Read Online Far From Home by Valerie Wood - Free Book Online Page B

which viewed him with suspicion.
    She muttered something in Spanish as she curtsied to him and her father spoke sharply to her in the same language.
    ‘Shall we be seated?’ Señor Rodriguez snapped his fingers and a troop of servants appeared. Two of them positioned themselves behind the two ladies and one behind the señoritas and drew back their chairs so they might be seated. Another moved towards Edward to show him his place and one attended Rodriguez, who sat at the head of the table.
    Wine was poured into crystal glasses and the food was brought in. Edward, having eaten plainly for so many weeks, found his mouth watering as dish after dish was placed on the table. They were served with a dish of guacamole containing tomato, avocado and chilli, which made him draw in his breath with its fire. Bright red and green peppers decorated a dish of cold spit-roasted quail. Smoked fish, oysters, crayfish, boiled turkey, pastries filled with minced ham and hot black peppercorns were placed before him. Tortilla and rice with ham and olives were offered. A dish of figs and dates mixed with almonds and raisins, capers and spinach, was topped with slices of oranges and lemons and sprinkled with sugar and almond oil.
    For dessert he was offered honey corn cakes and a creamy chocolate blancmange flavoured with nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger and malmsey.
    His glass was constantly filled, first with a crisp white wine, next a delicate rosé. Then the glasses were changed and he was brought a deep red Portuguese wine, mellow to the tongue, followed by a sweet dessert wine spiced with coriander and cardamom.
    After they had finished, the ladies departed to another room and through the closed doors Edward heard the angry tones of Elena, who he had noticed ate greedily and quickly. Her mother answered sharply and then came the raised voice of the older señora, though he couldn’t understand what was being said.
    ‘You will take a glass of malmsey, Mr Newmarch?’ Rodriguez lifted a crystal decanter enquiringly. ‘We will drink a toast to your success in your new country!’
    Edward blinked and accepted, though he knew he had had more than enough. He lifted his glass. ‘Thank you,’ he murmured. ‘And may I wish you and your family good health and continuing prosperity.’
    What riches, he thought. What sumptuous surroundings! Everything he saw around him spoke of wealth and old money. If I could cultivate this man, would some of his aura rub off on me? Could I acquire such grandeur and splendour?
    Edward drained his glass, saw Rodriguez smiling to himself and realized that the Spaniard wanted something from him, equally as much as he wanted from the Spaniard.

CHAPTER SIX
    ‘How do you do?’ Georgiana was standing on the stairs, so she had the advantage of being higher than the man who was posing as Edward Newmarch. She recognized him instantly as Edward’s valet, for she had seen him many times when calling on her cousin May. His name? she thought. What is his name? She tried to think of Edward’s voice as he called to him, as he often did, to fetch him this or that.
    Allen! she remembered. That’s what it is. So what has happened to Edward? Is he dead and Allen posing as him and spending May’s money? Her lips tightened. I cannot condone this, even though I have no regard for Edward Newmarch! But then she saw Wilhelm Dreumel’s smiling honest face and wondered how she could tell him that the man he was trusting with his land and gold mine was an impostor. But she must.
    ‘I’m pleased to meet you, Miss Gregory.’ Allen’s voice was nervous and his eyes had an appeal in them. ‘I believe we come from the same district?’
    Such nerve, she bristled. ‘I am related to the Newmarch family by marriage,’ she said coldly. ‘You must be from another branch of the family?’
    ‘Yes, ma’am, my family came originally from the west of Yorkshire. They were – in the mining business.’
    Perhaps they were. She continued to watch