Summer Days

By Elizabeth Pulford

While publishing assistant Jane is happy to accept a temporary job at Foxhall House, she knows it is for one reason only. To put distance between her wounded pride and ruined relationship. She certainly doesn’t expect to meet a pirate, and find herself inexplicably drawn to him.
Nat is the owner of a bookstore and an entrepreneur of characters, who has placed himself on a lonely island, with his grief-stricken memory of what happened to his one true love.
Only acceptance of the past will bring the two together. But can Jane and Nat let go of what they are holding close to their hearts?
Are they willing to give love another chance?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Elizabeth Pulford
• Release date: Feb 5, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463909416

Elizabeth Pulford

Before I became a writer I was a traveller, a typist, a cleaner and an ice-cream girl in a cinema.Now I live in New Zealand in a small southern seaside town with one extra nice husband who is a king of-all-trades.We have two children and two grandchildren.Every morning I go to my little writing room to make up stories. From this room I look out into a small garden, where I can hear the birds squabbling.Writing has long been a passion and sometimes even a curse!I have had over sixty children's books published from the very young to YA with regular publishers. Plus my adult short stories have been lucky enough to win many short story competitions.I love being creative, be it baking bread or chasing after new characters.Photograph by: Liz Cadogan - http://www.facebook.com/LizCadoganphotos

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Summer Haze

JENNIE DRAKE

Copyright © 2020 Elizabeth Pulford

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the copyright owner. Please respect the hard work of the author.

This is a work of fiction. No resemblance to any persons or situations is intended.

Cover © Shutterstock

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter One

Jane scanned the road. There was still no sign of her contact. Nathaniel Rhodes had said two o’clock and already he was ten minutes late. Much longer and she would mark him down as unreliable. With a sigh Jane realised her fresh beginning wasn’t going exactly as she had imagined. It felt as if it was already fraying at the edges.

Behind her stood what she hoped was her new place of employment. Foxhall House. Its former glory now as faded and parched-looking as the countryside in the heat of the afternoon. Turning, Jane surveyed the grand old house, which stood on the outer edge of Berrinton Village and had done since the beginning of the eighteenth century, according to Google and Nathaniel.

The stone house was two-storeyed. There were five windows upstairs and four down, each containing eight panes. There were also two attic rooms above the second floor, tucked beneath the slate roof. Perhaps they had once been the maid’s quarters, mused Jane. Two tall grand chimneys stood on either side of the roof. A bricked pathway led to the front door.

As she waited by the iron gates, flanked by tall lichen-covered columns, the midday sun breathed nothing but heat. She should have worn her sunhat. Jane went and stood under the shade of an imposing oak tree at the end of the wall before her pale skin burnt.

She would wait another five minutes, then she would go it alone. She wanted the job. She didn’t want the gentleman who was expecting her to take umbrage for being late. It wasn’t her fault.

The air was dry and brittle. She took out her bottle of water and gulped it down. It was so quiet her head rang with the silence. Would she be able to stand living in such isolation? She knew she would miss London, a city where she could lose herself. Become one of the throng of people. Hide her broken heart. If she knew all that, then why move so far away?

No answer came.

Jane pulled her slim shoulders back and reminded herself it was the first time she had felt a stirring of her old self on hearing about the job. When she had applied, on a desperate whim, she had never expected for a moment she would be successful.

But here she was.

The five minutes was up. Nathaniel Rhodes had plummeted to rock bottom in her estimation. Yet he had sounded so pleasant on the phone. Jane walked back to the wrought-iron gates. She hesitated before pushing them open. Was this really what she wanted to do? Spend the next six weeks, or however long it took, to type up an elderly gentleman’s memoirs?

It wasn’t too late to disappear.

Then guilt caught her. She would not let him down. What on earth was she thinking? It had never been in her nature to be mean. She wasn’t about to start now.

She pushed open the gates. At first, they resisted as if unwilling to let her in.

Jane carried her belongings in a bulky old-fashioned carpet bag which was heavy and expensive. When she had seen it in her favourite vintage shop she couldn’t resist. After all, now there was no need to save frantically for her wedding.

The front door of Foxhall House had seen better days. The green paint was flaking in patches. As she pulled the bell rope she heard it jangle inside the house.

A few seconds later it was flung open.

‘There you are,’ said a cheery voice. ‘Come in, my dear. Nat not with you?’

She shook her head.

‘He’s never had any notion of time.’

Jane stepped inside. The hall was dark and morbid. Large framed pictures lined the walls like stiff soldiers.

‘I’m taking it you found the place no trouble?’

‘I did. Thank you.’ Jane had decided to walk from the station. That was her first mistake. It was much further than she had expected and the heat more searing.

‘Jane, isn’t it?’

With a nod Jane confirmed it was.

‘Mrs Johnston, pleased to meet you.’

Jane followed the plump middle-aged woman up the wide and gracious staircase. ‘I do for the master. Prepare his meals, keep the house tidy. You know, that sort of thing.’

Jane didn’t really know, but indicated she did. Did she really call Sir Stuart Harrison the master? Jane was beginning to feel as if she had stepped into a novel, one written long ago, the same period as the house had been built.

‘I’ll show you to your room first,’ said Mrs Johnston, puffing as she traipsed up a narrow flight of stairs. ‘I’ve put you in the blue room. Ripe pretty it is too.’ She paused while she caught her breath. ‘Eeee…I’m not as young as I used to be. Here we are then. You get yourself settled, then I’ll take you to meet the master.’

The room was lovely. As soon as Jane stepped inside she felt immediately at home. The walls were painted a pale sky blue. Behind the bed hung three small cross-stitched tapestries. One showed an open carriage with a couple on an outing. The other two were a woman with a parasol and a gentleman wearing a tall hat, holding a walking stick. She wondered who had worked them. The iron bedstead had obviously been with the house for years, and by the look of it, so had the patchwork quilt. Again, like the pictures, she pondered who had spent the hours making the covering. It was gorgeous. Just what Jane adored.

To the right of the bed was a small white table. On it stood a lamp with a glass and beaded shade. A bookcase filled with paperbacks had been built beneath the small window. She went over and stared down at the front yard and the spreading branches of the oak tree. Beyond were browning fields and hills. She sighed with pleasure. At least if she ever felt lonely or out of place, she knew she would feel at home in this room. Here, Jane knew, she would feel soothed should her anxiety and insecurities surface.

The bathroom, Mrs Johnston informed her, was at the end of the passage, right next to her own room. There were five bedrooms in all on the first floor. Jane wondered what occupied the attic rooms.

She was about unpack and hang her few clothes in the wardrobe when the doorbell rang.

No doubt it was Nathaniel Rhodes, finally making an appearance.

From the sound of his voice on the phone during the interview, Jane had imagined Nathaniel as a caring, middle-aged gentleman who had never once visited the gym, had a cat and had never heard of the words abs, hub or apps. It was a silly assumption, but it was a game she always played before meeting someone for the first time, after communicating only through texts or speaking to them personally on the phone.

As Jane descended the staircase she realised she had been entirely wrong.

Nathaniel wasn’t middle-aged. And he wasn’t a gentleman. He was a pirate.

Chapter Two

Jane tried not to laugh as he limped up the stairs.

Nathaniel the pirate was tall and lean. His face, what she could see of it behind the overly large eyepatch, was tanned. He wore a pair of striped red and white pantaloons, a white rumpled ruffle shirt, and a hefty red coat which came to his ankles. Beneath a rakish tricorne hat, his hair hung in limp waves to his shoulders.

‘Apologies.’ Nathaniel lunged forward on one good leg and an unstable-looking peg leg, a crutch under his arm. A stuffed parrot sat at a jaunty angle on his shoulder. ‘My children wouldn’t let me go. Jane Munro, I presume?’

So, he was married with children.

‘I am,’ said Jane with a smile. ‘And at a wild guess I’d say you are Long John Silver?’

Nathaniel grasped her hand in a firm grip. ‘Absolutely.’

‘Robert Louis Stevenson.’

‘You know your books and authors.’ The pleasure showed on Nathaniel’s face.

‘Goodness gracious,’ came a voice from behind them both. ‘I must say I never know what to expect with you, Nat.’

Both Jane and Nathaniel turned to see Mrs Johnston shaking her head.

‘Mad as a coot this one,’ she said with a beaming smile. ‘Off you go then; he’s waiting.’ Mrs Johnston made a shooing movement with her hands.

Jane could tell she was fond of Nathaniel and wondered what he was to Sir Stuart Harrison.

‘This way,’ said Nathaniel, heading towards a room in the opposite direction to hers, his tone implying she’d been the one who’d been late.

Still, thought Jane as she quickly followed him, she couldn’t be angry with someone who was dressed as Long John Silver, especially with a sword swaying from a sash tied around his middle.

‘Did you know,’ said Nathaniel over his shoulder, ‘Long John Silver was inspired by William Henley, Robert Louis Stevenson’s best friend?’

‘I didn’t. Makes you wonder about the friend, doesn’t it? He must have had strong piratic tendencies.’

‘Ha! Indeed. I like the sound of him immensely.’

Arriving at Sir Stuart’s room, Nathaniel knocked and entered without waiting for a reply.

‘You awake?’ he bellowed.

‘My God,’ said a spritely man, who was propped up in bed with a myriad of pillows. ‘What the devil are you this week?’

Nathaniel laughed. It was a nice sound, decided Jane, hovering in the doorway. He didn’t bother to answer the question and instead did the introductions, beckoning her to come forward. ‘Jane Munro, meet my godfather, Sir Stuart Harrison.’

Ahh, so that was the connection.

Jane walked up to the bed, unsure whether to shake his hand or not. The decision was made by the elderly gentleman himself reaching out and grasping her hand. ‘What a pretty young thing you are. It does my heart good.’

Jane realised between Sir Stuart Harrison and Nathaniel Rhodes she was going to have her work cut out. They both reminded her of characters from books, not only in their looks but also by their manner. It seemed her fervent desire to have something completely different in her life had definitely been answered.

‘A pleasure to meet you,’ said Jane, trying not to sound too formal. She wondered if she should use his title when addressing him.

‘I shall call you Jane and you will call me Stuart.’

Jane was glad that was out of the way.

The old gentleman had bright blue eyes, an electric shock of white hair, and deep-set wrinkles.

‘I would like us to work in the mornings. Say from nine until twelve-thirty. Every day except Sunday. After that, once the notes are typed, the day is yours. How does that sound?’

‘Perfect.’

‘Good. Now off you go.’ He dismissed the two of them by turning away and gazing out of the nearest window.

As they approached the staircase, Jane said, ‘I can give you a hand if you like,’ then added in a hurry, ‘not that I think you need any assistance.’ She tried to block out a vision of Long John Silver slipping and taking a tumble, ending up at the bottom of the staircase in a mangled mess.

Nathaniel grinned. ‘Stuart would kill me if I did any damage to myself or bled on his fine wooden staircase.’ He