Sophie Pembroke - The Last Days of Summer - The best feel-good summer read for 2017

Maybe, if I could find the right costume, the right clothes to blend in, no one would think to ask what I was doing there in the first place.

Chapter One

“We’ll take it,” I said, making Bella laugh as she looked up at the imposing house.

“You can’t just buy it! We haven’t even stepped inside yet.”

I pulled her close against my side. “I don’t need to. This is it. This is home.”

Biding Time , by Nathaniel Drury (1967)

Two long years away, and the first person I saw upon my return to Rosewood was the ghost. Even if I didn’t quite realise it at the time.

I’ll admit, I was preoccupied. I hadn’t planned on going home so soon, not until Nathaniel called and insisted, and the temptation was too great to resist. Oh, I’d assumed I’d go back eventually, for a visit, at least. But two years away didn’t seem like enough. Two Christmases, two birthdays, two anniversaries – Ellie couldn’t possibly have forgiven me so soon.

This was a mistake. Which is why I was loitering in the Rose Garden instead of going inside.

The walled Rose Garden is one of my favourite spots at Rosewood, especially at midsummer, when it’s overflowing with flowers. As children, Ellie and I would mix up buckets of perfume from the petals: pungent flower water we’d sell to charitable passers-by at the end of the driveway. This year, however, it seemed that someone else had got there first.

Almost all the yellow rose bushes had been decapitated, leaving only stalks, leaves and thorns. As I blinked at the empty spaces where the flowers should be, I thought for a moment that I saw someone standing across the flower bed – a girl, younger than me, with long dark hair and pale features. The summer sun shone through her skin, lighting her up from the inside, like a creature from one of my grandfather’s more fantastical stories, only existing between one second and the next. Because when I opened my eyes, I was alone again, standing outside the house that was supposed to be my home, wondering if I’d be welcomed or dismissed.

Wasn’t that Rosewood all over? A place out of time, more fiction than real it seemed sometimes. Like Nathaniel had pulled the house itself from the pages of one of his books, complete with secrets and mysteries – even the paranormal.

Before I could fully process what I’d seen, my grandmother’s voice echoed out from the terrace, imperious and impatient, just as I remembered. Isabelle Drury was the mistress of Rosewood, and she never forgot it, not for a moment. It was more than a home to her; it was her kingdom, and she ruled it – and us, her willing subjects.

“We’ll need more of the eucalyptus. You can go and tell her.”

There was no response, and I found myself waiting, breath stuck in my chest, all thoughts of the strange girl forgotten. I wanted to hear another familiar voice, there, in the buzzing summer air, with its insects and pollen and freshly cut grass, rather than over a too-clear phone line. I wanted to feel like I was really home again.

I hadn’t intended to come back to Rosewood so soon. But now that I was here, I couldn’t imagine how I’d stayed away so long.

“And don’t forget the etched vase,” my grandmother’s voice rang out again. I smoothed down my hopelessly creased pale linen skirt and stepped out of the Rose Garden. Time to face the music.

Isabelle had moved back inside, and whichever family member she’d been ordering about had obviously rushed off to fulfil her demands; haste was always a good idea when dealing with my grandmother’s requests. The terrace was deserted again.

“In and out,” I muttered to myself as I retrieved my suitcase. “Minimum casualties.” That was the plan. This was a tester weekend. If it wasn’t dreadful beyond all measure, maybe I could come back for Christmas. Start finding a place here again. Maybe even find forgiveness, eventually.

But first I had to make it through the weekend.

I climbed the few steps to the glass-panelled doors that led from the terrace into the house, pushing down the hope beating in my chest. It was all so familiar, as if at any moment Ellie, aged seven and a half, could come running out carrying dolls for a tea party, Isabelle following with the second-best china tea set. At least, until I passed through the empty drawing room and reached the cool shade of the hallway.

The tiled floor of the wide entrance hall was covered in buckets, vases, stands, and what appeared to be chicken wire. Bright yellow roses and dark green foliage were stuffed and stacked into any and all containers; loose leaves and petals littered the ground. And in the middle of it all sat Isabelle, head bent over a small crystal vase filled with two blooms and a few sprigs of lavender, sunlight from the windows either side of the front door shining silver on her hair.

I leant my overfilled suitcase against the wall, and asked, “Can I help?”

Isabelle jerked her head up to look at me, and she lost her grip on the vase in her hand. It tumbled to the floor, spilling water across the floor tiles and crushing one of the rose’s stems. I darted forward and righted the vase, miraculously still intact. For one, brief moment, I saw the depth of the shock she must be feeling flash across her face, before she recovered her composure.

She really hadn’t expected me to come. As much as I knew the lack of an invitation wasn’t a mistake, I realised a small part of me had been hoping against hope that it was. That I hadn’t been forgotten, cut out.

Except I had.

“Hi,” I said, trying to look less nervous than I felt.

“Kia, darling, really!” Isabelle smiled, but she still looked a little shaken. Older, too, I realised. Faded. Frail. “You should have told us you were coming. You can’t just show up, scare people half to death.”

I reached my arms around my grandmother’s body, feeling bones and skin. “I did tell you. Well, I told Nathaniel I’d be here, when he rang to invite me. I even gave him my train times when he called last week.”

He’d wanted to check I was still coming. I wasn’t sure that it was a good sign that Nathaniel was so desperate to have me there to witness whatever he had planned to add excitement to Isabelle’s party. It almost made me an accessory.

Not to mention the fact he hadn’t told anyone else he’d invited me. What did that say about the welcome I should expect?

Isabelle wriggled out of the embrace and, regaining her natural poise, set about choosing a new rose for her vase. “And isn’t it just like him not to mention it.”

“Perhaps he wanted it to be a surprise?” I suggested, feeling even more uneasy. I’d honestly assumed he’d have at least told them I was coming. I should have known better. This all had the stink of one of Nathaniel’s Plans – and they seldom ended well.

“I’m sorry, Isabelle. I really thought Nathaniel would have told you.” Isabelle sniffed, but looked faintly mollified, so I went on: “Where’s everyone else?”

Isabelle checked her watch and ticked them off on her fingers. “Your parents have taken Caroline to buy a dress for the party, as the one I picked for her was apparently unacceptable to her. Your grandfather has the DO NOT ENTER sign up on his door, so I choose to believe that he is writing. Therese is probably still wandering the woods aimlessly, and has forgotten she’s supposed to be collecting foliage for me. Edward’s here, though. He can help you with your bag.”

No mention of the two people I wanted to know about most, I noticed. Had it been Ellie Isabelle sent for vases? I wanted to ask a thousand questions. About how Ellie was, how she’d been, since I left. Whether she still hated me as much as I imagined she must. And, most urgently, what had Ellie told our grandmother about why I left? From Isabelle’s reaction, I suspected that she knew more of my secrets than I’d like. When I’d left, while Ellie and Greg were on their honeymoon, what happened had been a secret between the three of us. I couldn’t imagine that Ellie would want anyone else to know, any more than I did. But it was clear that Isabelle knew something.