Read Secret of the Sands for Free Online

pot and stows it back under the bed. Then, rather than calling for his valet, he washes in a desultory fashion, pulling on his wig haphazardly, preoccupied over whether he might have chocolate this morning with his rolls, or coffee. Still debating this, he takes the stairs down at a sharpish trot to the sunny, yellow drawing room on the first floor. He never will get used to the portrait of Lord Byron over the mantel, though, of course, to remove it would cause a scandal were further scandal required. It has been a good ten years since Murray’s father famously burned Byron’s memoirs to safeguard public morality, and hardly a week passes even now that he is not asked by some starry-eyed matron or other if the old codger had, by chance, ever mentioned to his son the nature of the manuscript’s contents. Murray considers the matter both foolish and tiresome. He is a serious man of science and his interests do not stretch to poetry – unless perhaps it is German poetry – or indeed to much in the way of scandal. Byron’s musings on sherbet and sodomy might have funded Murray’s education, but now, as he has been known to dryly remark, it is time to put aside such childish things. At least in conversation – for Byron’s full canon still graces the great publisher’s list and sells at least several hundred copies every year. In addition, each week Murray receives by post a number of attempts at Byronic genius, all of which, on principle, he consigns to the fire.
    Coffee, Murray decides.
    The enticing smell of fresh bread is floating upstairs from the kitchens in the basement and he can almost taste the melting butter and lemon conserve already. A glass of rhenish, some ham perhaps and he will be set.
    There is a pile of correspondence on his desk and, as it is Friday, he might have passed it by for it is his habit to ride on a Friday morning, but there is one packet that catches his eye. Neither the handwriting nor the paper is extraordinary but in the small, nondescript, black wax seal there are embedded some grains of sand. Murray breaks open the packet with a satisfying click and inside lies a manuscript bound in worn card, accompanied by a covering letter dated several weeks before and written in a neat hand.
    Dear Sir,
    I wish to offer for your consideration an account of my recent exploration and adventures on the island of Socotra where I have been humbly employed as an officer of the Indian Navy during the current survey of the Red Sea by the ship Palinurus. I hope you might wish to publish my unworthy writings and find them of some small interest.
    Yours, etc.,
    James Raymond Wellsted (Lieutenant)
    Murray crosses the room and spins the leather globe until he finds the Red Sea. Then he peers short-sightedly to try to identify the islands nearby. He has never heard of this Socotra place but with the help of a magnifying glass he quickly plants a firm finger over the speck of the island, which is far smaller than his nail. It is perched to the east of Abyssinia and to the south of Oman.
    I must ask George about this, he thinks.
    Murray will be dining that evening with the President of the Royal Geographical Society and his beautiful wife, Louisa. The manuscript might make for some interesting dinner conversation over the roast fowl and jellied beets. His wife will not like it, for her interests do not run to anything the least bit sensible, but Murray, like most of London, is eager for news of the Empire’s burgeoning territories – the more exotic, the better – and a keen sense for a bestseller is in his blood. If it is written well, an explorer’s memoir is generally a sure-fire success. So many people these days are either venturing abroad themselves, or have relations in the far reaches, that there is something of a vogue for travel writing and Murray’s view is that he will be publishing more and more of the stuff. After all, it is worthy, educational and occasionally exciting (all of which he approves