One Minute to Love

CHAPTER ONE ~ 1887-1

CHAPTER ONE ~ 1887Yolisa Warren rode out from the woods and across the Park towards the village.

She had a message from her father to leave at one of the cottages before she returned home for luncheon.

It was such a lovely day and she had enjoyed every moment of her ride under the shady trees.

The woods had always had a special attraction for her.

She had trotted slowly along the mossy paths which twisted and turned under the silver elms.

She felt, as she did so, that the elves and fairies were whispering to her.

Because she was an only child she often told herself stories that she had a companion with her and he laughed at the same things as she did.

She rode out of the great iron gates and came in sight of the thatched cottages.

With their small flower beds in front of them they looked pretty and attractive. It was her mother who had always encouraged people in the village to grow flowers in their gardens.

She had herself created a large Herb Garden at the back of Warren Court.

Yolisa now rode to the village shop which supplied almost everything that anyone could want in every station of life.

She dismounted.

There were some boys playing at the side of the road and she then called one of them over to hold her horse for her.

“You know that Achilles is always good with you, Jim.”

Jim grinned.

“I loves them ’orses, Miss Yolisa,” he said, “and when I’m big I’m goin’ to be a jockey.”

“Then you will have to learn to ride very well,” Yolisa replied. “In the meantime you must try very hard to understand horses, as a horse goes better when he and his rider are compatible with each other.”

Jim nodded, but she was not sure if he had followed what she was saying.

He was a clever little boy of eight and she had known him since he was born.

She went into the village shop and Mr. Hundell, when he saw her, hurried from where he was packing up a parcel.

“Good morning, Miss Yolisa,” he then greeted her. “What can I do for you?”

“I have brought a letter from my father,” Yolisa said, “and he wants me to thank you for the goods you sent to us yesterday. They are just what we wanted.”

“That’s what I likes to hear,” Mr. Hundell smiled, “and I do hopes, Miss Yolisa, you’re feelin’ as good as you looks.”

“Rather better,” Yolisa laughed and went out into the sunshine.

She was just going to mount Achilles again when a young girl came running up to her. She was petite and good-looking in a rather tousled way.

“Oh, Miss Yolisa,” she said, “please I’ve somethin’ to ask you.”

Yolisa stopped.

She knew only too well what was coming.

“It be Ben,” the girl blurted out. “And ’e wants to marry me, but I can’t make up my mind.”

“You cannot expect me to do that for you,” Yolisa replied.

“’Tis just that I wants you to look into the future, Miss Yolisa, as you’ve done for me before and tell me if you thinks we’ll be ’appy together.”

Yolisa did not reply and the girl went on,

“There be someone else who be after me, but I be not sure of ’im either.”

“It all comes,” Yolisa said, “of being the prettiest girl in the village, Brenda.”

Brenda giggled and looked coy.

“At least I’ve a choice, miss.”

“That is true, Brenda, and I can understand that you are afraid of making the wrong decision.”

“That’s just what I be sayin’, Miss Yolisa, and only you can tell me what to do.”

“I cannot answer for your heart,” Yolisa said, “but, knowing that Ben is a reliable man, I think you can at least consider him seriously.”

“I see what you means, Miss Yolisa, “and perhaps the other one be a bit flighty, so to speak.”

“You have to decide for yourself what you want,” Yolisa said. “But a flighty husband can have a roving eye and perhaps forget his family when he has other interests at heart.”

Brenda thought for a moment.

She was undoubtedly a pretty girl. Rather on the plump side, but at the same time Yolisa was not surprised that the young men in the village found her enticing.

There was always someone proposing to her.

Yolisa had in fact had this conversation with her twice already.

She knew, with what her father called her Third Eye, that Brenda would settle down eventually and be a very good wife.

Now as Brenda did not speak, Yolisa added,

“What I should do if I was you, Brenda, is think it over carefully and before you do finally decide to marry one or the other, I should make quite certain that he will love you and you can always be sure of his protection and support.”

“I think that I understands what you’re sayin’, Miss Yolisa,” Brenda replied, “and that be Ben right enough.”

“Then perhaps it had better be Ben,” Yolisa said. “But if you are still worried, come to see me one evening when you finish work and I will tell the cards for you.”

“Oh, I ’opes you’d do that, miss,” Brenda cried. “Thank you, thank you! You knows as ’ow us all relies on you.”

“That is what worries me!” Yolisa replied.

She knew, however, that Brenda was not listening and she turned towards Achilles.

Jim was patting his nose and talking to him in a low voice.

She felt that the boy was right in saying that when he was older he would work with horses.

“Thank you, Jim,” she said, “and here is a penny to spend in the shop.”

“Thank you, miss, thank you,” Jim grinned, taking it eagerly.

At the same time he gave Achilles one last pat as Yolisa climbed onto the saddle.

Then, as Jim ran into the shop, she waved to him and turned Achilles round and rode back towards the gates of her home.

Ever since she was a child she had had a strange intuition about the future of other people.

Whatever she knew or told them invariably came true.

Some people thought that it was uncanny, but as her father frequently said to her,

“It is quite usual for people in Scotland to be fey and your mother was a Scot. You have inherited that from her and not from me.”

“It often worries me,” Yolisa confessed, “how they believe everything I tell them. I am so frightened that I might be wrong.”

Her father looked at her for a moment before he replied,

“I don’t think that that is quite true. When you are predicting the future for someone, I have the feeling that you are absolutely sure in your own mind that what you say will indeed come true.”

Yolisa laughed.

“You are quite right, Papa. I am only covering my tracks in case anything really does go wrong.”

“It does not seem to have done so so far,” Sir John replied, “and you should wait until it happens before you start worrying.”

“I am sure, Papa, that your advice is much better than mine,” Yolisa said.

Equally she was aware that her ‘predictions’, as she always called them, came from a deep conviction that was so strange but compelling that she could not dispute it.

She was only three when it had first happened.

She had pointed to a man who had been taken on in the household by the butler to do odd jobs and said,

“Bad man, bad man, go ’way.”

Her Nanny had been horrified.

“That is very rude of you, Yolisa,” she had scolded her, “now say you are sorry to Jacob.”

“Bad, bad,” Yolisa had persisted.

She had then run away before Nanny could catch her.

Only a week later it was discovered that Jacob was systematically stealing things in the house.

He was caught when Sir John remembered where he had put a small amount of money and then found that half of it was gone.

Jacob was naturally instantly dismissed and after he had left quite a number of other items were found to be missing.

Yet no one had suspected him except for Yolisa.

After that there was incident after incident when something she pointed out or predicted was proved entirely correct.

As she grew older, in fact by the time she was in her teens, the servants regularly consulted her.

Of course the story of her powers quickly reached the village and surrounding towns.

It was impossible for anything concerning courtship to happen without her being consulted about it.

Sir John had to admit that he relied on her when he was engaging staff for the house and occasionally when he was negotiating with people he had some business contacts with.

To Yolisa it was a remarkable gift, as she insisted, from God, which she could not ignore.

“If I can help people, then I am very fortunate,” she had said to her mother before she died. “I am just afraid, Mama, that I might tell them what was wrong and perhaps damage their lives.”

“I am very sure, my dearest,” Lady Warren replied, “that what you have is a gift from God. At the same time I quite understand that you are afraid of telling those who consult you what is not right. But you must trust your own intuition and pray you will never make a mistake.”

“I always do that,” Yolisa murmured.

“In that case I am sure that God will not fail you,” Lady Warren answered.

Yolisa’s mother had died in the middle of a very cold winter. She was weakened by a hacking cough which went to her lungs and eventually turned to pneumonia.

Yolisa was, at first, inconsolable.

She adored her mother in the same way she loved her father, but with her mother she had a special affinity.

It was so close that, when her mother died, she felt that half of herself had gone with her.

Gradually she came to realise that her mother was still there to guide her and help her as she always had done in the past.

Yolisa did not talk to anyone about it because they would not have understood.

However she was vividly conscious of her mother’s presence whenever she was undertaking a task that was too big or difficult for her.

Now, as Yolisa rode back home, she was thinking how fond her mother had been of everyone who lived in the village.

They had loved her and indeed five years after her death her grave always had little bunches of flowers on it from those who lived in the nearby cottages.

At times Yolisa had seen the first fruits arranged on their leaves beneath the tombstone.

“They have never forgotten Mama,” she said once to her father.

“How could they?” Sir John had replied. “Just as she lives in your memory and mine, she lives in theirs.”

It was what Yolisa thought herself and because she knew how much her father missed his wife she would put her arms round him and kiss his cheek.

“I am so lucky to have you, Papa,” she would sigh, “and that, I know, is what Mama would want.”

“I can say the same, my dearest,” her father replied. “And she would want us to carry on making the house and the garden as beautiful as it was when she was here and, of course, looking after other people as she did.”

“Which you do magnificently Papa,” Yolisa smiled. “Colin was telling me yesterday how you promised to help him set up his own business. That was very kind of you.”

“He is a good boy,” Sir John said, “and his father and mother have lived on this estate for over fifty years.”

“Then they are certainly one of us,” Yolisa laughed and kissed her father again.

Now, as she rode nearer the house, she thought how lovely it was.

It had been built in Tudor times, a black and white house with diamond-paned casement windows.

Over centuries it had been enlarged as the family increased in size and yet it still looked as it had originally and was listed as one of the best preserved Tudor mansions in the country.

There was a stream running below it where swam a variety of ducks, some of them quite rare.

They were Sir John’s special hobby and enthusiasts came from all over the country to admire them and consult him on their breeding.

Now, as it was spring, the ducks were followed by their ducklings.

They made a very pretty picture as they moved over the water that was sparkling in the bright sunshine.

Sir John had always said that it was entirely due to the stream that Yolisa’s eyes were of the same soft green flecked with gold.