Straw in the Wind Read Online Free PDF

subservient member of staff but she would get things done – already had in the short time she’d been here.
    Oscar had gleaned enough from the staff to discover that she’d already put Maggie in her place. Fanny liked her and thought she was pretty, Giles had a healthy respect for her and Joseph said she was a sprightly piece of goods, like his wife had been. Oscar had told him she had a face with delicate bones, with a small nose, fair skin, a big smile and long dark hair that reached to the small of her back.
    She also smelled good as she moved past him in a stir of fragrant air. She was a mixture of polish, to which lavender oil had been added unless he was mistaken, of scrubbing soap and roses. In fact, her smell blended with the house.
    He rose and moved around his sitting room. Once it had been his parents’ house, but his mother had married and had gone to live in America after the death of his father. She had died there. Diana had taken it over, refurnishing it to her own taste. Now and again she’d entertained her friends here and the room had resonated with laughter as they’d gossiped together.
    Picking up an ornament from a table his fingers ran over it. It was the shepherdess in her blue frilly dress. A hand’s width away was the shepherd. The ball of Finch’s thumb sought out a small imperfection in the glaze. He’d won them at a shooting contest at the local fete the year after he’d married Diana.
    He worked his way around the room. Here on the lounge were four embroidered cushions his wife had fashioned, depicting Leighton Manor in the various seasons. Summer had been left unfinished, and Mrs Cornwell had completed it. If he was careful he could feel the change in the embroidery stitches. Diana’s stitching had been so fine when compared to Mrs Cornwell’s, which was slightly clumsier . . . though that could be in his imagination.
    He voiced his thoughts, reminding himself. ‘Because I loved Diana I now think of her as perfection.’ She’d been far from it.
    He moved to the mantelpiece, using the map in his mind. Lightly he touched the clock. Apart from the noise, it felt alive, the tiny vibrations clicking off time against his palms. He jumped when it chimed, and grinned. A quarter past four! The clock had been a wedding gift, but Finch couldn’t remember from whom. Diana would have.
    Everything was in its place. The face screens had been embroidered by his mother. The fender, fire-dogs and sparks screen were in place around the empty grate. He’d wished that he and Diana had had children together; it would have settled her down, and he’d like to have had a daughter to remember her by.
    You’re not too old to marry again and produce children.
    â€˜But who would want a blind man,’ he murmured.
    Diana had been young when they’d married . . . like Sara Finn. He’d been seven years older, too old for her in his mind. She hadn’t wanted children, and as a result their personal relationship had been unsatisfactory.
    He had worked his way round the room. Now he had nothing to do but sit in his chair again, enjoying the sun’s warmth against his skin as he inhaled the scents coming from the profusion of wild flowers growing in the overgrown garden outside the house – once neatly trimmed grass and flower beds.
    â€˜At least my efficient new housekeeper hasn’t changed that,’ he murmured, wishing that she were older, and therefore more sensible. He didn’t like change, and she was bound to forget he was blind and put obstacles in his path. Her youth alone would rearrange the quietness of his home. Already her scrubbing brush had intruded into it, scrubbing away last week’s dirt, or was it last month’s . . . or even last year’s? Boredom would eventually move her on to remove the memories from someone else’s past. He should get rid of her now, before she settled in – send her