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Ashley hesitated for only a moment because she knew that Jack wouldn’t dream of asking his housekeeper to intervene on his behalf. He was much too proud for that—he could have tried himself through the agency and he hadn’t done. So why was she wanted? Some instinct made fear swell up inside her stomach and grip at her throat. She stood in a quiet alcove at the boutique hotel as she gripped the phone, while a shaky-voiced Christine told her that there had been an accident.
‘What kind of an accident?’ demanded Ashley.
‘A fire. A terrible fire. Ashley.’ There was a kind of gulping sound, the sound of someone swallowing their tears. ‘Blackwood has been destroyed.’
Ashley’s knees buckled. The world threatened to cave in around her. ‘And Jack? Was he hurt?’
There was a silence—a terrible, gathering silence.
‘He was,’ said Christine, her solid voice sounding precariously close to breaking. ‘Badly hurt. He’s blind, Ashley. Mr Marchant’s blind.’
Blind? Her beloved Jack blind? Only some inner strength she didn’t know she possessed stopped Ashley from falling to the ground—and from railing at a God who was clearly not listening. Sucking in a ragged breath, she steadied her breathing enough to ask, ‘And where is he? Where is he now?’
‘He’s living in one of the other properties on the other side of the estate. You know the old Ivy House?’
‘I do.’
‘He’s there. I still work for him. I go in most days now and he has… well, he has a couple of carers living in who help look after him.’
Carers? Her brave, strong Jack—the man who had been commended for bravery in all the active service he had seen—was being looked after by carers? Ashley swallowed down the acrid taste of horror as she tried to imagine the reality of his life. How on earth would such an independent man cope with having to rely on others for his very existence?
‘Christine,’ she said slowly. ‘I’m coming to see him—but you must not tell him. You must not. That is imperative. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, Ashley. I understand.’
Ashley went into the office to speak to her boss. He was a fair man who she hoped would let her go with his blessing—though she knew that she would leave without it, for she had no choice. ‘I need to go urgently to see a dear friend who is very sick,’ she said, in a low voice—the irony not escaping her that this was the second time she had failed to give adequate notice to her employer.
‘And are you planning on coming back?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said honestly—for wasn’t honesty the only thing she had ever been able to rely on?
Something in her face made him treat her kindly, as though she herself were some kind of invalid, and Ashley made the long journey back north with nothing more than an overnight bag. The journey took hours—punctuated by delays at two railway stations and a train which seemed to rattle like a sack of bones. Her stomach was so churned up that she couldn’t bear to eat anything—sipping only at weak, warm tea and unable to settle until at last the train drew into Stonecanton station.
She jumped into the waiting taxi and gave the driver directions and, if he looked at her curiously, she was too tired and too scared to satisfy his curiosity with any kind of explanation. Ivy House was on the western side of the estate but the taxi took her past Blackwood and, on an impulse, Ashley made the driver take the car up the long drive so that she could have a look at it.
From a distance, it all looked the same as the first time she’d seen it. The same imposing and beautiful structure which had so impressed her—straddling the edges of the stark northern moorland she’d grown to love. But as the car drew closer she could see that the façade was nothing but an illusion. She told the driver to stop and she got out, her heart as heavy as a stone. Much of the building had crumbled and was lost—and at the back were just blackened remains where once a home had stood. A grim ghost of a place with pane-less windows and no roof or chimney. Jack’s beloved Blackwood was nothing but a fragile shell with all the life blown away from it.
Hearing something was not the same as seeing it for yourself and the reality of the destruction made her feel sick. Tears threatened to burn her horrified eyes—but there was no time for tears and she climbed back into the taxi, taking one last forlorn look out of the window. The lawns were wild now and the shrubs badly in need of pruning and with every second that mounted Ashley could feel the painful acceleration of her heart as the car took her towards the Ivy House.
What would she find there? Would blindness and disfigurement have changed Jack beyond recognition?
A woman she didn’t know opened the door, and she looked at Ashley with a question in her eyes.
‘Can I help you?’
‘I’m… a friend of Jack’s. I heard about his accident and I’ve come to see him.’
‘I’m sorry, but I’m afraid Mr Marchant isn’t seeing any visitors.’
‘Please. I think he’ll want to see me.’ But as she said the words she realised their bitter irony. If Jack was blind then he wouldn’t be ‘seeing’ anyone.
There was a pause while the woman studied her and maybe something in Ashley’s plea touched her because she opened the door wider and stepped aside.
‘You look harmless enough—and it might do him good to talk to someone for a change. But not for long, mind,’ she warned. ‘Come this way.’
The woman led the way along a long corridor to a door right at the far end, and she opened it to let Ashley step through and then shut it behind her.
The room was gloomy, the light from the fire its only illumination, and Ashley was trembling as her eyes took in the scene in front of her. Because there, sitting in front of the fire—his head bowed in a way she had never seen it bowed before—sat the blinded form of her lover. His tall frame was still striking but all the energy and vitality seemed to have been sucked from him—as if, just like Blackwood, he were nothing but an empty shell. By his feet sat Casey, who looked up as she entered. The dog’s ears pricked and, with a little yelp, he jumped up and ran towards her.
