Lovers in London Read Free Page B

and I are now planning to take you to Ascot and, of course, there will be plenty of balls then.”
    Lanthia gave a cry of delight.
    â€œOh, Mama! You did not tell me!”
    â€œIt was to be a surprise, but Ascot is just one reason why I really want you to start choosing pretty gowns now, because unless my leg gets better quickly we shall not have much time before we will all have to go to London.”
    â€œFor you and Papa to enjoy the racing at Ascot, and for me to go to parties every night!”
    Lanthia kissed her mother.
    â€œYou did not tell me all this, Mama, but it sounds so exciting.”
    â€œI am only frightened that I will just not be well enough. When the doctor called this morning he said he is quite certain that I will be my old self by next month, but I am to do as little as possible until then.”
    â€œOf course you must do exactly as he says. Oh, Mama, going to Ascot with you and Papa will be the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me! I only wish we were entering a horse for the Gold Cup.”
    Sir Philip chuckled.
    â€œThat is something I definitely cannot afford, even though I would enjoy owning a racehorse!”
    â€œPerhaps if your book is a huge success, Papa, next year you may be able to buy one horse which is so good that we can run him at Ascot.”
    â€œIt is just a case of ‘ if wishes were horses, beggars might ride ’, Lanthia! You are not to try to tempt me to wild extravagance, as I am saving up for your wedding when you have one.”
    â€œThat will be a long, long time away, Papa. I have no wish to marry anyone.”
    That was not exactly true.
    In her dreams she fervently believed she had a very special man in her life, completely invisible but exploring the world with her.
    She had always thought in her heart of hearts that he was the man she would eventually marry; all she had to do was find him.
    But she had no intention of marrying anyone unless she was as much in love with him as her mother was with her father, and he loved her in the same way.
    Lanthia had grown up in a house filled with love.
    From all the books she had read she had been made vividly aware of the power of love and she was brought up to appreciate that it was something that men and women had always sought since the beginning of time.
    So many events had occurred entirely as a result of love – misery, crime, war, cruelty and blissful happiness, all because two people had found each other.
    It was in the books about Greece that Lanthia had read the mythology of how real love began.
    Apparently, the ancient Greeks fervently believed that when God first created a human being, he just made a man.
    But the man was lonely all by himself.
    God therefore cut him in half making one half the woman and the other half the man.
    It was the woman who was sweet, gentle, loving and inspiring and equally it was the man who was strong, protective, masculine and adventurous.
    Together they made one complete person, just as they had been before being divided into two.
    â€˜That is what I am looking for,’ Lanthia had often told herself, ‘my other half.’
    That particular fancy crept into her dreams and the stories she lived in as she went riding.
    She was, however, well aware that her mother hoped that she and the Lord Lieutenant’s eldest son would be attracted to each other.
    He was really quite a nice young man and Lanthia had known him since they were children, but he was not particularly interested in her and if she was honest, she found him rather dull.
    He was certainly not the hero of her dreams or her imagination.
    She had no desire to climb up the highest mountain with him or go down deep into the darkness of the earth.
    â€˜The man I marry will have to be different , very different,’ she told herself many times.
    So far she had not met him, nor had there been any occasion when she might have done.
    Her mother’s father, Lord Leamsford, had