Monsoon Mists
Authors: Christina Courtenay
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Genre Fiction, #Family Saga, #Scottish, #Sagas, #Historical Romance, #Romance, #Adventure, #Historical, #Fiction
Titles in the Kinross Series:
Trade Winds
Highland Storms
Monsoon Mists
Copyright © 2014 Christina Courtenay
Published 2014 by Choc Lit Limited
Penrose House, Crawley Drive, Camberley, Surrey GU15 2AB, UK
The right of Christina Courtenay to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying. In the UK such licences are issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London, W1P 9HE
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-78189-169-8 (epub)
ISBN 978-1-78189-170-4 (mobi)
ISBN 978-1-78189-168-1 (epdf)
To Fu-Tsi, Fudge and Shendu
– I’m so lucky to have you!
Contents
Acknowledgements
From the moment I wrote
Highland Storms
, telling the story of Brice Kinross and his supposedly treacherous brother, I knew Jamie had to be given the opportunity to give his version of events. I might not have persevered in writing this though if it hadn’t been for one person – Liv Thomas – who kept telling me she wanted to read about him. So many thanks, Liv, for encouraging me to put fingers to keyboard and I hope you like Jamie now he’s finally here!
A big thank you, as always, to the rest of the ChocLiteers – stars one and all – and the amazing Choc Lit team and their Tasting Panel, without whom none of this would be possible. It’s an honour to work with you all!
Massive thanks to Sue Moorcroft for keeping me sane through my first year as Chair of the RNA, for being my brilliant “roomie” at various conventions and for teaching me so much about professionalism and perseverance in the face of adversity – respect! To Gill Stewart for always being there and for being a wonderful critique partner. To Henriette Gyland for making our Swedish adventures such fun and for being an equally wonderful critique partner, and to all my other writing friends who make it such a joy to be an author.
And last, but not least, huge thanks to my hero-at-home, Richard, who makes it possible for me to write and to go places, to my lovely daughters, Josceline and Jessamy, and to Fu-Tsi, Fudge and Shendu, my constant companions to whom this book is dedicated and who are the inspiration for all my canine characters. Thank you all!
Author’s Note
This book could not have been written without the superb diary of one man – Christopher Hinric Braad (b. 1728–d. 1781). A Swede who travelled with the Swedish East India Company on some of their journeys to the Far East, he kept the most meticulous journals you could possibly imagine, which were invaluable to me in trying to describe the city of Surat in the late 1750s.
Braad travelled on board the ship Götha Leijon when it sailed to Canton in China in 1750–52, stopping at Surat and several other destinations. His journal (called
Beskrifning på skeppet Götha Leijons resa till Surat och åtskillige andre indianske orter
, which can be found at Gothenburg University Library in the Swedish East India Company collection) contains not only copious notes and descriptions, but also superb drawings of all manner of things – fish, plants, buildings and places. These too helped me immensely in picturing the sights the hero of my story would have seen during his travels.
Braad seems to have gone on the journey with the Götha Leijon purely as a scientific spectator and writer, rather than a trader. He went out of his way to seek out the most obscure facts about each of the places they visited along the route, recording it all carefully, even going so far as to measure out the size of a town’s square in number of footsteps! He gives measurements, longitudes and latitudes for everything, but the most interesting parts of his accounts (for me anyway) are those where he describes the people and sights he encounters. Quite often you can almost hear the amazement in Braad’s writing voice as he witnesses things most of his countrymen would never see and marvels at how different they are to what he is used to.
Writing his diary in old-fashioned Swedish, Braad’s account was a bit difficult to decipher at times, not to mention somewhat long-winded (although I thoroughly enjoyed his erratic spelling!). I hope I have understood him correctly – any mistakes are obviously my own. I am truly indebted to Braad and others like him, who had the courage to sail to what they must have thought of as the ends of the earth, and then felt it their duty to tell others what they had seen.
Prologue
Småland, Sweden – Late December 1754
It was well after midnight and the farmhouse was eerily silent, apart from the slight creaking of the floorboards as Jamie Kinross paced back and forth in the parlour. He was too restless to sleep, but he wished now he’d brought his eiderdown bolster downstairs with him. This room was so cold he was sure he’d freeze to death if he sat down on any of the stiff-backed furniture. The only way to stay warm enough was to keep moving.
Damn Elisabet!
Could you damn someone who was already dead? And who might, at this very moment, be standing by the gates of hell being judged and condemned for her sins? Jamie didn’t care and muttered another curse about conniving women in general and his deceased wife in particular, even though he knew he was probably being unfair. She’d had her reasons. If only she’d played her little games with someone other than him …
He stopped briefly to glance out the window, rimed with ice both inside and out. The yard was ringed with drifts of snow so deep you sank in up to your thighs if you tried walking through them. The moonlight bathed the scene in a surreal glow, making the surfaces glitter like a thousand diamond fragments. Jamie loved this sight, loved the snow, but tonight he felt as though the deep cold outside penetrated right to his core. He shivered and turned away.
He couldn’t stay here. He had to leave. Needed to leave.
But he had responsibilities.
Granhult farm and everything in it was his now and had been since Elisabet’s father died the previous month, leaving her sole heiress and Jamie, as her husband, owner by default. The problem was he didn’t want it. Had never wanted it.
Or her.
He sighed and continued his pacing. It was all so complicated and he’d been trying for months to come to terms with the fact that he couldn’t change his fate. He had to accept it and live with it. Live with
her
. And truly, he’d intended to make the best of it as soon as the baby was born. Only, now it was too late.
And the baby, currently sleeping upstairs – he couldn’t leave her here.
Think, man, think!
Just before dawn he made up his mind and went to speak to the farm steward, Jonas Nilsson, who lived in a cottage just the other side of the yard. ‘I need you to take over the day-to-day running for now, please,’ Jamie told the man. ‘I may be away some time, but I trust you to look after everything.’
Nilsson nodded, sympathy and understanding showing clearly in his sleep-hazy eyes. ‘Aye, I’ll take care of it, don’t you worry, sir.’ And Jamie knew he would. Nilsson was a good sort, honest to a fault and entirely dependable.
Unlike some people.
Jamie shook off his dark thoughts and went back to the main house. He woke the wet nurse, Lina, and told her to get herself and the baby dressed and packed. ‘Put as many layers of clothing on her as possible, please. I’ll find sheepskin rugs and Elisabet’s fur-lined cloak to wrap around her.’
Jamie waited for Lina to protest at his orders and try to reason with him. He’d have welcomed an argument; anything to let out his suppressed feelings of anger, resentment, grief and guilt. But she took one look at his face and did as she was told.
Half an hour later, the horses were stamping their hooves on the icy surface outside the front door. They shook their heads, jingling the bells on the harnesses while whinnying softly, as eager to be off as their master. Jamie exhaled a misty breath of impatience while he watched the wet nurse settle under the covers with her precious burden. Thank the Lord the baby wasn’t crying at least. That would have set his teeth on edge for sure.
‘Mr Kinross, you can’t mean to take a day-old baby out in this cold, surely? It’s madness!’
Jamie turned to see that Karin, his dead wife’s personal maid and confidante, had followed him out of the house and now stood wringing her hands on the porch.
‘She’s well wrapped up and we’re not going far,’ he told her, his curt tone indicating that he didn’t intend to take any notice of her views on the matter. Never had, never would
.
He could barely stand the sight of the woman and if he’d been a more vindictive man he would have told her to go to hell. With a huge effort of will, he held his tongue and settled himself on the driver’s seat in the sleigh.
‘But it’s going to snow! Look at the clouds.’ Karin seemed to be on the verge of tears, but Jamie hardly noticed and cared even less. Karin’s tears were usually of the fake variety and although they may be genuine now, it made no difference.
‘It will hold off for half an hour or so, which is all I need. Lina has hot bricks under the covers and if you’d just let us be on our way, all will be well. Stand aside.’
The snow had been shovelled into piles around the edges of the yard, but the leaden skies threatened to undo this good work in the very near future. Jamie knew time was of the essence and perhaps he was mad to go travelling with a newborn infant today, but he simply couldn’t stay here another minute. And he was only going as far as the next estate – to Askeberga, his parents’ manor house.
When he gave the horses the command to walk on, the sleigh glided easily on the smooth surface.
‘But, Mr Kinross …!’
Jamie heard Karin calling one last protest, but he ignored her and concentrated on the narrow road. He’d never been much for praying, but he did so now. ‘Please, dear God, keep the snow from falling, just for a short while, so we don’t get stuck in a snow drift somewhere.
And get me the hell out of here!’
He realised belatedly that this probably wasn’t an appropriate way of addressing the Lord, even in your thoughts, but perhaps He would understand the feeling was heartfelt and make allowances?
Jamie’s eyes stung from the cold and he buried his nose inside the scarf wrapped around the lower half of his face. Turning to the wet nurse on the seat behind him inside the sleigh, he saw that she was submerged under the sheepskin rugs and wolf pelts with her charge. ‘Are you warm enough?’ he asked, raising his voice a little to be heard over the swishing sound of the runners.
‘Yes, at the moment.’
The woman’s eyes, which were all Jamie could see, were wary. He couldn’t blame her. She probably thought him crazed with grief and was humouring him. That almost made him smile, it was so far from the truth. Out of his mind he may be, but not because he was sorrowing for Elisabet.
Or at least not in the way Lina thought. He didn’t mourn the loss of his wife, but he did feel sad about someone dying so young. It seemed a terrible waste and he couldn’t help but wonder if it was partly his fault. He should have made peace with her before the birth, extended an olive branch perhaps … Would it have made a difference? Put her in a more positive frame of mind?