Home > Just Make Believe

Just Make Believe
Author: Maggie Robinson


Make Believe

   There are times when you feel sad and blue

   Something’s wrong, you don’t know what to do

   When you feel that way, stop and think awhile

   Just make believe and smile

   Make believe you are glad when you’re sorry

   Sunshine will follow the rain

   When things go wrong, it won’t be long

   Soon they’ll be right again

   Tho’ your love dreams have gone, make believe, don’t let on

   Smile tho’ your heart may be broken

   For when bad luck departs, you will find good luck starts

   Don’t grieve, just make believe

   When your dearest friends have turned away

   And blue skies above have turned to gray

   Don’t worry for it may not all be true

   Here’s my advice to you

   Make believe you are glad when you’re sorry

   Sunshine will follow the rain

   When things go wrong, it won’t be long

   Soon they’ll be right again

   Tho’ your love dreams have gone, make believe, don’t let on

   Smile tho’ your heart may be broken

   For when bad luck departs, you will find good luck starts

   Don’t grieve, just make believe.

   Music and lyrics: Jack Shilkret/Benny Davis, 1921

 

 

Cast of Characters


   Fernald Hall, Broughton Magna

   Lady Adelaide Compton (Addie)

   Major Rupert Compton, ghost

   Sir Hugh Fernald, baronet

   Lady Pamela Fernald, his wife

   Lady Evelyn Fernald, his mother

   John Fernald, his son

   Mrs. Iris Temple, his aunt by marriage

   Miss Marguerite (Margie) Jordan

   Miss Amanda (Mandy) Jordan

   Owen Bradbury

   Captain Dennis Clifford

   Simon Davies

   Patrick Cassidy

   Lord Lucas Waring

   Philippa Dean, Lucas’s new girlfriend

   Beckett, Addie’s maid

   Jim Musgrave, Sir Hugh’s valet

   Trim, Sir Hugh’s butler

   Mrs. Lewis, the housekeeper/cook

   Juliet Barlow, John’s governess and Pamela’s cousin

   Murray, Pamela’s maid

   Mary, a maid

   Colin Stewart, tutor

   Barry Dunn, head gardener

   Bert Dunn, his cousin

   Charlie Dunn, Bert’s brother

   Robby and Liam, grooms

   Bill Parks, landlord at the Pig and Shilling, Broughton Magna

   Dower House, Broughton Park, Broughton Magna

   Lady Cecilia Merrill, Addie’s sister

   Ian Merrill, Marquess of Broughton, their cousin

   Carstairs, butler

   Compton Chase, Compton-Under-Wood

   Forbes, butler

   Mrs. Drum, housekeeper

   Mrs. Oxley, cook

   Scotland Yard

   Detective Inspector Devenand Hunter

   Sergeant Bob Wells

 

 

Dear Addie,

   Hugh and I hope you can join us for a week at Fernald Hall Saturday next. We’ll have a small, congenial group—a few old army chums of Hugh’s and a pair of pretty twins who remind me of our debutante days. Such girlish glory. How time marches on.

   Lucas agreed to be torn from his farming duties for most of the week, and I count on you to keep him out of trouble and away from disobliging sheep and reluctant root vegetables. It will be heaven to have dear friends here again. We’ve missed you!

   Bring your riding togs. We’ll have three new additions to our stables, brought all the way from Ireland. I can’t wait for you to see the improvements I plan for the grounds here and will welcome your suggestions. I do hope you can come despite the late notice.

   Yours affectionately,

   Pamela

 

 

Chapter One


   Fernald Hall, Broughton Magna, Gloucestershire

   A Saturday afternoon in June 1925

   The brick stableyard was clattering with laughing guests and lofty horses, the equines’ blindingly shiny tack redolent of harness oil, brass polish, and saddle soap. The humans were equally well turned-out, and Lady Adelaide Compton was glad she’d had a new riding habit made. The jade tweed brought out the green of her hazel eyes. Even if she disgraced herself riding, she’d look damn good doing it.

   She waited for her mount to be brought out to her from its box with just a touch of nervous excitement. It had been quite some time since she’d sat on a horse. Major Rupert Charles Cressleigh Compton, her late and sincerely unlamented husband, had converted their stables at Compton Chase into a garage to hold his car collection.

   To be frank, she now preferred an automobile’s horsepower to the real thing. Much to her late—and sincerely lamented—father’s disappointment, despite years of Pony Club, she’d never been a natural horsewoman. It was doubtful she’d turn into Boudicca one month shy of turning thirty-two.

   She swallowed as a horse was led to her. It was very…tall. Glossy as the rest of Hugh’s mounts, perhaps even glossier. A lovely color, rather like an Irish setter, which made sense, since he was an Irish horse. But still…

   Addie had reservations. Her reluctance must have shown, for the Irish horse stud owner Patrick Cassidy, as glossy and burnished as the horse itself, touched her shoulder. Ordinarily, she would have stiffened at the familiarity; she’d only met the man at lunch. But this week she was trying to be the woman everyone expected her to be.

   A merry widow. Sophisticated. Rich and titled. Not a care in the world. Closets full of first-class fashion, half of which she’d apparently brought with her for the week-long house party, since her maid, Beckett, wanted her to make a good impression. Even if she changed ten times a day, she’d never repeat herself.

   With her usual cheeky candor, Beckett had informed Addie that she needed some fun. A flirtation was just the ticket, one that might even turn into a fling, as was de rigueur at so many country-house parties.

   Naughty nocturnal navigations.

   What her maid left unsaid: something to take away the sting of Addie’s unsuccessful attempt to seduce Detective Inspector Devenand Hunter of Scotland Yard. She had thrown herself at the man two months ago and he’d resolutely refused to catch her.

Hot Books
» House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1)
» A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire
» From Blood and Ash (Blood And Ash #1)
» A Million Kisses in Your Lifetime
» Deviant King (Royal Elite #1)
» Den of Vipers
» House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2)
» Sweet Temptation
» The Sweetest Oblivion (Made #1)
» Chasing Cassandra (The Ravenels #6)
» Wreck & Ruin
» Steel Princess (Royal Elite #2)
» Twisted Hate (Twisted #3)
» The Play (Briar U Book 3)
» The War of Two Queens (Blood and Ash #4)