Sneak peek: Chapter One of Three on a Match
Publication Date: January 14, 2022
ONE
Seth Marlowe had a newspaper sitting on his lap that he had purchased at the King’s Cross train station in London prior to leaving on the 10:28. The morning’s sun was firmly tucked behind grey clouds. Seth found himself looking for glimpses of blue to remind him of the Kenyan sky he had recently left. He’d never seen so much rain. It was astounding the country wasn’t perpetually submerged.
He looked down at his hands and found himself comparing his tanned hands to the ivory skin of the passenger seated across from him. Her thumbs were slowly rubbing the leather of her purse handle in clockwise circles. The motion reminded Seth of a man he had once met on an expedition, the way he circled his fingers on the steering wheel of the caravan when he was contemplating two paths of action.
Moving upward, his eyes rested on her face as she stared out the window. Her brow was smooth and clear. Her jaw was slightly shifting with little movements that tightened the pale skin on her face. Her grey eyes looked unseeingly at the stations and thatched roofs nestled in geometric land parcels.
Seth sensed a lack of substantiality about the woman. She was a collection of illusions, not realities. She seemed wealthy, but there were inconsistencies, like the thin fabric on the elbows of her dress. She seemed in possession of herself, but that clenched jaw stood in contradiction. The big game hunter had watched enough animals to know that humans were the least outwardly honest, but the most interesting to dissect.
“You’re certainly not from England, are you?” the woman asked without really removing her eyes from the window. She continued, “A true Englishman would not stare quite so persistently. He would hedge for an introduction.”
Seth’s bright white teeth flashed for an instant as he smiled at the porcelain girl.
“You have to admit that such directness is not quite English either,” he rejoined. “My father was from southern England, my mother from Egypt. I’ve been in Kenya for the past twenty years.”
“You’ve missed a little bit of history, including the Great War,” she replied.
“If you count fighting in the Somalian resistance forces as missing out, then you have a strange definition of war,” Seth said quietly as he lit a cigarette.
She looked slightly abashed.
“Oh. Forgive me. I’ve become a bit blunt after living in the States for quite a while. I’m coming back to London for the spring,” she said extending a tiny, gloved hand.
“Violet.”
“Seth Marlowe. This train ride and its stops might be boring to you after the glitter of London.”
“I grew up on a country estate, so it feels more like a homecoming than a chore. I suppose we’re both coming home, in a way.”
Both took the opportunity to look out over the green fields dotted with sheep and shorthorn cattle. A mist was starting to congeal into a thick fog that settled over the thickets and pastures.
As the sky fell lower, a sense of lonely sanctuary pervaded the atmosphere, a remnant of the first inhabitants of the island. The chugging of the train and glimpses of civilized boroughs could not dispel the ancient wilderness that came with the fog. Violet sat motionless, her pallor somehow becoming part of the grey landscape while her darting eyes pulsed with life. Seth felt the hair on his neck rising and he instinctively pulled his coat collar closer.
“What’s your stop?” Seth asked.
“Heathbury.”
“How odd. Me too.”
Normally, this revelation would engender closeness or continued conversation, but Seth saw the shutters close over her eyes and her jaw tightened again.
“Perhaps I’ll see you again,” Violet said with a touch of finality.
“I hardly think you can help it in such a small town.”
The queen had dismissed him. The conversation was over. Seth resumed his perusal of the newspaper. He was prepared to be treated like an outsider in Heathbury, and there was no time to start like the present.