“Oh no!” Carson’s expression was fierce. “They certainly won’t stay with her. As soon as we start divorce proceedings I shall apply for custody. After all she deserted me. My lawyer has already written to ask her intentions. They are my children. Toby is my heir, and I want them to be brought up in Wenham, as we were. Wenham, not Venice, is where the Woodvilles belong.”
***
After Eliza had left Carson stood at the gate of Riversmead for a while and then picked his way across the lawn towards the river.
He thought it was a good thing that Aunt Eliza was returning to her roots. Not to her roots exactly, because she had been born at Pelham’s Oak, but for many years she’d lived at Riversmead and it seemed fitting that she should go back. And what of him?
He wandered along the river bank towards the churchyard, conscious of a feeling of isolation, of loneliness. He had been lonely at many times in his life, but not like this.
Nelly had gone, Connie and the children had gone. He was perfectly alone.
Nelly was alone too, in a strange dark place. He stopped and looked up at the cross on top of the church tower. Or maybe there was a heaven and she was there?
He made his way up the hill and, reaching the graveyard, stood for a long time looking down at her grave. There was, as yet, no headstone until the earth had settled.
The boughs of the tree that had bent low over her coffin at her funeral, heavy with buds and the promise of spring, were now shedding their tired leaves, heralding the approach of winter. They fluttered to the ground covering the grave with a soft blanket as though, safe and secure, at peace at last in the bosom of her mother, the earth, Nelly merely slept.
Contents
PAST LOVE
Publishing History
About the Author
By the same author
Synopsis
Prologue
PART ONE
The Black Sheep of the Family
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
PART TWO
An Old Love Rekindled
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Past Love (Part Four of The People of this Parish Saga) Page 23
