‘I can’t imagine anywhere less likely to be haunted.’ She spoke the thought aloud as, the tour completed, they were returning via her room so she could pick up her coat and bag while Simon spent a few minutes with his grandfather.
‘So you’ve heard there’s a ghost?’
Feeling a blush starting, she admitted, ‘I was curious enough to look Farringdon Hall up in Britain’s Heritage of Fine Historical Houses…’
‘I see.’ There was some slight nuance she couldn’t catch. ‘What else did it have to say?’
‘That in her heyday, Elizabeth I was rumoured to have made many private visits to the Hall.’
‘I don’t doubt it. Sir Roger Farringdon, a notorious rake who owned the house at that time, and had been widowed quite young, was known to be one of the queen’s favourites. Next time we visit the gallery I’ll show you his portrait. But to get back to our ghost…’
‘You mean there really is one?’
‘Grandfather certainly believes there is. This is her room we’re just coming to now.’
When he opened the door Charlotte was surprised to find that it was a child’s room, full of the paraphernalia of childhood—dolls and a doll’s house, an old-fashioned rocking-horse, a pram with a golly in it and a cot containing a large teddy.
A jumble of books and toys were still stacked on a wide shelf. The air struck chill.
‘After her death it was left completely untouched,’ Simon explained.
‘So she was a member of the family?’
‘Oh, yes. She was Grandfather’s sister. Her name was Mara and she was born in 1929. When she was still a toddler it was discovered she had a serious heart defect that in those days it wasn’t possible to correct. She was just turned seven when she died.’
‘And Sir Nigel believes that her spirit still lingers here?’ Charlotte asked with a shiver.
‘Yes.’
‘What do you believe?’
‘I keep an open mind,’ he said lightly.
Charlotte would have liked to know more, but the brevity of his answer seemed to preclude any further questions.
‘Now, about ready for our outing?’ he queried.
‘I will be in a second or two when I’ve fetched my jacket and bag.’
‘While you do that, I’ll just put my head round Grandfather’s door and tell him we’re off.’
Outside, the air had turned appreciably colder and a rising wind was hustling ragged, charcoal-coloured clouds across a leaden sky.
As they made their way through a wide stone archway to the right of the house, Simon, who was wearing a short car coat, remarked, ‘It looks like the forecast’s correct and we’re in for some rain.’
‘If I’d been thinking straight I would have packed a mac instead of a jacket,’ Charlotte said ruefully.
But excitement had precluded straight thinking.
‘It won’t matter if it rains while we’re in the car, and I’ll try to park near the entrances to both the pub and the village hall… Of course if everyone has the same idea—’
‘We’ll just have to run between the drops,’ she finished, smiling.
He returned her smile.
Watching his excellent teeth gleam and laughter lines form at the corners of his eyes, she felt her heart begin to beat faster.
The force of his attraction was powerful, as if he were true north and she, like a magnet’s needle, couldn’t resist the pull.
‘As we’ll be going cross-country,’ he told her, when they reached the creeper-covered garage block, ‘what I will do is take the vehicle Frank Moon, our estate manager, uses, rather than my own car.’
Retrieving a large bunch of keys from a locked cupboard, he added, ‘A lot of the roads through the wooded areas are just rutted tracks, so if it does rain heavily, we may well need a four-wheel-drive.’
Glancing around her, Charlotte observed, ‘This looks like part of an old stable block.’
‘It is,’ he confirmed as he helped her into the big estate car. ‘There are still a couple of stalls left in the other part, but we haven’t kept horses since I was in my teens.’
‘Did you learn to ride as a child?’
Sliding behind the wheel, he answered, ‘Yes, but when I went to university there was only Lucy left and she didn’t care for horses, so Grandfather gave them to a local riding school for the blind.’
As the engine roared to life and they headed north through rolling parkland dotted with grey woolly shapes, he went on, ‘From time to time I’ve considered getting a couple of horses so I, and possibly a guest, could ride at weekends.’
Only half listening, she watched his hands on the wheel—strong, exciting hands with long, lean fingers and neatly trimmed nails—and pictured them touching her intimately, so that her breath came faster and butterflies danced in her stomach.
Making an effort to banish such erotic thoughts and concentrate, she pulled herself together, and said, ‘It sounds a wonderful idea. But wouldn’t you need someone to exercise them during the week?’
‘Our present chauffeur used to be a groom, and he’s declared himself more than willing to take them out on a daily basis.’
Then thoughtfully he asked, ‘I gather you ride?’
‘Yes, I learnt when I was about eleven. Of course, it wasn’t real riding,’ she added a shade wistfully. ‘I used to go to a local riding school that took small groups hacking round suburbia.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘I rode a black horse named Milord. Though he stood seventeen hands, he was as gentle as a lamb. The problem was, we were always trailing behind the others.’
‘Why was that?’
‘His mouth was so hard he was able to do exactly as he pleased. He used to amble along at his own pace, stopping whenever he felt like it to tear chunks from people’s hedges and snatch whatever he could reach from their gardens. I often spent a lot of my ‘‘lesson’’ apologising,’ she added wryly.
Watching the corner of his long, mobile mouth lift in a smile, she found herself imagining that mouth moving against hers.
As though he knew exactly what she was thinking, he turned his head and their glances met.
In that instant, as green-gold eyes looked into grey, desire flared between them with a white-hot furnace heat.
Damn! Simon thought, returning his gaze to the road. Normally his feelings were well under control, but that unexpected and unplanned explosion of lust had taken him by surprise.
Out of the corner of his eye he could see that Charlotte’s face was as red as a poppy and she was staring fixedly ahead.
It was clear that the feeling had been mutual, which in some ways was satisfying. But it had come too soon.
He had every intention of seducing her, but when the time came to put his plans into action, he didn’t want her to be on her guard. It would only make things more difficult.
Feeling as though her very bones had melted like candle wax, Charlotte gazed through the windscreen, while she wondered confusedly how so much strong feeling,