snowy night.
Rather disappointingly, as the steamer approached Southampton port, Cecily saw that England looked as gloomy and grey as the Manhattan she’d left behind. She donned her new hat, then wrapped her fur shrug around her shoulders as her steward came to collect her luggage.
‘Is anyone meeting you, miss?’
‘Yes.’ Cecily dipped into her purse and took out a card on which was printed the name of the chauffeur who had (hopefully) been sent from Woodhead Hall to meet her.
‘Thanks, miss. You stay inside your cabin for now – it’s dead nippy out there – and I’ll come and fetch you when the car’s pulled alongside.’
‘Thank you, Mr Jones. You’ve been very helpful.’
Cecily handed him a healthy five-dollar tip and the young man blushed and nodded at her appreciatively.
‘Well, it’s been a pleasure looking after you, Miss Cecily, it truly has. Maybe I’ll meet you again on the return trip?’
‘I sure hope so, yes.’
The steward closed the cabin door behind him and Cecily went to sit in the chair by the porthole. As soon as she arrived at Woodhead Hall, she knew she must telephone her parents to let them know she was safe. It had all been a little hectic in the twenty-four hours before she’d left New York a week ago. Kiki’s maid had telephoned on the morning they were meant to leave to say her mistress had gone down with bronchitis. Her doctor had warned her it could turn into pneumonia if she didn’t stay in bed for a few days. Cecily had been happy to delay for as long as it took Kiki to recover, but Dorothea, having organised the visit to Woodhead Hall, had disagreed.
‘Kiki says her doctor is sure that she should be well enough to travel in a week’s time, which means she can meet you in England to board the flight to Kenya. You can still continue with your visit to Audrey and her family, Cecily. Audrey has made plans especially for your visit.’
So Cecily had set off from New York alone, and having been trepidatious at the thought, had actually enjoyed her days aboard ship. More than anything, it had built her confidence as she had been forced to make conversation with strangers over dinner and accept invitations to play cards (at which she was rather good) afterwards. There had also been at least three young men who had been keen to win her favour; it was almost as if, away from Manhattan where nobody knew who she was, she could finally be herself.
There was a knock on her cabin door and Mr Jones peered round it.
‘Your documents have been checked and the car’s pulled up alongside,’ he said, handing her back her passport, ‘and your trunk is loaded, Miss Cecily. Are you ready to go?’
‘Yes, thank you, Mr Jones.’
A biting cold wind hit her as she walked down the gangplank, the heavy fog blurring everything around her. The chauffeur helped her into the waiting Bentley and started the engine.
‘Are you comfortable, miss?’ he enquired as she settled herself into the plump leather seat. ‘There are extra blankets if you need them.’
‘I’m absolutely fine, thank you. How long is the drive?’
‘Depends on the fog, miss, but I’d say we’ll be at Woodhead Hall in two or three hours. There’s a flask of hot tea if you’re parched.’
‘Thank you,’ Cecily said again, wondering what on earth ‘parched’ meant.
In reality, the drive took well over three hours and she dozed on and off, unable to see anything of the English landscape through the fog. When she’d been to England before, Audrey had received Cecily and her parents at her grand London house in Eaton Square and then they had moved on to Paris. She only hoped the weather would clear a little so she could see something of the famed British countryside. Dorothea had visited her friend at her vast country estate in somewhere called West Sussex and pronounced it quite beautiful. But when the chauffeur pulled through a pair of large gates and announced that they’d arrived, it was almost dark and Cecily could only see the outline of an enormous gothic mansion sitting eerily against the dimming light behind it. As she approached the imposing porticoed front door, Cecily sighed in disappointment at the workman-like red brick facade. It wasn’t like any house she’d read about in Jane Austen’s books – they had all been mellow stone, whereas this looked like something out of Edgar Allan Poe’s stories.
The door was opened by