Nicola Cornick by True Colours

borrowed maid trotting along behind, seemingly awed into silence by the oppressive atmosphere.
    Although Alicia had been nineteen when she had left Greyrigg for her London Season, the house now looked smaller, as though she had previously seen it through a child’s eyes. There was a smell of mustiness and decay in the hall which she did not remember. Huge cobwebs festooned the grimy central chandelier and there was a spartan emptiness which suggested the recent removal of various pieces of furniture. Alicia wondered briefly if her father’s business affairs were ailing and the neglect of his house was a direct result. Certainly the marble floor had not been cleaned for an age and the air had a stale smell which made her wrinkle up her nose in disgust.
    The front door closed and Alicia had the oddest idea that a trap had closed with it. She shrugged the fanciful idea away impatiently. It was natural that she should feel uncomfortable, for she associated her father with the unhappiness of her marriage and her recent meeting with James Mullineaux could only put such matters back at the forefront of her mind.
    Even before the meeting at Ottery, she had never had any intention of staying long at Greyrigg, having come reluctantly at Broseley’s behest only to take her sister to London for the forthcoming Season. It would be pleasant, Bertram Broseley had written, for Annabella to have the opportunity for a come-out, just as Alicia herself had done. This had seemed perfectly reasonable, but Alicia had felt both hurt and manipulated. Three years before, when Annabella had been fifteen, Aliciahad tried to mend the breach with her father so that she could see her sister again. Her approach had been brutally rebuffed by Broseley, who had never contacted her again until the day three weeks before when his letter had arrived out of the blue.
    Despite their past differences and the fact that all Alicia’s letters to Annabella had been returned unopened, she had unwillingly bowed to her father’s pressure, anxious to prevent a fate similar to her own from befalling her sister. Broseley’s letter had pointed out urbanely that Alicia’s home at Chartley was close enough for her to come to Taunton to collect Annabella, and Alicia had not been able to find a gracious way to refuse. Now she wished she had tried harder.
    Suddenly the door of her father’s study was flung open and Bertram Broseley himself came striding across the floor to greet her, hands outstretched as though she were the prodigal daughter.
    ‘Alicia! My dear! It is a happy day for us now that you are once more beneath the roof of your home!’
    He met his daughter’s sardonic eye but did not falter. Castle smirked. Alicia, overwhelmed by a feeling of revulsion, found that she was utterly unable to respond in kind. In fact, she was unable to respond at all and simply stood, struck dumb. She had underestimated how unpleasant it would feel to be confronted with her father again. Old fears and memories were stirred up, confusing her. As she struggled to frame a suitable response, Broseley spoke again.
    ‘We expected you yesterday and were somewhat concerned when you failed to arrive. I hope you did not experience trouble on the journey?’
    ‘Merely some damage to my carriage on the Ottery road,’ Alicia replied, dismissing all the events of the previous twenty-four hours in one fell swoop. She was already feeling profoundly uncomfortable. She had hoped that Annabella would be ready to leave immediately, yet there were no trunks in the hallway, no signs of imminent departure. Suspicion stirred, faint but disturbing.
    ‘It’s a bad road,’ Broseley commented, his shrewd grey gaze making an inventory of his daughter’s appearance as though totting up exactly how much her clothes and jewellery had cost. An indefinable hint of satisfaction entered his manner. He had already calculated how expensive her outfit was.
    ‘Never mind, you are here now. And you are looking