Lord of the Far Island by Victoria Holt (free e novels .TXT) 📕

them to get a horse ready for you," he said, "so we can start at once if you like. But perhaps you would like some refreshment first."

"I can't wait to see Fenwick," I said.

"Very well. We'll start immediately. It's about eight miles inland, close to the moors. Ready?"

We rode out of the inn together. It was a lovely crisp morning with a touch of frost in the air—which was rare in these parts. The winter sun shone on the thin layer of ice on the puddles on the roadside—it had rained on the previous day. The bare branches of the trees stretched upwards towards the sky like supplicating arms. I had often thought that trees were even more beautiful in winter than they were in summer. The leaves of the conifers glistened and for me there was excitement in the air because I believed I was on a voyage of discovery.

"He wasn't easy to find," said Michael. "It seemed as if the man was determined to hide himself. But he has agreed to talk to you."

"So you have warned him of my coming."

"I felt that was necessary."

"Of course you are right. I'm so glad he will see me."

We had left the sea behind us and the countryside was less lush here for there was a hint of moorland in the uncultivated stony ground.

And then the glory of the moors burst upon us. Bright sun shone on the streams, which a few days before had been trickling over the boulders and were now frozen into immobility. We skirted the moor and came to the little hamlet of Karem-on-the-Moor.

"This is the place," said Michael, "and Moorside Cottage is Fenwick's place."

The garden was neat and looked as though it had recently been made so; the cottage was small but charming. Ivy climbed its walls, against which leaned an old water butt to catch the rain. A small path of crazy paving ran from the front gate to the door across a miniature garden.

We tethered the horses to a stake and Michael led me through the gate to the door; and when we knocked this was opened by a man of medium height very neatly dressed in every detail.

"Mr. Fenwick," said Michael. "I have brought Miss Kellaway to see you."

"Come in," said Fenwick. "I understand you want to talk to me, Miss Kellaway."

"I should very much like to and it is good of you to allow me to come."

"By no means," he said.

Michael explained that he had business to attend to in the neighborhood and would like to take the opportunity to do that now. He would call back for me in about an hour. Would that be all right?

Mr. Fenwick said it would and I realized that Michael's impeccable good manners had made him realize that what we had to discuss might be of a private nature and therefore he had no wish to intrude.

Fenwick took me into a small room in which a fire was burning. There was a great deal of brass about the place and it was very brightly polished; in fact the impression was of complete cleanliness everywhere.

"Do sit down, Miss Kellaway," he said. "Sit near the fire. It's a cold morning."

I sat down and he took a chair opposite me.

"Now what is it I can do to help?"

"I think there is a great deal you can tell me. You see, I have only recently come to Kellaway Island and I had never heard of it before I came."

He nodded. "I know the story," he said. "I was so long in your father's employ that I am well conversant with family matters."

"You knew my mother, of course."

"Yes and your father's first wife."

"And you knew my half sister."

"Indeed, yes."

"What sort of a man was my father?"

He hesitated.

"You knew him well," I prompted.

"I was with him every day and in his confidence to a certain extent."

"Then you must have known him as well as anyone in the castle. I can't understand why he was so indifferent to his family ... to my half sister, to myself, to my mother."

"He was not indifferent to your mother nor to you . . . until she left him."

"But why did she leave him?"

"She could not settle down in the Island. She was constantly trying to get away. She wanted him to take her away but he wouldn't. He said he had his duty to the Island."

"But when she ran away he didn't care."

"He did. She had tried to go before but he had stopped her. He had ordered that no boat was to leave the Island without his permission. We never knew how she got away, but she did."

"Someone must have helped her then."

"It was something we never discovered."

"What about my half sister? What do you know of her?"

"She was a strange girl who gave a great deal of trouble."

"I've heard that. Why did she?"

"It seemed her nature to do so."

"Did my father not care for her at all, didn't he try to make her happy? After all she was his daughter."

Fenwick paused as though he were considering whether he should tell me what he knew.

I prompted him gently: "It's my family, you know. We're talking about my father. If there is anything strange about the family, I should know it, surely."

He said: "Your father was not sure that Silva was his daughter."

"Not sure!"

"She was known as such. Well, his first wife, Effie, was unfaithful to him. That was when things began to go sour. He went away on business and was sometimes gone for as much as three or four months. Silva was born seven months after his return. She was a perfectly well formed child but at first it was thought that she was a seven months' baby—and later people said that accounted for her ways. Whether she was or not is not certain. But your father discovered that her mother had had a lover and he half believed that Silva was the result of that liaison. Your father was not a