Yesterday's Promise

by Linda Lee Chaikin

  Rogan placed his hand on the desk and leaned toward him, smiling almost boyishly. “Then do something, big brother. You’ve got the means and methods. Look it up, check the wires, find out what happened to that claim he filed. Is it held up somewhere? Who’s behind it? Julien? Rhodes himself?”

  Parnell drew back in his leather chair, his Irish linen shirt so white it had a bluish cast. The gold ring and diamond pin at his cravat glittered.

  “And get demoted if they find out?” Parnell choked. “If I got in his way, what would he do about Darinda? He’d rule against me for sure. I’d never get near her again.”

  Rogan straightened, disturbed at the sight of his brother cowering under Julien’s constant control. “Has she no say about seeing you again? And what would Darinda think about you if she knew that you helped Julien in that kind of dirty deal?”

  Parnell picked at his manicured fingernails.

  “What Darinda thinks she keeps to herself.”

  Rogan folded his arms. “Sounds a pretty mess, if you ask me.”

  “Well, I’m not asking you. Stay out of it, Rogan. I know what I’m doing.”

  Rogan wondered but kept silent.

  Parnell came from behind the desk and circled the lavishly decorated room. “It’s you who’d best be on guard,” Parnell said as he looked at Rogan seriously. “Henry’s dreams about gold beyond the Limpopo may not be as foolish as everyone once thought. That puts you in a precarious spot.”

  Alert, Rogan looked at him, studying his tense face.

  “Go on.”

  Parnell shrugged, looked as if he wished he had kept silent, then gestured to the large map on the wall.

  “We had that drawn up by Giles Mornay.”

  Rogan stood still. “Mornay?”

  “Ah…I see you understand. Yes, Giles is the son of Bertrand Mornay, who worked with Uncle Henry on that Zambezi expedition you’ve been so fond of all these years.”

  In three strides Rogan was standing before the map, his jaw set, studying the drawing meticulously to see how much it matched Henry’s. His anger boiled.

  Parnell shoved his hands in his trouser pockets and looked sullen.

  “Julien’s been very interested in Henry’s touted gold deposit for a few years now. You know that as well. It’s one of the reasons why he bought in so quickly with Mr. Rhodes’s idea of an English colony north of the Limpopo. Remember? It’s also one of the main reasons he wanted Arcilla and Peter to marry, so he could send them north. It was on your sixteenth birthday, I think. I told you even back then what I thought was the cause behind Julien’s interest in a new colony.”

  Rogan was hardly listening. His mind was racing with the sickening thought of his uncle’s discovering what he had dreamed of since he was a boy. He’d been a fool. He should have known Julien would try to locate Giles Mornay.

  Derwent! Why hadn’t the boy contacted him, warning him that Mornay and Julien were working together?

  “You’ll have to join the BSA along with the rest of us,” Parnell said.

  Rogan turned sharply, his smile sardonic, and challenging. “Maybe not.”

  Parnell’s eyes came alive. “What do you mean? You’re not much better off than that Irish kid with his fool claim to the coal. I’ve told you Mornay was paid to make that map of the Zambezi. I could risk Julien’s displeasure in even telling you that.”

  Rogan knew he would need to be careful about sharing too much with Parnell. Unlike Arcilla, Parnell was Julien’s man because of Darinda. A marriage to Darinda meant that together they would inherit a greater share in De Beers Consolidated after Julien’s death. Julien would leave Darinda a large fortune. With this glittering promise dangling above Parnell’s head just out of reach, his loyalties were likely to side with the one man who could fulfill his dream.

  Parnell was watching him. Had he given anything away in his expression?

  “So that’s the crux of it, is it?” Parnell said. “That’s why you’re here now instead of next year. You’ve found out something… Haven’t you? About Henry’s map?”

  Rogan started for the door. He had to find Derwent and talk to Mornay as soon as possible.

  Parnell was at his heels following Rogan to the door. He took hold of Rogan’s arm. “You found it, didn’t you?” Some emotion brightened his eyes.

  Rogan didn’t like the look of it, but he could not be sure of what it meant. He looked at Parnell evenly, disappointed in the change he saw, or was it change? Had it not always been there, but now was growing stronger in this ripe environment of greed?

  “Breathe a word to Julien, and you’ll regret it, big brother.”

  Parnell stared back, then his hand dropped from Rogan’s arm. He let out a slow breath. There was no excitement now, just a sober look. “Rogan, promise me you won’t lock horns with him over this.”

  Rogan was taken aback by the unexpected look of worry. “I can’t promise that, and you know it.”

  “I know you, and I know Julien—better than at any time in my life. That’s what worries me. He will have his way, and no one will stop him. For one thing, he’s close to Rhodes. If there’s any English loyalist more determined than even Julien to control mining rights in the north, it’s Rhodes. They both see a new colony as a means to provide the wealth that will help them build a powerful empire for England. Rhodes envisions an Africa ‘all red,’ as he puts it. A Commonwealth belonging to the throne. He’s a driven man…a clever man…and an intelligent man. You can question his motives, you can doubt his right to proceed, but you won’t be able to stop him. Nothing will stop him—or Julien. They will squeeze the life out of you as coolly and methodically as a python and will think little about it—a mere sacrifice for a greater purpose. There is no law that can stop them. In many ways, Mr. Rhodes and the Company are the law.”

  Rogan thought of John Sheehan. His hand was still on the doorknob, gripping it hard.

  “Julien will get Henry’s map over my dead body.”

  Parnell went white around the mouth. “Don’t even joke like that.”

  His brother’s response did more to shake Rogan than anything he’d heard. A moment of silence passed between them, like a ripple of wind passing through an open window. Rogan deliberately smiled to ease the tension.

  His mind went back aboard ship to the pages from Henry’s diary: “When it comes to diamonds and gold, I’d trust him no more than a banded cobra.”

  They looked at each other soberly, then Rogan threw the door open and walked out.

  He was sure now that his brother would not tell Julien that he’d found the map. Ambitious, Parnell was; Darinda, he wanted. But it was now clear that Parnell feared Julien in a far more serious way than Arcilla feared him. Arcilla was apprehensive over Julien’s interference in her frivolous social life. But Parnell feared him because he was convinced Julien could commit murder if anyone got in his way.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Grimston Way, England

  Rookswood

  A week later, Sir Lyle Chantry and his maiden sister, Lady Elosia, conducted a meeting in the Rookswood parlor with Dr. and Mrs. Tisdale, and Vicar Osgood and his wife, Martha. Mrs. Croft was there as well, sitting in a corner wringing her hands. She knew her eyes were red-rimmed from crying as she twisted her damp handkerchief, now and then blotting her pointed nose.

  When Evy had not shown up for Allhallows Eve Supper at the parish hall, she had grown worried and sent Wally to the cottage.

  “In the rain, Mrs. Croft?”

  “In the rain, Wally. Now, scat with you. She should’ve been here by now.”

  “Aye, then you be saving me some of that pumpkin pie, else it’ll soon be gone.”

  “Run along. I’ll save you a piece.”

  He had come running back dripping wet, eyes wide, yelling that Miss Evy was dead. It had taken some minutes to quiet everyone down to discover that Wally wasn’t sure that Evy was dead, but to him she sure looked it. He said he found her lying in an awful state at the bottom of the
attic steps, and he didn’t think she was breathing.

  Dr. Tisdale and Sir Lyle had rushed to the cottage with a few of the leading citizens of Grimston Way. Mrs. Croft had followed, arriving some twenty minutes later, huffing and puffing her way along the edge of the muddy road through wind and rain, all the time her heart in her throat and a prayer for the mercies of God upon her trembling lips. By the time she entered the bungalow, she was in such a state of exhaustion and emotional distress that Dr. Tisdale had Mrs. Tisdale treat her with a mild sleeping powder while he gave his full attention to Evy. Mrs. Croft lay down on the divan and remembered nothing until her niece Lizzie shook her awake an hour later.

  She awakened to a cup of strong tea and Lizzie hovering about her like a nervous swallow. Lizzie had come down from Rookswood with the latest news and to bring Mrs. Croft up to Rookswood. Dear Evy was not dead, although she was gravely injured.

  “The poor darlin’ lost her footing, she did. It were dreadful, Aunt Edna, just dreadful. I was there when they carried her up the stairs and put her in her old room near the nursery.”

  Lizzie told her how the squire and Lady Elosia had insisted Evy be brought immediately to Rookswood. They had put her in the very bedroom she had used as a girl when Mrs. Grace Havering lived with her at Rookswood as Miss Arcilla’s governess.

  Lady Elosia wanted Mrs. Croft to pack some of Evy’s things and come and stay with her in the alcove beside Evy’s chamber. Although Mrs. Croft wouldn’t come out and say so, she had long considered Evy like a granddaughter. She had loved her dearly from the time Evy was in braids and would sneak into the big rectory kitchen for freshly baked scones.

  Now sitting off by herself in the Rookswood parlor, Mrs. Croft looked up from her wet handkerchief as Dr. Tisdale, a tall gaunt man with a two-inch-wide silver bar mustache, was gravely answering Lady Elosia’s question. Mrs. Croft had been so upset, she hadn’t heard what the question was.

  “As to that, Lady Elosia, I cannot say. That will be for experts to decide. Whether Evy ever walks again is too early to determine. We’ll know more as we observe her recovery, which, quite frankly, might be rather slow, given the seriousness of her injury.”

  Mrs. Croft choked back a sob. Never walk? Oh, the cruelties of life. Dr. Tisdale went on to state that Evy’s back was not broken, but although he could not prove it, he believed there was damage to her spine.

  “She will benefit from treatment I cannot give here in Grimston Way. She will need to go to a hospital in London.”

  “This is, indeed, a great tragedy,” Vicar Osgood said. “But we must trust God’s good providence in all this. Not to say we take this lightly. No, not at all.” He was short and plump with a shiny scalp. “We should at least try to contact any of Evy’s direct relatives.”

  “Yes, a shame,” Martha Osgood said. “Such a lovely girl like that, alone in the world and without mother, sister, or even an aunt of blood to step forward to care for her. We simply must do something, Lady Elosia. I always did think it a trifle unhealthy for her to be living alone in that cottage.”

  “Not to say Grimston Way isn’t a perfectly safe and secure village,” Sir Lyle said flatly, as though his squireship were being faulted. “It’s not as though she lived in the East End of London where thieves abound thicker than rats.”

  “Oh yes, surely,” Mrs. Tisdale nodded vigorously. “Quite safe. It would be scandalous if it wasn’t, wouldn’t it? I mean, my dear Alice grew up here. Such a splendid child she was. And now she’s off in that savage land of Africa—I do hope Derwent discovers gold—”

  The squire stood, shoving his hands in his trouser pockets and frowning, looking nothing like his handsome son Rogan Chantry, Mrs. Croft thought. That scoundrel, Rogan. Ought to be here now at a time like this.

  Sir Lyle looked somewhat embarrassed by Mrs. Tisdale’s little speech. Of course, it had nothing whatever to do with poor Evy. Mrs. Croft turned an irate glance on the doctor’s wife, but the poor woman seemed not to notice that the squire had cut off her rambling. So like Mrs. Tisdale. Always bragging silly like about that Alice Tisdale, now “Mrs. Derwent Brown.” Mrs. Croft shook her head. Dreadful mistake, that was. Alice had stolen that decent boy right from under Evy’s nose. Shameful, it was. All so he could go looking for gold in Africa. Such piffle.

  “Her accident had nothing whatsoever to do with being alone in the cottage,” Sir Lyle stated.

  “Of course not.” Mrs. Tisdale seemed to shrink like a fading rose beneath his gaze.

  “We should make certain a rail is put on those attic steps,” he told Lady Elosia.

  “They are steep,” Lady Elosia said with a frown and a shudder. “Poor child. The thunder and lightning must have startled her.”

  Vicar Osgood nodded in agreement. “Nonetheless, Martha has a point. Evy ought to be with family.”

  Martha Osgood nodded. She was a slight woman with graying hair and patient ways. She sat still, her wrinkled hands folded quietly on her lap. She seemed to watch the squire with compassion, Mrs. Croft thought.

  “Not that we haven’t tried to be her family,” Vicar Osgood said. “We even invited her to live at the rectory and take her old room, but she wouldn’t hear of it.”

  “Too many memories, no doubt,” Martha said.

  “And an independent spirit,” the squire added. “Trouble is, Vicar, Evy has no blood relatives in England.”

  “It’s such a grief Grace Havering died so young,” Mrs. Tisdale said. “A fine woman. Treated Evy like her daughter.”

  Lady Elosia stood, all six feet of her, with a dignified lift of her head, her gray-gold hair smoothly wrapped into a chignon. She seemed to have had enough of the confab and took matters into her own hands, as usual. She touched the diamond brooch on the bodice of her pinstripe satin blouse with leg-of-mutton sleeves.

  “We will need to contact Julien about Evy’s unfortunate accident, Lyle. There’s no way around this. She ought to be placed in a London hospital. She will need money for her expenses.”

  Every head present in the little confab appeared to turn her way, including Mrs. Croft’s. Sir Julien Bley in Capetown? Now why would Lady Elosia be saying that? Miss Evy is no relation to that evil-looking Julien with his one eye and black patch.

  “Don’t you think so, Lyle?” Lady Elosia urged when the squire was silent a moment too long.

  He turned toward his older sister, and it seemed to Mrs. Croft that he sighed.

  “Yes. But there won’t be a need to wire him. Anthony’s in London.”

  “Oh? Well, tush,” Lady Elosia said, brows lifted. “Of all things. And I didn’t know.”

  Lady Elosia knew just about everything there was to know, thought Mrs. Croft.

  “And he hasn’t called at Rookswood?”

  The squire cleared his throat. Immediately, Mrs. Tisdale’s hungry eyes were alert and interested.

  That got her hair prickling. Soon Mrs. Tisdale would be gossiping, asking questions about why Anthony Brewster didn’t call at Rookswood, and suggesting reasons she knew nary a thing about.

  “He’s at the diamond-cutting business,” Sir Lyle told his sister.

  “Ah, well,” Elosia said reflectively. “That rather explains things. Then Anthony can wire Julien.”

  Mrs. Croft noticed that Mrs. Tisdale’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

  In the meantime, Lady Elosia decided that Evy would remain at Rookswood and that Mrs. Croft and Lizzie would tend to her needs. That was just the way Mrs. Croft wanted it.

  “I’m certain Julien will have something to say about this tragedy, as well as its aftermath,” Sir Lyle stated.

  “Quite sure,” Lady Elosia said.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Kimberly, South Africa

  Rogan strode up De Beers Road scowling to himself over the disturbing turn of events.

  “Mr. Rogan!”

  He stopped and turned. A familiar young man, slim and wiry, with russet hair beneath a floppy hat came hurrying across De Beers Road and caught
up with him, grinning widely. He stood shaking Rogan’s extended hand.

  “Am I glad to see you, Mr. Rogan. This is a grand surprise. Thought you wouldn’t arrive for more’n a year. Was just on my way up to the Blue Diamond to wait for you.”

  Derwent and his wife, Alice, had arrived in Capetown a short time after Arcilla and Peter married and sailed to the Cape. But even after a year beneath the African sun, his fair skin had refused to tan, except for the freckles on his gaunt nose, which had deepened into a toasty color. He was the same old Derwent Brown, and Rogan found himself relaxing and smiling at his boyhood village friend, hitting him good-naturedly on the shoulder.

  “Good to see you’ve survived all the lions and snakes, Derwent. How is Alice taking it all?”

  Derwent’s nervous fingers removed his floppy hat and then put it back on again as he continued to smile.

  “She’s doing dandy, but missing Grimston Way, to be sure.” He changed the subject a little too quickly. “I daresay I was mighty surprised to get your message this morning. So was Alice. This is good news, sir! We’re both hoping you’ll come to supper tonight.”

  “I’d be glad to come.” Rogan strode along toward the hotel, and Derwent’s long legs kept up.

  “I just left Parnell at De Beers Consolidated Mining Company. Do you know what’s on the wall?”

  Derwent looked suddenly dismal. “Aye, sir, I saw it…a map, drawn by Giles Mornay.”

  “Aye, indeed,” Rogan countered curtly. “The very man I’ve been telling myself I’d hire for the expedition north. And now what do I discover on my arrival?”

  Derwent rubbed his nose. “That I’ve been working for him—an’ he’s drawn an expedition map, and not for us—but for the BSA.”

  “Exactly.” Rogan narrowed his eyes as he peered at Derwent. “How did you allow that to happen, I’d like to know?”

  “The map wasn’t anything I ever expected, Mr. Rogan. I’d never have guessed he was doing it at all, leastwise for Sir Julien. Mr. Mornay sure did keep it from me. Not that I told him about you,” he hastened, “or mentioned our—your plans for the Zambezi expedition. I was waiting for your direction. I figured when you were ready, you’d let me know, and then I’d talk to him about doing the trek with us, try to line him up early so he wouldn’t hire out on one safari or another. Those Europeans sure do think highly of shooting big game for their fancy.”