Читать книгу A Winter’s Tale: A festive winter read from the bestselling Queen of Christmas romance - Trisha Ashley - Страница 9

They have given mee a chamber in the solar to be near Thomas. I spend much time there—or in the stillroom, which is sadly neglected, Lady Wynter having no interest in those arts in which it should be her pride to be accomplished. I walk in the gardens when I can spare the time and pick herbs. The plants I need that grow wild in the woods and pastures are harder to obtain and some must be picked by the light of the moon…To slip out here unseen is difficult.

From the journal of Alys Blezzard, 1580

‘Anya!’ I said, when I finally managed to reach her. ‘My guardian angel is a golden Lucifer—diabolically handsome and slightly sulphurous round the edges. He’s hot—and I think I’m in love!’

‘How do you know?’ she said, sounding as if she was standing in a metal oil drum (which she might have been—you never know with Anya).

‘That I’m in love?’

‘No, that your guardian angel is a Lucifer.’

‘Oh—because he visited me yesterday,’ I said. ‘He’s sort of a cousin—a very distant cousin.’ Then I told her all about my grandfather’s death, my inheritance—and Jack’s offer.

‘And he was furious when he first turned up, because he thought I’d somehow managed to brainwash Grandfather into leaving Winter’s End to me. Once he realised I hadn’t he was really, really nice.’

‘I bet he was,’ she said, sounding unconvinced. ‘But after all you’ve told me about your childhood at Winter’s End and how you feel about the place, I can’t understand why you don’t sound delirious with pleasure.’

‘Well, for one thing I’m still stunned and wondering why on earth Grandfather did it; and for another, it isn’t the Winter’s End I remember, because it’s clear that Jack took my place soon after I left,’ I said slowly. ‘Apparently the house is really run down and there is a big outstanding bank loan against it too, which Grandfather took out to pay for his garden restoration.’

‘What were you expecting, a Shangri-La that always stayed the same?’

‘It did always stay the same, in my imagination—and part of me thinks it’s better left like that, and I should never try to go back there.’

‘Well, they always say, be careful what you wish for,’ Anya said breezily, ‘but actually, I always thought the only reason you started working in stately homes was because you were trying to recreate a bit of what you once had—and just think how useful all that experience will be now! Doesn’t the thought of doing such a major clean-up get your juices flowing?’

She knows me only too well.

‘I wish my angels would conjure something up like that, Sophy. I’m getting a bit tired of wandering around now,’ she confessed to my surprise, because she has been on the road since she was eighteen and left the commune. We did this sort of role-reversal thing. When I arrived at the commune I was tired of moving about and just wanted to settle down, while she was fed up with the whole thing and attracted to the kind of life I’d had with Mum.

‘I think when Guy gets a job I might settle somewhere near him,’ she added thoughtfully. ‘He’s got lots of interviews.’

‘I’m not surprised; he got a first-class degree.’

Guy is Anya’s son, a year younger than Lucy, and was always bright—and very determined. When he was eleven he insisted on staying with his grandmother in Scotland during the school terms and got grade A everything.

‘How is Lucy doing?’ Anya asked.

‘She seems fine, but I wish she wasn’t so far away. And some man keeps pestering her, which I find worrying. She says he seems fascinated by her being so tall and blonde. There have been a couple of cases of British women being stalked and even murdered in Japan.’

‘But Lucy is very sensible, Sophy. I’m sure she wouldn’t put herself at risk.’

‘Perhaps not, but if I did sell Winter’s End to Jack, she could come home and I would be able to pay off her student loan and buy a cottage somewhere. Then maybe we could start up a business together and—’

‘Don’t you do anything hasty,’ she warned me, ‘especially with this relative of yours. He doesn’t sound like any kind of angel to me, but he does sound the kind of clever, tricky, devious man you always seem to go for.’

‘I don’t know what you mean by “always”. I can count on one hand the number of men I’ve been out with since Rory left me,’ I said with dignity and some modesty, leaving one or two of my brief encounters with absolute no-hopers out of the reckoning. ‘And I can’t imagine what I’ve said to make you think that about Jack! He’s a really genuine, lovely person—and what’s more, he’s family. Anyway, I can’t do anything at all until the solicitor turns up. I’m still trying to take it all in, but I’m worried that Grandfather might have changed his will on impulse after arguing with Jack about spending too much on the garden, and then died before he could change it back. It does seem unfair that he should leave the house to me. Anya—’

There was a plaintive bleeping. ‘Blow—my phone’s almost dead,’ she said, and was cut off.

My belated rescue turned out to be a very belt-and-braces affair, for next day the cavalry, in the sober and suited form of the family solicitor, turned up too.

You see, I knew good things were on the way. My second sight was just a bit dodgy about when.

Mr Hobbs said he had already written to tell me he was coming to see me today ‘on a matter to my advantage’, but of course I haven’t had the heart to go back to Spiggs Cottage and collect my mail since I left. The new owners are probably putting it straight into the skip, anyway.

Any more strange men visiting my caravan and, as far as the village is concerned, I might as well hang a red lamp over the door, even if this one looked so old and desiccated that strong winds could have blown him away. I’ve learned the hard way that a divorced woman is always seen as a sexual predator, after everyone else’s menfolk (which is why, I suppose, I haven’t made many friends here and hardly ever get asked to dinner parties).

But I invited Mr Hobbs in, and he was surprised to find I already knew of the legacy, until I told him about Jack’s visit and his offer to buy Winter’s End. Then, over tea and rather overdone rock cakes (the caravan stove is a bit temperamental), I asked him if he knew exactly why my grandfather hadn’t left the estate to Jack.

‘After all, he was the obvious heir, wasn’t he, even if they had had one or two disagreements? It does seem unfair.’

‘He had his reasons,’ he said cagily. I suppose it was only natural that he should side with my grandfather—they were of an age and had probably been friends. ‘Jack is the only son of his cousin Louisa, now deceased, and was born in New Zealand. When his father remarried he was sent back here to school, about a year after you and your mother left…and of course he spent the holidays at Winter’s End and looked on it as his home. He is divorced with no children—another disappointment to your grandfather—and has a house in London. You know he is a property developer?’

‘He did mention that. Presumably a successful one, if he could afford to buy me out?’

‘Yes indeed: one cannot say that he hasn’t risen by his own endeavours. His father purchased a small house for him to live in when he was at Oxford, and then later he renovated it and sold it at a profit and bought two more on the proceeds…and so it went on. I suppose his enterprise is quite remarkable. Nowadays he specialises in buying large period properties cheaply and converting them into extremely upmarket and expensive apartments,’ he added meaningfully.

I stared at him. ‘But surely you don’t think he would do that to Winter’s End? He said he loved the place and wanted to restore it to its former glory—and he seemed so sincere.’

‘I am sure he did: his sincerity must be one of his greatest business assets,’ Mr Hobbs said drily. ‘And of course he has restored the houses he has purchased, which might otherwise have fallen into irreversible decay. They were all, like Winter’s End, within an easy commuting distance of thriving major cities.’

‘Oh,’ I said, digesting this. ‘But in the case of Winter’s End, that could be just a coincidence?’

‘Of course, that may be so. However, in his eagerness to persuade you to sell your inheritance, he may have been perhaps a little selective in the information he imparted to you. For instance, did he touch upon the various responsibilities that come with the legacy?’

‘I…no, what responsibilities?’

‘Apart from your grandfather charging you to complete a garden restoration scheme that has, in my opinion—and I have to say in all fairness, Jack’s—nearly brought the house to ruin, the livelihoods of several people working for the Winter’s End estate depends on your decision. You might also want to consider that Winter’s End has been your Great-Aunt Hebe’s home for all her life, though she does, of course, have some means of her own, as does her twin sister, Ottilie, who resides for part of the year in the coach house.’

I felt responsibility settle round my shoulders like a lead cape. ‘But I know nothing about managing an estate! How could I possibly take it on?’

‘But you do have relevant experience in looking after old properties, Ms Winter. Sir William thought you were just what Winter’s End needed.’

‘He did? But I’ve no experience of running one, only doing the donkey work and passing on orders to the other staff. And do call me Sophy—I have a feeling we are likely to see a lot of each other.’

His face broke into a smile like a rather jolly tortoise. ‘Or one of my sons—I am semi-retired, you know, though I like to keep my brain active by retaining one or two clients. But to get back to business, Sophy, Winter’s End is not a large house, although the gardens are extensive and take quite some keeping up, especially the yew maze and all the box hedges and topiary. Do you remember the spiral maze?’

I nodded. ‘At the front of the house.’ I felt a sudden pang for the small, mischievous Sophy who used to run through it with Grandfather’s pack of miniature spaniels chasing after her, yapping madly—and who would then usually have to go back and rescue one or two of them who had got lost among the labyrinthine turns. ‘It was quite low, wasn’t it? Most tall adults would be able to see over the top of the hedges.’

‘That’s right, and all those curves and rounded edges take a good deal of clipping. Then there is a considerable area of woodland on the opposite side of the valley to the house and one tenanted farm. Are you interested in gardening at all?’

‘I had enough of mulching and digging in all weathers when I lived in the Scottish commune to cure me of wanting to be a hands-on gardener, but I do love the frivolity of gardens made just to look at.’

‘Quite,’ he said. ‘And Sir William told me that you have considerable expertise in caring for old houses and their contents from your previous employment, do you not?’

‘Oh, yes, I left school at sixteen and my first job was in a Scottish castle. The Mistress saw to it that I learned the correct way to clean it and all the valuable things it contained.’

‘The Mistress?’

‘That’s how she liked to be addressed by her staff,’ I explained, ‘which I was, until I ran off and married her cousin Rory. Then after I had Lucy I got the job here at Blackwalls with Lady Betty, keeping everything clean and in good repair, passing on her orders to the other staff, taking guided tours around the house on open days, being her PA…you name it, I did it. Lady Betty didn’t pay me a lot, but she was very kind to me and Lucy, and I was fond of her.’

I touched the little gold, enamel and crystal bee brooch I wore. ‘She gave me this as a keepsake when I visited her in the hospital, because she said she had a premonition she wasn’t going to see Blackwalls again. And she was quite right, because once she signed the power of attorney, her nephew had her moved to an upmarket old people’s home and she just lost the will to live. The last time I visited her she didn’t really recognise me.’

I fished a tissue out of the box and blew my nose, while Mr Hobbs looked away tactfully.

‘After he had been up here to see you, your grandfather said, and I quote his very words, “It seems to me the women of the family have always run things behind the scenes here at Winter’s End, so one might as well take over as head of the family and have done with it.” He thought you would make a better job of it than Jack ever would, especially with Lucy to help you. Yes…’ he added thoughtfully, ‘he was particularly taken with your daughter.’

‘He was? But they quarrelled the whole time he was here!’

‘He said she had the typical Winter temperament, allied with an almost masculine sense of business.’

‘Well, I suppose he meant that as a compliment,’ I conceded. ‘She is very bossy and argumentative, though it’s called assertiveness these days, and she did business studies and English at university.’

‘Those would be considerable assets in running the estate. Sir William also said that, although so unlike your mother in character, in appearance Lucy reminded him very much of how Susan had been at the same age.’

‘Yes, she’s tall, slender and has that lovely red-gold hair—nothing like me. I don’t look like a Winter at all. Even Jack, who is only a cousin several times removed, looks more like a Winter than I do!’

‘Oh, there are the occasional darker Winters,’ he assured me. ‘Sir William told me that he was deeply sorry that he had not seen you grow up, but I believe he would have discovered your whereabouts much earlier had your mother not changed her name to all intents and purposes, to—’ he looked down at his papers—‘Sukie Starchild.’

‘I know. Dreadful, isn’t it? She wanted to call me Skye, but I stuck to Sophy. I did have to use the surname Starchild on the few occasions when we stayed somewhere long enough for me to go to school, though, so Grandfather couldn’t find us. She said she was afraid I would be taken away from her, but I often wondered if there was something else making her so paranoid about it.’

‘There was,’ Mr Hobbs said. ‘Sir William did tell Susan that he would cut off her allowance and have her declared an unfit mother if she didn’t change her ways, but those were merely empty threats that he had no intention of carrying out, for he often said things in temper that he afterwards regretted.’

‘But my mother obviously believed he meant them that time?’

‘That is so, but when she left she also took with her a diamond necklace that was not actually hers to dispose of—a family heirloom, in fact. He circulated its description, so he would have been notified if it came up for sale, but when it didn’t he assumed it had been broken up and the stones recut.’

‘I wondered how she bought the van in the first place!’ I exclaimed. ‘And she did have some very dodgy friends when I was very small and we were living in squats in London.’

‘Sir William assumed she would return when the money ran out, so by the time he realised she wasn’t going to, and began to try to trace you both, you had vanished.’

‘She was terrified of him finding her, and I suppose that explains why—but she never could stand anger and loud voices; she was such a gentle person.’

‘He never quite gave up hope that you would both be found, Sophy—and then, of course, he discovered that your mother had died in an accident. You know that her body was repatriated, and is buried in the family plot in the Sticklepond graveyard?’

I nodded. ‘Though I didn’t find out until much later what had happened.’

‘Your grandfather assumed you had been in America with her, so that is where he searched again for you, without result.’

‘No, I was fourteen by then, and I’d had enough of travelling. I didn’t like my mother’s new boyfriend much, either, so I didn’t want to go to California with them. We’d been living in a commune in Scotland and my best friend’s mother offered to look after me if I stayed, so I did until I got a live-in job at the castle, when I was sixteen.’

‘And stayed lost until someone pointed out the unusual name “Sophy Winter” in a magazine advert,’ Mr Hobbs said, ‘when, on making enquiries, Sir William discovered that you were indeed his granddaughter.’

‘Yes, I reverted to my real name after my mother died. I always felt ridiculous as a Starchild—so old hippie. And I didn’t change my name when I married Lucy’s father, I just stayed a Winter. I was only married for five minutes anyway.’

Actually, that was a slight exaggeration: it was five weeks, just long enough for me to fall pregnant and for commitment-phobe Rory to get such cold feet that he went away to find himself. So far as I know, he’s still looking.

‘Yes, that did worry your grandfather a little—but at least you had got married.’

‘Unlike my mother?’

He ignored that, smoothing out the papers in front of him with a dry, wrinkled finger. ‘You have no contact with your former husband?’

‘No, none. He was a cousin of the owner of the castle I was working in, a diver working on the oilrigs—you know, six weeks on, six off. He was ten years older than me, but we fell in love and married in Gretna Green—very romantic—and then settled down in a rented cottage. Then he supposedly went off back to work and instead vanished.’

I had waited and waited for him, sure he would come back, until I finally realised that he’d taken everything he valued with him and never meant to return at all. With hindsight I could see that I had been the one in love with the idea of marriage and domesticity, the family I yearned for, and he had simply gone along with it in a moment of madness, or frustrated lust, or…something.

‘And that is the last you saw of him?’ Mr Hobbs prompted gently. ‘He never contacted you again?’

‘No, though I’m sure his family knew where he was. But they wouldn’t have anything to do with me, of course, because they were horrified when he married the help. I’ve heard that he has been working abroad ever since, and I divorced him eventually. There hasn’t been anyone serious in my life since then. I don’t need anyone really; I’ve usually got a dog.’

‘Quite,’ he said, though looking slightly perplexed. ‘That does, however, simplify matters. I would most earnestly advise you not to consider selling the property at this juncture, and certainly not without visiting it first. Indeed, they are all expecting you to take over the reins as soon as possible.’

‘All?’ I said, startled. ‘How many people are we actually talking about here?’

‘Well, your twin great-aunts—though of course they were provided for under the terms of your great-grandfather’s will. Ottilie leases the coach house, which she converted into a studio with living accommodation soon after your mother left. You do remember her?’

‘Yes, though I saw much less of her than Aunt Hebe. She didn’t come to Winter’s End much when I lived there—isn’t she a sculptor?’

‘Indeed, a very well-known one. She made something of a misalliance in her brother’s eyes when she was in her forties by marrying his last head gardener, though I believe Sir William was more grieved at the thought of losing his right-hand man than at the marriage itself. But as it transpired he did not, since Rufus Greenwood was as passionate about restoring the Winter’s End gardens as he was himself. He stayed on and Ottilie had the old coach house converted so she could divide her time between her husband at Winter’s End and her studio in Cornwall. Still does, though she is now widowed.’

‘So, who else is there? I remember a cook-housekeeper…’

‘Yes, Mrs Lark and her husband, Jonah, are the only live-in staff now. There are three gardeners—four, if you include the head gardener…’ He ruffled the papers a little, seemed about to say something, and then thought better of it. ‘Ye-es. There is a daily cleaner…and Mr Yatton, the estate manager, who like myself is semi-retired, but he comes in most mornings to the office in the solar tower.’

‘Four gardeners and only one cleaner? For a place that size?’ I exclaimed, amazed, because if there is one thing I do know about, it is the upkeep of old houses.

‘At first a cleaning firm was brought in occasionally, but I don’t think that has happened for three or four years now.’

‘A specialist firm? One used to dealing with the contents of historic buildings?’ I asked hopefully.

‘No, a local agency called Dolly Mops. They are very thorough—my wife uses them.’

I winced, thinking of all the damage a well-meaning but untrained cleaner might have inflicted on the fabric and contents of Winter’s End.

‘Then, of course, there are the Friends,’ Mr Hobbs added.

‘The…friends?’

‘The Friends of Winter’s End, a local group of history enthusiasts, who volunteer to come in on the summer opening days to sell tickets, and look after those rooms open to the public—the Great Hall and gallery. The house and gardens are open two afternoons a week, from May to the end of August.’

‘I understand from Jack that the house is in very poor condition and there isn’t enough money to restore it. Is that so?’

‘While it is true that your grandfather diverted most of his income into renovating the gardens, he did not touch the capital, which is securely invested—though of course, no investments bring the returns they used to, and an old house like Winter’s End needs a considerable amount of keeping up. And unfortunately, he took out a bank loan when he started to restore the maze and the terraces, secured against the property, which is a drain on the estate.’

‘Jack mentioned that. How big a bank loan?’ I asked hesitantly. I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know.

‘I believe there is still twenty thousand pounds outstanding.’

‘Good heavens!’

‘Yes, indeed—it is all quite a responsibility.’

The ‘r’ word again—and although I had pretty well run Blackwalls for Lady Betty, having the ultimate responsibility for my own stately pile was still a scary prospect. On the other hand, the thought of having a whole neglected house to put right sort of appealed…OK, I admit it, it drew me like a magnet, especially if this time the house I would be working in would actually be mine!

But I now had two rather differing views of my inheritance to compare—three, if you counted the letter from my grandfather that Mr Hobbs now handed to me, though actually it was more of a brief note scrawled in thin, spidery writing, urging me to complete the garden restoration project—his ‘Memorial to Posterity’ as he put it. It was abundantly clear that I needed to see Winter’s End for myself before deciding what to do, and the sooner the better: I would be upping sticks and decamping to rural west Lancashire as soon as I could get my act together.

Besides, I was beginning to feel a strong, almost fearful tug of attraction, as though some connecting umbilical cord stretched almost to invisibility had suddenly twitched, reminding me of its existence.

Mr Hobbs must have drawn his own conclusions from the expression on my face, for he seemed to relax and, with a satisfied smile, said, ‘So, I may inform the family that you will be arriving shortly?’ He looked around at the cluttered caravan. ‘It would seem you do not have a home or employment to keep you here.’

‘Very true,’ I agreed. ‘No, there is nothing to keep me here—so I’ll go to Winter’s End and then make my own mind up what will be the best thing to do.’

‘Spoken like a Winter,’ he said approvingly.

‘Yes, but Jack might not be pleased about it,’ I said, suddenly remembering my handsome cousin’s existence (be still my beating heart!). ‘He told me that he’d decided, before he met me, that if I wouldn’t sell Winter’s End back to him he would challenge the will. If he has a strong case, is there really any point in my going to Winter’s End?’

‘Oh, that’s an empty threat, my dear,’ Mr Hobbs assured me. ‘Your grandfather was perfectly compos mentis when he made the will: only look at the way he left instructions for everything to be settled before you were informed of your inheritance, so you could step right in and pick up the reins. I am sure Jack has already taken legal advice and been told the same thing.’

He stood up and began to gather his papers back into his briefcase, declining my offer of more tea and rock cakes with every sign of polite revulsion. There’s no accounting for tastes.