Welcome to sleep stories with Steph It is time to relax.
And fully let go.
There is nothing you need to be doing now.
And know where you need to go.
Close your eyes.
And feel yourself sink into the support beneath you.
And let all the worries of the day go.
Drift away.
This is your time.
And your space.
Take a deep breath in through your nose.
And let it out with a long sigh.
That's it!
There is nothing you need to be doing now.
And know where you need to go.
Happy listening.
Chapter 43 But Barney,
Protested Valancy after a few minutes,
Your father somehow gave me to understand you were still in love with your first love.
He would.
Dad holds the championship for making blunders.
There's a thing that's better left unsaid,
You can trust him to say it.
But he isn't a bad horse,
Old Valancy,
You'll like him.
I do now.
And his money isn't tainted money.
He made it honestly.
His medicines are quite harmless.
Even his purple pills do people heaps of good when they believe in them.
I'm not fit for your life.
Side valancy,
I'm not.
.
.
Clever or well-educated or good.
My life is in Mustaouis and all the wild places of the world.
I'm not going to ask you to live the life of a society woman.
Of course we must spend a bit of time with Dad.
He's lonely and he's old.
I'm not in that big house of his,
Pleaded Valancy.
I can't live in a palace.
You can't come down to that after your blue castle.
Grinned Barney.
Don't worry,
My sweet.
I couldn't live in that house myself.
It has a white marble stairway with gilt banisters and looks like a furniture shop with the labels off.
Likewise,
It's the pride of Dad's heart.
We'll get a little house somewhere outside of Montreal,
In the real country.
Near enough to see Dad often.
I think we'll build one for ourselves.
A house you build for yourself is so much nicer than a hand-me-down.
But will spend our summers in the stowers and our autumns travelling.
I want you to see the Alhambra.
It's the nearest thing to the blue cast of your dreams I can think of.
And there's an old walled garden in Italy.
I want to show you the moon rising over Rome through the dark cypress trees.
But will that be any lovelier than the moon rising over Miss Stowers?
Not lovelier,
But a different kind of loveliness.
There are many kinds of loveliness.
Fancy before this year,
You've spent all your life in ugliness.
You know nothing of the beauty of the world.
Or climb mountains,
Hunt for treasures,
Search out the magic of East and West,
Run hand in hand to the Rim of the World.
I want to show you it all.
See it again through your eyes.
Oh,
There are a million things I want to show you.
Do with you.
Say to you.
It'll take a lifetime.
And we must say about that picture by Tierney after all.
Will you promise me one thing?
Asked Valancy solemnly.
Anything.
Said Barney recklessly.
Only one thing.
You are never ever under any circumstances or provocation.
To cast it up to me that I ask you.
To marry me.
Chapter 44 extract from a letter written by Miss Olive Sterling to Mr Cecil Bruce.
It's really disgusting that Doss's crazy adventure should have turned out like this.
It makes one feel there's no use in behaving properly.
I'm sure her mind was unbalanced when she left home.
What she said about a dust pile showed that.
I,
Of course,
Don't think there was ever a thing the matter with her heart.
Or perhaps Snaith or Redfern or whatever his name is,
He's fed purple pills to her back in that Mastowis hut and cured her after all.
It would make quite a testimonial for the family ads,
Wouldn't it?
He's such an exsignificant looking creature,
I think.
I mentioned this to Das,
But all she said was,
I don't like collar ad men.
Well he's certainly no Colerad man,
But I must say there's something rather distinguished about him now he's cut his hair and put on decent clothes.
I really think Cecil you should exercise more.
It doesn't do to get too fleshy.
He also claims,
I believe,
To be John Foster.
We can't believe that or not as we would like,
I suppose.
Old Dr Redfern has given them two millions for a wedding present.
Evidently the purple pills bring in the bacon.
They're going to spend the fall in Italy and the winter in Egypt and motor through Normandy in apple blossom time!
Not in that dreadful old Lizzie though.
Red Fern's got a wonderful new car.
Well,
I think I'll run away too and disgrace myself.
It seems to pay.
Uncle Ben is a scream.
Likewise Uncle James.
The fuss they make over DOS now is absolutely sickening.
To hear Aunt Amelia talking of my son-in-law Redfern and my daughter Mrs Redfern mother and father are as bad as the rest and they can't even see balance is just laughing at them all in her sleeve.
Chapter 45 Valancy and Barney turned under the mainland pines in the cool dusk of the September night for a farewell look at the Blue Castle.
The stars was drowned in sunset lilac light,
Incredibly delicate and elusive.
Nip and tuck were cawing lazily in the old pines.
Good luck and Banjo were mewed and mewing in separate baskets in Barney's new dark green car.
Cousin Georgiana was going to take care of them until Barney and Valancy came back.
Aunt Wellington and cousins Sarah and Aunt Alberta had also entreated the privilege of looking after them.
But to Klaus and Georgiana it was given.
Fallency was in tears.
Don't cry,
Moonlight.
We'll be back next summer.
And now we're off for a real honeymoon!
Valancy smiled through her tears.
She was so happy that her happiness terrified her.
But despite the delays before her.
The glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome.
Lure of the ageless Nile,
Glamour of the Riviera,
Mosque and palace and minaret.
Balancing you perfectly well.
That no spot or place or home in the world could possibly ever possess the sorcery.
Of her dear blue castle.
The End
