Lord of the Far Island, Victoria Holt [world of reading TXT] 📗

freely in front of me. I quickly learned that Her and Him were Cousin Agatha and Cousin William Loring and that She was parsimonious, saw the cook's housekeeping accounts every week and relentlessly queried every item and that He was frightened of Her and daren't raise his voice against Her. She was all for social climbing. Look how she ran after those Carringtons. Shameful! And they kept a good establishment, my word they did, both in Park Lane and in Sussex, and it had come to the cook's ears that She had made Him buy that Sussex house just because the Carringtons had their place there. Always plotting, She was, to move up the ladder.

I learned through a series of subtle winks and nods (which they thought I was not smart enough to interpret) that She was determined to link the family with that of the great Carringtons and them having boys and her having a girl, the method was as easy as pie to understand.

I was amazed. They believed they were going to marry Esmeralda to Philip or to the magnificent creature I had seen on his white horse! It made me want to laugh as I debated whether to tell Esmeralda. But there was no point in scaring her completely out of her wits. She was not always in full possession of them as it was.

Life was full of interest: Upstairs in our nursery quarters, where I could spy on what Cousin Agatha was constantly reminding me were my betters, and downstairs in the kitchen, where I could drink in secret information when they all grew rather sleepy after finishing the joint or the chicken pie washed down with cook's best elderberry or dandelion wine.

I was pleased too that my origins were mysterious. I would have hated to own Cousin Agatha for a mother, as I would tell Esmeralda when I was feeling mean. Perhaps Cousin William Loring would have been a kind sort of father, but his subservience to his wife did not make me admire him.

So there was the autumn and winter—roaring fires and chestnuts popping on the hearth; the muffin man; hansom cabs clopping by. Peering out to watch them and wondering about the people who were riding in them, I would invent all sorts of stories to which Esmeralda would listen enthralled and then she would say: "How can you know who are in them and where they are going?" I would narrow my eyes and whistle. "There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Esmeralda Loring, than you wot of in your philosophy." She would shiver and regard me with awe (which I very much enjoyed). I would quote to her often, and sometimes pretend I had made up the words I spoke. She believed me. She could not learn as quickly as I could. It was a pity that she was so ineffectual. It gave me an exaggerated idea of my own cleverness. However, Cousin Agatha did her best to rid me of that; and perhaps, as I gathered from the servants' gossip and Cousin Agatha's manner towards me that I was of not much account, it was not so unfortunate after all, for I needed something to keep up my confidence.

I was adventurous and this gave rise to the speculation that I had a streak of wickedness in me. I loved the markets particularly. There were none in our district, but some of the servants used to go to them and I would hear them talking. Once I prevailed on Rosie, one of the parlormaids, to take me with her. She was a flighty girl who had always had a lover and had at last found one who wanted to marry her. There was a great deal of talk about her "bottom drawer," and she was always collecting "bits and pieces" for it. She would bring them into the kitchen. "Look what I've found in the market," she would cry, her eyes sparkling. "Dirt cheap it was."

As I said, I persuaded her to take me to the market. She liked to act outside the law too. She was rather fond of me and used to talk to me about her lover. He was the Carringtons' coachman and she was going to live in a mews cottage with him.

I shall never forget that market with its naphtha flares and the raucous Cockney voices of men and women calling their goods. There were stalls on which mounds of apples, polished until they shone, were arranged side by side with oranges, pears and nuts. It was November when I first saw it, and already holly and mistletoe were being displayed among the goods. I admired the crockery, the ironmongery, the secondhand clothes, the stewed and jellied eels to be eaten on the spot or taken home, and I sniffed ecstatically at the cloud of appetizing steam which came from the fish-and-chip shop. Most of all I liked the people, who bargained at the stalls and jostled and laughed their way through the market. I thought it was one of the most exciting places I had ever visited. I returned with Rosie starry-eyed and wove stories around the market to impress Esmeralda.

I rashly promised that I would take her there. After that she kept asking about the market and I made up outrageous stories about it. These usually began: "When Rose and I went to the market . . ." We had the most fantastic adventures there—all in my mind—but they had Esmeralda breathless with excitement.

Then the day came when we actually went there and what followed brought me to the notice of the great Rollo himself. It was about a week before Christmas, I remember—a darkish day with the mist enveloping the trees of the Park. I loved such days. I thought the Park looked like an enchanted forest bathed in that soft bluish light, and as I looked out on it I thought to myself: "I'll take Esmeralda to the market."

Of course this