Castles Of Sand. Anne Mather
-b61c-fdd2c8a13ae0">
Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous collection of fantastic novels by bestselling, much loved author
ANNE MATHER
Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the
publishing industry, having written over one hundred and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.
This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance
for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful, passionate writing has given.
We are sure you will love them all!
I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun—staggered by what’s happened.
I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.
These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.
We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is [email protected] and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.
Castles of Sand
Anne Mather
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
THE room was quiet. Even though it was only a stone’s throw from the busy heart of London’s West End, the school buildings seldom allowed more than the steady hum of traffic to invade their thick walls, and Kingsley Square was a sequestered backwater, secure from the noise and confusion scarcely half a mile away. Sitting at her desk, with a pile of crisp new exercise books in front of her, Ashley could not have wished for more private surroundings to bear the shock she had just experienced, and yet it still left her shaking and incapable of coherent thought.
She looked at the register of names in front of her, and ran a trembling finger down the column. Devlin, Fredericks—perhaps she had been mistaken—but no, there it was again, Gauthier, Hussein Gauthier, there was no mistake. And it was not such a common name either. Surely, surely, there could not be two seven-year-old boys called Hussein Gauthier.
She did not often take a drink, but right now Ashley felt she could do with one. Her mouth felt dry, and her head was spinning, and although she knew there were other matters to be taken into consideration, all she could think of was that she was expected to have the boy in her form for a whole year!
It couldn’t be done. Her initial reactions were all negative. She would not—she could not—be expected to teach him; not in the present circumstances. It was too much to ask of anyone, any woman, at least. How could it have happened? What cruel twist of fate had brought the boy to this school, out of all the schools that could have been chosen? It was intolerable, it was unkind, it was inhuman!
Ashley got up jerkily from her desk, pushing back her chair so abruptly, it almost fell over, and rocked dangerously on its back legs. But it steadied itself, as Ashley tried to do, before stepping down from the small dais and walking determinedly towards the door.
Outside, the polished wooden blocks of the floor of the corridor stretched ahead of her, the walls lined with portraits of past headmasters of Brede School. Between the portraits, half glass doors opened into other classrooms and activity rooms, empty until tomorrow when the school re-opened after the summer recess. Ashley herself had only come in that morning to acclimatise herself to her surroundings again, and to run a casual eye over the new pupils she was to have charge of. She had been away, staying with some friends in Yorkshire, enjoying the unaccustomed freedom from books and learning, joining in the work of the farm, where she had spent the last two months. The Armstrongs had always been like her own family to her. She and Lucy Armstrong had met at university, and since then, apart from those disastrous months she had spent with Hassan, she had remained in regular contact with them. As she had no parents of her own, there had been many occasions when she had been grateful for their support, and at this very moment she would have welcomed Mr Armstrong’s practical common sense.
The corridor emerged on to a railed landing, overlooking the entrance hall below. The school had originally been formed in the eighteenth century by linking together two town houses, and although the buildings had been added to since that time, the atmosphere of a close community remained. There were lots of halls and curiously winding staircases, and low beams to catch the unwary, but as the boys it accommodated were only five to thirteen years of age, it seldom troubled them. It was a small school, only a hundred and fifty pupils, but its record was excellent, and its results ensured a permanent register of pupils waiting to receive a place.
As she hurried down the stairs, Ashley wondered how Hussein had been admitted. Had his name been entered since his birth, as many of the boys’ names had, or had someone in authority pulled some strings? She could hardly believe the former, and although the latter seemed more likely, what unknowing chance had prompted Alain to choose this school?
Malcolm Henley, the present headmaster of Brede School, had his study on the ground floor, in a room which had once been used as a reception parlour. It was not a large room, but the ceiling was high, and the bookshelves that lined the walls drew one’s eyes upwards rather than pointing to