Paradise In Penang. Barbara Cartland
of work for me to do,” he remarked to Mr. Stevens.
His secretary nodded.
“It is not as bad as it might be, my Lord,” he said. “There are a number of invitations and one from Her Majesty the Queen. Then I must draw your attention to an important letter that needs your immediate response.”
Lord Selwyn raised his eyebrows.
“Important?” he asked. “In what way?”
“It concerns your great-uncle, my Lord.”
“My great-uncle? Which one?”
“Lord Durham.”
Lord Selwyn stared at his secretary.
“Lord Durham? My father’s uncle? I have not thought of him for years! In fact I thought he was dead.”
“No, he has just died, my Lord. He was eighty-nine.”
“Yes, I suppose he must have been,” Lord Selwyn remarked. “He was living abroad.”
“Yes, my Lord, in Penang.”
Lord Selwyn gave an exclamation.
“I remember. He retired from Hong Kong, where he had been the Chief Judge for God knows how many years, but he then refused to return to England.”
“That is correct, my Lord.”
“My father’s family considered it a rude insult that he had no wish to be with us,” Lord Selwyn said. “I seem to remember his saying in a letter that he thought of the East now as his home and would feel out of place anywhere else.”
Mr. Stevens picked up one of the letters from the desk and handed it to Lord Selwyn.
He saw that it was written from George Town in Penang. It was obviously from a firm of Solicitors who were both English and Chinese.
He read the letter which informed him that his great-uncle had died and had left him his house and his estate.
He had also left him quite a considerable amount of money.
The letter ended by saying that the Solicitors now awaited his instructions.
If it was possible, they would appreciate it if he could come to Penang to see for himself what he had inherited. Lord Selwyn read the letter and then looked at Mr. Stevens.
“Well, that is certainly a surprise,” he exclaimed. “I never expected Great-Uncle Edward to remember me in his will.”
He laughed ironically before he added,
“God knows what I can do with a plantation in Penang!”
As he was speaking to Mr. Stevens, he was thinking that Penang was a small island off the Malay Peninsula and it was a place that he had never thought of visiting.
He had been to India and when he was there had contemplated going on to Singapore.
However, he had decided to come straight home.
There was so much for him to do in England that he could not spare the time to explore any more of the Far East.
“Why did my uncle settle in Penang of all places?”
He was really thinking out loud, but Mr. Stevens replied,
“I believe it is a beautiful Island, my Lord, and very prosperous as a Trading Post.”
Lord Selwyn was not listening.
He had put down the letter from the Solicitors.
On the desk beside a pile of invitations he noticed that there was a letter lying by itself.
For a moment he thought that it might be from Maisie.
Mr. Stevens had strict instructions not to open any letter addressed to Lord Selwyn that looked as if it might be private. And he very seldom made a mistake.
Now, as this letter was lying by itself, Lord Selwyn thought at once that it would be from a woman.
When he picked it up, he saw that it was not in Maisie’s handwriting.
The envelope was sealed and, because he was curious, he opened it right away.
He was well aware that Mr. Stevens was waiting to show him the rest of his mail.
Inside the envelope there was one sheet of writing paper.
It was of good quality, although not engraved with any address.
Then, as he looked at the handwriting, he was even more sure that it had come from a woman and wondered who it could be.
Written in a flowing hand, he read,
“You are being deceived by two treacherous blue eyes and a lying tongue. If you wait in the Mews at the back of a certain house in Grosvenor Square, no doubt you will learn a great deal more than you know already.
A Friend.”
Lord Selwyn stared at the letter in sheer astonishment.
He could not remember ever before receiving an anonymous letter and certainly not one from a so-called ‘friend’.
It was quite obvious to him who it referred to.
He thought angrily that it was only a woman who could attack another woman in such an underhand and disgusting manner.
“When did this letter arrive?” he asked Mr. Stevens.
“It was not posted, my Lord, but dropped through the letterbox.”
Lord Selwyn saw now that there was no stamp on the envelope.
He did not speak and after a moment Mr. Stevens enquired,
“Is it anything that I should deal with, my Lord?”
“No, no, of course not!”
Lord Selwyn put the letter back into the envelope and placed it in his pocket.
For a moment he just stood there as he hesitated.
Then he said,
“I think that the rest of the correspondence, Stevens, will have to wait until the morning. I will now go up and have my bath.”
He walked out of the library.
Mr. Stevens looked after him with an expression of concern in his eyes.
Something had clearly gone wrong.
Lord Selwyn was not at all sure what it was, but he was quite certain that the letter had come from a woman.
‘It is always a woman who is at the bottom of any trouble,’ he said to himself bitterly.
As he spoke, he picked up the letter from Penang.
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