Return to Rhonan (13 page)

Feeling Douglas’s hand squeeze hers, Jess dimpled. ‘I think I’ll be okay now Di’.  You get a good night’s sleep.’

‘Are you sure honey? I really don’t mind.’

She felt his eyes on her. ‘Quite sure.’

CHAPTER
19
 

Jess spoke hesitantly, ‘It’s good of you to check the room, but honestly, I feel a bit stupid now.   It was after all only a dream.  I panicked at the thought of an exorcism being carried out – shades of the Exorcist. I’m scared stiff of seeing any ghosts.’  The room looked innocent, the lights enhancing the blue silk covered walls, the gilt on the chairs glinting. 

Douglas smiled. ‘You had every right to be frightened – especially with Lucy talking about the
exorcism; it
would scare anyone.’

‘Come in – sorry I haven’t unpacked properly yet.’

She gasped
,
as Douglas caught hold of her arm swinging her round to him.  He bent, brushing her lips, his hands stroking her back, pulling her closer.  Her mouth opened to the soft tip of his tongue,
her body
quivering as she felt the hardness of hi
m
, the thigh muscles tensing against her.

Hearing her soft groan, his arms tightened around her, his tongue tasting the sweetness of her mouth, as he swiftly unzipped the back of her dress.  She pulled back, lightly slapping his shoulder. ‘Hey this is a bit fast.’

He loosed her immediately unrepentant
,
and stood back running his fingers through her tangled curls. ‘I’ve wanted to do that since I first saw you. God you’re beautiful.’ 

Jess grinned, ‘I thought
you came
to search the room. So, if you’d zip me up, I’ll get you a drink, what would you like?’   

Before doing so, Douglas could not resist stroking the curve of her spine, only to feel her shudder in response. ‘Oh God, don’t do that. I’m trying to resist you.’

Douglas laughed, ‘So I’ve found your weak spot.  I’ll know what to do next time.’ 

Going to the drinks' cabinet she said, ‘Brandy?’

‘Yeah, thank you, just a snifter.’ He walked through to the sitting room his eyes glancing over to the escritoire. She’d obviously been working on it, as the lid was down with her laptop resting on top.  Beside it were some papers and a jewel
l
ed
P
arker pen.  Although the priest had been quite insistent that it was haunted, it looked innocent enough especially with the addition of a computer.  How could an inanimate object have any powers or influence?  He didn’t believe in that nonsense anyway.  Jess interrupted his thoughts as she handed him the brandy.    To his disappointment, she sat in one of the chairs to the side of him.

‘It’s good of you to be so concerned Douglas.  It’s just I’ve always had this horror of physically seeing a ghost.  The dream I could cope with, but not the idea of an exorcism.’

‘So tell me more about the dream.’

‘I don’t know about that, you seem so touchy on the subject of Muriall and Duncan.’ 

‘I promise I won’t be.  It’s just there are a few things I haven’t explained – personal things. But
,
go on tell me.’

She sipped at the brandy.  ‘Do you really want to know?’

‘Of course. I’ve got all night.’

Jess grinned, ‘You wish.’

Douglas sipped the brandy and raised his eyebrows.  ‘Well you get what you wish for.’

‘Ouch, what a cliché.’ She decided to recount the route to the small lake
that
she often took in her dreams.  ‘The dreams always start in fragments, then it becomes clearer
.
I‘m walking through trees, there’s a ditch and some kind of open ground. I pass some long haired and very shaggy cow
s
with huge horns, which terrify me, and then I’m struggling through muddy hassocks....’

Douglas felt the skin on his arms crawl. She hadn’t been at the Manor long enough to scout the grounds.  She’d described exactly, the way to the lake, the trees by the Orangery, the ditch in the Ha Ha, the field, and the boggy ground. 

His heart quickened, as she said, ‘The bank rises some distance from the lake, there are stones and a circle of small rocks nearby.  Sometimes they would shelter in the hut.  Duncan built it with stones and mud from the bog – you could say the hut was their love nest.’  She stopped a flush rising up her throat. ‘Err ... it’s sexy.’

Douglas grinned, ‘Now I am interested.’  Even as he joked, his throat felt dry.  She was describing his hideaway exactly.

‘The lake is surrounded with bulrushes and then clumps of reeds so it’s quite difficult to wade or swim there I should think, although the couple in my dream loved it.  They always raced to the Willow tree on the other side, but first they had to wade through the bulrushes.  It’s always so vivid. I can see it in my mind now, as I talk.  The willow tree is huge, hundreds of years old, well at least in my dream.  It’s surrounded with silver birch with clumps of rhododendrons, the ancient copper beech trees leading into the forest.’ 

He said quickly, ‘You know, not only have you described somewhere where I go for a bit of privacy and time out, it's a place that’s difficult to reach so it’s quite deserted. Now with you dreaming about the names and that particular spot, it could have been the perfect place for Muriall and Duncan – seeing as they were lovers.’

‘But, you
did tell me about Duncan before I had the nap
,
  so I could have just included it.’

‘Hmm – one thing that puzzles me. If you’re a psychic artist, why the fear of ghosts?’

Jessie bit her lip.  ‘It’s alright thinking about it or drawing it, just so long as I don’t see it in the flesh.’

‘Yeah I guess that goes for a lot of people. So the psychic art?  Have you always had visions of ghosts?’

‘Yes, from a child. I also have premonitions of the future.  I used to frighten the family quite a lot as I would draw someone – always with a small angel floating beside them. I would tell my aunt or uncle that the angel was taking this person to heaven.  Trouble was, they would find out that person had really died and recently.’

‘So, it’s like a gift or something.  I don’t want to be rude, Jess, but I’m a
skeptic
– yet,  open minded about it all.  Have you ever seen anything physically?’

‘No – thank God, and neither do I want to’

‘But
,
why do the art
if you have this fear surely it would be better not to have anything to do with it?

‘It’s not that easy. The visions will come wherever I am or whatever I am doing. They are spontaneous.   Generally, it’s through dreams, or inner visions, which I draw or paint. One day I remember clearly,   I was on the beach and drew some gravestones in the sand.  My aunt asked who they were for, and I said for they were for her and my uncle. As I was often right, they asked how long in the future. They told me I said, “Oh years yet –when I’m ten.”  I was about six or seven at the time.’ She laughed lightly. ‘
Much to  their relief that
did not come true.’

Douglas laughed with her.  ‘Scary.  Your aunt and uncle seem nice people.’  Really he was wondering why she never mentioned her parents.

‘Ah yes, well my step-mother was my aunt, my mother’s sister. Her name was Prissy;
she brought me
up along with my uncle who was my aunt’s brother, Uncle Tim.  Err ....’  She paused, taking a tight breath. ‘My mother died when I was two months old.  My father died in a hunting accident when I was three.
My aunt moved around a lot you know with the business. 
She
had homes in Canada and America. After my aunt died, I moved back to America. I was born there, went to Harvard, made lots of friends, so it seemed the right thing to do. I set up a practice with Dinah in Bedford-Stuyvesant.’

‘
You’ve had it tough.’

Looking at the sudden pallor in her cheeks, the stillness of her body, Douglas went across to her.  Kneeling by her
side,
he took her small hands in his as he said, ‘How about
you,
and I go exploring tomorrow. I’ll show you the lake and bring your bikini and towel; they say it’s going to be a scorcher.’

‘That would be wonderful. Thank you. But look, I’m beat; I really do have to go to bed.’

‘Sure, I don’t have any pyjamas, but I’m wearing boxer shorts.”

She giggled. ‘I need to sleep. Time you left.’

He grinned. ‘That’s the furthest thing from my mind. But, look just one thing.”   He rose to his feet lifting her with him.  Clasping her in his
arms,
he felt the soft roundness of her breasts, the curved angle of her hip against him.  He warily clasped her buttocks pulling her in closer as he nuzzled her neck.  ‘Just an appetizer.’  Finding her lips, he pushed his tongue through, flicking the inside of her cheek. God she tasted so sweet.  He felt her shudder, her body tense. Maybe, there was just the chance that he would be carrying her to the bed. However, her hands gently pushed him away.

‘No – let’s take this slowly okay?’

He growled sexily, as he smiled, ‘No it’s not okay, but I can wait.’ He left reluctantly.  She was enchanting, intriguing.  He tried to lay his suspicions to rest.  She was a millionaire, no way did she show any hint of wanting to take over Rhonan. She was an idealist committed to her vocation and also deeply passionate about her art. 

Locking the door behind him, Jess wandered over to the dressing table, taking out a small silk bundle. Carefully peeling away the silk she looked at the blue velvet box aged with yellow and brown spots. Lifting the lid she gazed down at the locket, old gold embellished with the same intricate design as the one Muriall wore in the portrait.  Could it be the one? Was this a key to that lost ancestor? 

Opening the locket she looked at the miniature painting of a young aristocrat, his face fit for any Grecian sculpture, the full lower lip, that faintly menacing look.  It could be mistaken for Douglas in Regency dress. From another purse, she took out two fragments of paper tattered and flocked with
age; some of the
writing was obliterated.   The first a narrow strip held the letters Mur.... born October 1792.... R –
the
second, female ... Mor ... at sea 181
1
... definitely part of a birth certificate, of course, her ancestor Morag. That much she did know. It was carefully treasured, handed down from generation to generation. 

Nothing was known of Morag’s history before the shack in
America
. But, she had to find out, after all that was really the purpose of her visit to Scotland to find her ancestors. She wanted to feel whole, to be part of something.  With the death of both her parents she could never rid herself of feeling so isolated, leading a liminal existence on the edge of society.

An awful tiredness crept into in her eyes, spreading to the muscles of her body. What was it? She’d slept heavily in the afternoon. Maybe she was going down with summer flu or something.  Leaning forward she examined her eyes in the mirror unaware of a still figure on the balcony watching her through the window. 
T
he wraith pressed her face to the glass as she clutched the small bundle to her breast.

Fighting an almost overwhelming tiredness, Jessie tried to undress. Stepping out of her dress, she collapsed across the duvet, slipping into kaleidoscopic pieces of dreams, images rising, flying across the screen of her mind.   She did not see the figure pass through the window into the room and stop for a few seconds watching her.  Silently, the woman floated onto the bed settling down by Jessie, stretching out a skeletal hand to stroke her bright hair.

CHAPTER 2
0
 

The Countess Flavia languidly pushed a stray ringlet from her cheek as she lay on the chaise longue of embroidered blue silk, her small feet  encased in heel-less satin shoes, a King Charles Spaniel snuggling among the muslin folds of her dress. Yawning she said, ‘Muriall you look a wreck as usual, and you smell like a rank reed. Why oh why do you insist on bathing in that filthy lake of yours.’

Muriall stiffened. That was the first time she’d
complained about
the lake. Was she suspicious? Had someone spied on them?  But, how could they? D
uncan
had a special shortcut through the bog.  Her aunt could not possibly follow; neither would she instruct a servant to spy on them. The news would spread like wildfire.  ‘Aunt Flavia, it’s healthy – I love it.’

‘The stuff of childhood.  Hmm, well go bathe and dress becomingly; the Earl of Whitney will soon be here with his Mama to pay you his attentions. I am sure he is going to offer for you. ’

‘Oh Aunt, he’s as limp as a lettuce leaf and equally as boring.’ 

‘His fortune is not boring, and it is high time you were wed. What is wrong with you? He is heir to vast estates.’