The Last to Know Read Online Free

agreeably. “I can assure you, Mr. Carsholt, that none is required. It was merely a misunderstanding. Unused to travel without my parents, perhaps I can be forgiven also?”
    Mr. Carsholt seemed suddenly confused. My hand stole to the crown of my bonnet. Could it be the feathers again? I felt them streaming out behind me as the carriage picked up pace.
    “. . . an explanation of the time it will take to travel to Carsholt Hall. I do not wish you to become alarmed. Though the house is at some small distance from the village, we shall be inside the home park for the entire length of the journey.” My companion’s eyes flicked away, and I followed the line of his gaze. We were passing through a gateway which was formed by two great towers of stone, each higher than ten or, perhaps, twelve men standing on one another’s shoulders. A heraldic beast of lichened bronze guarded the summit of each edifice, and I shivered when I saw that these snarling, winged creatures—half hound, half dragon—had massive iron chains spilling from their mouths; the links clanked and shifted as we drove beneath them. It was as if these brutal and brutalized forms had torn themselves from dungeon imprisonment and were awaiting the call to fly down upon our defenseless carriage.
    I looked back, almost against my will. Mighty gates had closed behind us without, it seemed, the agency of human hands.
    “Miss Fairfax, the estate is very large, but Will has driven its roads his entire life. You will be completely safe in my hands, I do assure you.”
    Safe? Now I was becoming alarmed, for the sun was rapidly descending, and, as the shadows lengthened beneath that bloody sky, the warm day cooled. I felt a distinct chill.
    “I am not certain, sir, what you can mean by such a statement.”
    Mr. Carsholt frowned. For a moment I thought that he would speak, but he did not. And, as he turned away to stare at the darkening landscape, it seemed to me that I saw, as if for the first time, how very handsome he was. There was something in the profile—hard and cold—like the edge of knife caught in the dying light. I began to be afraid.
    “Sir? Mr. Carsholt?”
    “Miss Fairfax?” He had turned back, smiling. It seemed to my overwrought fancy that it was a terrible smile.
    “I must ask you once more, sir. You spoke of safety? What possible difficulty could be encountered within the bounds of a gentleman’s park?”
    He answered me softly. “I see you do not know the North, Miss Fairfax.”
    The air of deliberate mystery irked me, and that overcame dread. “Do you joke with me, sir?”
    This time, each word was delivered slowly, as if to a child. “Miss Fairfax, my family has lived here, at Carsholt, for hundreds of years. In that time, many peculiar things have happened. Things I should not like to speak of but, for your sake, your innocent, trusting sake . . .” Did he shiver when he looked out into the gloaming? He did. I saw it. And he observed me note that fact.
    Mercurial, he was suddenly reimbued with that restless energy I had observed on the train. “Come, it’s almost as if we are before the fire on midwinter’s night telling ghost stories! This will not do. You are to be the honored guest of my mother and my father. My mother . . .”
    He ceased to speak, and his eye strayed from mine; he peered forward anxiously. What was he searching for?
    The journey continued in deepening silence, dear Cousin, and though I sought to engage Mr. Carsholt in conversation—what an irony considering our relations in the train!—on each of those occasions, he mumbled something distracted, or ignored me. Our roles had reversed.
    At last, lights could be seen in the near distance. A substantial building was close to us now, embowered in trees: trees larger and older than any I had ever seen. Their forms moved past like a dark army as the carriage swept on and, finally, the dusty road gave way to a gravel drive. Will brought the carriage to the front of the