The Reading

By Noland Williams

Set in 1924, Leicestershire, England, three aristocratic brothers throw a gala party at their family's grand manor house. However, the party gets interesting when a fortuneteller arrives to read their palms and reveal their secrets.
The ending is as unexpected as the fortunes told during the evening.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Blue M Publishing
• Release date: Mar 31, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370529186

Book preview

THE

READING

A Short Novel

By Noland Williams

Blue M Publishing, LLC - Chicago

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-publication data

Names: Noland Williams

Title: The Reading

Description: First edition | Blue M Publishing (ePub), Chicago, IL [2017] | Contents: The Reading | Summary: The setting is 1924 England, and the aristocracy is having a party at the castle. A fortuneteller joins the group and makes uncomfortable predictions before the final scene. | Audience Note: Recommended for readers thirteen and older | Language Note: no offensive language.

Identifiers: ISBN

Subjects: LCSH:sh85048050 Fiction; sh85121965 Short Story; sh86004353 domestic | BISAC: FIC045000 Family; FIC0290000 Short Stories; FIC008000 Saga | GSAFD: 45 000000cz a2200037n 455 Regency; 555 Regency |

Classification: LCC PS370-380 | DDC 813/--dc23; 200-038 Moralities; 200-50 Regency

The Reading, Noland Williams

Contents: One Part | ISBN (ePub)

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Contents

Book Summary

Introduction

CH 1

CH2

CH3

CH4

CH5

CH6

CH7

CH8

CH9

CH10

CH11

CH12

CH13

CH14

CH15

CH16

CH17

Epilogue

Author

Blue M Publishing

The Reading

Book Summary

Set in 1924, Leicestershire, England, three aristocratic brothers throw a gala party at their family's grand manor house. However, the party gets interesting when a fortuneteller arrives to read their palms and reveal their secrets.

The ending is as unexpected as the fortunes told during the evening.

*****

Introduction

Brief note to the reader:

The peerage titles used within the story do not relate to any known position within British nobility. This was intentionally crafted not to offend or disparage anyone within those families or lineages. Any inadvertent relationship gleaned from this work is purely coincidental.

In addition, the means used to refer to characters of nobility do not always comport with acceptable traditions; however, for purposes of clarity and readability, certain deviations were taken.

Finally, this is a short novel (novella), the early chapters with their seemingly boorish conversations are all designed with a singular purpose. For the patient reader, the ending will be the true reward for having persisted through the readings of the many earlier chapters.

We believe the ending is worth the wait.

*****

CH 1 Royalty on Display

1924 – Leicestershire, England

The sun was falling quickly into the western sky, creating an eerie, orange hue not uncommon during the autumnal season. Its fading rays were reflecting off the centuries-old, stone mansion that sat stoically on the twenty-thousand-acre estate of Charles Beaumont, the Marquess of Beresford in Leicestershire.

The land of the Beaumont's was the envy of England. Rich in tillable farmland, the estate boasted high yields in annual crops of barley, beans, wheat and rye. Typically, the soil held the barley and beans in the spring and followed with wheat and rye in the fall. In addition, there were eight-hundred head of Herefords and Ayrshire cattle that grazed sectors of the property reserved for the herds - mainly that in what was known as the wilderness areas. The cattle were fenced off by stone walls; however, the sheep were allowed to graze freely throughout the estate, except where partitioned by a Ha-Ha wall up by the main house to prevent their loitering too near the entrance.

Near the country house were several other buildings. The stables were the home to over twenty-five horses, including three studs which were often leased for procreation. Long and narrow, the stable building was constructed of the same Caen limestone used for the manor house and held stalls for all the horses with extra rooms for the harnesses, saddles, bridles and other equipment, as well as lofts for hay storage. An additional room was provided for the stable master to oversee his team of stable grooms. At the other end was the carriage house where the carriages of pre-combustion-engine England had been maintained.

In addition to the stables was the dovecote - a holdover building no longer used by the family. Originally built to house the doves and pigeons that were raised for meat and feathers, the building was largely in disrepair. Other buildings on the grounds were the old icehouse, which was still used to store blocks of ice for the kitchen in the lower level of the manor house, and a small conservatory, where small plants and exotics were kept within the protection of thick, glass panes and managed by one full-time conservatory gardener.

Farther afield and scattered throughout the estate were small cottages for the managers who ensured the success of the crops and the propagation and thinning of the herds. A small, little used chapel lay just outside the main park area of the manor house. It's tall, narrow steeple still offered a platform for the tarnished, copper cross on top, but the stained-glass windows had largely become broken and replaced with clear glass over the years.

As for the manor house, it was built in the 1720's by an architect steeped in the Inigo Jones motif of Palladianism. Highlighted by classical columns and friezes of the Greek and Roman eras, the country house blended a newer version of that style with a touch of baroque which was just coming into vogue at the time. With its twenty major rooms and another forty-five lesser ones, it was a respectable home, albeit not the largest of those in the surrounding county.

However, as one entered through the massive double doorways in front, one walked into the great hall which opened-up to a forty-foot domed ceiling, covered with frescos. These scenes showed images of the great battles of England, including the Battles of Marston Moor and Naseby, 1646-47, and Sedgemoor in 1685. Two wide staircases flanked each side of the hall, meeting at the top of the marble walkways to give access to the lavish second floor promenade that bordered and looked out over the interior gardens in the center. Just off the great hall were several of the lesser rooms intended for guests awaiting their audience with the manor's owner.

Other large rooms in the main structure were the elaborate dining room, spanning sixty-five feet in length, with an elaborately-carved table that would comfortably seat thirty guests. Lined with layers of mahogany molding and wainscoting, the room had three lead-crystal chandeliers imported directly from the same craftsman who fashioned those for Louis XIV for his palace in Versailles. Along the walls were gold-leaf-framed paintings of ancestry to the house and tapestries dating to the fifteenth century. In the music room was a limestone hearth six feet high by twelve wide, one barely large enough to frame the large fireplace that had seen frequent usage over the years of cold winters. In the art room, next door, gold draperies hung from rods posted nearly twenty feet above the multi-wood grains of the parquet floor below. There is where the owner had kept his easel and paints, positioned in front of the large, Palladian windows that overlooked the gardens behind the house.

But one of the most spectacular of the grand rooms was the ballroom. Designed in the Baroque style, the room held innumerable panels of frescos, mainly scenes from Greek mythology. Other paintings showed the coronation of Queen Elizabeth I in 1559 and another of King Henry