With these thoughts heavy on her mind she followed a route which took her along the two miles of pathways to Castle Creek, mentally damning Lady Margaret with every step she took. The woman should be ashamed—getting rid of her granddaughter as she would a stray dog.
It was a hot day, and the child was heavy in Nessa’s arms. She was wondering at the reception she would receive when Castle Creek came into view. Commanding a view over the English Channel, it was a solid, square-built house, with crenelated walls and innumerable windows. It was bigger and more imposing than any house Nessa had ever seen. She found it quite awesome.
Reaching the lodge, she knocked on the door. Getting no response, she peered through the window. It appeared no one was at home. She carried on up the long drive to the house and reached the heavy wooden doors. The shutters were closed, and when she pulled the rope that rang the bell inside the house sounded hollow and empty.
An old man in working clothes and a floppy felt hat who was tending the gardens told her that the old master had passed on two months back. His son, Sir Robert, had been in Mexico on silver mining business. He had been notified immediately, but before arrangements had been made for him to return home he’d been fatally wounded. The house had been closed and the other servants dismissed until further notice.
When the man had shuffled off to go about his work, Nessa stared after him. Clutching the babe in her arms—an orphan, she realised—she looked around. The beautiful house had a look of desolation about it, a feeling of emptiness, as though all the life it had known since the day it was built had been whisked away for ever.
What was she to do? What was to become of them? She had to find work, and the child would only hinder her. But for now there was nothing for it but to take the child with her to Cornwall.
The journey was hard. Without the usual method of feeding a young baby, she had to buy milk to spoon-feed her.
She had a spinster aunt who lived in Saltash, but being a harsh, self-righteous woman she would not take kindly to her turning up with an infant. Perhaps by some miracle something would turn up.
One thing she was sure of—Lady Margaret might not want her grandchild, and she, Nessa, had no part of her, but she would not take Miss Meredith’s defenceless daughter to any orphanage.
* * *
Two days after the lumbering farmer’s cart carrying Nessa Borlase and her young charge crossed into Cornwall, leaving her at a crossroads to go her own way, with her spirits crushed and no hope of finding a place for herself and the baby, a young boy rode over the undulating terrain.
Gripping the spirited roan with his strong legs, Marcus Carberry bent low over its glossy neck as he rode—at great danger, it seemed, not only to him but to the animal, as he galloped with complete abandon across the great expanse of undulating parkland. At any other time he’d enjoy courting danger—the thrill of it. But today he rode his horse hard in an attempt to rid himself of his brother’s harsh words.
Edward, his half-brother—the elder by six years—had arrived home from school. To his disappointment, Marcus had known immediately that Edward’s resentment towards him was unchanged.
‘Come, Edward,’ their father had said. ‘Aren’t you going to say hello to your brother? You haven’t seen him for almost twelve months.’
Edward had regarded Marcus with cold, malevolent eyes as he’d pulled off his leather gloves, and from his expression Marcus had known that Edward could quite happily have gone another twelve months and more without seeing his younger brother.
‘It’s good to see you, Edward,’ Marcus had said, in an attempt to reach out to his brother, despite his aura of barely concealed ferocity. ‘You are looking well.’
‘So are you,’ Edward had replied, before turning his back on him.
Marcus had stared at his straight back, angered by his attitude. His dislike of his brother at that moment had been so intense that he’d been afraid of losing his temper—and with it any advantage he might have.
Marcus’s mother, Lady Alice, was Lord Carberry’s second wife. Edward had been born to his first wife, who had died as a consequence of a carriage accident. At five years old, Edward had not welcomed his father’s second marriage. Even at so young an age he had resented the intrusion of a stranger into his well-ordered world—and he had resented it all the more when Marcus had come along, followed three years later by his sister Juliet.
In the distance the blue sea met the sky, and to the left of him a large lake on which many species of beautiful birds glided serenely and silently over the smooth surface was half a mile away. The boy gave it no more than a cursory glance as he rode towards the woods in the distance.
Once there, he slowed his horse and followed a narrow path into the trees. It was cool within the confines of the wood. The beech and the oak trees were heavy with leaf, dappling the path. In patches where the sun came through he felt the heat of those stray sunbeams as he rode through.
At ten years old he was a handsome boy. His eyebrows swooped fiercely upwards and his heavily fringed eyes were a startling silver-grey in a face as dark as a gypsy’s. His mouth had a hint of hardness, even in one so young, but at his age it was mobile, and he smiled easily and often. His hair was thick, and as smooth and black as a raven’s wing.
Hearing a rustling ahead, he paused and waited, smiling and looking with awe at the beautiful creature that suddenly appeared—a deer, slender and graceful, with long legs and stick-like antlers growing out of its proud head. Startled, it stopped and stared at him, before bounding away. The darkness that had shrouded him with his brother’s return melted away.
Laughing easily, the boy dismounted and led his horse along the path, delighting in the rabbits that ventured from the undergrowth and loving the peace of the wood which was shrouded in timeless tranquillity. The May sunshine had turned the beauty of the woodland and the quiet glades of ash and sycamore and venerable oak to every shade of green and brown.
He was so entranced with his surroundings that he could not believe his ears when he emerged into a circular glade and heard what he thought to be a young animal crying. The ground was thickly carpeted with delicate white wood anemones and bluebells, their scent quite intoxicating. Looking about him for the source of the noise, he found his eyes drawn to what looked like a bundle of rags beneath a canopy of leaves. He was sure he saw it move, and suddenly what looked to be a tiny hand reached up and thrashed the air.
Tentatively he moved towards it, unable to believe his eyes when he found himself looking down at a baby. It was wrapped in a pink woollen shawl which the infant, clearly objecting to being so confined, had worked loose with its wriggling about.
Marcus glanced around, unable to believe the baby was unaccompanied—surely someone would appear at any moment to claim it. Hunkering down, he studied the tiny scrap of humanity with interest.
‘Well, what have we here?’ he murmured.
The infant was female, by the look of it, and couldn’t be any more than a few days old—although he was none too sure, not having much knowledge of babies and never having given them much thought.
He felt a prickle of curiosity. She was a lovely-looking child to be sure, he decided, simply lovely. His heart softened towards the infant. She was distressed. Great fat tears brimmed from her incredible eyes and her face was red and screwed up with anger and exasperation.
‘Hush, now—stop yelling,’ he murmured softly, touching her cheek gently with the backs of his fingers.
He thought he must have a magic touch when she stopped crying almost immediately. Her eyes were as bright as two great blue jewels beneath their burden of moisture as they became fixed on his. When he held out his finger and placed it within her palm she gripped it and clung