adjective was deliberate, Joanna felt, pinpointing as it did his evident opinion of her. She had never encountered such indifference from a man before, or experienced such a feeling of blind frustration. She didn’t know exactly what she had anticipated, but certainly nothing like this, and his defence of the child was in complete opposition to his expected reaction. She felt like flinging his job back in his face, and only the thought of her mother’s disappointment if she returned to London without giving it a chance kept her silent.
‘So,’ he said, indicating an upright chair opposite. ‘Won’t you sit down, and we can discuss the situation more—amicably. I understand from my sister that you haven’t had any actual experience of teaching a child before, and that you have in fact been finding it hard to gain employment.’ Joanna sat down on the chair he indicated with a bump. He was certainly frank, she thought indignantly, or perhaps insolent was a better description of his vaguely mocking turn of phrase. In the space of a few sentences he had dismissed her claims of being physically threatened, and reduced her qualifications to nil.
‘I never expected to have to get a job, Mr Sheldon,’ she declared now, holding up her head in icy disdain. ‘Until my father’s death——’
‘Yes, I know,’ he interrupted unpleasantly, tumbling a pile of canvases on to the floor and taking the seat behind the desk. ‘You were a lady of leisure—I had heard. However, I’m not interested in how you came to be looking for a job, rather the accomplishments you have which make you think you are capable of teaching an eleven-year-old.’ Joanna gazed at him, not quite able to hide her astonishment. Did he really think he could speak to her like that, employee or otherwise? How dared he sit here in this rundown house, making excuses for a child who was little more than a barbarian, so far as Joanna could see, and expect her to be grateful for his indulgence in even listening to her? However dismayed her mother might be, surely she would not expect her daughter to be subjected to such treatment.
Grasping the strap of her handbag, Joanna rose to her feet. ‘I don’t think the accomplishments I possess fit me for this position at all, Mr Sheldon,’ she declared coldly. ‘We have obviously both been under some misapprehension about the other. I expected to have to teach a—a little girl, not an uncontrollable adolescent, and if I was prepared to make allowances for the child, I’m certainly not prepared to make allowances for its father!’
If she expected her remarks to arouse some answering retort from him, she was very much mistaken. And while remorse at the recklessness of such a declaration, influenced as it was by the lateness of the hour and a reluctant awareness of her own unfamiliarity with either the area or its transport services, caused her no small anxiety, Jake Sheldon sat there, gazing up at her, a look of sardonic amusement twisting his hard features.
‘You think I’m an ignorant savage, don’t you?’ he asked at last. ‘You’d like very much to tell me what I can do with my job. But from what I hear, you don’t have a great deal of choice.’
Joanna gulped. ‘I can get another job, Mr Sheldon.’
‘Can you?’
He pushed back his own chair now and stood up, dark and intimidating in the rapidly fading light. It was obviously later than she had thought, and the prospect of making her way back to the road and possibly having to thumb a lift back to Penrith was a daunting one. But she would not stay here to be insulted, not by a man who in his rough shirt and waistcoat and mud-splattered corded pants looked more like a gipsy than anything else.
‘I suggest, Miss Seton, that you reconsider,’ he said now. ‘Perhaps I was—hard on you, but you have to understand, it’s over two years since I had any—polite conversation. As to your abilities to teach Anya, that’s something we have both to consider. However, I’m prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt, provided you are prepared to do the same.’
It was scarcely an apology. On the contrary, it was more in the nature of a concession, as if he was overlooking her insolence.
‘I really don’t think I can stay here, Mr Sheldon,’ she insisted, glancing round at the shabby chairs, the equally shabby carpet. ‘I—well, I was misinformed. Your sister told my godmother that your daughter needed eighteen months’ preparation for boarding school. Having seen the child for myself, I suggest her estimate was vastly underrated.’
‘The challenge is too much for you, then?’ he remarked scornfully. ‘I had heard you had spirit, the only evident point in your favour. Apparently that was overrated.’
Joanna’s lips compressed, tom by the conflicting desire to prove to this man that he was wrong, and the conviction that she should leave now before any further humiliation was heaped upon her.
As she hesitated, groping for words, there was a tap on the half-open door behind her, and a slovenly-looking woman appeared in the aperture. Jake Sheldon seemed resigned, but not impatient, at the interruption, and arched black brows above those startling tawny eyes.
‘Yes, Mrs Harris?’
‘What time will you be wanting your supper, sir,’ she enquired, casting a look of avid curiosity in Joanna’s direction, so that she was firmly convinced that was the only reason the woman had appeared. ‘Anya’s tucking into hers in the kitchen, right this minute, but I wondered whether you and the—er—young lady——’
‘Anya’s doing what!’
The thunderous tones obviously cowed the cook—housekeeper?—as much as they shocked Joanna. With a muffled oath her would-be employer strode angrily across the room, disappearing out the door without a backward glance. It was left to Joanna to exchange an awkward glance with Mrs Harris, and they both waited in anxious anticipation for what would happen next.
They did not have long to wait. Seconds later, the silence was broken by a scream of indignation, and two pairs of footsteps could be heard approaching from the kitchens, and then receding up the stairs. These sounds were accompanied by more of the choking sobs Anya had emitted earlier, and the low harsh admonishment of Jake Sheldon’s not unattractive tones.
Mrs Harris waited until they were out of earshot, and then said confidentially: ‘A proper tearaway, that young Anya is, and no mistake. What’s she done now? Why was Mr Sheldon so angry, just ‘cos she was having her supper?’
Joanna licked her dry lips. ‘I—I really don’t know,’ she lied, wishing perversely that Jake Sheldon would hurry and come back, and Mrs Harris’s bony arms folded across her flat bosom.
‘You going to stay then?’ she enquired, apparently determined to make the most of her employer’s absence. ‘I shouldn’t, if I was you. No place for a nicely brought up young lady, this isn’t. And if you expect to make any headway with that limb of Satan,’ she dipped her head significantly in the direction of the door, ‘then you can think again. Three ladies there’ve been, real nice ladies, like yourself. Maybe a bit older, but all with proper qualifications, you know. All gone! Every one of them. Wouldn’t put up with that besom for more than a couple of weeks at a time. Drummed out of school, she was. Been to four schools since she and her father came here, but none of them would keep her. Troublemaker, that’s what they said, nothing but trouble——’
‘Really, Mrs—Harris, is it?’ Joanna had to stop her somehow, ‘I don’t think you ought to be telling me all this. I—er—if I decide not to stay, it won’t be because of anything you’ve said.’
‘But you are thinking of it, then?’ Mrs Harris had heard the note of indecision in her voice. ‘Don’t blame you. Living in this Godforsaken place.’
She pronounced God as Gawd, obviously in no way offended by Joanna’s attempt to silence her. She was a garrulous old gossip, and Joanna’s mother wouldn’t have had her in the house for more than five minutes, but apparently Jake Sheldon had no such misgivings.
‘Mrs Harris …’ Joanna was beginning again, when heavy footsteps sounded once more on the stairs. Evidently Mr Sheldon was returning, and her voice trailed away as he strode back into the room.
‘You may leave us, Mrs Harris,’ he said shortly, seemingly irritated to find her still there. ‘You can serve supper in half an hour. Whether Miss Seton chooses to join me or not is immaterial. Lay a place, just in case.’
‘Yes, sir.’
The woman cast another glance in Joanna’s direction, before going out of the room. Her look was speculative, as if she was mentally calculating whether Joanna would tell her employer what she had been saying, but there was no apprehension in her gaze. Obviously she was not afraid of losing her position, and Joanna could only assume that she had good reason for feeling secure.
With the older woman’s departure, Jake Sheldon’s gaze turned to Joanna once again, and there was weariness as well as impatience in his expression now.
‘Well?’ he said. ‘Do I take it you’ve decided to leave? If so, then I’d better run you into Ravensmere in the Rover. I believe there’s a bus to Penrith in half an hour. I doubt you’ll get a train to London tonight, but the Station Hotel will likely find you a room.’
Joanna hesitated. ‘The child—Antonia; where is she?’
‘In bed,’ he declared indifferently. ‘Nursing her pride, I imagine.’
‘You hit her?’ Joanna couldn’t keep the note of unease out of her voice.
‘She had it coming,’ he replied laconically. ‘And if you’re feeling guilty because of it, forget it. Please don’t imagine it places you under any obligation to stay.’
Joanna sighed. ‘I don’t know what to do.’
‘No?’ He sounded sceptical. ‘I should have thought after what Mrs Harris must have told you, you’d have been standing on the doorstep, your suitcase in your hand.’
‘Mrs Harris never——’ But after a moment, Joanna broke off, realising there was no point in lying to him. ‘That is—I don’t listen to gossip.’
‘Don’t you?’ He shrugged his broad shoulders rather jadedly. ‘You mean you didn’t hear about the other governesses who have tried and failed to discipline my daughter, or the numerous schools I’ve sent Anya to in an effort to improve her education.’
Joanna frowned. ‘Why do you call her Anya? I understood her name was Antonia.’
‘It is.’ He sounded bored with the conversation, but he explained. ‘When she was just learning to talk, she couldn’t say her own name. The consonant was beyond her. She used to call herself An-ia. We—that is, my wife and I—used to call her that, too, and over the years it’s been turned into Anya.’
‘I see.’ It had been a silly question in the circumstances, and Joanna felt rather embarrassed now.
‘Having disposed of that, I suggest you make up your mind what you’re going to do. It’s getting late, and I have work to do.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Joanna almost choked on the apology. What a boor of a man he was! There ought not to be a shred of hesitation in her rejection of his offer, and yet for some reason she was loath to give him that satisfaction. He thought she was frivolous, useless; an ornament, finding the utilitarian world a cold and barren place. She would like the chance to prove to him that this was not so, that she could play just as useful a role in society as anyone else. And to have that chance, she had to ignore all the rudeness and insults he put in her way, and demonstrate her ability to succeed in spite of him.
However, he seemed to have taken her apology as a clear rejection of the position he was offering her. Without another word he had crossed the thinly carpeted floor towards the door, and only her instinctive: ‘Mr Sheldon!’ caused him to pause and look at her.
‘Yes?’
Joanna’s tongue circled her lips once more. ‘I—I’ll stay,’ she said impulsively, and immediately wished that she had not.
‘You will?’ There was a glimmer of relief in the narrowed eyes, but that was all. No great enthusiasm, no words of encouragement or gratitude. Just ‘You will?’ followed by a perfunctory: ‘I’ll get Mrs Harris to show you your room.’
‘No!’ Joanna took an involuntary step forward, and then felt herself colouring, something she had not done in ages. ‘I—that is, couldn’t you just tell me where I’m to sleep? I’m sure I could find my own way. Without—without troubling Mrs Harris.’
‘As you wish.’ He seemed to be mentally washing his hands of the whole affair. It’s the third door on the right at the top of the stairs. If you’ll leave your suitcase, I’ll carry it up later.’
‘I can manage,’ mumbled Joanna unwillingly, biting her tongue against the remark that if she could carry it fully a mile from the bus stop, she could certainly carry it up a few stairs, and he made a dismissive gesture.
‘Very well. But I suggest you leave your unpacking until after supper. Mrs Harris’s meals are best taken hot, and you’ll have plenty of time later to get accustomed to your surroundings.’
Joanna inclined her head. Evidently one did not change for dinner at Ravengarth. She wondered if Jake Sheldon intended to come to the table in the same disreputable gear he was wearing at the moment. It seemed highly likely, and a small voice inside her evinced mild hysteria at her decision to stay. She must be mad, she thought, after Jake Sheldon had left her and she was climbing the stairs. No one should have to pay so heavily just to prove one’s point.
CHAPTER TWO (#uab0e73da-f895-55c4-a58a-0a6601101f9c)
IT was a curious evening, a slightly unreal evening, and lying in bed later that night, Joanna reviewed its events with a certain amount of incredulity. It had definitely not resembled any first evening she might have anticipated, and the feeling of anticlimax she had experienced had not yet dissipated.
Her bedroom, which she had found no difficulty in locating, was quite a spacious apartment, but its appearance matched the rest of the house. Either Jake Sheldon had no money to spend on refurbishment, or he simply didn’t care about his surroundings. The wallpaper was old, and peeling in places where the furniture had been pushed against the walls, the floor’s only covering was linoleum, which would be icy cold to the feet on winter mornings, and the furniture itself would not have disgraced a junkyard. Joanna had been at first appalled, and then amazed, and finally reluctantly amused to find herself in such a situation.
The view from her windows made up in some part for the rest. Although it was getting dark, it was still possible to glimpse the tumbling beauty of the stream, and beyond, the glimmer of a larger expanse of water. In the distance the shadowy fells brooded, dark and mysterious, casting a sheltering arm around the stillness of the valley.
Taking Jake Sheldon’s advice, Joanna had paused only long enough to wash her face at the handbasin she found in her room and apply some fresh make-up before going downstairs. Her hair, despite her ordeal, was still secure in its knot, and the jersey dress was not unwelcome now as the evening grew cooler. There was an ancient radiator in her room, she noticed, but it was stone cold at present, and she wondered if such an antiquated plumbing system was still operational. If not, it was going to be very cold on winter mornings, with only open fires to provide any heat. However, she refused to consider something so nebulous as the future. Right now, she had the present to live with, and despite her determination it was a daunting task she had set herself.
Downstairs again, she found the dining room by means of trial and error. There was no one about, and she glimpsed a sitting room and a cloakroom before finding a room with a table laid for one. This in itself was puzzling enough, but Mrs Harris, who appeared a few moments later, explained in her usual garrulous way that Mr Sheldon would not be taking supper after all.
‘He’s had to go down to the village after Matt Coulston,’ she confided, setting a plate of thick soup in front of Joanna. ‘Been drinking since opening time, he has, and George Page at the Fox and Hounds can’t handle him.’
Joanna picked up her spoon. She was reluctant to ask questions of the housekeeper, but if she was going to live here she would have to know who everyone was, and with a reluctant sigh she ventured: ‘Mr Coulston works for Mr Sheldon?’
‘‘Course he does.’ Mrs Harris stood back from the table, and nodded her greying head. ‘Sort of shepherd and general handyman he is, when he’s sober.’
‘Isn’t it a little early in the evening for anyone to be—intoxicated?’ Joanna asked doubtfully, but Mrs Harris only laughed, a rather unpleasant gurgling cackle, that split her thin lips and displayed a dearth of teeth in her lower jaw.
‘When Matt goes on one of his binges, time doesn’t have anything to do with it,’ she declared with a sniff. ‘He’ll have been drinking since early this morning, and by now he’ll be roaring drunk. There’s only Mr Sheldon can handle him at times like that, but he’ll get him back to his cottage and lock him in until he sobers up.’
‘I see.’ Joanna took her first mouthful of the soup and managed to hide her distaste as its powdery consistency clung to the roof of her mouth. ‘Well—thank you, Mrs Harris. I—er—I’ll have to eat alone.’
For an awful moment after she’d uttered those words, Joanna wondered if the housekeeper would imagine they were some kind of an invitation, but apparently Mrs Harris had other things on her mind.
‘You’re staying, then?’ she probed, lingering by the door. ‘Or is he just putting you up for the night, until you can get a train back to London?’
Joanna was tempted to say it was none of her business, but that would have been unreasonable. After all, Mrs Harris had to cater for the household, though judging by the state of the place her ministrations were by no means satisfactory.
‘I’m staying,’ she replied now, taking another mouthful of soup after surreptitiously stirring it with her spoon. ‘At least for the present. I hope I may have more success than those ladies had.’
‘Some hopes,’ muttered Mrs Harris dourly, and Joanna looked up.
‘You sound pessimistic, Mrs Harris. Anyone would think you didn’t want me to succeed.’
‘Oh, no. No,’ the housekeeper denied this hastily. ‘O’ course, I hope you’re successful. It’s just that—well, Anya’s not like an ordinary child, if you know what I mean. Been too much with adults, she has——’
‘I think you should leave me to learn about—Anya—for myself,’ replied Joanna firmly, cutting her off. ‘This soup is very nice. What are you going to offer me as an entrée, I wonder?’
Mrs Harris frowned, screwing up her mouth. ‘I don’t know what you mean by no on-tree,’ she declared, sniffing again. ‘But there’s lamb chops to follow, and a piece of my custard.’
Joanna endeavoured to appear enthusiastic, and to her relief Mrs Harris took her dismissal. But as the meal progressed, she began to understand why Jake Sheldon had suggested that Mrs Harris’s meals were best taken hot. Lamb was a greasy dish at any time, and in Mrs Harris’s unskilled hands it had been allowed to swim in its own fat. Left to go cold, it would be revolting, and she wondered whether her employer would be expected to eat it later. The vegetables, boiled carrots and potatoes, had fared a little better, but the gravy, like the soup earlier, was inclined to be floury. The custard tart to finish was not set properly, and as she sat over a cup of instant coffee, which anyone could make, Joanna wondered if the housekeeper would object to being given a few tips. Cooking was one of Joanna’s few accomplishments, and although in the past it had been confined to preparing sauces and desserts for far more elaborate meals, she didn’t think she could do much worse than the unfortunate Mrs Harris.
With supper over, she wandered aimlessly into the sitting room, switching on the standard lamp by the window, and drawing the heavy repp curtains. She discovered a rack of paperback books in an alcove, and a pile of outdated science magazines, and the furnishings were completed by a pair of buttoned horsehair sofas, that gave as liberally as a saddle when one sat upon them, and a black and white television set. Two corner cupboards faced the wide fireplace, but their contents of chipped and dusty porcelain inspired only a fleeting interest. There were no dolls in evidence, no toys at all that she could see, except a couple of jigsaw puzzles, stuffed into the bottom of the bookcase. None of the items present in the room seemed to reflect Jake Sheldon’s personality, and Joanna wondered whether he had bought—or leased?—the property already furnished. That would account for its deplorable lack of taste, she thought, although why she should imagine Jake Sheldon might have any taste was not a proposition she cared to explore.
Picking up one of the paperback books, she attempted to glean some interest in the activities of a well-known private detective, but her ears were constantly alert for any sound of her employer’s return, and the events being described in the book seemed far less improbable than her own situation. She wondered if there was a phone so that she could ring her mother, but the idea of assuring her of her daughter’s well-being seemed totally ludicrous in the present circumstances, and she decided to wait and write when she felt less emotional than she did at present.
She guessed she must have fallen asleep on the sofa, despite its hardness, because when she next looked at the clock on the stone mantelpiece, it was after ten o’clock. She thought some sound must have wakened her, but she was still alone in the room, and inclined to be chilly because of the lowering of her body temperature during her nap.
She got stiffly off the couch and walked to the door into the hall, but there was no one about, and a frown furrowed her brow. She supposed she might as well go to bed as wait here indefinitely for her employer to appear, and with a feeling of flatness she went up the stairs to her room.
It was only as she opened the bedroom door that a sudden thought struck her. She had neither seen nor heard from Antonia all evening, and while her father had declared she was safely in bed, remembering the incident in the woods, Joanna couldn’t help but feel apprehensive. She had read books about naughty children who upset suitcases and squeezed out toothpaste and even put lizards in their governesses’ beds. While she had been lazily snoozing downstairs, Antonia—or Anya—could quite easily have wrought havoc up here.
She pushed open the door tentatively, half prepared to step back if some awful booby trap was waiting for her, but after groping for the switch and turning the light on, she found no apparent signs of mayhem. On the contrary, the room was exactly as she had left it, and she breathed a sigh of relief as she closed the door.
She undressed quickly, shivering as she put on the nightgown she had rummaged out of her case. The rest of her belongings could wait until the morning to be unpacked, she decided firmly, and after a speedy trip to the bathroom she climbed eagerly between the sheets.
The mattress was at least interior sprung, but the nap she had had downstairs had left her wide awake now that she wanted to fall asleep. She tossed and turned incessantly, wondering about Antonia, wondering whether she ought to have checked on the child to see if she was all right before going to bed, wondering whether Jake Sheldon would expect her to be waiting up for him whatever time he chose to come back. She finally fell into a fitful slumber that was rudely destroyed by someone drawing back the curtains and shaking her awake.
‘What is it? What time is it?’ she mumbled, not really conscious of her whereabouts as she struggled to push off the bony hand, and Mrs Harris’s face swam before her, maliciously amused in the bright sunlight streaming in through the windows.
‘It’s time you was up, Miss Seton,’ the housekeeper declared, setting down a cup of tea on the bedside table and folding her arms, a favourite position of hers. ‘After eight o’clock, it is, and Mr Sheldon said to tell you we don’t keep town hours here.’
‘After eight o’clock …’ Joanna elbowed herself up on to her pillows, aware that Mrs Harris was studying her with evident interest. It made her self-consciously aware of the brevity of her silk nightgown, and also reminded her that this was the first time the housekeeper had seen her hair loose. Long and honey-brown, streaked with gold in places, it swung soft and becomingly about her shoulders, framing the oval shape of her face and accentuating the creamy paleness of her skin.
‘Yes, nearly quarter past, it is, and if I was you I’d get myself downstairs.’
‘Eight o’clock’s not so late, is it?’ protested Joanna, draping the sheet protectively about her shoulders. Despite the brightness of the day outside it was still chilly, and she needed a few minutes to gather her confused senses.
‘Mr Sheldon had his breakfast at seven o’clock,’ retorted Mrs Harris with evident relish. ‘And I have other things to do than keep meals hanging about for hours.’ She moved towards the door. ‘It’ll be on the table in fifteen minutes. If you’re there, all well and good, if not——’
‘Wait!’ Joanna strove to get into a sitting position. ‘Mrs Harris, I don’t eat breakfast. At least, perhaps toast and coffee sometimes.’ The aroma of frying bacon was unmistakable as the housekeeper opened the door. ‘I’m afraid I can’t stomach fried food in the mornings.’
Mrs Harris pursed her lips. ‘You mean to say my fried eggs, sausages and bacon are going to be wasted?’
Joanna tried to hide her grimace. ‘I’m sorry.’ She was tempted to add, give them to the dogs, but she was glad she decided against it when Mrs Harris continued:
‘I’ll have to tell Mr Sheldon about this,’ she declared, with the inevitable sniff. ‘He can’t afford for good food to go to waste. Like as not, he’ll suggest that I warm it up for your lunch, so don’t imagine you can pick and choose here like you used to in London.’
The door closed behind her, and Joanna’s shoulders sagged. She wondered whether Mrs Harris would believe her if she told her that at home finances had been so tight that the idea of having bacon, eggs and sausages for breakfast would have been an unthinkable extravagance. It was true, she had never eaten a big breakfast, but that was mostly because at boarding school the food had been so appalling, and in Switzerland she had grown accustomed to the continental style of eating.
Still, there was no time now to sit and reflect on the past. Evidently she was expected to start work at nine o’clock, and it would probably take her half the time she had to pull herself together.
The cup of tea helped, despite the fact that it was thick and black, and far too sweet for her taste. But at least it was restoring, and she got out of bed afterwards with a little more enthusiasm.
The lino was icy to her toes, which certainly quickened her actions. Slipping her feet into slippers, she padded over to the washbasin, and after sluicing her face in lukewarm water and cleaning her teeth, she hastily put on the first things that came to hand. The purple corded jeans were blessedly warm, and she found a matching polo-necked sweater that dispelled the gooseflesh from her arms.
Her hair presented more of a problem, but she managed to coil it into a loose-fitting knot, although she was aware that the tendrils which persisted in falling about her ears gave it a far too casual appearance. Nevertheless, it would have to do until later, she decided, after an anxious examination of her watch, and after applying a shiny lipstick she hurriedly descended the stairs.
Once again she had the dining room to herself, the early sun highlighting the dents and stains that marked the heavy sideboard, and reflecting off windows grimy with the dust of months. However Mrs Harris filled her time, it was not in housework, thought Joanna grimly, realising that her mother would have dismissed the woman the minute she saw this place.
A congealing mess of bacon, sausages and broken eggs was set for Joanna’s inspection, and she heaved a sigh of impatience. She had explained she didn’t want the fried food, but the housekeeper had ignored her instructions. There was also toast—cold, she discovered, and tea instead of coffee.
It was too much. With a feeling of intense frustration, Joanna marched to the door, then stepped back in confusion as she almost collided with her employer. This morning he had not shaved as yet, and the shadow of his beard darkened his already swarthy skin. His black hair, and it was black, she saw, although streaked with grey in places, was rumpled, as if he had been threading his fingers through it, and he seemed to be wearing the same clothes as he had worn the night before. His scarred appearance seemed more obvious this morning, accentuated as it was by gauntness and exhaustion and a certain red-rimmed weariness about his eyes. She wondered for an awful moment whether he had joined the notorious Matt Coulston in his drinking bout, but there was no slurring of Jake Sheldon’s speech when he said harshly: ‘So you’ve decided to get up at last, Miss Seton. When you’ve had your breakfast, perhaps you and I could have a few words.’
Joanna glanced back at the table, and then took a deep breath. ‘As a matter of fact, I wanted to have a few words with you, Mr Sheldon,’ she stated, refusing to be intimidated by his grim countenance. ‘I’m afraid I don’t eat a cooked breakfast. I never have, and what’s more, I prefer coffee in the mornings, not tea.’
‘Oh, you do, do you?’ His expression had not changed, though she perceived a faint hardening of the curiously cat-like eyes. ‘Well, perhaps you ought to take that up with Mrs Harris. She’s the housekeeper around here, not me.’
‘Is she?’ mumbled Joanna, under her breath, but he had heard her, and the dark brows descended.
‘What is that supposed to mean?’
Joanna sighed. The last thing she wanted this early in their association was an argument about his housekeeping arrangements, and bending her head, she moved her shoulders in an offhand gesture.
‘Nothing,’ she said at last. ‘I—er—I’ll speak to Mrs Harris, as you say.’
He seemed loath to leave it, though without her contribution he had no choice, but as he turned away she ventured: ‘When will—er—Antonia be ready to start her lessons, Mr Sheldon? And where would you like me to conduct them?’
His frown was penetrating. A narrow concentration that made her wish she had waited for him to broach the subject. ‘You don’t know?’ he demanded. ‘Mrs Harris didn’t tell you?’
‘Tell me? Tell me what?’
‘Anya ran away yesterday evening. I’ve been out all night looking for her.’
‘No!’ Joanna was horrified. That explained the haggard appearance, the growth of beard on the jawline. ‘And have you found her? Do you know where she is? You should have woken me, I could have helped you.’
‘Really?’ His tone was sardonic. ‘When you’re the reason she ran away?’
Joanna flushed. ‘Have you found her?’
He heaved a heavy sigh. ‘I have a good idea where she is.’
‘Where?’
He hesitated, as if reluctant to discuss it with her, and then he shrugged. ‘There’s a shepherd’s hut, up on the fell. I know she goes there sometimes. It’s about two miles from here, but until the mist lifts we haven’t a hope in hell of finding it.’
‘You knew that—last night?’
‘I guessed, after searching the woods around the house, and enquiring in the village.’
‘Then why didn’t you——’
‘—go searching the fell?’ He shook his head. ‘You don’t know this area very well, do you, Miss Seton? When the mist comes down, and at this time of the year it inevitably does, the fells are treacherous to an inexperienced climber like me. Even the rescue teams can’t turn out in weather like that. They have to wait till the mist clears, till they can see where they’re going.’
Joanna glanced towards the windows. ‘But it’s clear now.’
‘It’s clearing,’ he agreed heavily. ‘As soon as I’ve changed my clothes, I’m going out after her. I only hope to God she got there in time.’
Joanna made a helpless gesture. ‘But—staying out all night!’ She recalled the anxious moments she had had climbing the stairs the night before, the anticipation of childish pranks meant to deter her from staying. And all the while Antonia had not even been in the house. She felt hopelessly inadequate to combat such determination. ‘Wouldn’t she be afraid?’
‘Anya?’ There was pride as well as anxiety in his voice now. ‘She’s not afraid of the dark, if that’s what you mean. And Binzer’s with her, wherever she is. He won’t leave her.’
‘Binzer?’ Joanna paused. ‘That’s a dog?’
‘One of the sheepdogs you saw yesterday,’ Jake agreed, expelling his breath wearily. ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me——’
‘May I come with you?’ Joanna’s cheeks burned briefly as she encountered his sardonic gaze. ‘I mean—to find Antonia, of course.’
‘Call her Anya. Everybody does,’ he remarked flatly. ‘It may help you to get through to her, although I doubt it somehow.’
‘And may I? Come with you?’
‘Do you have any strong walking shoes?’
Joanna glanced down at the plain vamps she had worn for comfort. Obviously they were not suitable. ‘I have some desert boots,’ she murmured doubtfully.
‘Desert boots?’ He shook his head. ‘What are they?’
‘They’re suede; ankle boots. They’re quite strong.’
He looked at her for a disturbing moment, making her overwhelmingly aware of his opinion of her. She could almost feel his contempt scraping over her skin, and she realised how similar their situations were. He didn’t really want a young female, with no formal qualifications, teaching his daughter. He would much have preferred one of the educated ladies Mrs Harris had spoken of, whose references were no doubt exemplary. And she had never expected to find herself in this position, being forced to care for a problem child, when what she had really hoped for was some pleasant sinecure with a wealthy family, where she could continue to live the kind of life to which until recently she had been accustomed.
‘Very well,’ he said at last, striding towards the stairs. ‘Be ready in ten minutes. And bring a warm coat.’
The ten minutes gave her little time to eat any breakfast, or to complain about the choice of beverage. Instead, she scraped butter and jam on a slice of toast and carried it up to her room, deciding that now was not the time to cross swords with Mrs Harris.
The unmade bed gave the room an unkempt appearance, and after lacing on her boots she quickly shook the pillows and pulled up the covers. She doubted Mrs Harris would consider bed-making part of her duties, and as she had a couple of minutes to spare she contemplated a hasty appraisal of Anya’s room. Maybe if she could see her belongings, the things she cared about, she would have some idea of how to approach her, and swallowing the last morsel of toast, she left her room. In the hall outside she slid her arms into the sheepskin jacket she was carrying, and made a swift inspection of the doors available to her. Apart from her door, and the door into the bathroom, there were four other doors, and her brow furrowed as she realised she had no way of knowing which was the child’s room.
Biting her lip, she moved along the hall to the landing, and then glanced back. She guessed the two doors at the far side of the landing were more likely to be Jake Sheldon’s doors than any of the others, and on impulse she moved closer to the first of the remaining doors, and put her ear to the panels. The doors were old, however, and very thick, and she doubted she would hear anything through them. But like all old doors, they had keyholes, and squatting down on her haunches she applied her eye to the narrow aperture.
‘You’ve chosen the wrong room, I’m afraid, Miss Seton,’ remarked an ironic voice behind her, and she got to her feet in red-faced consternation to find her employer standing watching her from the head of the stairs. She had obviously been right in assuming one of the farthest doors was his, but she felt horribly embarrassed at being discovered in such a compromising position. ‘If I’d known you were interested, I’d have left the door open,’ continued the mockingly derisive voice, and her lips pursed as she strove for words to erase his contemptuous assumption.
‘I was looking for Anya’s room, as it happens,’ she declared, ignoring the sardonic twist of his mouth. ‘I didn’t know which room it was.’
‘This is it,’ he volunteered abruptly, brushing past her to open the door next to the one she had been investigating. ‘But I don’t really have the time right now to give you a conducted tour. However, if that really was your objective ….’ He gestured impatiently, and with high colour blooming in her cheeks, she stepped past him.
He had changed his clothes, that much was obvious, the rough checked shirt of the day before having given way to a slightly less coarse grey cotton. Over this he wore closefitting jeans and a dark blue corded jacket, and as she passed him the smell of his shaving lotion was strong in her nostrils. There was something intolerably disturbing about him, a kind of sexuality that was even accentuated by the hard masculinity of his scarred face. Certainly, Joanna had never experienced the kind of reaction to a man that he aroused in her, and she decided that it was his evident indifference towards her that was causing this totally unreasonable sense of awareness.
The room into which he had invited her to look was similar to her own, in that it contained the same outdated furniture, the same unimaginative decoration, and the same bare floor. What was surprising was that here, as downstairs, there were no dolls or soft toys of any kind, and the few books that were piled beside the bed were boys’ adventure stories, annuals and notebooks. The bed was unmade, obviously as Anya had climbed out if it after the punishment her father had administered the night before, and the whole room had a forlorn air, as if the state of mind of its occupant still lingered.
‘Well?’
Jake was apparently waiting for her to make some comment, and forgetting her recent resentment, she made a helpless gesture. ‘Doesn’t she have any toys?’ she asked, gazing up at him in her confusion. ‘No dolls or teddies, or games of any sort? I thought I might learn something about her by discovering the things she’s interested in, but there’s nothing here.’
Jake’s tawny eyes narrowed as they surveyed her upturned face, and belatedly she realised that he probably thought her attitude was a deliberate attempt to attract his attention. Suspicious of her, as he was bound to be after discovering her peering through keyholes, he no doubt considered her present behaviour as typical of her frivolity, and her lids lowered in anticipation of his denunciation. But no admonishment of that sort came, even though he did draw in his breath rather harshly. Instead, his tone was expressionless when he responded:
‘I wonder why you really came here, Miss Seton. Was it to help Anya? Or to satisfy my sister that I’m not impotent as well as intellectually deficient?’
Joanna’s lids flicked back then, but he made no attempt to pursue this outrageous statement. As she moved out into the hall again, to escape the unavoidable intimacy he had provoked, he closed the door behind them and moved past her to the head of the stairs. Then, as if feeling obliged to make some explanation, he added:
‘Since her mother’s death, Anya has had no interest in girlish things; I imagine spending so much time alone with me has retarded her natural development. Perhaps you’ll be successful in changing all that. Who knows?’
His eyes challenged hers again, and this time she forced herself not to appear intimidated. It was the first time she had heard his wife mentioned since Aunt Lydia had explained she had died in the same crash which had disabled her husband, and even though Joanna would have liked to have pursued that topic, she shrank from the unenviable task. Evading such a personal issue, she said:
‘But she has been to school, hasn’t she, Mr Sheldon? And there have been other—governesses.’
He shrugged, an eloquent gesture, which seemed to dismiss her words as of no account. ‘As you are aware, Miss Seton, none of them had any success with her. Schools demand too much discipline, and the women I employed to teach her seemed to regard her as being mentally subnormal.’
Joanna reserved comment. If yesterday’s little fiasco was anything to go by, they might well have had reason to suppose the child backward, and she had yet to make any real contact with her.
‘I really think we should be on our way,’ Jake added now, starting down the stairs. ‘Don’t look so alarmed, Miss Seton, I don’t expect miracles.’ He paused halfway and looked back at her. ‘But nor do I expect you to treat the job as temporary, something with which to fill your time until a more appealing proposition comes along.’
Joanna held up her head. ‘I wouldn’t do that, Mr Sheldon.’
‘No?’ He regarded her sceptically for another disturbing moment. ‘Don’t you think you’re going to find it rather—boring here, away from the company of your friends?’
Joanna forced herself to begin the descent. ‘You don’t seem to want me to stay, Mr Sheldon,’ she remarked quietly, calling his bluff, and without another word he turned away, his grim mouth evidence of the opinion she was confirming.
CHAPTER THREE (#uab0e73da-f895-55c4-a58a-0a6601101f9c)
To Joanna’s surprise, a dusty green Range Rover was parked in the cobbled yard outside the house, and Jake indicated that she should get inside. As she did so, she noticed an old man leaning on the wall beside the gates, and guessed it was Matt Coulston even before Jake threw a terse instruction to him. Then he climbed into the vehicle beside her, slammed his door, and started the engine.
‘It’s two miles across country,’ he explained shortly, in answer to her silent enquiry, ‘but it’s more than twice that distance by road.’
Joanna nodded, looking out of the side window as they turned out of the gates, but she was aware of the old man’s inquisitive stare as the Rover bounced up the track towards the road. It was a cool autumn morning, but the sun was quickly warming the ground, dispersing the heavy dew, and causing wisps of steam to rise from the hedgerows. It gave an added depth to the gold-swept landscape, the bare fells responding with shades of green and purple and dark sienna. She had heard of the beauty of the Lake District, but this was her first experience of it, and her antipathy towards her employer melted beneath its insidious appeal.
Through the copse, Jake stopped the Rover and got out to open the gate, but after he had driven through, Joanna pushed open her door. ‘I’ll close it,’ she said, jumping down on to the track, and then flushed impatiently as her boot landed in a muddy pool. Still, she ignored the stains it splattered on the leg of her pants, and climbed back in again after completing her task, jaw clenched, ready to do battle if he made any sarcastic comment. He didn’t, though she thought she detected a faintly ironic twist to his mouth, but she relaxed again as they reached the lane and turned towards Ravensmere.
Ravensmere was one of the smaller lakes, and the village of the same name nestling at its foot was small and compact, with narrow streets running down to the lakeside. There were two hotels facing the jetty, and several cottages advertising accommodation, and rowing boats pulled up on the shingle, deserted now that the season was virtually over.
Jake drove along the lake shore, skirted the village, and after driving across a narrow hump-backed bridge, emerged on to the road to Heronsfoot. The traffic was brisker on this stretch of highway, connecting as it eventually did with the main trunk road south, but presently they turned off again on to a lane that gave way to a hikers’ track, winding steadily upward until they reached a shelving plateau. Looking across the wide expanse of the valley spread out below them, Joanna suddenly realised that the stream at its foot was the same stream she had seen from her bedroom window at Ravengarth. They must have driven round in a semi-circle, and they were now some distance up the fell that faced north-east across the valley.
‘Recognise it?’ Jake said, reaching round into the back of the vehicle and pulling out a pair of thick leather gloves. ‘Here; put these on. You may have to use your hands, and I’d hate that soft white skin to get blistered.’
Joanna pursed her lips and looked at him, but he merely dropped the gloves into her lap and thrust open his door. The draught of cold air his exit permitted to enter the car made her realise how much colder it was here up on the fell, and with a grimace she put on the gloves and joined him outside.
‘Ready?’ he asked, looking down at her quizzically, and she nodded her head.
‘As I’ll ever be,’ she responded, holding out her hands for his inspection. ‘Aren’t you afraid I’ll have a major accident with these? They’re far too big for me!’
‘They’re not for climbing,’ he retorted, turning up the collar of his jacket. ‘Going up it’s quite easy, but coming down on loose shale can overbalance you. It’s easier if you squat on your hands.’
Joanna hunched her shoulders. ‘If you say so,’ she submitted, and with a faint arching of his brows he strode away.
They climbed a rocky incline and started up a steeper slope of scree, where tiny springs provided natural irrigation for the gorse and heather that grew on the lower slopes. A few stray sheep voiced their objections as they trotted out of their path, and a hawk hanging in the air some way above them seemed to be speculating on their possible destination.
Joanna was panting before they had climbed a hundred feet. Shopping expeditions in Oxford Street and disco dancing until the early hours were poor substitutes for real exercise, and she was glad Jake was ahead of her and therefore could not hear her laboured breathing.
About halfway up the slope, another outcrop hid the roof of a wooden hut, and Jake glanced round to see if she was with him before vaulting over the projecting face. The mist was still lingering above them, veiling the upper slopes like a shroud, and it was not difficult to imagine how easy it would be to miss their way in its blanketing folds. Struggling up behind Jake, Joanna was selfconsciously aware of her red face and trembling knees, and she guessed he was not deceived by her attempt at composure.
‘This is it,’ he said, and she glanced round automatically, alarmed to see how small the Range Rover looked from their superior height.
‘Is—is she there?’ she asked, striving to regain her breath, and he shrugged his broad shoulders before swinging down the narrow gully.
Joanna heard the dog barking as Jake approached, and presently a small figure appeared from behind the hut. Her own relief was tempered by the realisation that she was about to be properly introduced to her charge, but Jake had evidently no such misgivings. He swung the child up into his arms as the dog appeared to leap excitedly about them, and then after a brief conversation which Joanna could not hear, he turned with the child still in his arms, to climb the track back to where she was waiting.
Joanna felt an unbearable sense of disquiet as they approached. She half wished she had not succumbed to the anxiety in her employer’s face and had waited back at the house, but it was too late now to have such thoughts. Instead she endeavoured to adopt an expression that was neither severe nor ingratiating, and squashed the unworthy suspicion that in Jakes’s shoes she would have shown a little more anger and a little less understanding.
He set the child on her feet beside Joanna, and she looked down at her somewhat unwillingly. She could not forget their previous exchanges, in the copse and in the hall at Ravengarth, and she was quite prepared to meet aggression with aggression. But Anya’s expression was almost angelically mild, and encountering wide blue eyes, innocent of all malice, Joanna wondered if she could have mistaken the child’s character entirely. But how was that possible? She had been greeted with a shotgun, and no matter how obedient Anya appeared now somewhere behind that disarming gaze lurked another, less agreeable, personality.
‘Anya wants to apologise, don’t you?’ prompted Jake now, pushing his hands into his jacket pockets, and the girl, if she really was of the feminine gender, nodded.
She was smaller than Joanna remembered, or perhaps in retrospect she had just appeared taller, and her night in the shepherd’s hut had not improved her grubby appearance. The cap she had been wearing the previous afternoon was still pulled down about her ears, making the ends of her dark hair stick out almost comically at the sides. She wore an old anorak, with leather patches at the elbows, jeans, and an old woollen sweater, with cuffs that hung down over her wrists. Wellington boots completed her outfit and Joanna found it amazing that a girl of her age should care so little about how she looked.
‘I’m sorry, Miss Seton.’ Anya was speaking now, and Joanna was amazed at the attractiveness of her voice after the coarse language she had used the day before. ‘It was silly, running off like that. It didn’t solve anything.’
Joanna digested these words rather doubtfully. There was something wrong here. She didn’t know why she felt so sure, but she did. Last night Anya had been slapped and put to bed after behaving quite appallingly. She had sobbed and screamed, and shown every indication of anger and resentment, even to the extent of actually running away. Now she was apologising, saying she was sorry, that she had been silly, that it hadn’t solved anything. Solve was a curious word to use. Finding any kind of solution in the circumstances had an ominous ring to it, and Joanna looked rather blankly at her employer, wondering if he had detected anything unusual about his daughter’s behaviour. But he apparently had not. He was obviously waiting for her to make the next move, and with a grimace she said:
‘You didn’t expect me to leave, did you, Anya? I’m not that easily deterred. Your father and I only want what’s best for you, and I’m sure you’re not going to disappoint us.’
Joanna didn’t quite know why she used that particular approach, or indeed why she should attempt to antagonise the child with her first words. She was aware that Jake was looking at her in some irritation, and evidently he would have preferred a more conciliatory tone, but Joanna had already sensed that with Anya, one had to stay one jump ahead. Even so, she felt a certain ripple of apprehension slide along her spine as she glimpsed the sudden anger that filled the child’s eyes, and guessed that her deliberate linking of herself and Anya’s father had aroused that instinctive response. So she was right, she thought, without any of the exhilaration she should have been feeling. Anya was only bluffing, but what kind of an advantage did that give her?
‘I think Anya is beginning to realise that these stupid, childish pranks are just a waste of time,’ Jake pronounced heavily, his breath vaporising in the chilly air. ‘She’s growing up. She has to learn to take responsibility for her actions. And now I suggest we go back to the car. Anya needs some hot food and a change of clothes, and then perhaps we can start behaving like civilised people.’
Joanna was glad of the leather gloves going down the hillside again. She was not used to the steepness of the slope, and she soon learned the advantages of squatting down on her heels and controlling her slide with her hands. Anya, of course, had no such fears. She and the dog, Binzer, bounded down the loose shale with complete confidence, and even Jake kept his balance without apparent effort. It was a little annoying for Joanna to have to complete her descent under Anya’s intent appraisal, but she managed to get to her feet near the bottom and meet the girl’s gaze with bland enquiry, hoping the trembling uncertainty of her knees could not be detected.
There was no argument about who should sit where in the Range Rover. Jake ordered Anya and the dog into the back, and Joanna got into the seat beside him with some relief. It had been quite an exhausting trip, one way and another, and she slumped rather wearily against the upholstery as he started the engine. The journey back to Ravengarth was completed almost in silence, but Joanna was aware all the way of the physical presence of Anya’s knees digging into her back, and the not-so-physical awareness of her resentful gaze boring into the back of her head.
As they neared the house, however, Joanna remembered she was still wearing the gloves he had given her, and tugging them off her now sweating palms she dropped them on to the shelf in front of her.
‘Thank you,’ she murmured, glancing sideways at her employer, and a vaguely amused quirk tilted his eyebrow.
‘I saw you made use of them,’ he said, with a wry grimace. ‘You’re no fell-runner, I think.’
‘I’m not the outdoor type,’ retorted Joanna shortly, forgetting for a moment that they had an audience, and the amusement deepened in his eyes.
‘That’s the truth,’ he confirmed, turning off the lane on to the track for Ravengarth, and she was dismayed to find she wanted to laugh. It had been such a curious morning, and it wasn’t half over yet, and she could picture her friends’ reaction if she confessed to them that she had been climbing grubby hillsides before nine o’clock and sliding down them again on the seat of her pants.
‘You’re supposed to run down the shale,’ said a clear scornful voice behind them, that completely dissipated the humour of the situation. ‘That’s how you keep your balance. Only dogs and babies slide on their bottoms!’
‘Thank you, Anya, that will do.’
Jake’s curt remonstrance was immediate, and Joanna wondered why the girl had so quickly forgotten the role she had intended to play. If she imagined she could delude her father into thinking she was a reformed character one minute, and then revert to her objectionable self the next, she was very much mistaken.
However, Anya was already restoring her image. ‘I’m sorry, Daddy,’ she was saying, adopting a wounded tone. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude. But it’s true, isn’t it? You are supposed to run down the shale. It’s not half as dangerous as it sounds.’
‘Experts run down the shale, Anya, inexperienced climbers don’t,’ Jake retorted, pulling up at the gate that gave on to the copse and pushing open his door. ‘No one could call Miss Seton an experienced climber, and I expect you to show a little more respect.’
He went to open the gate, and Joanna waited resignedly for the retaliation she was sure would come. She wasn’t disappointed. Anya only waited until the door had closed behind her father before saying in a low, venomous voice:
‘Don’t think I’m going to let you stay here, just because you think you’ve won the first round! I can get rid of you any time I like, and I will!’
Joanna listened, but as she did so her own anger flared, and she turned on the child without consideration for her age or her inexperience. ‘Now you listen to me, you little hellcat,’ she spat furiously, ‘no one, but no one, speaks to me like that! Just who do you think you are? Dressed like a scarecrow, with brains to match! Do you think I want to teach you? Do you think I want to stay here in this hole, living in a house that pigs would find offensive? You’re a joke, do you know that? A living, breathing joke, and if it was up to me, you wouldn’t be able to slide down shale on your bottom! You wouldn’t even be able to sit on it!’
Anya shrank back in her seat as she spoke, and if Joanna had been less incensed, she would have seen much sooner how her outburst was draining all the colour out of the child’s cheeks. As it was, she had barely registered the fact before another angry voice broke into her tirade.
‘What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?’ Jake had jerked open his door and was climbing savagely back into the Rover. He glared incredulously at Joanna before turning to look at his daughter, and then shook his head disbelievingly as she took advantage of the situation and burst instantly into tears. ‘Heavens above, I get out of the car for two minutes to open the gate, and you take leave of your senses! If this is your idea of gaining a child’s confidence, I suggest you pack your bags right away. This isn’t Dothegirls Hall, Miss Seton, and I do not condone adults acting like children, whatever the provocation!’
Joanna pressed her lips mutinously together, hunching her shoulders against the acidity of his stare. What was the point of staying here, as he said? Anya didn’t want to learn; she didn’t even want to behave civilly. They were all just wasting their time trying to change her. What she needed was a keeper, not a governess, and Joanna simply hadn’t the patience to humour her.
‘She said our house was a pigsty,’ Anya sniffed indignantly, and Joanna was forced to defend herself when Jake demanded if this was so.
‘It’s true,’ she declared, holding up her head. ‘Your—your housekeeper doesn’t know how to keep house, and the food she serves is appalling. I don’t know what you pay her, but whatever it is, it’s too much!’
Jake was gazing at her as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and Joanna acknowledged to herself that the situation was unique. He had obviously never had to rebuke the governess before, but if he expected her to apologise and beg to be kept on, he was very much mistaken. It might be pigheaded, it might be a case of cutting off her nose to spite her face; but she was not some mealy-mouthed spinster, willing to suffer any kind of humiliation in order to keep her position. No eleven-year-old was going to make a fool of her, and if it meant her having to take a job in a shop or a factory, then so be it. Anything was better than struggling to save her self-respect with this little savage. In consequence, she was able to meet Jake’s steel-hard eyes with almost insolent indifference, and sensed that he had never been so near to striking a woman before.
Without another word he swung round in his seat, slammed his door, and drove through the gateway. Then, standing on his brakes so that she was almost projected through the windscreen, he got out to close the gate again, leaving his door open this time so that he could hear any exchange there might be. But Anya was either too clever, or too distressed, to be caught that way. She continued to sniff rather plaintively in the back of the vehicle, not responding to Binzer’s mournful whining, or blowing her nose as Joanna could have wished.
When Jake climbed in again, Joanna avoided his gaze, staring rather disconsolately out of the window. She remembered the anticipation she had felt on the outward journey, and her mouth turned down rather cynically at the corners. There should be a union for governesses, she decided, pursing her lips half indignantly. Unfair dismissal, that was what she was being given, and just because she had no desire to stay, was no reason to force her to leave. All right, so she had spoken her mind—wasn’t that better than pretending a liking for the girl she didn’t feel? At least she and Anya understood one another now, even if the next female to be employed was bound to suffer the consequences of her outburst.
She sighed, casting a surreptitious look in her employer’s direction. His profile, set against the shadows of the copse, was hard and unyielding, yet she suddenly knew an illogical feeling of sympathy for him. It couldn’t be easy, trying to bring up a rebellious child like Anya single-handed, particularly in his personal circumstances. Losing his wife like that, losing his career; she and her mother had thought the world had come to an end when her father had died and left them without any money. Money! Money couldn’t solve Jake Sheldon’s problems. They were much more complex than that, and her conscience pricked her at the suspicion that she had perhaps added to them.
Jake parked the Range Rover in the yard and climbed out rather aggressively, Joanna thought. ‘Indoors, bath, and hair washed,’ he ordered the still sniffing Anya, and after she had departed trailing the confused Binzer, he turned back to Joanna.
‘I want to see you in the library in five minutes,’ he told her curtly, before striding away towards the stables. ‘Please don’t keep me waiting.’
Joanna stared after him in some amazement, and then with a helpless shrug she thrust open her door. She almost stood on a chicken as she put her foot to the ground, and it ran squawking away as she drew a steadying breath. Well, he wanted to give her her notice, didn’t he? she argued with herself, as she picked her way towards the house, and then felt a wave of weariness sweep over her as she saw Mrs Harris waiting at the door. She could tell from the housekeeper’s face that Anya had not wasted any time in relating her comments, and she squared her shoulders a little defiantly to bolster her fast-fading confidence.
‘I want a word with you—miss!’ Mrs Harris declared, as she approached, and for a minute Joanna thought she wasn’t going to let her into the house. But although she was slim, she was quite strong, and evidently the housekeeper decided her grievances fell short of physical violence.
Joanna brushed past her into the hall of the house, her upbringing deterring her from conducting any kind of argument outdoors, and Mrs Harris had no choice but to follow her into the library.
‘What’s all this you’ve been saying about my housekeeping?’ she demanded, as soon as Joanna had crossed the threshold. ‘What right have you to make remarks about how I looks after this place? I’ll have you know, I’ve been here nigh on thirty years, and no one’s ever complained before.’
‘Really?’ Joanna didn’t want to get involved in this. It was no business of hers if she was leaving. But she could hardly believe that she was the first to notice the deplorable state of the place.
‘Yes, really,’ Mrs Harris continued aggressively. ‘There was no complaints when Mr Fawcett was alive, and since he’s gone and Mr Sheldon’s took over, he’s never said he wasn’t satisfied with my work.’
‘Perhaps Mr Sheldon, being a man, doesn’t care about such things,’ put in Joanna carefully, and Mrs Harris let out an indignant howl.
‘You cheeky young madam, coming here with your hoity-toity ways, putting on airs and graces, pretending you’re something you’re not! Why, Mrs Hunter herself told us you and your mother was practically penniless since that father of yours gambled all his money away, and you were forced to look for work to support the two of you!’ Joanna’s cheeks burned. What had Aunt Lydia told Jake Sheldon’s sister? How had she phrased the offer of her goddaughter’s services to educate her niece? And how had Marcia Hunter described her to her brother, that his housekeeper should speak so disparagingly of it?
‘My personal affairs are no concern of yours, Mrs Harris,’ she said now, trying desperately to maintain her detachment. If she once resorted to a slanging match with the woman, she would lose all semblance of self-respect, and that was something she must retain at all costs.
‘Personal affairs!’ sneered Mrs Harris scornfully. ‘Your affairs aren’t personal. It was in all the papers—how your father broke his neck trying to jump a fence when he was drunk——’
‘He wasn’t drunk,’ denied Joanna hotly, unable to stay silent on that score. ‘The horse bolted——’
‘So you say.’
‘It’s the truth!’
Mrs Harris obviously didn’t believe her, but she changed her tactics. ‘You soon found out who your friends was, though, didn’t you?’ she taunted. ‘All them posh ways of yours count for nothing when you’ve got no money, do they? And you come here, criticising me! I don’t know how you have the nerve! Saying I keep a dirty house—complaining about my cooking—telling Mr Sheldon that the food is appalling——’
‘It is,’ asserted a hard masculine voice behind them, and their employer came impatiently into the room, applying the flame of the slim gold lighter in his hand to the narrow cigar between his teeth. ‘You’re fired, Mrs Harris. I should have done it long ago, but I’m afraid I’ve allowed everything to slide since—since coming here. I intend to rectify that. And your dismissal is long overdue.’
Joanna didn’t know which one of them was the most astounded, herself or Mrs Harris. The last thing she had expected was that he might actually act on what she had said, and in spite of her aversion for the housekeeper’s slovenly ways, she couldn’t help but sympathise with such an abrupt expulsion.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/anne-mather/whisper-of-darkness/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Anne Mather
Mills & Boon are excited to present The Anne Mather Collection – the complete works by this classic author made available to download for the very first time! These books span six decades of a phenomenal writing career, and every story is available to read unedited and untouched from their original release. Beware the boss…As the third governess to take on problem child Anya Shelton, Joanna was expecting a little more gratitude from Anya’s father, Jake Sheldon. She can’t believe the antagonism she encounters from her frosty, classically handsome employer. How dare he treat her in such an unprofessional manner? Soon Jake’s reclusive ways raise more questions – why does he persist in cutting himself and his daughter off from the world? But something about the prickly Jake draws Joanna in, and she has to ask herself – why is she so concerned about him…?
Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous collection of fantastic novels by bestselling, much loved author
ANNE MATHER
Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the
publishing industry, having written over one hundred
and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than
forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.
This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance
for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful,
passionate writing has given.
We are sure you will love them all!
I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun—staggered by what’s happened.
I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.
These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.
We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is mystic-am@msn.com (mailto:mystic-am@msn.com) and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.
Whisper of Darkness
Anne Mather
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Table of Contents
Cover (#u23db74d7-513a-5015-bc95-ca66de23c4f1)
About the Author (#ue3275275-a80a-5142-81bd-70a6e7469f65)
Title Page (#u2a5abf43-ba4a-5525-babe-e98b28fa021b)
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#uab0e73da-f895-55c4-a58a-0a6601101f9c)
THE track to Ravengarth wound up over the rise, or so the bus driver had informed her, casting a rather amused glance at her high heels. It followed the contours of the low stone wall, narrow and pitted with tyre tracks, and treacherously slippy after the rain the night before.
‘There’s no proper road to Ravengarth,’ he had insisted, when she had protested she had been told otherwise, and the murmurings among the other passengers had convinced her that she was holding them up unnecessarily. She had climbed down, lugging her heavy suitcase behind her, and coughed in some resentment at its departing expulsion of fumes.
The road she was on was little more than a lane as it was. High hedges, thick with the fruits of autumn, hugged the ditches at either side, and the only sound after the bus had departed was the distant bleating of some sheep. It was remote, and isolated, and even slightly unnerving, a sensation Joanna was not at all used to feeling.
Stiffening her shoulders, she determinedly pushed such fanciful notions aside. There was no point in indulging in regrets. She was here. She had a job of work at last. And anything was better than the hand-to-mouth existence she and her mother had lived for the past six months.
Even so, as she began to climb the muddy track, sticking as close to the wall as she could to avoid the more obvious potholes, she couldn’t help a wry grimace at the realisation of how ill-prepared she had been to face a situation as this. Who would have thought that her education at an exclusive girls’ school, followed by an equally expensive sojourn at a finishing school in Switzerland, should have produced someone so evidently lacking in useful accomplishments? It was true that her schooldays had been dogged by reports that read: ‘Joanna is an intelligent girl, but she pays too little attention to her lessons.’ Or: ‘Joanna is very popular with her school friends, but she must spare more time for her studies.’ Nevertheless, her results had been only a little below average, and what use were ‘O’ or ‘A’ levels to someone who was destined to marry into a wealthy family like her own, and whose main task in life would be the running of her husband’s home?
At the top of the rise she stood for a moment, regaining her breath as she surveyed the distance she had yet to cover. The track wound down for a while, disappearing into a belt of trees, and beyond the trees she could vaguely see the chimneys of a house. That must be Ravengarth, she thought a little irritably. At least half a mile away. Couldn’t they have sent someone to meet her? There were not that many buses that ran from Penrith to Ravensmere. Surely someone could have taken the trouble to find out what time her train arrived.
Realising there was no point in wasting time in silent imprecations, she picked up her case again and began to descend the downward track. Although the climb she had just undertaken had been harder, she soon realised it was easier to keep one’s feet going up than coming down. Stones, seemingly embedded in mud, moved when she placed her foot upon them, and once or twice she had to snatch at the stone wall to keep her balance. Her temper was not improved by the knowledge that the mud would doubtless stain the navy blue suede of her boots, and it squelched sulkily beneath her, as if anticipating her eventual downfall.
By the time she reached the gate which opened into the copse, Joanna was hot and tired, and the autumn beauty of the surrounding hills made no impression on her irritated disposition. It was a cool September afternoon, and she had dressed accordingly in a belted coat of wine-dark suede over a sweater dress of a toning rose colour. Aunt Lydia had expressly said that she should be prepared for it being cooler in the Lake District, and she had taken her advice without question. Now, she felt she could have done without the warm clothing or the boots, though wellingtons would not have come amiss.
Beyond the gate, a notice reading: ‘Private Land. Trespassers will be prosecuted’ aroused only a moment’s interest. Obviously Mr Sheldon did not encourage visitors, and remembering what Aunt Lydia had told her about him, perhaps it was understandable. He had chosen to hide himself away from the world, and obviously he would not welcome intruders.
The birds in the trees all around her were making their preparations for the night, and protested loudly as her feet crunched on fallen twigs and other debris, left by the previous night’s rain. She supposed the lane was wide enough to take a Land Rover, and probably that was what one would need to get up that rutted track, but apparently Mr Sheldon’s staff were not cosseted in that way, and Joanna’s lips tightened as her case began to hang ever more heavily from her aching fingers.
Then two things happened so suddenly that seconds later the offending suitcase had fallen from her nerveless grasp. There was a shot, a distinct explosion of sound, that ricocheted round the copse with an ear-splitting blast that sent all the birds skyward in panic-stricken flight. Joanna knew how they felt. She wished she could escape in similar fashion. But instead she was forced to remain where she was, albeit shaking from the tips of her toes to the top of her head, and gaze at the diminutive figure that had sprung out of the trees just after the shot and now stood facing her in the middle of the track.
What was it? she asked herself, dry-mouthed, staring at the aggressive creature that confronted her, still gripping the smoking shotgun in its hand. No more than four and a half feet tall, dressed in filthy jeans and ragged sweater, a cap pulled down low over its eyes, she guessed it must be a poacher she had disturbed at his work, and judging by the size of him, little more than a boy.
Not that this reassured her. Nowadays children committed the most abominable crimes, and she was in no position to argue with a cartridge full of small shot. Somehow she had to convince him that she presented no threat to his livelihood, and to this end, she took a tentative step forward.
‘Stay where y’are!’
The voice was pitched low, but its message was unmistakable, and Joanna licked her lips and tried again.
‘I—if you’ll get out of my way, I promise I won’t mention having seen you,’ she said, in what she hoped was her best and most convincing tone. ‘Honestly, I’m not interested in what you’re doing. I just want to get on my way——’
‘—to Ravengarth,’ finished the boy gruffly. ‘Aye, I know all about that. But you can’t go to Ravengarth. You’re not welcome there. If I was you, I’d go back where I came from, before I point this gun in your direction.’
Joanna could hardly believe her ears. This simply could not be happening, she thought incredulously. Any minute now she would wake up to find Lottie by the bed with her breakfast tray, and Ravengarth and Jake Sheldon and his troublesome daughter would still be just an idea in Aunt Lydia’s neatly coiffured head. Nightmares like this were an occupational hazard, and in a day or two she would find someone who welcomed her services, who did not require certificates and diplomas to prove that she could teach good manners to their small offspring, or handle the kind of correspondence she had been receiving herself for years.
But it was no nightmare. Without thinking she took another involuntary step forward, and the woods rang again with the deafening roar of the shotgun. It dispelled for ever the thought that this might not be happening, and Joanna stepped back quickly, tripped over her case, and sat down heavily on a mouldy pile of leaves.
What happened then shocked her almost as much as the shotgun had done. The child, for it was obviously nothing more, started laughing, shrill peals of merriment filled the air that was still trembling after the explosion, and amidst her fear, and the dismay at the ruination of her coat, a surge of angry suspicion swelled inside her. She tried desperately to recall exactly what Aunt Lydia had told her about Antonia Sheldon, but all she could remember was her age—eleven years—and the fact that she had succeeded in ridding herself of three governesses in as many months.
However, before she could struggle to her feet and put her suspicions to the test, another figure strode out of the woods behind the child, a tall, equally threatening figure in the gloom cast by the trees, who grasped the barrel of the shotgun in a powerful hand, wrenching it out of the child’s grasp. At the same time, the man grabbed hold of the urchin before it could move, holding it securely by the scruff of the neck, as he transferred his attention to Joanna.
She, for her part, got to her feet with as much elegance as her shaking legs would permit her, brushing away the muddy leaves, and endeavouring to regain her composure. Aware of them watching her with varying degrees of hostility, she realised that until now she had not even speculated about the man who was to be her employer, but across the yards of track that separated them she was suddenly made aware that if this was he, he was not the prematurely-aged invalid she had imagined.
‘Miss Seton?’ The man was speaking now, ignoring the howling that had replaced the peals of laughter issuing from his prisoner’s mouth, and she nodded. ‘If you’re not hurt, perhaps you’ll follow me.’
Joanna gasped. That was it! No apology, no explanation; no offer to carry her suitcase that was as muddy now as her coat. He had simply turned away, propelling the screaming child ahead of him, the safely breached shotgun hooked over his free arm. Of course, he might have found some difficulty in handling the shotgun, the suitcase and the child, she acknowledged reasonably, but he didn’t even offer any regret at this deficiency in his capabilities.
Clamping her jaws together, Joanna hoisted her suitcase once more and set off in pursuit of her apparently unwilling rescuer. To add to her weariness, her legs were decidedly unsteady now, and resentment flared anew at this cavalier treatment. She was doing them the favour, goodness knows, she muttered peevishly. She didn’t have to come here. She didn’t have to stay. And if this was the kind of treatment the other governesses had had, no wonder they hadn’t stayed either!
They emerged from the trees above an incline, with a trout stream gurgling at its foot. Approximately halfway down the slope, the house she had glimpsed earlier clung tenaciously to the hillside, its grey walls mellowed by russet-coloured creeper. The track wound down to its stone gateposts, and set around the main building were stables and garages and the usual miscellany of outhouses. It was bigger that Joanna had expected, larger, but not so well-kept, and she wondered if they had the same problem with housekeepers as they had with governesses.
She had not yet seen the man’s face clearly. In the shadows of the wood it had been impossible to glimpse more than an impression of his features, and besides, she had been too shocked and disturbed to pay much attention to his appearance. He was tall and powerful, lean without being thin, with strong muscular thighs that swung him down the track without any apparent effort. Was this Jake Sheldon? she wondered, struggling after him. Could it be? She would know soon enough if he turned and let her see the scars which Aunt Lydia had said had driven him to take refuge in this remote and isolated part of the country.
The child was something else. She found it incredible to believe that the uncouth demon of the copse was in reality an eleven-year-old girl! What was her father thinking of, allowing her to run around in that state, and with a loaded shotgun in her hand? She could have killed herself. She could have killed Joanna! And after all, that was the greater of the two evils so far as Joanna was concerned.
The child’s cries had subsided to a muffled sobbing by the time they reached the gates of Ravengarth, but Joanna could not find it in her heart to feel sorry for her. She had to be crazy, brandishing a deadly weapon like that, and Joanna’s belief in her own capabilities suffered a distinct setback at the prospect of teaching such a child.
A pair of long-haired sheepdogs set up a noisy barking at their approach, bounding out to greet them with more excitement than aggression. They fawned around their master and his charge for a moment, and then came to inspect Joanna, apparently finding her equally acceptable. As watchdogs they were decidedly unprofessional, thought Joanna dryly, but as pets they were adorable.
The man let go of the child as they entered a gloomy entrance hall, unpleasantly scented with the smell of boiled cabbage, and administering a distinct slap to her small backside, bade her go and make herself respectable immediately. Then, as she scampered towards the stairs that curved round two walls of the hall, he turned sharply into a room on his left, asking Joanna to follow him.
Joanna did so, after setting down her suitcase with great relief. As she straightened, however, her eyes again encountered those of the child now leaning dangerously far over the banister rail, and the impudent contempt in that stare made her long to repeat the punishment her father had given, with interest. If she had to take this job, and in spite of her vain posturings she hadn’t much alternative, sooner or later Miss Sheldon would have to understand she was no longer dealing with some timid, self-effacing old lady.
The room into which her employer—she assumed he was her employer—led her was a library of sorts, although many of the shelves were empty of books, their places having been taken by folders of what appeared to be artwork. There were canvases everywhere, propped against the walls, and the bookcases, some even occupied the chairs where possible, and others were spread across the heavy mahogany desk that sat squarely beneath the long windows. The air was musky with the smell of oils, and faintly stale from the neglected shelves of books.
The man positioned himself beside the desk, deliberately, Joanna later decided. There was not much light from the overcast sky, but what there was fell fully on to his scarred and battered countenance, and she was left in no doubt that this was indeed Jake Sheldon.
‘Well?’ he said, as if challenging her with his appearance. ‘It’s not a pretty sight, is it? But then you knew that, didn’t you? Someone must have told you—have warned you.’
Joanna wondered if anyone had ever had a more peculiar introduction to a job. A child, who dressed and spoke and behaved like a boy—a particularly objectionable boy at that—and a man who had apparently been deprived of his manners in the same accident in which he had been deprived of his livelihood. They had said he was a brilliant mathematician, a skilled and accomplished engineer, a man with a computer for a brain. And what was he now? An indifferent farmer, a part-time painter, and the father of a child who was evidently free to do exactly as she liked.
And he was challenging her to dispute his appearance, to deny that it shocked her feminine sensitivities. His face was scarred, it was true, but it was by no means repugnant, and she wondered if he realised how time had mellowed old wounds and given his ravaged face a certain strength and character. Some women might even find his rugged features attractive, and Joanna realised that Aunt Lydia and her mother could have had no idea of how old he actually was. Aunt Lydia’s description had been vague at best, and because he had a nineteen-year-old son she had evidently assumed he was well into middle age. But Joanna, facing him in that revealing light, saw that he was probably on the right side of forty, and this was going to prove a most unsuitable arrangement if no other help was kept. If his expression had not been so grimly serious, she might have allowed a small smile to tilt the corners of her mouth, but the situation was still far too volatile to take such liberties.
‘Cat got your tongue?’ he enquired now, cynically, turning from the window to flick through the canvases on the desk, and she endeavoured to gather her thoughts.
‘My godmother told me you required someone to take care of your daughter,’ she ventured at last. ‘I assume that was your daughter who—greeted me on my arrival.’
His lower lip jutted as he surveyed her slightly dishevelled appearance. It was a full lower lip; it might even be called sensual. And Joanna was given the piercing appraisal of narrowed amber eyes.
‘I suppose I should apologise for Antonia, shouldn’t I?’ he remarked, as if considering the proposition, and the disarming amusement which had briefly dispelled her indignation vanished.
‘Perhaps she should apologise for herself?’ she retorted, controlling her resentment with difficulty. ‘And I would suggest she is forbidden to run wild with firearms in future.’
His shoulders stiffened. ‘Oh, you would, would you?’
‘Yes.’ Joanna drew herself up to her full height, but even then her five feet six inches fell far short of his superior measure. ‘I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request. She could have killed me in the woods. Obviously she doesn’t understand——’
‘She understands very well,’ he interrupted her harshly, the dark brows descending with ominous intent. ‘She’s known how to handle guns for the past two years—I taught her. You were in no danger.’ He paused, allowing his astonishing words to sink in. ‘You were, however, subjected to a certain amount of—intimidation.’
‘Intimidation! Is that what you call it?’ Joanna could feel the colour sweeping up her normally pale cheeks. ‘How was I to know who she was or what she was doing? She was filthy. She was wearing boy’s clothes. She could have been a thief—a poacher, disturbed at his work!’
‘I see you have a vivid imagination, Miss Seton. That’s—unfortunate. I would have preferred someone a little more—unimaginative.’
His hesitation before using that particular adjective was deliberate, Joanna felt, pinpointing as it did his evident opinion of her. She had never encountered such indifference from a man before, or experienced such a feeling of blind frustration. She didn’t know exactly what she had anticipated, but certainly nothing like this, and his defence of the child was in complete opposition to his expected reaction. She felt like flinging his job back in his face, and only the thought of her mother’s disappointment if she returned to London without giving it a chance kept her silent.
‘So,’ he said, indicating an upright chair opposite. ‘Won’t you sit down, and we can discuss the situation more—amicably. I understand from my sister that you haven’t had any actual experience of teaching a child before, and that you have in fact been finding it hard to gain employment.’ Joanna sat down on the chair he indicated with a bump. He was certainly frank, she thought indignantly, or perhaps insolent was a better description of his vaguely mocking turn of phrase. In the space of a few sentences he had dismissed her claims of being physically threatened, and reduced her qualifications to nil.
‘I never expected to have to get a job, Mr Sheldon,’ she declared now, holding up her head in icy disdain. ‘Until my father’s death——’
‘Yes, I know,’ he interrupted unpleasantly, tumbling a pile of canvases on to the floor and taking the seat behind the desk. ‘You were a lady of leisure—I had heard. However, I’m not interested in how you came to be looking for a job, rather the accomplishments you have which make you think you are capable of teaching an eleven-year-old.’ Joanna gazed at him, not quite able to hide her astonishment. Did he really think he could speak to her like that, employee or otherwise? How dared he sit here in this rundown house, making excuses for a child who was little more than a barbarian, so far as Joanna could see, and expect her to be grateful for his indulgence in even listening to her? However dismayed her mother might be, surely she would not expect her daughter to be subjected to such treatment.
Grasping the strap of her handbag, Joanna rose to her feet. ‘I don’t think the accomplishments I possess fit me for this position at all, Mr Sheldon,’ she declared coldly. ‘We have obviously both been under some misapprehension about the other. I expected to have to teach a—a little girl, not an uncontrollable adolescent, and if I was prepared to make allowances for the child, I’m certainly not prepared to make allowances for its father!’
If she expected her remarks to arouse some answering retort from him, she was very much mistaken. And while remorse at the recklessness of such a declaration, influenced as it was by the lateness of the hour and a reluctant awareness of her own unfamiliarity with either the area or its transport services, caused her no small anxiety, Jake Sheldon sat there, gazing up at her, a look of sardonic amusement twisting his hard features.
‘You think I’m an ignorant savage, don’t you?’ he asked at last. ‘You’d like very much to tell me what I can do with my job. But from what I hear, you don’t have a great deal of choice.’
Joanna gulped. ‘I can get another job, Mr Sheldon.’
‘Can you?’
He pushed back his own chair now and stood up, dark and intimidating in the rapidly fading light. It was obviously later than she had thought, and the prospect of making her way back to the road and possibly having to thumb a lift back to Penrith was a daunting one. But she would not stay here to be insulted, not by a man who in his rough shirt and waistcoat and mud-splattered corded pants looked more like a gipsy than anything else.
‘I suggest, Miss Seton, that you reconsider,’ he said now. ‘Perhaps I was—hard on you, but you have to understand, it’s over two years since I had any—polite conversation. As to your abilities to teach Anya, that’s something we have both to consider. However, I’m prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt, provided you are prepared to do the same.’
It was scarcely an apology. On the contrary, it was more in the nature of a concession, as if he was overlooking her insolence.
‘I really don’t think I can stay here, Mr Sheldon,’ she insisted, glancing round at the shabby chairs, the equally shabby carpet. ‘I—well, I was misinformed. Your sister told my godmother that your daughter needed eighteen months’ preparation for boarding school. Having seen the child for myself, I suggest her estimate was vastly underrated.’
‘The challenge is too much for you, then?’ he remarked scornfully. ‘I had heard you had spirit, the only evident point in your favour. Apparently that was overrated.’
Joanna’s lips compressed, tom by the conflicting desire to prove to this man that he was wrong, and the conviction that she should leave now before any further humiliation was heaped upon her.
As she hesitated, groping for words, there was a tap on the half-open door behind her, and a slovenly-looking woman appeared in the aperture. Jake Sheldon seemed resigned, but not impatient, at the interruption, and arched black brows above those startling tawny eyes.
‘Yes, Mrs Harris?’
‘What time will you be wanting your supper, sir,’ she enquired, casting a look of avid curiosity in Joanna’s direction, so that she was firmly convinced that was the only reason the woman had appeared. ‘Anya’s tucking into hers in the kitchen, right this minute, but I wondered whether you and the—er—young lady——’
‘Anya’s doing what!’
The thunderous tones obviously cowed the cook—housekeeper?—as much as they shocked Joanna. With a muffled oath her would-be employer strode angrily across the room, disappearing out the door without a backward glance. It was left to Joanna to exchange an awkward glance with Mrs Harris, and they both waited in anxious anticipation for what would happen next.
They did not have long to wait. Seconds later, the silence was broken by a scream of indignation, and two pairs of footsteps could be heard approaching from the kitchens, and then receding up the stairs. These sounds were accompanied by more of the choking sobs Anya had emitted earlier, and the low harsh admonishment of Jake Sheldon’s not unattractive tones.
Mrs Harris waited until they were out of earshot, and then said confidentially: ‘A proper tearaway, that young Anya is, and no mistake. What’s she done now? Why was Mr Sheldon so angry, just ‘cos she was having her supper?’
Joanna licked her dry lips. ‘I—I really don’t know,’ she lied, wishing perversely that Jake Sheldon would hurry and come back, and Mrs Harris’s bony arms folded across her flat bosom.
‘You going to stay then?’ she enquired, apparently determined to make the most of her employer’s absence. ‘I shouldn’t, if I was you. No place for a nicely brought up young lady, this isn’t. And if you expect to make any headway with that limb of Satan,’ she dipped her head significantly in the direction of the door, ‘then you can think again. Three ladies there’ve been, real nice ladies, like yourself. Maybe a bit older, but all with proper qualifications, you know. All gone! Every one of them. Wouldn’t put up with that besom for more than a couple of weeks at a time. Drummed out of school, she was. Been to four schools since she and her father came here, but none of them would keep her. Troublemaker, that’s what they said, nothing but trouble——’
‘Really, Mrs—Harris, is it?’ Joanna had to stop her somehow, ‘I don’t think you ought to be telling me all this. I—er—if I decide not to stay, it won’t be because of anything you’ve said.’
‘But you are thinking of it, then?’ Mrs Harris had heard the note of indecision in her voice. ‘Don’t blame you. Living in this Godforsaken place.’
She pronounced God as Gawd, obviously in no way offended by Joanna’s attempt to silence her. She was a garrulous old gossip, and Joanna’s mother wouldn’t have had her in the house for more than five minutes, but apparently Jake Sheldon had no such misgivings.
‘Mrs Harris …’ Joanna was beginning again, when heavy footsteps sounded once more on the stairs. Evidently Mr Sheldon was returning, and her voice trailed away as he strode back into the room.
‘You may leave us, Mrs Harris,’ he said shortly, seemingly irritated to find her still there. ‘You can serve supper in half an hour. Whether Miss Seton chooses to join me or not is immaterial. Lay a place, just in case.’
‘Yes, sir.’
The woman cast another glance in Joanna’s direction, before going out of the room. Her look was speculative, as if she was mentally calculating whether Joanna would tell her employer what she had been saying, but there was no apprehension in her gaze. Obviously she was not afraid of losing her position, and Joanna could only assume that she had good reason for feeling secure.
With the older woman’s departure, Jake Sheldon’s gaze turned to Joanna once again, and there was weariness as well as impatience in his expression now.
‘Well?’ he said. ‘Do I take it you’ve decided to leave? If so, then I’d better run you into Ravensmere in the Rover. I believe there’s a bus to Penrith in half an hour. I doubt you’ll get a train to London tonight, but the Station Hotel will likely find you a room.’
Joanna hesitated. ‘The child—Antonia; where is she?’
‘In bed,’ he declared indifferently. ‘Nursing her pride, I imagine.’
‘You hit her?’ Joanna couldn’t keep the note of unease out of her voice.
‘She had it coming,’ he replied laconically. ‘And if you’re feeling guilty because of it, forget it. Please don’t imagine it places you under any obligation to stay.’
Joanna sighed. ‘I don’t know what to do.’
‘No?’ He sounded sceptical. ‘I should have thought after what Mrs Harris must have told you, you’d have been standing on the doorstep, your suitcase in your hand.’
‘Mrs Harris never——’ But after a moment, Joanna broke off, realising there was no point in lying to him. ‘That is—I don’t listen to gossip.’
‘Don’t you?’ He shrugged his broad shoulders rather jadedly. ‘You mean you didn’t hear about the other governesses who have tried and failed to discipline my daughter, or the numerous schools I’ve sent Anya to in an effort to improve her education.’
Joanna frowned. ‘Why do you call her Anya? I understood her name was Antonia.’
‘It is.’ He sounded bored with the conversation, but he explained. ‘When she was just learning to talk, she couldn’t say her own name. The consonant was beyond her. She used to call herself An-ia. We—that is, my wife and I—used to call her that, too, and over the years it’s been turned into Anya.’
‘I see.’ It had been a silly question in the circumstances, and Joanna felt rather embarrassed now.
‘Having disposed of that, I suggest you make up your mind what you’re going to do. It’s getting late, and I have work to do.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Joanna almost choked on the apology. What a boor of a man he was! There ought not to be a shred of hesitation in her rejection of his offer, and yet for some reason she was loath to give him that satisfaction. He thought she was frivolous, useless; an ornament, finding the utilitarian world a cold and barren place. She would like the chance to prove to him that this was not so, that she could play just as useful a role in society as anyone else. And to have that chance, she had to ignore all the rudeness and insults he put in her way, and demonstrate her ability to succeed in spite of him.
However, he seemed to have taken her apology as a clear rejection of the position he was offering her. Without another word he had crossed the thinly carpeted floor towards the door, and only her instinctive: ‘Mr Sheldon!’ caused him to pause and look at her.
‘Yes?’
Joanna’s tongue circled her lips once more. ‘I—I’ll stay,’ she said impulsively, and immediately wished that she had not.
‘You will?’ There was a glimmer of relief in the narrowed eyes, but that was all. No great enthusiasm, no words of encouragement or gratitude. Just ‘You will?’ followed by a perfunctory: ‘I’ll get Mrs Harris to show you your room.’
‘No!’ Joanna took an involuntary step forward, and then felt herself colouring, something she had not done in ages. ‘I—that is, couldn’t you just tell me where I’m to sleep? I’m sure I could find my own way. Without—without troubling Mrs Harris.’
‘As you wish.’ He seemed to be mentally washing his hands of the whole affair. It’s the third door on the right at the top of the stairs. If you’ll leave your suitcase, I’ll carry it up later.’
‘I can manage,’ mumbled Joanna unwillingly, biting her tongue against the remark that if she could carry it fully a mile from the bus stop, she could certainly carry it up a few stairs, and he made a dismissive gesture.
‘Very well. But I suggest you leave your unpacking until after supper. Mrs Harris’s meals are best taken hot, and you’ll have plenty of time later to get accustomed to your surroundings.’
Joanna inclined her head. Evidently one did not change for dinner at Ravengarth. She wondered if Jake Sheldon intended to come to the table in the same disreputable gear he was wearing at the moment. It seemed highly likely, and a small voice inside her evinced mild hysteria at her decision to stay. She must be mad, she thought, after Jake Sheldon had left her and she was climbing the stairs. No one should have to pay so heavily just to prove one’s point.
CHAPTER TWO (#uab0e73da-f895-55c4-a58a-0a6601101f9c)
IT was a curious evening, a slightly unreal evening, and lying in bed later that night, Joanna reviewed its events with a certain amount of incredulity. It had definitely not resembled any first evening she might have anticipated, and the feeling of anticlimax she had experienced had not yet dissipated.
Her bedroom, which she had found no difficulty in locating, was quite a spacious apartment, but its appearance matched the rest of the house. Either Jake Sheldon had no money to spend on refurbishment, or he simply didn’t care about his surroundings. The wallpaper was old, and peeling in places where the furniture had been pushed against the walls, the floor’s only covering was linoleum, which would be icy cold to the feet on winter mornings, and the furniture itself would not have disgraced a junkyard. Joanna had been at first appalled, and then amazed, and finally reluctantly amused to find herself in such a situation.
The view from her windows made up in some part for the rest. Although it was getting dark, it was still possible to glimpse the tumbling beauty of the stream, and beyond, the glimmer of a larger expanse of water. In the distance the shadowy fells brooded, dark and mysterious, casting a sheltering arm around the stillness of the valley.
Taking Jake Sheldon’s advice, Joanna had paused only long enough to wash her face at the handbasin she found in her room and apply some fresh make-up before going downstairs. Her hair, despite her ordeal, was still secure in its knot, and the jersey dress was not unwelcome now as the evening grew cooler. There was an ancient radiator in her room, she noticed, but it was stone cold at present, and she wondered if such an antiquated plumbing system was still operational. If not, it was going to be very cold on winter mornings, with only open fires to provide any heat. However, she refused to consider something so nebulous as the future. Right now, she had the present to live with, and despite her determination it was a daunting task she had set herself.
Downstairs again, she found the dining room by means of trial and error. There was no one about, and she glimpsed a sitting room and a cloakroom before finding a room with a table laid for one. This in itself was puzzling enough, but Mrs Harris, who appeared a few moments later, explained in her usual garrulous way that Mr Sheldon would not be taking supper after all.
‘He’s had to go down to the village after Matt Coulston,’ she confided, setting a plate of thick soup in front of Joanna. ‘Been drinking since opening time, he has, and George Page at the Fox and Hounds can’t handle him.’
Joanna picked up her spoon. She was reluctant to ask questions of the housekeeper, but if she was going to live here she would have to know who everyone was, and with a reluctant sigh she ventured: ‘Mr Coulston works for Mr Sheldon?’
‘‘Course he does.’ Mrs Harris stood back from the table, and nodded her greying head. ‘Sort of shepherd and general handyman he is, when he’s sober.’
‘Isn’t it a little early in the evening for anyone to be—intoxicated?’ Joanna asked doubtfully, but Mrs Harris only laughed, a rather unpleasant gurgling cackle, that split her thin lips and displayed a dearth of teeth in her lower jaw.
‘When Matt goes on one of his binges, time doesn’t have anything to do with it,’ she declared with a sniff. ‘He’ll have been drinking since early this morning, and by now he’ll be roaring drunk. There’s only Mr Sheldon can handle him at times like that, but he’ll get him back to his cottage and lock him in until he sobers up.’
‘I see.’ Joanna took her first mouthful of the soup and managed to hide her distaste as its powdery consistency clung to the roof of her mouth. ‘Well—thank you, Mrs Harris. I—er—I’ll have to eat alone.’
For an awful moment after she’d uttered those words, Joanna wondered if the housekeeper would imagine they were some kind of an invitation, but apparently Mrs Harris had other things on her mind.
‘You’re staying, then?’ she probed, lingering by the door. ‘Or is he just putting you up for the night, until you can get a train back to London?’
Joanna was tempted to say it was none of her business, but that would have been unreasonable. After all, Mrs Harris had to cater for the household, though judging by the state of the place her ministrations were by no means satisfactory.
‘I’m staying,’ she replied now, taking another mouthful of soup after surreptitiously stirring it with her spoon. ‘At least for the present. I hope I may have more success than those ladies had.’
‘Some hopes,’ muttered Mrs Harris dourly, and Joanna looked up.
‘You sound pessimistic, Mrs Harris. Anyone would think you didn’t want me to succeed.’
‘Oh, no. No,’ the housekeeper denied this hastily. ‘O’ course, I hope you’re successful. It’s just that—well, Anya’s not like an ordinary child, if you know what I mean. Been too much with adults, she has——’
‘I think you should leave me to learn about—Anya—for myself,’ replied Joanna firmly, cutting her off. ‘This soup is very nice. What are you going to offer me as an entrée, I wonder?’
Mrs Harris frowned, screwing up her mouth. ‘I don’t know what you mean by no on-tree,’ she declared, sniffing again. ‘But there’s lamb chops to follow, and a piece of my custard.’
Joanna endeavoured to appear enthusiastic, and to her relief Mrs Harris took her dismissal. But as the meal progressed, she began to understand why Jake Sheldon had suggested that Mrs Harris’s meals were best taken hot. Lamb was a greasy dish at any time, and in Mrs Harris’s unskilled hands it had been allowed to swim in its own fat. Left to go cold, it would be revolting, and she wondered whether her employer would be expected to eat it later. The vegetables, boiled carrots and potatoes, had fared a little better, but the gravy, like the soup earlier, was inclined to be floury. The custard tart to finish was not set properly, and as she sat over a cup of instant coffee, which anyone could make, Joanna wondered if the housekeeper would object to being given a few tips. Cooking was one of Joanna’s few accomplishments, and although in the past it had been confined to preparing sauces and desserts for far more elaborate meals, she didn’t think she could do much worse than the unfortunate Mrs Harris.
With supper over, she wandered aimlessly into the sitting room, switching on the standard lamp by the window, and drawing the heavy repp curtains. She discovered a rack of paperback books in an alcove, and a pile of outdated science magazines, and the furnishings were completed by a pair of buttoned horsehair sofas, that gave as liberally as a saddle when one sat upon them, and a black and white television set. Two corner cupboards faced the wide fireplace, but their contents of chipped and dusty porcelain inspired only a fleeting interest. There were no dolls in evidence, no toys at all that she could see, except a couple of jigsaw puzzles, stuffed into the bottom of the bookcase. None of the items present in the room seemed to reflect Jake Sheldon’s personality, and Joanna wondered whether he had bought—or leased?—the property already furnished. That would account for its deplorable lack of taste, she thought, although why she should imagine Jake Sheldon might have any taste was not a proposition she cared to explore.
Picking up one of the paperback books, she attempted to glean some interest in the activities of a well-known private detective, but her ears were constantly alert for any sound of her employer’s return, and the events being described in the book seemed far less improbable than her own situation. She wondered if there was a phone so that she could ring her mother, but the idea of assuring her of her daughter’s well-being seemed totally ludicrous in the present circumstances, and she decided to wait and write when she felt less emotional than she did at present.
She guessed she must have fallen asleep on the sofa, despite its hardness, because when she next looked at the clock on the stone mantelpiece, it was after ten o’clock. She thought some sound must have wakened her, but she was still alone in the room, and inclined to be chilly because of the lowering of her body temperature during her nap.
She got stiffly off the couch and walked to the door into the hall, but there was no one about, and a frown furrowed her brow. She supposed she might as well go to bed as wait here indefinitely for her employer to appear, and with a feeling of flatness she went up the stairs to her room.
It was only as she opened the bedroom door that a sudden thought struck her. She had neither seen nor heard from Antonia all evening, and while her father had declared she was safely in bed, remembering the incident in the woods, Joanna couldn’t help but feel apprehensive. She had read books about naughty children who upset suitcases and squeezed out toothpaste and even put lizards in their governesses’ beds. While she had been lazily snoozing downstairs, Antonia—or Anya—could quite easily have wrought havoc up here.
She pushed open the door tentatively, half prepared to step back if some awful booby trap was waiting for her, but after groping for the switch and turning the light on, she found no apparent signs of mayhem. On the contrary, the room was exactly as she had left it, and she breathed a sigh of relief as she closed the door.
She undressed quickly, shivering as she put on the nightgown she had rummaged out of her case. The rest of her belongings could wait until the morning to be unpacked, she decided firmly, and after a speedy trip to the bathroom she climbed eagerly between the sheets.
The mattress was at least interior sprung, but the nap she had had downstairs had left her wide awake now that she wanted to fall asleep. She tossed and turned incessantly, wondering about Antonia, wondering whether she ought to have checked on the child to see if she was all right before going to bed, wondering whether Jake Sheldon would expect her to be waiting up for him whatever time he chose to come back. She finally fell into a fitful slumber that was rudely destroyed by someone drawing back the curtains and shaking her awake.
‘What is it? What time is it?’ she mumbled, not really conscious of her whereabouts as she struggled to push off the bony hand, and Mrs Harris’s face swam before her, maliciously amused in the bright sunlight streaming in through the windows.
‘It’s time you was up, Miss Seton,’ the housekeeper declared, setting down a cup of tea on the bedside table and folding her arms, a favourite position of hers. ‘After eight o’clock, it is, and Mr Sheldon said to tell you we don’t keep town hours here.’
‘After eight o’clock …’ Joanna elbowed herself up on to her pillows, aware that Mrs Harris was studying her with evident interest. It made her self-consciously aware of the brevity of her silk nightgown, and also reminded her that this was the first time the housekeeper had seen her hair loose. Long and honey-brown, streaked with gold in places, it swung soft and becomingly about her shoulders, framing the oval shape of her face and accentuating the creamy paleness of her skin.
‘Yes, nearly quarter past, it is, and if I was you I’d get myself downstairs.’
‘Eight o’clock’s not so late, is it?’ protested Joanna, draping the sheet protectively about her shoulders. Despite the brightness of the day outside it was still chilly, and she needed a few minutes to gather her confused senses.
‘Mr Sheldon had his breakfast at seven o’clock,’ retorted Mrs Harris with evident relish. ‘And I have other things to do than keep meals hanging about for hours.’ She moved towards the door. ‘It’ll be on the table in fifteen minutes. If you’re there, all well and good, if not——’
‘Wait!’ Joanna strove to get into a sitting position. ‘Mrs Harris, I don’t eat breakfast. At least, perhaps toast and coffee sometimes.’ The aroma of frying bacon was unmistakable as the housekeeper opened the door. ‘I’m afraid I can’t stomach fried food in the mornings.’
Mrs Harris pursed her lips. ‘You mean to say my fried eggs, sausages and bacon are going to be wasted?’
Joanna tried to hide her grimace. ‘I’m sorry.’ She was tempted to add, give them to the dogs, but she was glad she decided against it when Mrs Harris continued:
‘I’ll have to tell Mr Sheldon about this,’ she declared, with the inevitable sniff. ‘He can’t afford for good food to go to waste. Like as not, he’ll suggest that I warm it up for your lunch, so don’t imagine you can pick and choose here like you used to in London.’
The door closed behind her, and Joanna’s shoulders sagged. She wondered whether Mrs Harris would believe her if she told her that at home finances had been so tight that the idea of having bacon, eggs and sausages for breakfast would have been an unthinkable extravagance. It was true, she had never eaten a big breakfast, but that was mostly because at boarding school the food had been so appalling, and in Switzerland she had grown accustomed to the continental style of eating.
Still, there was no time now to sit and reflect on the past. Evidently she was expected to start work at nine o’clock, and it would probably take her half the time she had to pull herself together.
The cup of tea helped, despite the fact that it was thick and black, and far too sweet for her taste. But at least it was restoring, and she got out of bed afterwards with a little more enthusiasm.
The lino was icy to her toes, which certainly quickened her actions. Slipping her feet into slippers, she padded over to the washbasin, and after sluicing her face in lukewarm water and cleaning her teeth, she hastily put on the first things that came to hand. The purple corded jeans were blessedly warm, and she found a matching polo-necked sweater that dispelled the gooseflesh from her arms.
Her hair presented more of a problem, but she managed to coil it into a loose-fitting knot, although she was aware that the tendrils which persisted in falling about her ears gave it a far too casual appearance. Nevertheless, it would have to do until later, she decided, after an anxious examination of her watch, and after applying a shiny lipstick she hurriedly descended the stairs.
Once again she had the dining room to herself, the early sun highlighting the dents and stains that marked the heavy sideboard, and reflecting off windows grimy with the dust of months. However Mrs Harris filled her time, it was not in housework, thought Joanna grimly, realising that her mother would have dismissed the woman the minute she saw this place.
A congealing mess of bacon, sausages and broken eggs was set for Joanna’s inspection, and she heaved a sigh of impatience. She had explained she didn’t want the fried food, but the housekeeper had ignored her instructions. There was also toast—cold, she discovered, and tea instead of coffee.
It was too much. With a feeling of intense frustration, Joanna marched to the door, then stepped back in confusion as she almost collided with her employer. This morning he had not shaved as yet, and the shadow of his beard darkened his already swarthy skin. His black hair, and it was black, she saw, although streaked with grey in places, was rumpled, as if he had been threading his fingers through it, and he seemed to be wearing the same clothes as he had worn the night before. His scarred appearance seemed more obvious this morning, accentuated as it was by gauntness and exhaustion and a certain red-rimmed weariness about his eyes. She wondered for an awful moment whether he had joined the notorious Matt Coulston in his drinking bout, but there was no slurring of Jake Sheldon’s speech when he said harshly: ‘So you’ve decided to get up at last, Miss Seton. When you’ve had your breakfast, perhaps you and I could have a few words.’
Joanna glanced back at the table, and then took a deep breath. ‘As a matter of fact, I wanted to have a few words with you, Mr Sheldon,’ she stated, refusing to be intimidated by his grim countenance. ‘I’m afraid I don’t eat a cooked breakfast. I never have, and what’s more, I prefer coffee in the mornings, not tea.’
‘Oh, you do, do you?’ His expression had not changed, though she perceived a faint hardening of the curiously cat-like eyes. ‘Well, perhaps you ought to take that up with Mrs Harris. She’s the housekeeper around here, not me.’
‘Is she?’ mumbled Joanna, under her breath, but he had heard her, and the dark brows descended.
‘What is that supposed to mean?’
Joanna sighed. The last thing she wanted this early in their association was an argument about his housekeeping arrangements, and bending her head, she moved her shoulders in an offhand gesture.
‘Nothing,’ she said at last. ‘I—er—I’ll speak to Mrs Harris, as you say.’
He seemed loath to leave it, though without her contribution he had no choice, but as he turned away she ventured: ‘When will—er—Antonia be ready to start her lessons, Mr Sheldon? And where would you like me to conduct them?’
His frown was penetrating. A narrow concentration that made her wish she had waited for him to broach the subject. ‘You don’t know?’ he demanded. ‘Mrs Harris didn’t tell you?’
‘Tell me? Tell me what?’
‘Anya ran away yesterday evening. I’ve been out all night looking for her.’
‘No!’ Joanna was horrified. That explained the haggard appearance, the growth of beard on the jawline. ‘And have you found her? Do you know where she is? You should have woken me, I could have helped you.’
‘Really?’ His tone was sardonic. ‘When you’re the reason she ran away?’
Joanna flushed. ‘Have you found her?’
He heaved a heavy sigh. ‘I have a good idea where she is.’
‘Where?’
He hesitated, as if reluctant to discuss it with her, and then he shrugged. ‘There’s a shepherd’s hut, up on the fell. I know she goes there sometimes. It’s about two miles from here, but until the mist lifts we haven’t a hope in hell of finding it.’
‘You knew that—last night?’
‘I guessed, after searching the woods around the house, and enquiring in the village.’
‘Then why didn’t you——’
‘—go searching the fell?’ He shook his head. ‘You don’t know this area very well, do you, Miss Seton? When the mist comes down, and at this time of the year it inevitably does, the fells are treacherous to an inexperienced climber like me. Even the rescue teams can’t turn out in weather like that. They have to wait till the mist clears, till they can see where they’re going.’
Joanna glanced towards the windows. ‘But it’s clear now.’
‘It’s clearing,’ he agreed heavily. ‘As soon as I’ve changed my clothes, I’m going out after her. I only hope to God she got there in time.’
Joanna made a helpless gesture. ‘But—staying out all night!’ She recalled the anxious moments she had had climbing the stairs the night before, the anticipation of childish pranks meant to deter her from staying. And all the while Antonia had not even been in the house. She felt hopelessly inadequate to combat such determination. ‘Wouldn’t she be afraid?’
‘Anya?’ There was pride as well as anxiety in his voice now. ‘She’s not afraid of the dark, if that’s what you mean. And Binzer’s with her, wherever she is. He won’t leave her.’
‘Binzer?’ Joanna paused. ‘That’s a dog?’
‘One of the sheepdogs you saw yesterday,’ Jake agreed, expelling his breath wearily. ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me——’
‘May I come with you?’ Joanna’s cheeks burned briefly as she encountered his sardonic gaze. ‘I mean—to find Antonia, of course.’
‘Call her Anya. Everybody does,’ he remarked flatly. ‘It may help you to get through to her, although I doubt it somehow.’
‘And may I? Come with you?’
‘Do you have any strong walking shoes?’
Joanna glanced down at the plain vamps she had worn for comfort. Obviously they were not suitable. ‘I have some desert boots,’ she murmured doubtfully.
‘Desert boots?’ He shook his head. ‘What are they?’
‘They’re suede; ankle boots. They’re quite strong.’
He looked at her for a disturbing moment, making her overwhelmingly aware of his opinion of her. She could almost feel his contempt scraping over her skin, and she realised how similar their situations were. He didn’t really want a young female, with no formal qualifications, teaching his daughter. He would much have preferred one of the educated ladies Mrs Harris had spoken of, whose references were no doubt exemplary. And she had never expected to find herself in this position, being forced to care for a problem child, when what she had really hoped for was some pleasant sinecure with a wealthy family, where she could continue to live the kind of life to which until recently she had been accustomed.
‘Very well,’ he said at last, striding towards the stairs. ‘Be ready in ten minutes. And bring a warm coat.’
The ten minutes gave her little time to eat any breakfast, or to complain about the choice of beverage. Instead, she scraped butter and jam on a slice of toast and carried it up to her room, deciding that now was not the time to cross swords with Mrs Harris.
The unmade bed gave the room an unkempt appearance, and after lacing on her boots she quickly shook the pillows and pulled up the covers. She doubted Mrs Harris would consider bed-making part of her duties, and as she had a couple of minutes to spare she contemplated a hasty appraisal of Anya’s room. Maybe if she could see her belongings, the things she cared about, she would have some idea of how to approach her, and swallowing the last morsel of toast, she left her room. In the hall outside she slid her arms into the sheepskin jacket she was carrying, and made a swift inspection of the doors available to her. Apart from her door, and the door into the bathroom, there were four other doors, and her brow furrowed as she realised she had no way of knowing which was the child’s room.
Biting her lip, she moved along the hall to the landing, and then glanced back. She guessed the two doors at the far side of the landing were more likely to be Jake Sheldon’s doors than any of the others, and on impulse she moved closer to the first of the remaining doors, and put her ear to the panels. The doors were old, however, and very thick, and she doubted she would hear anything through them. But like all old doors, they had keyholes, and squatting down on her haunches she applied her eye to the narrow aperture.
‘You’ve chosen the wrong room, I’m afraid, Miss Seton,’ remarked an ironic voice behind her, and she got to her feet in red-faced consternation to find her employer standing watching her from the head of the stairs. She had obviously been right in assuming one of the farthest doors was his, but she felt horribly embarrassed at being discovered in such a compromising position. ‘If I’d known you were interested, I’d have left the door open,’ continued the mockingly derisive voice, and her lips pursed as she strove for words to erase his contemptuous assumption.
‘I was looking for Anya’s room, as it happens,’ she declared, ignoring the sardonic twist of his mouth. ‘I didn’t know which room it was.’
‘This is it,’ he volunteered abruptly, brushing past her to open the door next to the one she had been investigating. ‘But I don’t really have the time right now to give you a conducted tour. However, if that really was your objective ….’ He gestured impatiently, and with high colour blooming in her cheeks, she stepped past him.
He had changed his clothes, that much was obvious, the rough checked shirt of the day before having given way to a slightly less coarse grey cotton. Over this he wore closefitting jeans and a dark blue corded jacket, and as she passed him the smell of his shaving lotion was strong in her nostrils. There was something intolerably disturbing about him, a kind of sexuality that was even accentuated by the hard masculinity of his scarred face. Certainly, Joanna had never experienced the kind of reaction to a man that he aroused in her, and she decided that it was his evident indifference towards her that was causing this totally unreasonable sense of awareness.
The room into which he had invited her to look was similar to her own, in that it contained the same outdated furniture, the same unimaginative decoration, and the same bare floor. What was surprising was that here, as downstairs, there were no dolls or soft toys of any kind, and the few books that were piled beside the bed were boys’ adventure stories, annuals and notebooks. The bed was unmade, obviously as Anya had climbed out if it after the punishment her father had administered the night before, and the whole room had a forlorn air, as if the state of mind of its occupant still lingered.
‘Well?’
Jake was apparently waiting for her to make some comment, and forgetting her recent resentment, she made a helpless gesture. ‘Doesn’t she have any toys?’ she asked, gazing up at him in her confusion. ‘No dolls or teddies, or games of any sort? I thought I might learn something about her by discovering the things she’s interested in, but there’s nothing here.’
Jake’s tawny eyes narrowed as they surveyed her upturned face, and belatedly she realised that he probably thought her attitude was a deliberate attempt to attract his attention. Suspicious of her, as he was bound to be after discovering her peering through keyholes, he no doubt considered her present behaviour as typical of her frivolity, and her lids lowered in anticipation of his denunciation. But no admonishment of that sort came, even though he did draw in his breath rather harshly. Instead, his tone was expressionless when he responded:
‘I wonder why you really came here, Miss Seton. Was it to help Anya? Or to satisfy my sister that I’m not impotent as well as intellectually deficient?’
Joanna’s lids flicked back then, but he made no attempt to pursue this outrageous statement. As she moved out into the hall again, to escape the unavoidable intimacy he had provoked, he closed the door behind them and moved past her to the head of the stairs. Then, as if feeling obliged to make some explanation, he added:
‘Since her mother’s death, Anya has had no interest in girlish things; I imagine spending so much time alone with me has retarded her natural development. Perhaps you’ll be successful in changing all that. Who knows?’
His eyes challenged hers again, and this time she forced herself not to appear intimidated. It was the first time she had heard his wife mentioned since Aunt Lydia had explained she had died in the same crash which had disabled her husband, and even though Joanna would have liked to have pursued that topic, she shrank from the unenviable task. Evading such a personal issue, she said:
‘But she has been to school, hasn’t she, Mr Sheldon? And there have been other—governesses.’
He shrugged, an eloquent gesture, which seemed to dismiss her words as of no account. ‘As you are aware, Miss Seton, none of them had any success with her. Schools demand too much discipline, and the women I employed to teach her seemed to regard her as being mentally subnormal.’
Joanna reserved comment. If yesterday’s little fiasco was anything to go by, they might well have had reason to suppose the child backward, and she had yet to make any real contact with her.
‘I really think we should be on our way,’ Jake added now, starting down the stairs. ‘Don’t look so alarmed, Miss Seton, I don’t expect miracles.’ He paused halfway and looked back at her. ‘But nor do I expect you to treat the job as temporary, something with which to fill your time until a more appealing proposition comes along.’
Joanna held up her head. ‘I wouldn’t do that, Mr Sheldon.’
‘No?’ He regarded her sceptically for another disturbing moment. ‘Don’t you think you’re going to find it rather—boring here, away from the company of your friends?’
Joanna forced herself to begin the descent. ‘You don’t seem to want me to stay, Mr Sheldon,’ she remarked quietly, calling his bluff, and without another word he turned away, his grim mouth evidence of the opinion she was confirming.
CHAPTER THREE (#uab0e73da-f895-55c4-a58a-0a6601101f9c)
To Joanna’s surprise, a dusty green Range Rover was parked in the cobbled yard outside the house, and Jake indicated that she should get inside. As she did so, she noticed an old man leaning on the wall beside the gates, and guessed it was Matt Coulston even before Jake threw a terse instruction to him. Then he climbed into the vehicle beside her, slammed his door, and started the engine.
‘It’s two miles across country,’ he explained shortly, in answer to her silent enquiry, ‘but it’s more than twice that distance by road.’
Joanna nodded, looking out of the side window as they turned out of the gates, but she was aware of the old man’s inquisitive stare as the Rover bounced up the track towards the road. It was a cool autumn morning, but the sun was quickly warming the ground, dispersing the heavy dew, and causing wisps of steam to rise from the hedgerows. It gave an added depth to the gold-swept landscape, the bare fells responding with shades of green and purple and dark sienna. She had heard of the beauty of the Lake District, but this was her first experience of it, and her antipathy towards her employer melted beneath its insidious appeal.
Through the copse, Jake stopped the Rover and got out to open the gate, but after he had driven through, Joanna pushed open her door. ‘I’ll close it,’ she said, jumping down on to the track, and then flushed impatiently as her boot landed in a muddy pool. Still, she ignored the stains it splattered on the leg of her pants, and climbed back in again after completing her task, jaw clenched, ready to do battle if he made any sarcastic comment. He didn’t, though she thought she detected a faintly ironic twist to his mouth, but she relaxed again as they reached the lane and turned towards Ravensmere.
Ravensmere was one of the smaller lakes, and the village of the same name nestling at its foot was small and compact, with narrow streets running down to the lakeside. There were two hotels facing the jetty, and several cottages advertising accommodation, and rowing boats pulled up on the shingle, deserted now that the season was virtually over.
Jake drove along the lake shore, skirted the village, and after driving across a narrow hump-backed bridge, emerged on to the road to Heronsfoot. The traffic was brisker on this stretch of highway, connecting as it eventually did with the main trunk road south, but presently they turned off again on to a lane that gave way to a hikers’ track, winding steadily upward until they reached a shelving plateau. Looking across the wide expanse of the valley spread out below them, Joanna suddenly realised that the stream at its foot was the same stream she had seen from her bedroom window at Ravengarth. They must have driven round in a semi-circle, and they were now some distance up the fell that faced north-east across the valley.
‘Recognise it?’ Jake said, reaching round into the back of the vehicle and pulling out a pair of thick leather gloves. ‘Here; put these on. You may have to use your hands, and I’d hate that soft white skin to get blistered.’
Joanna pursed her lips and looked at him, but he merely dropped the gloves into her lap and thrust open his door. The draught of cold air his exit permitted to enter the car made her realise how much colder it was here up on the fell, and with a grimace she put on the gloves and joined him outside.
‘Ready?’ he asked, looking down at her quizzically, and she nodded her head.
‘As I’ll ever be,’ she responded, holding out her hands for his inspection. ‘Aren’t you afraid I’ll have a major accident with these? They’re far too big for me!’
‘They’re not for climbing,’ he retorted, turning up the collar of his jacket. ‘Going up it’s quite easy, but coming down on loose shale can overbalance you. It’s easier if you squat on your hands.’
Joanna hunched her shoulders. ‘If you say so,’ she submitted, and with a faint arching of his brows he strode away.
They climbed a rocky incline and started up a steeper slope of scree, where tiny springs provided natural irrigation for the gorse and heather that grew on the lower slopes. A few stray sheep voiced their objections as they trotted out of their path, and a hawk hanging in the air some way above them seemed to be speculating on their possible destination.
Joanna was panting before they had climbed a hundred feet. Shopping expeditions in Oxford Street and disco dancing until the early hours were poor substitutes for real exercise, and she was glad Jake was ahead of her and therefore could not hear her laboured breathing.
About halfway up the slope, another outcrop hid the roof of a wooden hut, and Jake glanced round to see if she was with him before vaulting over the projecting face. The mist was still lingering above them, veiling the upper slopes like a shroud, and it was not difficult to imagine how easy it would be to miss their way in its blanketing folds. Struggling up behind Jake, Joanna was selfconsciously aware of her red face and trembling knees, and she guessed he was not deceived by her attempt at composure.
‘This is it,’ he said, and she glanced round automatically, alarmed to see how small the Range Rover looked from their superior height.
‘Is—is she there?’ she asked, striving to regain her breath, and he shrugged his broad shoulders before swinging down the narrow gully.
Joanna heard the dog barking as Jake approached, and presently a small figure appeared from behind the hut. Her own relief was tempered by the realisation that she was about to be properly introduced to her charge, but Jake had evidently no such misgivings. He swung the child up into his arms as the dog appeared to leap excitedly about them, and then after a brief conversation which Joanna could not hear, he turned with the child still in his arms, to climb the track back to where she was waiting.
Joanna felt an unbearable sense of disquiet as they approached. She half wished she had not succumbed to the anxiety in her employer’s face and had waited back at the house, but it was too late now to have such thoughts. Instead she endeavoured to adopt an expression that was neither severe nor ingratiating, and squashed the unworthy suspicion that in Jakes’s shoes she would have shown a little more anger and a little less understanding.
He set the child on her feet beside Joanna, and she looked down at her somewhat unwillingly. She could not forget their previous exchanges, in the copse and in the hall at Ravengarth, and she was quite prepared to meet aggression with aggression. But Anya’s expression was almost angelically mild, and encountering wide blue eyes, innocent of all malice, Joanna wondered if she could have mistaken the child’s character entirely. But how was that possible? She had been greeted with a shotgun, and no matter how obedient Anya appeared now somewhere behind that disarming gaze lurked another, less agreeable, personality.
‘Anya wants to apologise, don’t you?’ prompted Jake now, pushing his hands into his jacket pockets, and the girl, if she really was of the feminine gender, nodded.
She was smaller than Joanna remembered, or perhaps in retrospect she had just appeared taller, and her night in the shepherd’s hut had not improved her grubby appearance. The cap she had been wearing the previous afternoon was still pulled down about her ears, making the ends of her dark hair stick out almost comically at the sides. She wore an old anorak, with leather patches at the elbows, jeans, and an old woollen sweater, with cuffs that hung down over her wrists. Wellington boots completed her outfit and Joanna found it amazing that a girl of her age should care so little about how she looked.
‘I’m sorry, Miss Seton.’ Anya was speaking now, and Joanna was amazed at the attractiveness of her voice after the coarse language she had used the day before. ‘It was silly, running off like that. It didn’t solve anything.’
Joanna digested these words rather doubtfully. There was something wrong here. She didn’t know why she felt so sure, but she did. Last night Anya had been slapped and put to bed after behaving quite appallingly. She had sobbed and screamed, and shown every indication of anger and resentment, even to the extent of actually running away. Now she was apologising, saying she was sorry, that she had been silly, that it hadn’t solved anything. Solve was a curious word to use. Finding any kind of solution in the circumstances had an ominous ring to it, and Joanna looked rather blankly at her employer, wondering if he had detected anything unusual about his daughter’s behaviour. But he apparently had not. He was obviously waiting for her to make the next move, and with a grimace she said:
‘You didn’t expect me to leave, did you, Anya? I’m not that easily deterred. Your father and I only want what’s best for you, and I’m sure you’re not going to disappoint us.’
Joanna didn’t quite know why she used that particular approach, or indeed why she should attempt to antagonise the child with her first words. She was aware that Jake was looking at her in some irritation, and evidently he would have preferred a more conciliatory tone, but Joanna had already sensed that with Anya, one had to stay one jump ahead. Even so, she felt a certain ripple of apprehension slide along her spine as she glimpsed the sudden anger that filled the child’s eyes, and guessed that her deliberate linking of herself and Anya’s father had aroused that instinctive response. So she was right, she thought, without any of the exhilaration she should have been feeling. Anya was only bluffing, but what kind of an advantage did that give her?
‘I think Anya is beginning to realise that these stupid, childish pranks are just a waste of time,’ Jake pronounced heavily, his breath vaporising in the chilly air. ‘She’s growing up. She has to learn to take responsibility for her actions. And now I suggest we go back to the car. Anya needs some hot food and a change of clothes, and then perhaps we can start behaving like civilised people.’
Joanna was glad of the leather gloves going down the hillside again. She was not used to the steepness of the slope, and she soon learned the advantages of squatting down on her heels and controlling her slide with her hands. Anya, of course, had no such fears. She and the dog, Binzer, bounded down the loose shale with complete confidence, and even Jake kept his balance without apparent effort. It was a little annoying for Joanna to have to complete her descent under Anya’s intent appraisal, but she managed to get to her feet near the bottom and meet the girl’s gaze with bland enquiry, hoping the trembling uncertainty of her knees could not be detected.
There was no argument about who should sit where in the Range Rover. Jake ordered Anya and the dog into the back, and Joanna got into the seat beside him with some relief. It had been quite an exhausting trip, one way and another, and she slumped rather wearily against the upholstery as he started the engine. The journey back to Ravengarth was completed almost in silence, but Joanna was aware all the way of the physical presence of Anya’s knees digging into her back, and the not-so-physical awareness of her resentful gaze boring into the back of her head.
As they neared the house, however, Joanna remembered she was still wearing the gloves he had given her, and tugging them off her now sweating palms she dropped them on to the shelf in front of her.
‘Thank you,’ she murmured, glancing sideways at her employer, and a vaguely amused quirk tilted his eyebrow.
‘I saw you made use of them,’ he said, with a wry grimace. ‘You’re no fell-runner, I think.’
‘I’m not the outdoor type,’ retorted Joanna shortly, forgetting for a moment that they had an audience, and the amusement deepened in his eyes.
‘That’s the truth,’ he confirmed, turning off the lane on to the track for Ravengarth, and she was dismayed to find she wanted to laugh. It had been such a curious morning, and it wasn’t half over yet, and she could picture her friends’ reaction if she confessed to them that she had been climbing grubby hillsides before nine o’clock and sliding down them again on the seat of her pants.
‘You’re supposed to run down the shale,’ said a clear scornful voice behind them, that completely dissipated the humour of the situation. ‘That’s how you keep your balance. Only dogs and babies slide on their bottoms!’
‘Thank you, Anya, that will do.’
Jake’s curt remonstrance was immediate, and Joanna wondered why the girl had so quickly forgotten the role she had intended to play. If she imagined she could delude her father into thinking she was a reformed character one minute, and then revert to her objectionable self the next, she was very much mistaken.
However, Anya was already restoring her image. ‘I’m sorry, Daddy,’ she was saying, adopting a wounded tone. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude. But it’s true, isn’t it? You are supposed to run down the shale. It’s not half as dangerous as it sounds.’
‘Experts run down the shale, Anya, inexperienced climbers don’t,’ Jake retorted, pulling up at the gate that gave on to the copse and pushing open his door. ‘No one could call Miss Seton an experienced climber, and I expect you to show a little more respect.’
He went to open the gate, and Joanna waited resignedly for the retaliation she was sure would come. She wasn’t disappointed. Anya only waited until the door had closed behind her father before saying in a low, venomous voice:
‘Don’t think I’m going to let you stay here, just because you think you’ve won the first round! I can get rid of you any time I like, and I will!’
Joanna listened, but as she did so her own anger flared, and she turned on the child without consideration for her age or her inexperience. ‘Now you listen to me, you little hellcat,’ she spat furiously, ‘no one, but no one, speaks to me like that! Just who do you think you are? Dressed like a scarecrow, with brains to match! Do you think I want to teach you? Do you think I want to stay here in this hole, living in a house that pigs would find offensive? You’re a joke, do you know that? A living, breathing joke, and if it was up to me, you wouldn’t be able to slide down shale on your bottom! You wouldn’t even be able to sit on it!’
Anya shrank back in her seat as she spoke, and if Joanna had been less incensed, she would have seen much sooner how her outburst was draining all the colour out of the child’s cheeks. As it was, she had barely registered the fact before another angry voice broke into her tirade.
‘What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?’ Jake had jerked open his door and was climbing savagely back into the Rover. He glared incredulously at Joanna before turning to look at his daughter, and then shook his head disbelievingly as she took advantage of the situation and burst instantly into tears. ‘Heavens above, I get out of the car for two minutes to open the gate, and you take leave of your senses! If this is your idea of gaining a child’s confidence, I suggest you pack your bags right away. This isn’t Dothegirls Hall, Miss Seton, and I do not condone adults acting like children, whatever the provocation!’
Joanna pressed her lips mutinously together, hunching her shoulders against the acidity of his stare. What was the point of staying here, as he said? Anya didn’t want to learn; she didn’t even want to behave civilly. They were all just wasting their time trying to change her. What she needed was a keeper, not a governess, and Joanna simply hadn’t the patience to humour her.
‘She said our house was a pigsty,’ Anya sniffed indignantly, and Joanna was forced to defend herself when Jake demanded if this was so.
‘It’s true,’ she declared, holding up her head. ‘Your—your housekeeper doesn’t know how to keep house, and the food she serves is appalling. I don’t know what you pay her, but whatever it is, it’s too much!’
Jake was gazing at her as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and Joanna acknowledged to herself that the situation was unique. He had obviously never had to rebuke the governess before, but if he expected her to apologise and beg to be kept on, he was very much mistaken. It might be pigheaded, it might be a case of cutting off her nose to spite her face; but she was not some mealy-mouthed spinster, willing to suffer any kind of humiliation in order to keep her position. No eleven-year-old was going to make a fool of her, and if it meant her having to take a job in a shop or a factory, then so be it. Anything was better than struggling to save her self-respect with this little savage. In consequence, she was able to meet Jake’s steel-hard eyes with almost insolent indifference, and sensed that he had never been so near to striking a woman before.
Without another word he swung round in his seat, slammed his door, and drove through the gateway. Then, standing on his brakes so that she was almost projected through the windscreen, he got out to close the gate again, leaving his door open this time so that he could hear any exchange there might be. But Anya was either too clever, or too distressed, to be caught that way. She continued to sniff rather plaintively in the back of the vehicle, not responding to Binzer’s mournful whining, or blowing her nose as Joanna could have wished.
When Jake climbed in again, Joanna avoided his gaze, staring rather disconsolately out of the window. She remembered the anticipation she had felt on the outward journey, and her mouth turned down rather cynically at the corners. There should be a union for governesses, she decided, pursing her lips half indignantly. Unfair dismissal, that was what she was being given, and just because she had no desire to stay, was no reason to force her to leave. All right, so she had spoken her mind—wasn’t that better than pretending a liking for the girl she didn’t feel? At least she and Anya understood one another now, even if the next female to be employed was bound to suffer the consequences of her outburst.
She sighed, casting a surreptitious look in her employer’s direction. His profile, set against the shadows of the copse, was hard and unyielding, yet she suddenly knew an illogical feeling of sympathy for him. It couldn’t be easy, trying to bring up a rebellious child like Anya single-handed, particularly in his personal circumstances. Losing his wife like that, losing his career; she and her mother had thought the world had come to an end when her father had died and left them without any money. Money! Money couldn’t solve Jake Sheldon’s problems. They were much more complex than that, and her conscience pricked her at the suspicion that she had perhaps added to them.
Jake parked the Range Rover in the yard and climbed out rather aggressively, Joanna thought. ‘Indoors, bath, and hair washed,’ he ordered the still sniffing Anya, and after she had departed trailing the confused Binzer, he turned back to Joanna.
‘I want to see you in the library in five minutes,’ he told her curtly, before striding away towards the stables. ‘Please don’t keep me waiting.’
Joanna stared after him in some amazement, and then with a helpless shrug she thrust open her door. She almost stood on a chicken as she put her foot to the ground, and it ran squawking away as she drew a steadying breath. Well, he wanted to give her her notice, didn’t he? she argued with herself, as she picked her way towards the house, and then felt a wave of weariness sweep over her as she saw Mrs Harris waiting at the door. She could tell from the housekeeper’s face that Anya had not wasted any time in relating her comments, and she squared her shoulders a little defiantly to bolster her fast-fading confidence.
‘I want a word with you—miss!’ Mrs Harris declared, as she approached, and for a minute Joanna thought she wasn’t going to let her into the house. But although she was slim, she was quite strong, and evidently the housekeeper decided her grievances fell short of physical violence.
Joanna brushed past her into the hall of the house, her upbringing deterring her from conducting any kind of argument outdoors, and Mrs Harris had no choice but to follow her into the library.
‘What’s all this you’ve been saying about my housekeeping?’ she demanded, as soon as Joanna had crossed the threshold. ‘What right have you to make remarks about how I looks after this place? I’ll have you know, I’ve been here nigh on thirty years, and no one’s ever complained before.’
‘Really?’ Joanna didn’t want to get involved in this. It was no business of hers if she was leaving. But she could hardly believe that she was the first to notice the deplorable state of the place.
‘Yes, really,’ Mrs Harris continued aggressively. ‘There was no complaints when Mr Fawcett was alive, and since he’s gone and Mr Sheldon’s took over, he’s never said he wasn’t satisfied with my work.’
‘Perhaps Mr Sheldon, being a man, doesn’t care about such things,’ put in Joanna carefully, and Mrs Harris let out an indignant howl.
‘You cheeky young madam, coming here with your hoity-toity ways, putting on airs and graces, pretending you’re something you’re not! Why, Mrs Hunter herself told us you and your mother was practically penniless since that father of yours gambled all his money away, and you were forced to look for work to support the two of you!’ Joanna’s cheeks burned. What had Aunt Lydia told Jake Sheldon’s sister? How had she phrased the offer of her goddaughter’s services to educate her niece? And how had Marcia Hunter described her to her brother, that his housekeeper should speak so disparagingly of it?
‘My personal affairs are no concern of yours, Mrs Harris,’ she said now, trying desperately to maintain her detachment. If she once resorted to a slanging match with the woman, she would lose all semblance of self-respect, and that was something she must retain at all costs.
‘Personal affairs!’ sneered Mrs Harris scornfully. ‘Your affairs aren’t personal. It was in all the papers—how your father broke his neck trying to jump a fence when he was drunk——’
‘He wasn’t drunk,’ denied Joanna hotly, unable to stay silent on that score. ‘The horse bolted——’
‘So you say.’
‘It’s the truth!’
Mrs Harris obviously didn’t believe her, but she changed her tactics. ‘You soon found out who your friends was, though, didn’t you?’ she taunted. ‘All them posh ways of yours count for nothing when you’ve got no money, do they? And you come here, criticising me! I don’t know how you have the nerve! Saying I keep a dirty house—complaining about my cooking—telling Mr Sheldon that the food is appalling——’
‘It is,’ asserted a hard masculine voice behind them, and their employer came impatiently into the room, applying the flame of the slim gold lighter in his hand to the narrow cigar between his teeth. ‘You’re fired, Mrs Harris. I should have done it long ago, but I’m afraid I’ve allowed everything to slide since—since coming here. I intend to rectify that. And your dismissal is long overdue.’
Joanna didn’t know which one of them was the most astounded, herself or Mrs Harris. The last thing she had expected was that he might actually act on what she had said, and in spite of her aversion for the housekeeper’s slovenly ways, she couldn’t help but sympathise with such an abrupt expulsion.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/anne-mather/whisper-of-darkness/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Anne Mather
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
Отзывы: Пока нет Добавить отзыв
О книге: Mills & Boon are excited to present The Anne Mather Collection – the complete works by this classic author made available to download for the very first time! These books span six decades of a phenomenal writing career, and every story is available to read unedited and untouched from their original release. Beware the boss…As the third governess to take on problem child Anya Shelton, Joanna was expecting a little more gratitude from Anya’s father, Jake Sheldon. She can’t believe the antagonism she encounters from her frosty, classically handsome employer. How dare he treat her in such an unprofessional manner? Soon Jake’s reclusive ways raise more questions – why does he persist in cutting himself and his daughter off from the world? But something about the prickly Jake draws Joanna in, and she has to ask herself – why is she so concerned about him…?