La Canette.
As addresses went, this was pretty minimalist; she’d have to find a taxi. A vague thought tickled the back of her mind; she couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but something wasn’t right.
The feeling increased when she walked off the ferry and looked around the forecourt in front of the terminal. The other passengers quickly walked past her and disappeared down the two narrow lanes going to the right and left from the station. No taxis. This couldn’t be right; the only thing parked in front of the ferry terminal was a horse cart.
A horse cart?
She’d never seen one before unless she counted period films. This one was small with art-nouveau carved rail guards. She might have called it a carriage, except that would have been toofanciful.
She turned this way and that, but apart from a few bicycles chained to a rack by the entrance to the terminal, the forecourt was now empty. She pulled her cardigan tighter. Despite the late-afternoon sun, the breeze was quite chilly.
“Ehm, excuse me. Miss?” A middle-aged man in denim overalls climbed down from the driver’s seat behind the horse. “Yer wouldn’t be Mrs Emeline Wainwright, by any chance?”
TheMrs Wainwrightsounded strange to her ears now. She didn’t want Henry’s name anymore. Tomorrow, first thing in the morning, she would write out a deed poll application for a name change.
“Yes, I am.”
“Thank goodness. I wasn’t sure which ferry yer were takin’. I’ve been waitin’ all afternoon.”
“I’m sorry, whoare you?”
“Oh, beg pardon. Name’s Evans, the driver. Mrs B told me to look out f’r yer on account o’ you bein’ new to the island and not knowin’ yer way. I can take yer to the Hall. This yer bag, Mrs Wainwright?”
“Please call me Millie.”
“Righty ho.” He picked up her small suitcase and placed it in the cart next to a leather upholstered seat. He offered her a hand to help her up.
“Are we going in this? Don’t the Du Montforts own a car?” The impression she’d been given of her employer was a man not shortof money.
“I dare say,” Evans told her as he climbed into his seat and flicked the reins. The horse moved, and she instinctively held on to the guard rails. But there was no need; Evans set a gentle pace.
“But they’d be on the mainland, not here,” Evans said. “Never had cars on the island. Notallowed.”
Of course. That was the nagging feeling. When she’d watched the island from the sea, she’d seen no traffic. Cyclists and pedestrians, yes, but no cars.“Why not?”
“Always been the law, far back as anyone knows. No cars and no street lightin’ at night. But that’s more recent. We ’ad tanks durin’ the war when La Canette was invaded by the Germans, but not since. The senior can tell yer, he’s boundt’ know.”
“Who? Senior what?”
“Aren’t yer workin’f’r him?”
“Mr DuMontfort?”
“He’s our senior, dint theytell yer?”
“No.” But she still didn’t understand. Evans’ accent was unusual, like a West Country burr but elongated. “What do you mean, ‘senior’? How old is he?”
Evans laughed. “Our senior, he’s been senior since he was a young man when his cousin, the old senior, died.”
“Do you mean ‘seigneur’?”
“What I said.”
“You mean he rules the island?”
“Rules ’n owns most of it. The Du Montforts been seigneurs f’r three hundred years. We answer to the Queen, o’course, but she don’t interfere with our affairs here on La Canette. Princess Margaret used to visit in the seventies when she was young.”
Millie sat back, stunned. A feudal system? In Britain? In the twenty-first century?
