The Favoured Child (86 page)

As I came out of the woods on to the drive, it was nearly dawn; the sky was growing pale, though the storm-clouds were still black over the downs. The wind was high, sighing in the treetops. But above the noise of the wind I thought I heard people shouting in the woods.

I supposed they were all out looking for me. I hoped very much Richard was out too, then I could get to my room and sleep and sleep before I had to face him. Richard had to die. Richard had to be utterly destroyed. And I knew I was not yet strong enough to do it.

The front door stood open as I limped up the path, and the house was deserted. It was as I thought: everyone was out in the woods searching for me, and I might be able to creep upstairs and rest before I had to face Richard.

But I was a Lacey, not a silly child, and I thought that the least I could do was to write a note and pin it to the front door so that the men out in the rain could be sent home and would not spend all day looking for me while I lay safe and snug abed. I went into the library to fetch paper and pen to write my note before I went to bed.

Richard was in the carved heavy chair at the head of the table, in his breeches and linen shirt. His chair was tipped back on its two back legs with his weight.

His face was like a skull, his lips drawn back in a terrible piteous grin of fear, his eyes staring, looking to me as his rescuer, as the only person in the world who could save him from certain death.

Ralph was behind the chair, one hand pulling Richard’s head back with a tight grip on Richard’s curling hair, the other hand holding a long sharp knife against Richard’s throat.

They were both watching the doorway. They had heard me come in and the slap, slap, slap of my wet nightgown and cloak as I crossed the hall. I took in the scene in one swift glance and quickly pushed the door shut behind me so that no one else could come in, so that no one but us would know. And I leaned back against it.

Richard’s whole face trembled in a pitiful appeal. ‘Julia!’ he said, and I could hear him trying to put his charm into his voice. ‘Julia!’

I looked at him out of my red-rimmed weary eyes. I looked at him, the brother I had loved all my life, and I knew I would never cease loving him. My brother, my blood, my kin.

I raised my head and Ralph’s dark, understanding eyes met mine.

Ralph waited in silence for my decision.

‘Kill him,’ I said.

Ralph’s sweep of the knife was as clean as a butcher’s.

Meridon, the desolate Romany girl, is determined to escape the hard poverty of her childhood. Riding bareback in a travelling show, while her sister Dandy risks her life on the trapeze, Meridon dedicates herself to freeing them both from danger and want.

But Dandy – beautiful, impatient, thieving Dandy – grabs too much, too quickly. And Meridon finds herself alone, riding in bitter grief through the rich Sussex farmlands towards a house called Wideacre – which awaits the return of the last of the Laceys.

Sweeping, passionate, unique:
Meridon
completes Philippa Gregory’s bestselling trilogy which began with
Wideacre
and continued in
The Favoured Child
.

‘In other hands this would be a conventional historical romance. But Ms Gregory uses her historical knowledge of the haves and the have-nots of those times to weave a much more subtle and exciting story.’

Daily Express

ISBN 0 00 651463 4

Wideacre Hall, set in the heart of the English countryside, is the ancestral home that Beatrice Lacey loves. But as a woman of the eighteenth century, she has no right of inheritance. Corrupted by a world that mistreats women, she sets out to corrupt others. Sexual and wilful, she believes that the only way to achieve control over Wideacre is through a series of horrible crimes, and no-one escapes the consequences of her need to possess the land.

‘The eighteenth-century woman is a neglected creature but, in the figure of her heroine, Philippa Gregory has defined a certain kind of witness…This is a novel written from instinct, not out of calculation, and it shows.’

PETER ACKROYD
,
The Times

‘For single mindedness, tempestuousness, passion, amorality, sensuality and plain old-fashioned evil, [Beatrice Lacey] knocks Scarlett O’Hara into short cotton socks.’

Evening Standard

ISBN 0 00 651461 8

Philippa Gregory is an established writer and broadcaster for radio and television. She holds a PhD in eighteenth-century literature from the University of Edinburgh. She has been widely praised for her historical novels, including
Earthly Joys
and
A Respectable Trade
(which she adapted for BBC Television), as well as her works of contemporary suspense.
The Other Boleyn Girl
won the Parker Romantic Novel of the Year Award in 2002 and it has recently been adapted for BBC Television. Philippa Gregory lives in the North of England with her family.

Visit www.PhilippaGregory.com for more information and
www.AuthorTracker.co.uk
for exclusive updates about Philippa Gregory.

The Wideacre Trilogy

WIDEACRE
THE FAVOURED CHILD
MERIDON

Historical Novels

THE WISE WOMAN
FALLEN SKIES
A RESPECTABLE TRADE
EARTHLY JOYS
VIRGIN EARTH

Modern Novels

MRS HARTLEY AND THE GROWTH CENTRE
PERFECTLY CORRECT
THE LITTLE HOUSE
ZELDA’S CUT

Short Stories

BREAD AND CHOCOLATE

The Tudor Court Novels

THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL
THE QUEEN’S FOOL
THE VIRGIN’S LOVER
THE CONSTANT PRINCESS
THE BOLEYN INHERITANCE

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

Harper

An imprint of HarperCollins
Publishers
77-85 Fulham Palace Road,
Hammersmith, London W6 8JB

www.harpercollins.co.uk

This paperback edition 2001

3

First published in Great Britain by
Viking 1989

Copyright © Philippa Gregory Ltd 1989

The author asserts the moral right to
be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library

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EPub Edition © 1989 ISBN 9780007370139

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