Barbara Cartland - Stand and Deliver your Heart

When she could no longer hear the odd sounds behind her, she felt angry that the strictest privacy of the wood was being violated by unseemly strangers.

She wondered just what they could be doing there in the wood and why they found it so amusing.

‘I shall never know the answers to those questions,’ she told herself. ‘But I do hope they will go away and never come back.’

It suddenly struck her that they might do damage to the great house itself.

Wyn Hall was a magnificent example of the work of the Adam Brothers. It had been completed in the middle of the previous century on the site of a much older house.

The Earls of Wynstock dated back to King Henry VIII.

They had grown more important down the centuries and each one had improved the house that they lived in and they had also bought more land.

Having been brought up in the shadow of the great Wyn Hall, Vanda had a deep affection for it.

In the same way she loved the old Earl.

He was a distinguished man who enjoyed the company of her father, who was nearly the same age as he was.

The Earl had never been in the Army, but he liked to hear of the life that Vanda’s father, General Sir Alexander Charlton, had lived.

He told him about the many years he had spent with his Regiment in India and how well it was doing under British rule.

When the Earl died, Vanda knew that her father felt lost without him.

He had been shattered by her mother’s death and, when she was no longer there, he was just like a man who had been crippled.

He was, however, able to forget his unhappiness when he had a friend of his own age to talk to.

Now she thought sadly that he only had her.

Although she tried very hard to fill the gap in his life, it was difficult to do anything but listen when he talked on and on endlessly about his long life.

Fortunately ‘the General’ as the village liked to call him, was now writing a book and it was taking him a long time because he had so much to remember and so much to record.

At least, Vanda thought now, he must have reached the year when she was born.

She was certain that when it was finished it would be of great interest to the public.

She in fact had had considerable difficulty in persuading her father to write down the stories he told so amusingly.

Her mother had loved them all hugely even though she had heard them told hundreds of time

“Then tell Vanda,” she would plead with him, “how you quelled a mutiny among your sepoys.”

Or else she would say,

“Describe the real beauty of the Palace belonging to the Maharajah of Udaipur and the pink one you liked the best in Jaipur.”

Vanda adored her father’s tales.

She knew that the task of writing his reminiscences was making all the difference to his life.

He had been writing when she had left the house and he would not realise how many hours she had been away.

It was only for the last eighteen months that he had been unable to accompany her on horseback.

At first she felt guilty, knowing how much he enjoyed being on one of his well-bred horses.

Sir Alexander’s legs were swollen with rheumatism and it hurt to walk let alone ride.

Vanda now reached the end of the wood.

She wondered if she should go home and tell her father about the strange men in the centre of it.

Then she had a better idea.

She would ride up to The Hall and tell the caretakers to be on their guard.

If the hooligans were really intent on making trouble, they might stone the windows of the house or perhaps try to break some of the stone statues in the garden.

‘I will warn the Taylors, the caretakers of the house,’ she decided.

She rode Kingfisher quickly through the Park under the ancient oak trees, across the bridge that spanned the lake and straight into the stables.

She was so used to going there that it was almost like coming home.

As she then reached the yard, the Head Groom, who had known her since she was a child, came out of the stable.

He smiled a greeting before he said,

“Afternoon, Miss Vanda, it be a sight for sore eyes to see thee.”

“Thank you. I hope you are feeling better and that the cut on your hand has healed, Repton,” Vanda replied.

“It ’ealed immediate after you tells me what to do with it,” the Head Groom replied.

He took Kingfisher from her and led him into a stall.

Vanda walked along the path through the big banks of rhododendrons which led to the kitchen door.

She did not knock, but went along the flagged passage to the kitchen.

It was a very large room with a high ceiling. There was a large beam on which they had hung game and dried hams in the past.

Now there was nothing on the beam but one small rabbit.

The caretakers were sitting at a large deal table drinking tea.

Taylor would have risen when Vanda appeared, but she said quickly,

“Don’t move, I only came in for a moment or two to tell you something.”

“Now sit you doon, Miss Vanda. Mrs. Taylor said, who was a large and rosy-cheeked woman. “I’m sure you could do with a cup of tea and Taylor and me were a-just havin’ one.”

“I would love a nice cup of tea,” Vanda replied.

She knew that it was what they expected to hear.

Although she did not really enjoy the strong dark Ceylon Tea they always drank, they would have been disappointed if she had refused a cup.

When it had been poured out and the cup was beside her, Vanda began her story,

“Such a strange thing has just happened. I was riding in Monk’s Wood and what do you think was right in the centre where no one ever goes except myself? There were men!”

She paused for a short moment.

Then, as Mr. and Mrs. Taylor did not speak, she went on,

“They were all strangers and they most certainly did not come from Wiltshire. There were quite a number of them too and laughing in what I thought was an unpleasant manner.”

It was then that she was aware that Mr. and Mrs. Taylor were looking at each other.

She felt, although it just seemed incredible, they were not surprised at what she had said to them.

“They be in Monk’s Wood?” Taylor asked at last very slowly. “Now what on earth do you think that they’d be doin’ there, Mother?”

He looked at his wife as he spoke.

She did not answer, but seemed to be busying herself pouring out more tea into her cup. Although it was already nearly full.

Vanda looked from one to the other and then she asked them,

“Have you heard of these men before?”

“No, no,” Mrs. Taylor answered quickly. “We knows nothin’ about ’em.”

She was obviously becoming agitated and so spoke in a way that was not in the least like her.

Vanda next looked at Taylor.

She did not speak, but he was well aware that she was asking him a question,

“I knows of nothin’ we can tell you, Miss Vanda,” he said at length. “They ’as nothin’ to do with us.”

“But you are aware they exist,” Vanda insisted. “Have they been here causing any trouble?”

Mrs. Taylor put down the teapot and laid her two hands palm down on the table as she turned to say to Vanda,

“Now just you listen to me, Miss Vanda. Go home and say nothin’ of what you’ve heard. There be nought you can do about it and we wants no trouble.”

“Trouble?” Vanda asked in a bewildered tone. “What sort of trouble are you talking about and how can it possibly affect you?”

Mrs. Taylor looked helplessly at her husband.

“We be alone ’ere, Miss Vanda,” he said, “except for the grooms and Repton be an old man while Nat and Ben be high on a horse but small on the ground.”

Vanda would have smiled at the description of the two younger grooms, who did in fact look rather like jockeys, if she had not been feeling so worried.