He seemed pale, but nodded encouragingly. ‘No, of course not. You must not let these occurrences unsettle you, Miss Lattimer.’

By the time Mr Earle had reappeared and begun ushering her guests towards the kitchen, Hester was prey to rising nerves. Tension seemed to flow from Miss Nugent until Hester felt quite sick with it. She looked around for Guy and failed to see him. What to expect? In the event she found the kitchen spick and span, the table pushed back to the wall, chairs arranged in several half-circles facing the rear wall and the back door and the two cupboard doors hung with black cloth, apparently to keep the draught out.

Candles burned brightly all around the big room and the range was screened by the metal fire shield to keep the heat from scorching the complexions of the ladies nearest it.

Guy was helping people to their chairs and Hester with her reluctant companions found herself in the middle of the front row. She released Sarah Nugent’s arm and Guy touched her wrist as he straightened her chair. Hester looked up at him, but his eyes held no message for her and she shivered.

Mr Earle had assumed the role of master of ceremonies. Hester wondered what, exactly, his occupation was, for in the pleasantest manner possible he had them all in the palm of his hand.

‘Now, then,’ he announced from the Windsor chair he had pulled to the front so that he sat facing the audience with his back to the shrouded back door. ‘Who is to be our first storyteller? A little bird has told me that the vicar has a scary tale to tell.’

Amid much encouragement Mr Bunting came to the front and took the chair while Mr Earle effaced himself. With the aplomb one might expect of an experienced preacher, he told a simple tale with spine-tingling effectiveness and was much applauded as he returned to his seat.

‘Who next?’ Mr Earle invited. Glancing round, Hester wondered if anyone else had noticed that Susan had snuffed some of the candles and the room was perceptibly darker, with deepening shadows in the corners.

‘Mama,’ Annabelle was saying, ‘do tell the tale of Black Shuck.’

Mrs Redland was demurring, but her son joined in his sister’s persuasion and in the end she gave in. ‘This is a tale from Suffolk where I grew up,’ she began as she took the seat facing the audience. ‘The tale of the great black hound of death, which travellers find behind them on the road at night.’

Hester found herself quite caught up. Mrs Redland’s dry, well-bred manner threw the tale into stark relief and made it all the more frightening. Little gasps rose from the young ladies and even the gentlemen were sitting forwards in their chairs, paying rapt attention. The applause was vigorous, almost as if people found relief in the noise, Hester thought, noticing that even more candles had been snuffed.

‘Who next?’ Mr Earle enquired. ‘Lord Buckland? How about that tale you hinted at at luncheon today? A story that could hardly be more apposite for this occasion.’

Guy moved out of the shadows and looked towards Hester quite openly. ‘Perhaps Miss Lattimer would find it uncomfortable.’

Hester laid her hand on Sarah’s as though seeking support and replied, ‘What do you mean, my lord?’

‘As you know, thanks to the kind loan of books from his collection by Sir Lewis, I have been reading about local antiquarian lore, and the story of this house in particular. I did not tell you, Miss Lattimer, and I think I was remiss in not doing so, but this led me to investigate further into the story of the Moon House. It is certainly a tale fit for this evening’s entertainment, but you must tell me if it is too intrusive.’

‘I… I would be sorry not to hear it now, for I am sure we are all intrigued by that introduction, my lord. Please, tell the tale.’ Hester was pleased with her own acting. She flattered herself that she sounded slightly alarmed, certainly uneasy, but too polite to tell her guest not to continue. Sarah Nugent moved her forearm restlessly under Hester’s palm.

Guy took his time settling himself and, while all eyes were on him, Hester noticed more lights being doused. The room was in semi-darkness now, lit by the glow of the fire that gave the whitewashed ceiling a red flush and by two branches of candles at the back with one on a barrel by Guy’s side. He had moved the chair slightly and now the black-draped door of the cupboard containing the secret entrance was on his left-hand side as he sat facing the audience.

How was he going to manage this? Hester found herself watching the man she loved as though he were a stranger. The candles underlit his face, giving him a saturnine and sinister look, but his stance was easy, as elegant as though he was taking tea in a fashionable salon. When he spoke his voice was conversational with no attempt to inject unease or horror; he could have been reporting any item of local gossip.

‘This house is haunted,’ Guy said and a ripple of anticipation ran around the room. He had them all in the palm of his hand. ‘But, to begin at the beginning, we have to begin with a scandal.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Guy swept the room with his eyes, using his silence to gather the attention of everyone there. At the back he could see Susan, candle snuffer in hand, waiting for her next cue. To one side young Ackland watched the Nugents, his grey eyes hardly wavering.

Sir Jeremy was just behind them and John Earle was on the other side to Ackland, but his eyes, like Guy’s, had come to rest on the still figure of Hester Lattimer, poised and lovely in her green gown, the silver of her wrap and the glitter of her diamonds the only signs of her agitation as they flickered in the candlelight.

God, he wanted this over, he wanted her out of danger, clear of the Nugents and their schemes. And he wanted her alone so he could rebuild what was between them, make up for the hurt he had given her, make her his wife if she would ever agree to that now. The remarkable brown eyes, which were haunting his dreams, were fixed on his face. Her expression was one of polite anticipation, but her gaze held questions, and a trust that he only hoped he could fulfil.

Time to begin. ‘Fifty-four years ago a local gentleman had a cottage on this site demolished in order to build the house we are guests in this evening. It was to be a speculative venture apparently, for not long after it was finished a young widow moved in as a tenant. She was expecting a child and soon gained the sympathy of her neighbours with her tragic story, for her husband, a merchant, had been lost at sea during a voyage to the West Indies. She was retiring and well bred and, although very beautiful, she repulsed tactfully the hopeful advances of a number of local bachelors. This enhanced her standing amongst the matrons of the village.’ A murmur of amusement ran around the room.

Guy dropped his voice a fraction so that they had to concentrate to hear. ‘No one appeared to notice the strange coincidence that the lady, Mrs Parrish, should be called Diana when the house carried the sign of the moon above the door. The sign of Diana the huntress. Her daughter was born in January of the next year, a child promising to be as lovely as her mother, and was welcomed into local life as was her mother. It could not have been a more respectable little household and it was noted how very discreet Mrs Parrish was, for the only gentleman ever seen to enter the house alone was the vicar.’

‘What was not seen, however, was that her landlord was also her lover and entered the house nightly by a secret entrance that had been built in from the beginning. For the name of the house was no coincidence and the local gentleman, far from being the complacent husband of a difficult and sickly wife, had been carrying on an affair with Mrs Parrish, a talented actress, for more than four years.’ Was this going to be too shocking for the strict mamas in the audience? Guy watched Mrs Redland for her reaction, but saw only fascination and a dawning awareness on her angular face.

‘All went well. Diana was discreet, her child grew lovelier by the day and her lover managed his double life with such skill that his family never suspected a thing. His only failing was to forget that all men, even those in love, are mortal. His death at the age of forty of a seizure, one day before his daughter’s third birthday, was utterly unexpected. His grieving widow left all matters in the hands of her son, an arrogant cub of seventeen who lost no time in going through his father’s papers where he discovered ample proof of just what the older man had meant by calling the Moon House an investment.’

‘Accompanied by three grooms, he descended on the Moon House and forced his way into Diana’s dressing room, where she was sitting at her dressing table clad in only her night rail. Imagine if you can her state of mind that morning.’ Again he dropped his voice a little. The audience was leaning forward in its chairs, he could feel the intensity of Hester’s gaze on him, but dared not look at her and risk losing his thread.

‘Three days ago her lover, a man she loved deeply, her only source of support, had died without warning, leaving her with a child and her only possession of value, a wonderful rope of pearls which she always wore. She had just twisted it about her neck: perhaps she was stroking it, remembering the night he gave it to her, remembering the words he had spoken.

‘Then her door was forced open. With her child screaming with fear, her maid brutally forced from the room, she had the pearls torn from her neck, the nightgown ripped from her body, leaving her naked and humiliated in front of those men. Her lover’s son gave her an hour to pack and leave, his henchmen threw her clothes on to the floor so she had to scrabble on her hands and knees to gather up what she could, her baby hanging around her neck, terrified, seeing violence and hearing raised voices for the first time in her life.’