The Secret of Summerhayes
A war-torn summerA house fallen into ruinA family broken apart by scandal…Summer 1944: Bombed out by the blitz, Bethany Merston takes up a post as companion to elderly Alice Summer, last remaining inhabitant of the dilapidated and crumbling Summerhayes estate. Now a shadow of its former glory; most of the rooms have been shut up, the garden is overgrown and the whole place feels as unwelcoming as the family themselves.Struggling with the realities of war, Alice is plagued by anonymous letters and haunting visions of her old household. At first, Beth tries to convince her it’s all in her mind but soon starts to unravel the mysteries surrounding the aristocratic family’s past.An evocative and captivating tale, The Secret of Summerhayes tells of dark secrets, almost-forgotten scandals and a household teetering on the edge of ruin.
Читать The Secret of Summerhayes онлайн беплатно
The Crystal Cage
The Girl from Cobb Street
The Nurse’s War
Daisy’s Long Road Home
The Buttonmaker’s Daughter
MERRYN ALLINGHAM was born into an army family and spent her childhood on the move. Unsurprisingly, it gave her itchy feet and in her twenties she escaped from an unloved secretarial career to work as cabin crew and see the world. The arrival of marriage, children and cats meant a more settled life in the south of England where she’s lived ever since. It also gave her the opportunity to go back to ‘school’ and eventually teach at university.
Merryn has always loved books that bring the past to life, so when she began writing herself the novels had to be historical. She finds the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries fascinating eras to research and her first book, The Crystal Cage, had as its background the London of 1851. The Daisy’s War trilogy followed, set in India and London during the 1930s and 40s.
Her latest novels explore two pivotal moments in the history of Britain. The Buttonmaker’s Daughter is set in Sussex in the summer of 1914 as the First World War looms ever nearer and its sequel, The Secret of Summerhayes, thirty years later in the summer of 1944 when D-Day led to eventual victory in the Second World War. Along with the history, of course, there is plenty of mystery and romance to keep readers intrigued.
If you would like to keep in touch with Merryn, sign up for her newsletter at www.merrynallingham.com
Contents
Sussex, England, late April 1944
Something about the scene caught at him, some memory he couldn’t grasp. Behind him the tangled mass of alders – they were alders, weren’t they? – but before his eyes, a landscape he must have read about, or perhaps dreamt. He’d never been here before, that was certain. The last two years had been spent miles away, and though since January his regiment had been moving from camp to camp, this was the furthest west they had come. He pushed past the last few branches and received another scratch to add to all the others. The trees had long ago grown together to form an almost impenetrable barrier. The old fellow who’d given him a lift had heard the word Summerhayes and dropped him at what must have been the rear entrance. He should have stopped at the broken brick columns and found another way in, walked around the perimeter wall until he came to a main entrance. That was probably in the same ramshackle state, but the tanks would have bulldozed a path by now and the going would be easier. Very much easier. He should turn back.
But he didn’t. Something made him push on, that dream perhaps, a misty image he carried with him. Now that he was clear of the trees, he could see more than a few feet ahead. He appeared to be standing on what had once been a paved terrace. Beneath the heaps of dead winter leaves, he glimpsed terracotta. A Mediterranean colour, out of place in an English garden, or even an English wilderness. It appeared to circle what must have once been a lake but was now stagnant water, carpeted from one side to the other with giant water lilies. The air was slightly sour; it smelt of mud, smelt of must. In the centre of the lake, the remains of a statue, broken and chipped, rose strangely from out of the rampant vegetation. It was as though, wounded and maimed, it was trying to escape. Something about the place held him fast. He stood for a long time, feeling his pulse gradually slacken, the rhythm of his heart seeming to align itself to that of the earth. What kind of craziness was that? He shook his head in disbelief and as quickly as the heavy backpack allowed, made his way to an archway in one corner of the clearing. The exit, he imagined, but it was as overgrown as everything else, its laurel leaves a dense mass.
He looked back before shouldering through this new obstruction. On one side of the lake, there had been a small summerhouse but its roof was smashed and a giant vine had weaved its way through the corpse. Directly across the water, there had been another building, and he could see immediately that it was one built to impressive proportions. Now all that remained of it were two or three shattered columns and the raised dais they stood upon. It seemed to have been some kind of temple, for the pediment had crashed to the ground and taken several pillars with it. Did English gardens have temples? He supposed they must. In that instant, the sun emerged from a passing cloud and glanced across the remaining pillars, its rays flashing pure crystal. He gave a low whistle. The building was of marble. Once upon a time, this had been a wealthy place.
