Copyright

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers 2012

Copyright © Freya North 2012

Freya North asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Source ISBN: 9780007326709

Ebook Edition © June 2012 ISBN: 9780007326723

Version: 2017-11-28

FIRST EDITION

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

For Daddy

… to misquote Bobby – thank you for holding steady my ladder to the stars, for teaching me how to be righteous and true, for helping me to stand upright, to feel strong and to be courageous.

Thanks to you, my heart’s joyful – and it’s your song I’ll always sing.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue: March 1790

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Acclaim for Freya

Also by Freya North

Spend some time with Freya

About the Publisher

Prologue
March 1790

Lord Frederick Makepeace William Fortescue, Earl of Barbary, ran his hands over the undulations of Molly’s naked body, admiring the sight and relishing in the silky feel of her much as he did his favourite horse, Jepson. It gave him enormous pleasure, not in a carnal way, but for the sense of ownership. He loved to gaze, to feel, to assess what he had before he rode – either horse or woman – the delicious anticipation of how the external beauty brought with it the promise of such sublime physical rewards. He bucked into Molly hard, much as Jepson bucked after jumping a stile. Excited, he rode her energetically to the finish.

‘My dear,’ he said, ‘though I would spend all afternoon with you, Lady Fortescue is shortly to return from Bath – and it would not do for your mistress to find you in my bed.’ He slapped Molly’s bottom and resisted the temptation to call it a fine rump. ‘Out,’ he laughed, letting his hand linger and wander, before he gave her another hearty wallop which made her giggle lasciviously and climb aboard again. ‘Off!’ he said. ‘Away!’

Molly gave him a reproachful look that was as beguiling as it was coy. ‘As you ask, My Lord,’ she said, emphasizing the ‘Lord’ in such a way that it warranted a further slap on her buttocks. He watched her dress. She was turned away from him – not from any shyness, but actually because after the act itself she no longer wanted to see his corpulent body sprawled inelegantly wasted. She felt that fornication, especially of the illicit type, was rather like gorging oneself when starving hungry. Once sated, the very sight of leftovers was repellent. Lord Fortescue didn’t know this, of course. He thought it was a charming reversion of Molly from strumpet to servant; from a writhing, panting horny filly – unbridled, dirty and insatiable – to humble and reverent and back in her place. He wasn’t aware how the extra coins he gave her provided her with both the last laugh and her growing independence and emancipation.

‘I shall call for you,’ he said in a low growl.

‘I shall come,’ she said, all meek, just the way she knew he liked.

‘Molly Molly Molly,’ he marvelled. She gave a demure little curtsey. ‘A little something for your – exertion, a reward for your excellent fulfilment of all tasks set.’ He nodded at the occasional chair, draped with hastily strewn clothing. ‘Pocket,’ he said softly. She slipped her hand into the pocket of his breeches as if unsure what she might find and feigned surprise and delight at the lace handkerchief knotted on its bundle of coins.

‘Why, thank you, Lord Fortescue,’ she said, as if payment was an unexpected bonus.

He winked. ‘Be off now. I will ring down in a while and ask Mrs Fulford to send someone up to make the room afresh.’

‘– because you had one of your funny turns –’

‘That’s my girl,’ said Lord Fortescue. ‘Away with you now. Shoo!’

Molly paused by the door. He was a good master. Her working conditions and remuneration were above par compared with other maids she knew. And, actually, the extras he sought and paid for honourably didn’t offend her. He was rather good at it. And preferable to the fat fingers and clumsy cock of Lord Aldbury who’d had her before her move to the Fortescue household.

‘Lord Fortescue, sir,’ she said. She turned. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, his stomach like a plump pink pillow partially concealing the instrument of his adultery. ‘It’s just –’

He waited. ‘Just what?’

‘Something I heard,’ she said.

He raised an eyebrow for her to continue.

‘Probably just tittle-tattle. But my sister – she lives in Long Dansbury. And there’s all sorts of rumours in the village – so she says – about that new house you are building.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘Yes,’ said Molly. ‘And there’s rumours, too, here in Knightsbridge – amongst the staff. About positions to be lost, or country pay being lower than London. And country ways, sir – being, well, unsavoury.’

Whoever gossips to you, gossips about you, Lord Fortescue mused as he looked at Molly. ‘Bugger Knightsbridge,’ he said, ‘but I am interested in what the villagers are saying out there. From a philanthropic point of view, of course.’

Molly shrugged. ‘Just about the house you’re building.’

‘The house?’

‘The style – some say it’s too modern. Too big. Ugly, even. Others say that you’ll be chopping down all the forests to feed the fires just to heat the place.’

‘I see.’

‘And that the barley fields will be turned fallow. And that you’ll do cattle not sheep. And that the villagers won’t get the jobs – us London staff will. But us London staff won’t want to go all the way out there if we’re not on Knightsbridge wages.’

Lord Fortescue was enjoying all this. And he could see Molly wasn’t done.

‘And there’s more.’ She reddened yet glanced at him lasciviously. ‘They say none of the men will let their wives or daughters work for you – on account of your appetite.’ She licked her lips, as if he’d whetted hers.

‘Away with you, Molly,’ Lord Fortescue laughed. And when she was gone, he rubbed his hands and his cock and his belly gleefully. ‘Idiots! All of them! Hertfordshire is the new Knightsbridge – and those who choose not to come with me are fools. Longbridge Hall will put the village of Long Dansbury on the map – geographically and architecturally. I fully intend to touch the lives of the villagers in ways they’ll never forget!’

Chapter One

Stella knew there was a private car park at Elmfield Estates, and that a space would have been reserved for her little Fiat, but she pulled into a side street some way off and stopped the car. Adrenalin ate away at her, like lemon juice on teeth enamel; the same fresh but sour sensation, excitement and dread churning into an audible curdle in her stomach. She needed to compose herself and turned the ignition back on so she could have the radio on low, providing a comforting soft din to an otherwise loaded silence broken only by the rumble of her stomach. She hadn’t eaten a thing at breakfast – usually her favourite meal of the day. This was so much more than first-day nerves. This job could be life changing. She’d done the figures and, with potential commission, they’d all added up. She checked her reflection – an early-morning hair wash and a brand-new mascara certainly made her look fresher than she felt, she thought to herself, as if judging the face of someone else. She knew she looked younger than she was, but no one else would know that she appeared brighter than she felt. If she could fool herself, hopefully she’d fool the office of new colleagues awaiting her arrival just around the corner. She ought to waltz on in and simply say, hullo! Stella Hutton! Reporting for duty! How lovely to meet you all! Right, where do I begin! After all, if ever there was a new beginning, a golden opportunity, a lifeline, then taking on this job was it.

The first day of March, the first day of the week; the sky startlingly naked of clouds; the sun a slightly harsh white light and rather unnerving, like bare legs revealed for the first time after hibernating behind opaque tights all winter. Stella thought it must be a good omen – sunshine to signify the change from one month to another, not least because February had been alternately drenched and then frozen. A positive nod from the universe, perhaps, to say, it’s a fresh start, Stella. Here’s some brightness and warmth to prove it. Winter’s receding, put spring in your step. Especially today. Of all days, especially today.

She shifted in her seat, flipped the sun visor back up, switched the radio off and the engine on, crunching the car into gear. My back aches, she thought. And then she wondered what on earth was being said behind it by the office personnel a few streets away.

I’d certainly have something to say about it, Stella thought, if I’d been told a person like me was starting today.

‘Apparently, she has very little experience.’

‘How can you go from being an art teacher to an estate agent?’

‘Chalk and cheese, if you ask me.’

‘No no – I don’t think she was an art teacher – I heard she owned a gallery and it went bust.’

‘How do you go from paintings to property?’

‘Well, it’s all sales, isn’t it.’

‘She did work experience here – during the summers when she was at college.’

‘Well – obviously that’s how she got this job. Her father is brother to Hutton Senior – apparently they don’t speak. Black sheep. Apparently she’s estranged from her father but really close with our Huttons.’

‘Dear God, You Three – you’ve never met the woman!’ Geoff looked up at Belinda, Gill and Steve, to whom he always referred as You Three. Every day that triumvirate of three interchangeable voices gossiped the air into an oppressive cloy around him. Mostly, he was able to filter it out, like dust in his peripheral vision. But not today. Today the talk wasn’t about Z-list celebrities or people he didn’t know, it concerned someone about to walk in through the office door any moment. New blood in the company. It made him more nervous than curious. There’d always been only four agents working here in the Hertford branch of Elmfield Estates, excluding the chairman Douglas Hutton Senior who came into the office infrequently, and Douglas Hutton Junior his son and managing director whose door was mostly closed though he heard everything. With this new person it meant five. And as he was the eldest and his sales were down, he wondered if it was true that she was being brought in to edge him out. New blood. New bloody person.

Belinda, Gill and Steve’s eyes were glued to the door, not so much a welcoming committee, but a panel of judges. This was the most exciting thing to happen at work since Douglas Hutton Junior sold Ribstock Place for over the asking price last spring. A year, therefore, of dullness and drudgery, with little selling, little coming on, prices falling and commission being squeezed lower than ever. How could Elmfield Estates afford to take on an extra staff member? What was she on, salary-wise? Commission only, Belinda reckoned. What of her bonus structure? They’d had a meeting at the beginning of the year to change from pooled to individual bonuses.

She’d better bloody well be given only the one-bedders then, this new girl, said Gill. Steve thought to himself he should have taken that position at arch rivals John Denby & Co. when it was offered to him last Christmas. But it would have only been a sideways move. He was on the up, he could feel it in his bones, he could sense it every morning when he tied his tie, when he’d decided to upgrade from polyester to silk. This Hutton niece – nothing but a blip, little more than something new to talk about. Not worth stressing over.

When she arrived, none of them thought that Stella was Stella. She looked nothing like Messrs Hutton, Senior or Junior. She had small features, a gentle waft of chestnut hair and a willing if shy smile, compared to the expressionless hard edges, the bristles which stuck both to the heads and faces of her relations, like coir matting. She was older than they’d expected – perhaps mid-thirties – but nevertheless, still younger than Belinda, Gill or Geoff were happy about. A pleasant surprise for Steve, though. Quite attractive.

‘Can I help you?’

‘I’m Stella – Hutton.’

She was stared at.

‘I’m the new girl.’

Belinda didn’t take her eyes off her when she lifted the phone handset, tapped in four numbers and said, pointedly, ‘Your niece is here to see you.’

Oh God, please don’t let Uncle Dougie kiss me.

Douglas Hutton had no intention of doing anything of the sort.

‘Welcome, Stella,’ he said with a gravity that was appropriate for any new agent starting with the company. ‘This is the team – Belinda, Gill, Geoff, Steve. This is your desk. You’ll be with Gill this morning – she has three viewings. Geoff will come with you this afternoon. There’s a one-bedder on Bullocks Lane.’

He went to the whiteboard and added Stella’s name to the horizontal and vertical bands of the chart. A glance told her all she needed to know about the team. Steve storming ahead, Geoff lagging behind. Belinda and Gill side by side, neck and neck, tête-à-tête – thick as thieves, apparently.

‘I like your bag,’ Stella said to Gill as they headed out to one of two dinky Minis branded with the agency logo. Gill looked at her, unconvinced. Stella was about to hone in on the woman’s shoes for added praise but she stopped herself. Crazy – it’s like being at school again – agonizing trepidation concerning The Older Girls. She decided not to talk, just to nod and smile a lot at the vendor, at the client, at Gill. The effort, combined with first-day nerves, was exhausting and she was glad of the silence on the drive back to the office at lunch-time.

‘I like your hairstyle,’ said Gill just before she opened the car door. But the compliment was tempered by a touch of resentment. ‘Wish mine had a curl to it.’ And then she walked on ahead of Stella, as if to say, that’s as much as I can be nice to you for the time being. And don’t tell the others.

Stella warmed to Geoff, with whom she was coupled after lunch, even though initially he was as uncommunicative as Gill had been. His silence bore no hostility, instead an air of resignation seeped out of him like a slow puncture. He looked deflated. He didn’t seem to fit his sharp suit; Stella imagined that faded cords and a soft old shirt with elbow patches were his weekend wear. The Mini stalled, seemingly disappointed to have Geoff behind the wheel. She glanced at him as he waited patiently at the lights, as if he never expected to come across anything other than a red light and that now, after years of life being like this, the predictability was acceptable rather than infuriating. She detected a shyness from him towards her that mirrored how she’d felt that morning, sitting by Gill.

‘Was art your thing?’ he asked, tackling the main roundabout cautiously.

‘Sorry?’

‘That’s what I heard – that art was your thing.’

‘Oh. Yes. Yes, it was – I studied fine art. And then I had a little – place.’

‘A gallery?’

‘That makes it sound so grand. But yes – in as much as there was art on the walls and people came in to see it.’

‘And to buy?’

‘Not often enough.’

‘It went bust,’ said Geoff.

‘Sorry?’

‘That’s what we – what I was told.’

‘I had to close it, yes. I chose to change career.’

‘And that’s why you’re here?’

‘Yes.’

‘You couldn’t sell art but you think you might be able to sell houses?’ He hadn’t meant it to sound rude. He just couldn’t fathom how someone who wanted a career in art could metamorphose into someone wanting to work as an estate agent. ‘There’s an art to selling houses,’ he said, helpfully, ‘or so we like to lead our clients to believe.’

‘In these crap times – financially speaking – I suppose people don’t want to spend money on art. As much as I like to believe that people need art in their lives, there’s no point splashing out on a painting if you haven’t four walls around you and a roof over your head.’

He looked a little nonplussed and Stella cringed at what she’d said – it sounded like a dictum she might churn out in a job interview.

‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘that was almost two years ago. I love art – but I also really like houses. And I know you probably all think it’s family favouritism – but I did two years at the St Albans branch of Tremberton & Co. It’s just I moved from Watford to Hertford last autumn.’

Geoff looked at her quizzically, as if her move from one side of Hertfordshire to the other and the revelation that the gallery hadn’t gone bust yesterday and nepotism played little part in her change of career, moved her up in his estimation.

‘I have a John Piper etching,’ he told her with an almost-smile.

They had just pulled up outside the Victorian conversion, where the one-bedder was on the second floor.

‘A Piper?’

But Geoff pressed the doorbell before Stella could coax a reply.

Forty minutes later, Geoff really couldn’t fault her – they had a new vendor on their books, her valuation had been spot on. The client had liked her and Geoff had liked Stella’s manner – chatty, enthusiastic, supportive. He sensed if she took a potential purchaser around, they’d be lining up a second viewing just as soon as they’d seen the place. He had to concede that she’d probably sell a place like this faster than he could.

‘Nicely done,’ he said when they headed back to the car.

‘Thank you.’

‘We’d heard all sorts of things about you,’ he said, as if disbelieving that reality could be so very different. She looked aghast. ‘I doubt whether there was much truth in any of them,’ he told her. ‘Ignore them – Those Three, back in the office – they’re harmless.’ He paused. ‘Relatively.’

The trouble with rumours, thought Stella, is that once the seed is planted, roots spread and the whole thing rampages like ground elder. As fast as you pull it up, renegade shoots are already off on tangents.

But then she thought, it’s impossible for something to grow from nothing. However tiny, there’s always a seed of truth that starts it all off.

A bit like Love really.

Chapter Two

Jesus, do I not feel like doing this.

Xander reached over to whack down the alarm clock as if it was a bluebottle that had been bugging him for hours. Lying next to him, Siobhan mumbled in her reverie. He looked at her, naked and so very tempting. Outside, grey and raining. Inside, warm and cosy. Inside Siobhan, downright hot and snug. He lay back on his side of the bed, his hand lolling over his morning erection, trying to persuade himself that he had a true dilemma on his hands. But the truth was, Siobhan wasn’t really the distraction and he wasn’t really all that horny – he just craved any excuse not to go. He didn’t want to do ten miles. Not today. Not in the rain. But it wasn’t a choice; there really was no decision to make. He had to do it. And that was that. Half-marathon at the end of the month, all the won-derful people in his life effervescing on his justgiving.com page, pledging money for his chosen good cause. He dressed, steeled himself and headed out into the rain. More fool him for having believed in all that mad March sunshine yesterday. iPod on, he headed out of his house, past the other estate cottages in his terrace, and headed up Tramfield Lane at a sprint as if to prove wrong the Xander who’d woken thinking he didn’t want to run today.

Within two miles he felt good. Really good. He headed his loop up Bridgeback Hill and through Dansworth Forest, pushing on hard until the gradient levelled out and he was looking down on the Georgian beauty of Longbridge Hall; the arable fields, noble woods, rolling parkland and manicured gardens of the Fortescue estate. The rain had stopped and sudden sunlight elicited caramel tones from the mansion’s brickwork, glints of silver from the expansive slate roof; the high floating hornbeam hedge sparkled like a soft chuckle and the gravel driveway, from this angle, was like a swooping butter-coloured smile. Xander thought, it’s been a while since I saw Lady Lydia. His instinct was still to refer to her thus if he hadn’t seen her recently – though he’d been invited to call her Lydia once he’d graduated from university almost two decades ago.

I must drop her a line. It’s been over a month.

He ran on and laughed out loud – remembering a conversation so clearly she could very well be running alongside him just then.

‘Have you heard of eel mails, Xander?’

‘Email?’

‘What a ghastly notion. Lady Ranchester told me she is now called dorothy at ranchester dot com. All lower case. How preposterous! Dot Common – that’s what she is now.’

‘Handwritten letters are now known as snail mail, Lydia.'

‘Nonsense. If one can write – it’s downright wrong not to.’

Ten miles in sixty-eight minutes. Not bad. Not bad.

‘Xan?’

He wished Siobhan wouldn’t call him that. Laura used to call him Xan. And that experience had shown him how familiarity bred contempt. Also, with his mind now alert and his body charged by endorphins, he just wanted to shower, have a quick, quiet coffee with his bowl of muesli and be gone. Siobhan didn’t need to be here – not in his bed, not on the scene. He had to do something about it, he really did. Just not now.

‘Xan?’ she called out.

God!

‘I need a shower!’ he called back.

‘I need to go.’

Thank God!

‘OK.’

‘Call me.’

‘OK.’

Xander always marvelled at the transformation. All it took for his Lazy Git alter ego (the duvet-muffled bloke who’d had too much red wine the night before) to morph into Xander Fletcher with all traces of sleep, sex, stubble and sweat erased, bright and eager to greet the day, was a ten-mile run in under an hour and ten minutes. Dressed neatly in dark trousers and a pale shirt, driving sensibly through his beloved village of Long Dansbury to his office in Hertford twenty-five minutes away, he thought of the process as a sort of protracted Superman turnaround. Well, if not a super man, a good bloke at any rate. Heading for forty in a couple of years, Xander had no complaints at all. He lived in a lovely cottage, he had an OK bank balance and his own business keeping its head above water, a close family, great friends and a woman called Siobhan who didn’t mind things being casual. Doing those ten miles in sixty-three minutes would ice an already tasty cake. He thought about it as he headed out for his car. It was doable. Xander had been brought up to believe anything was doable. Apart from Love, which was beyond one’s control. Accordingly, he’d decided not to entertain it in his life, not since Laura.

He drove through a landscape which rolled and tumbled like a soft green rucked-up quilt. Born and bred here, Xander had never fallen out of love with his environs and never stopped noticing its beauty or the changes, for better or worse. That’s why, after interludes in Nottingham and London, he’d returned home at thirty.

His route took him through a handful of small villages, a few still with a shop clinging on for dear life to the local economy like a limpet to a storm-lashed rock. Most supported a pub and all of the villages heralded their approach with a profusion of daffodils along the verges in spring. Beyond each community, pastureland subtly cordoned off by barely visible electric fencing supported little gatherings of horses in weatherproof rugs, looking like the equine relatives of the Michelin Man. Woodland interrupted the swathes of fields like a patchy beard and the rivers Rib, Ash and Beane coursed through the landscape as if on a mission to deliver goodness straight to the Lea, the main artery of the area.

‘Good morning, Xander.’

Pauline Gregg, his PA of eight years, still wished he’d let her call him Mr Fletcher or Alexander at the very least. To her, it seemed too casual, unseemly somehow. When she’d been at secretarial school all those decades ago, she’d been trained, along with other girls, in the correct way to address their future employers and their clients. Formality is fitting; that’s what they learned. She felt it somehow downgraded her qualification to call her boss ‘Xander’. Her daughter, who was Xander’s age, told her it was a generational thing. But there again, her daughter had sent her children to a school where the pupils called their teachers by their Christian names. Moreover, the school didn’t classify it thus, but as ‘given names’. There again, that school appeared to be teaching Pauline’s grandchildren more about something called Diwali than Christmas. So many things to button one’s lip against – it was part of Pauline’s day to declare to herself at least once, what’s the world coming to?

‘Morning, Mrs Gregg,’ Xander said. He respected her right to be addressed like this – even though eight years on and being privy to the end of her marriage, the birth of her grandchildren and that Unfortunate Incident at the Roundabout With That Silly Car Which Wasn’t Her Fault, Xander considered Mrs Gregg to be on the outer ring of his family.

‘Seventy-two minutes?’ she ventured. Xander cocked his head and smiled. ‘Seventy?’

‘Sixty-eight,’ he said.

‘Very good, that,’ said Mrs Gregg. ‘Tea?’

‘Please.’ They sipped in amicable silence, each leafing through the documents on their desks. Xander looked up. ‘You’ve had your hair done.’

Mrs Gregg touched it self-consciously but smiled. ‘Yes.’

‘Very nice,’ said Xander. He wished his own mother would wear her hair in a similar style – elegant and in place – instead of the unruly thatch half in, half out of a bun, invariably adorned with debris from the garden. ‘Mrs Gregg, can you take this to the post office? And can you pick up a nice greetings card – blank inside?’

She glanced at him. When Xander had been steady with Laura for all those years, he’d never once asked her to help assist in the running of that relationship. He’d scoot off at lunch-time himself and return with flowers or something bulky in a bag which would sit quietly taunting her from the chair in the corner until he left in the evening. That was another part of her training going to waste – he had no need for her to alert him to Valentine’s Day, or Special Occasions. Yet today he was asking her to buy a card, blank, just like his expression.

‘Blank inside,’ she said, writing it down and, without looking up, she asked, ‘And what should be on the outside?’

‘Oh,’ he said, ‘something soft – floral perhaps. Or a landscape.’

She wrote it down. Floral. Landscape. Unlikely to be a special card for a ‘significant other’ – or however his generation referred to girlfriends these days. She felt strangely relieved and yet somehow disappointed for him too. He’s such a nice young man, she often described to her friends at bridge. It’s a bit of a waste, she’d say. Perhaps he’s not a lady’s man, one of her chums might venture. Oh, he’s not like that, Pauline would say, almost defensively. The contradiction had never confronted her – how she wanted to mother him, be at the helm of his life, yet keep the Decorum of Division she’d been trained to maintain.

‘Anything else?’

‘Treat yourself to a Danish pastry,’ said Xander.

‘Why, thank you!’

With Mrs Gregg gone, Xander leafed through his diary and in-tray. Design, print and packaging wasn’t a sexy business, but it was a solid one and even in the dire economic climate, Xander found his long-term clients remained loyal. He’d cut overheads instead of staff and it had been serendipitous that Keith, the designer, had asked to go part-time just when the office rent had been hiked, so Xander and Mrs Gregg moved to these smaller premises in the same building. Everything remained the same. Apart from the chair that had been in the corner of the old office, on which the flowers or the bag with the bulky object for Laura had once sat.

I don’t need that chair, Mrs Gregg, Xander had said. And that’s when Mrs Gregg realized Xander had broken it off with Laura – right at the point of engagement, she assumed. Though he said they could bring the chair with them, if she felt it might be useful, she’d declined. If he didn’t need it, who was she to suggest he might, at some point, in the future?

‘I bought this card – it has flowers and a landscape and is what I’d call gentle. I have paper napkins with this very design.’

‘Monet,’ said Xander.

‘No, no – it wasn’t pricey.’

‘Monet,’ Xander said again, as if he hadn’t heard her. ‘The Garden at Giverny.’

‘One of my favourites,’ Mrs Gregg said, as if there’d been no faux pas.

‘It’s most appropriate, thank you.’

Xander made a couple of calls and then, with the card open on his desk and his pen thoughtfully pursed between his lips, he gazed out of the window before beginning to write.

‘I’ll take the post,’ Mrs Gregg said at the end of the day.

‘There’s not much,’ said Xander.

‘It’s not a problem.’

‘I can post it on my way home.’

‘Let me,’ said Mrs Gregg. ‘You know those country lanes – if you get stuck behind something, you’ll be trundling along for hours and miss the post altogether. I’ll pop it in the box outside Elmfield Estates – it’s at the end of my street. It’s never collected before six. Never.’

‘OK,’ said Xander. ‘Thanks.’

She was barely out of the office door before she was leafing through the mail. Yes, yes, them, them, boring, boring. Ah! Aha!

Lady Lydia Fortescue

Longbridge Hall

Long Dansbury

Hertfordshire

Xander’s handwriting: even, bold and steady, written with his trademark calligraphy fountain pen. Mrs Gregg tutted at the envelope. Convene with women your own age, Xander, not an upper-class old battleaxe. Cut your ties with minor aristocracy! Venture forth into the real world – the one beyond Long Dansbury.

Chapter Three

Stella didn’t often go out, nor had she had her friends over that much recently. Her social life had dwindled over the last three years but this was her call because the invitations to socialize were no less forthcoming. Her close friends, her oldest friends – those she could count on the fingers of one hand who brought her all the dependable warmth and comfort of a well-fitting thermal glove – were always at the end of the phone, consistently energetic respondees to text messages and Facebook updates. Indirect contact and communication had become so easy that it was hard to remember when time was last spent together actually in person. She didn’t mind; she was always busy and, with the new job, tired too. It wasn’t as if she had much spare time to wonder how to fill it. But two weeks into her new position at Elmfield Estates, Stella had now settled into the routine. It was as if she’d been swamped by paperwork, floor plans and surveyors’ reports and had suddenly looked up and thought, where is everyone? So tonight, butternut squash soup simmered on the stove and a baguette was ready on the breadboard awaiting the arrival of Jo, the closest Stella had to a sister. Tomorrow, she’d invited herself over to her older brother Robbie’s and the day after that, their eldest brother Alistair would be hosting Sunday lunch for her on the condition she brought their mother and dessert. It did cross her mind that in one weekend she could conceivably regain the stone she’d lost over the last two years.

Jo arrived with a packet of tortilla chips, a jar of salsa, a great new haircut and, predictably, the suggestion of a date with some bloke who had a tenuous link to someone who knew someone who knew someone who knew Jo – and Stella had barely closed the front door.

‘Come on in, madwoman.’

‘You do realize I haven’t actually seen you since Pancake Day?’

Stella laughed. ‘Ah yes, when Stevie burnt herself on the pan, Scarlet spilled the sugar all over the floor and you referred to Michael as Tosser all evening?’

‘He was Chief Tosser – in charge of flipping the flipping pancakes,’ Jo justified. ‘And I told my daughters to keep away from the stove and let me do the sugar sprinkling.’

‘How are they all?’

‘Fine. Gorgeous.’ Jo kissed her friend three times: ‘There – their kisses are delivered.’

‘Thank you thank you thank you.’ Stella paused and raised an eyebrow. ‘I do have a bowl, you know. A veritable selection, in fact.’ But Jo had already opened the tortilla chips en route to the kitchen and updated Stella on her various nightmares at work through a mouthful of crumbs.

The salsa was pretty hot, the soup was delicious and butter oozed fragrantly into the warmed baguette but Jo and Stella barely tasted any of it, their hunger for conversation outweighing what was to eat. Stella regaled Jo with the details of Elmfield Estates and it provided ample opportunity for the merry chinking of glasses.

‘Any news from Charlie?’ said Jo. ‘Dare I ask?’

Stella chewed thoughtfully. ‘Not a word. Funny how, before it all happened, you always used to call him Chuck—’

Jo interrupted. ‘And when it was all kicking off, I called him Twatface.’ She paused. ‘I did wonder – even after all this time – with what’s happening now, whether he’d be in touch.’

Stella shrugged. ‘So did I. Yet the fact that he hasn’t, well –’

Jo nodded. ‘The lawyers – it’ll be any day now, I expect.’

‘I know,’ said Stella.

‘You’ll call me – won’t you?’ Jo stretched over the crumbs, the globs of salsa and splashes of soup which now decorated the table like a minor work by Jackson Pollock. She squeezed Stella’s arm. ‘Call it the last piece of the jigsaw – the final nail in the coffin. It’s a good thing.’

‘I’ll drink to that,’ Stella said, raising a glass and sipping so that she didn’t have to talk about it any more.

‘By the way,’ Jo said and, slowly, she let a lascivious smile spread, ‘your hair is looking a bit mumsy.’

‘Well, you look like a wee blonde elf,’ Stella said, in her defence.

‘That, my love, is intentional.’

‘But I wear it like – this – for work,’ Stella demonstrated, scooping it away from her face.

‘That’s highly appropriate for an estate agent,’ Jo said measuredly, ‘but a bit dull for a gorgeous, single, early-thirties gal.’

‘I’m mid-thirties, practically. So what is it you suggest I do?’

‘You phone Colin at Pop, that’s what you do. And tell him I sent you. And don’t tell him what you think you want – just put your head in his hands. Promise?’

‘Yes, Mum.’

‘How is your ma?’

‘I’m seeing her on Sunday, actually. At Alistair’s.’

‘And how’s the Robster?’ Stella’s brothers were as close as Jo came to having any.

‘I’m seeing him tomorrow, funnily enough.’

Jo was pleased. Stella, it seemed, was emerging from her self-imposed hibernation. At long last.

* * *

‘Mummy?’ Will called. ‘Mumma?’

Where was his rucksack? The medium-ish bluish one with the Clone Trooper design? Where had his mum put it? He looked in the usual places where she thought she tidied but really it was just moving his stuff to higher levels, to free up floor space. Well, it wasn’t in any of those places. Nor at the back of the cupboard. Nope, not under his bed either. Where was it? ‘Mummy!’ He really didn’t want to take the greenish, smallish rucksack because that had Ben 10 on and he so wasn’t into Ben 10 any more. ‘Mumm-y!’ He opened his bedroom door and stood at the top of the stairs, placed a cupped hand either side of his mouth and bellowed for her again.

There was a tap on his shoulder and Will jumped out of his skin. How did she do that? That teleporting thing? Suddenly appearing right behind him with precisely what he’d been looking for all along, and that Am-I-or-Am-I-Not-the-Best-Mum-in-the-World look on her face? She was, of course, the Best Mum Ever – and he’d bought her the birthday card with a badge that said so – but she still liked to pull that particular face all the time.

‘Why didn’t you answer me?’ Will said. ‘I was yelling and yelling. I thought you’d been taken by aliens or fallen down the loo or something.’

‘Thank you darling Mummy for my medium-ish bluish rucksack,’ said Stella.

‘Thanks, Mum.’

‘Mummy,’ said Stella.

‘Do I really have to be forty-five before I can just call you Mum?’

‘Absolutely. Now stuff in whatever it is you want to take to Uncle Alistair's and we’d better get going.’

Will went back into his bedroom and his mother went downstairs. ‘Remember the Stickies could choke on any small pieces of Lego,’ she called.

How did she know he was piling Lego into his bag? How did she know that? Will knew she had eyes in the back of her head – he’d known that from an early age. But how could she see through brick walls and closed doors? She said she’d tell him when he was ten – so just two years, six months and about a week of days and a zillion hours to go. He emptied out the Lego bricks and jumbled in some Bionicles pieces instead. His cousins – three-year-old Ruby and five-year-old Finn, commonly known as the Stickies on account of their constant general jamminess – were unlikely to eat Bionicles. Not once he’d explained their super powers and alarming weaponry. Anyway, his little cousins thought he was amazing in much the same way as he thought his older cousins, who he was seeing tomorrow, were incredible. And all his cousins called him Will-yum, sometimes just YumYum. Like he was delicious. And, as his mum told him he was precisely that, at least once a day, he sort of believed it too.

* * *

The Huttons were scattered over Hertfordshire; as if a handful of wild-flower seeds had been tossed from their mother’s front doorstep in Harpenden. Alistair lived with his family in a lovely 1930s semi in a good suburb of Watford just a stroll from Cassiobury Park. Robbie had settled with his tribe in St Albans, Stella had spent almost a decade just around the corner from Alistair and was now in Hertford and Sandie, their mother, still lived in the family home in Harpenden. Their father, Stuart, had a flat in Hemel Hempstead but seemed to spend most of his time with an odd woman called Magda at her bungalow near Potters Bar, though he resurfaced each Christmas and steadfastly made no mention of her. In terms of quality time, it was pretty much on a par with how much his offspring had spent with him when he’d been married to their mother. Whenever they referred to him, it was accompanied by a roll of the eyes and a quick tut – as if mention of him caused a minor tic. But it was indeed minor, Stuart having never played a major part in their lives.

The following day, Will could hardly wait for his grandma to get in the car and do her seat belt before he told her about Ruby putting the Bionicle piece up her nose yesterday, and sucking the bogeys off it before giving it an almighty chewing and denting it with her small teeth. He had to keep making the incident sound like an extraordinary happening where he’d somehow been both victim and hero, to deflect attention from the fact that everyone had said to him, Don’t Let Ruby Put Anything in Her Mouth. The grown-ups had given him responsibility. And though he’d failed, his expressive storytelling made it sound as though he’d saved Ruby and the Bionicle and he was fine about the fact that his toy was riddled with teeth marks.

His grandma was riveted. ‘Can you imagine if Ruby had swallowed it?’ She craned her neck to look aghast at Will in the back seat. ‘There’d be some poor Bionicle chap missing a vital part of his anatomy. Then how would the battles be won?’

‘Exactly,’ marvelled Will.

‘Exactly,’ Sandie concurred.

‘Mum!’ Stella protested.

‘Grandma, how old was Mummy before she could call you Mum?’

‘Twenty-eight and three-quarters,’ Sandie said, not missing a beat.

‘I have to be forty-five.’

‘That’s not very fair,’ said Sandie.

‘Twenty-seven, then,’ said Stella, glancing in the rear-view mirror at her son and giving him a wink.

‘Cool,’ said Will, looking out the car window.

Will assumed that, because of the family thing, he was genetically programmed to grow up and turn out like the Twins, teenagers Pauly and Tom, in much the same way as the Stickies would grow up to be just like him. And they’d all, one day in about a million years, turn into grown-ups like Alistair and Robbie. Apart, of course, from Sticky Ruby who’d turn out like her mum and Will’s mum and the Twins’ mum.

Much as Will felt his mother was the best, he secretly acknowledged that Aunty Juliet was the better cook, possibly the best cook in the world and, as he took his place between the Twins at the laden table he happily blocked out the boring chatter of the grown-ups, and the revolting mess of the Stickies sitting opposite him, to focus wholeheartedly on the spectacular offerings on his plate.

Stella sat by Juliet, whom she adored. Her brothers flanked their mother and Sara, Robbie’s wife, sat between her toddlers and managed in her inimitably competent way to feed herself and her children, yet be utterly present in the conversation. Stella looked around the table. It was like sitting in the best seats at the theatre waiting for the play to begin. With a surge of joy she thought this was to be her afternoon. It would linger into early evening and she was happy. She’d leave, hours later, replete in body and soul. Thank God for family. Thank God for hers. The decibel level was high yet not discordant and topics bounded between them all like the ball in a bagatelle. The tangents they veered off to, all part of the colourful ricochet of joyful banter.

‘It just goes back to what Gordon Brown said – but didn’t do,’ said Alistair.

‘That goes without saying,’ said Sandie, about something else entirely.

Sara chewed thoughtfully, picking up on an earlier thread. ‘I love the idea of supporting local businesses, shopping at the corner shop, buying books from a little independent bookshop. But when there’s Amazon and Ocado, and special offers which I can order online at silly o’clock, then it’s no contest.’

‘It was the debilitating flaw in New Labour,’ said Robbie to Alistair.

‘I think you’re probably right,’ said Sandie to any of them.

‘I have to agree,’ Juliet said, a little forlornly. She looked thoughtfully at a roast potato. ‘I bought these spuds from the farmers’ market. Ridiculously expensive, weighed a ton. I’m not entirely sure they taste any different from Waitrose. Oh, and Stella – I think I’ve found you a man.’

‘Whatsit’s brother?’ Alistair asked.

‘Miliband?’ said Robbie.

‘No – who Juliet’s talking about. For Stella.’

‘Oh! I forgot about him,’ said Juliet. ‘Two men, then,’ she told the table.

‘I have one for you too,’ said Sara.

‘Three,’ Robbie whistled.

‘Who’s who?’ asked Sandie.

‘The chap that takes Sing-a-Song,’ said Sara. ‘The Stickies love him. He’s so – smiley.’ She paused. ‘And he only wears the spotty trousers and silly hat when he’s working. I saw him strolling through the Maltings last week. Almost didn’t recognize him – really nice and normal. We had a little chat and I managed to deduce he’s not attached, not gay and likes dogs.’

‘I don’t have a dog,’ said Stella.

‘I know,’ said Sara, ‘but it’s a type, isn’t it – if he likes dogs he must have that caring side to his nature. Plus, of course, he’s great with kids.’

‘No, thanks,’ said Stella.

‘Talking of great with kids,’ Juliet said, ‘option number one is the brother of my friend Mel. He’s older—’

‘How old?’ Robbie interjected.

‘Fifty-odd,’ said Juliet.

‘I don’t like the “odd”,’ said Sandie.

‘I don’t like the fifty,’ said Robbie.

‘All right,’ said Juliet, ‘option number two is late thirties, never been married, split up with his girlfriend over a year ago. Has his own hair, his own teeth. He’s handsome, chatty, caring and he lives in Hadley Wood, apparently.’

‘He sounds promising,’ said Sara.

‘No, thanks,’ said Stella.

‘Hadley Wood is no longer a purely middle-aged enclave,’ said Alistair. ‘You should know that, Stella – from the property market.’

‘No, thanks,’ said Stella.

‘Who is he?’ asked Robbie.

‘My gynae,’ said Juliet.

‘No, thanks,’ said Stella.

‘Stella,’ Juliet said, ‘don’t be put off by his day job.’

‘The last thing I want to do after a day at the computer screen is to come home and log on,’ said Robbie darkly.

‘Don’t be awkward,’ said Sandie.

‘It’s not his job,’ said Stella.

‘What’s his name?’ asked Sara.

‘Bryanaston.’

‘What sort of a name is Bryanaston?’ asked Sandie.

‘That’s his surname,’ said Juliet. ‘His first name is Henry.’

‘No, thanks,’ said Stella.

They looked at her with For Heaven’s Sake, Why Not? written across their faces.

She shrugged.

‘Not ready?’ Juliet said softly.

‘Not interested,’ said Stella. ‘I’m fine as I am.’

‘For the time being?’ Sandie asked her daughter, a gentle pleading edging her question like garnish.

‘For the time being,’ Stella said. ‘Did any of you watch that new serial on the Beeb on Friday?’

‘About Rembrandt?’

‘With Kevin Branagh?’ said Sandie.

‘Kenneth,’ said everyone else.

‘Yes,’ said Stella.

‘We did.’

‘Us too.’

‘Wasn’t it brilliant?’

‘You and your Rembrandt,’ Sandie said. ‘She wrote her thesis on Rembrandt, you know. She got a first.’

They all knew that, and they all knew Sandie should be allowed to proclaim the fact as often as she liked.

* * *

Stella found Alistair, later on, out in the garage with all the children – including the teenage Twins – looking on in awe as he set his Hornby model railway into action. She watched alongside them for a while, transfixed by the little trees she’d made for him when she was a kid, remembering again the smell of the particular green paint she’d dipped the tiny torn pieces of sponge into. Remembering how they’d dried them on an old cake rack before painstakingly securing them onto matchstick trunks – her first use of Super Glue, her eldest brother coaching her, encouraging her, trusting her.

‘Alistair?’ Reluctantly, he looked up from controlling the points. ‘Here.’ She passed him a brown envelope.

‘What’s this?’

‘My rent, silly,’ she said.

‘Oh.’ He looked at the envelope as if he dreaded the contents.

‘This month and last.’

‘Stella – it’s fine, you know. Juliet and I both say – it’s fine.’

Stella shook her head decisively. ‘No way. It’s your house – and you have done me the most almighty favour in letting me live there for this amount. I know what the true rental value is, you know. My new job, Alistair – it’s a lifesaver. I can make ends meet – with commission, I might even be able to tie them in a bow.’

He continued to look at the envelope. ‘Charlie?’ he asked, very quietly, glancing at Will who was engrossed in Sir Nigel Gresley belting along the tiny track trying to catch up with the Flying Scotsman.

Stella shook her head.

‘No news?’

She shook her head again.

Alistair said Bastard under his breath, not so much for Stella’s sake, but for his own.

‘Please,’ he held the envelope out to her.

‘No, thanks,’ she said. She pushed her hands defiantly into her pockets, and she placed her head gently against her brother’s shoulder. She looked forward to the day when those close to her were no longer irked by Charlie.

Chapter Four

3 Lime Grove Cottages

Tramfield Lane

Long Dansbury

Herts

Monday

Dear Lydia

I hope this finds you in good health and high spirits. I took in the view of Longbridge Hall on my early morning run – the rain had lifted, a soft mist rolled quietly just above ground level, a glint of sunshine, a hint of spring – it really was a wonderful sight. Did you know there’s an extremely nice new Belgian patisserie recently opened in Ware? How about I treat you – or perhaps a bite of lunch at Hanbury Manor? Or just a stroll around Hatfield House? Audrey and Bert send their best – and I send my fondest.

Xander

Lady Lydia Fortescue read the letter twice. First with a smile, then with her customary wry consternation. A Belgian patisserie? In Ware? Was the boy forgetting Longbridge’s own Mrs Biggins whose scones and Victoria sponge and shortbread were legendary? Why buy foreign, dear God? And lunch at Hanbury Manor – preposterous! Rumour had it that New Money went there, and frightful Hen Party girls lolled around the place at weekends. Apparently, the hotel now had one of those gym places where men and women wore ridiculous get-ups and sweated and grunted alongside each other like toiling workhorses. A walk at Hatfield? During public opening hours? Paying for the privilege when she’d often been there as a guest of the Salisburys? And he’d written ‘Audrey and Bert’ – as if, had he just said ‘my parents’, she might be prone to have forgotten who they were.

Lydia laughed – a little staccato rush of air through her nostrils. Dear Xander. She would love to see the boy. How long had it been? A month? Six weeks? Atrocious! She walked from the drawing room through the staircase hall and across the entrance hallway over to the library. At the writing bureau, she sat and rummaged through the chaotic upper drawer for one of her heavy, watermarked, monogrammed cards.

Longbridge Hall

Long Dansbury

Hertfordshire

Wednesday

My dear Xander,

A treat to hear from you. Delighted to have provided an aesthetic backdrop to your athletic endeavours. I must decline the foreign bakery, and the public liability of Hanbury or Hatfield. But do come to tea at Longbridge, dear. Shall we say Saturday next – at half past three?

Yours,

Lydia F

Rifling through another drawer, becoming a little sidetracked by a clutch of old thank-you cards sent to her after some dinner party or other an age ago, Lydia found a sheet of second-class stamps. And then she came across the estimate for the roof repairs which she’d hidden on purpose months ago. She glanced at the columns of figures – the grand total – and cast her eyes to the heavens. Only, the ceiling was in the way and, taunting her, the yellow watermark ominously circumnavigating the cracked plaster of the ceiling rose. She buried the paperwork in an ancient copy of Country Life and set off for the postbox outside the village shop.

As Lydia walked back, she chided herself for not taking the car because she was undeniably tired. And silly – it wasn’t as if anyone would judge her, not at her age, not that she was remotely concerned with what anyone thought anyway. The driveway seemed to be so long these days and when did it develop this incline? Underfoot felt hard, uneven, despite her wearing her most comfortable slip-ons. She laughed – recalling a time when she refused to even glance at comfortable shoes, let alone buy them and wear them out in public.

Finally, she was home. And then she realized she’d forgotten her keys. No use knocking, it was Mrs Biggins’ day off. She went to the side of the house knowing the back door was unlocked because it was so tricky to lock that they’d given up years ago and just used the bolts, but she doubted it was bolted because Mrs Biggins wasn’t tall enough to shunt the topmost one across, and both she and her housekeeper were now old enough to eschew using anything one had to climb upon in order to reach something.

There were seven stone steps leading down to the door and, through the frosted glass pane, Lydia could see the comforting welcome of the lights she’d accidentally left on in the house. Down one step, two – it was really quite chilly. Three, four, five. Finally! Six and –

She fell. She wasn’t sure why. It didn’t matter why. But her shoulder bore the brunt and she took a knock to the side of her face too. It hurt, of course it hurt. But more significant than the pain was the shock. She felt frightened and that appalled her.

Mrs Biggins, damn you and your day off! Lydia stayed still for a few minutes. Was anything broken? She’d fractured various bones in hunting accidents over the years – no, she didn’t think so. Still, she felt most unsure about picking herself up. Her cheekbone was throbbing and her fingers were numb.

Hullo? Is anyone home? What a stupid question – why would there be? Mrs Biggins was probably in Bishop’s Stortford with her daughter. Mercifully, the door was indeed unlocked and Lydia finally made her way shakily inside. She checked her reflection and noted a red mark on the apple of her cheek, growing darker. Frozen peas, she thought, going into the kitchen. And then the lights flickered. Oh dear God, no. Just wait until I have the wretched peas, would you! Flickered again. And then off.

Once again, something somewhere had fused. Even without the fall, Lydia wouldn’t go feeling and fumbling her way to the panel down in the basement. More uneven stone steps. And an ancient and hostile fuseboard in what really was a dank dungeon. Silly old cheek – it was horribly sore. Lydia clasped her way along the kitchen wall to the dresser and located a box of matches after various things fell to the floor, one of which made the undeniable sound of something thick spilling. Lighting match after match, she managed to illuminate the safest passage to the cupboard under the sink where she knew there’d be a torch. Whether or not it had a battery in it would be another matter. Luckily, it did and its soft orange beam directed her to the freezer where she retrieved the peas and placed them in a tea towel against her cheek. Really, she should phone someone – Art or Clarence. But she didn’t want to. She really didn’t. Instead, she sat in the dark in the drawing room for a while, trying to read Country Life by the waning light of the torch until she told herself she wanted an early night anyway and didn’t care for whatever it was that Mrs Biggins would have left her for her supper all the way back in the kitchen.

Chapter Five

The longest thing about Long Dansbury village was the high street, with all other streets branching off it in short runs like the veins on a horse chestnut leaf. The high street itself, whilst not a cut-through to anywhere from anywhere, was still relatively busy in terms of traffic because along its length lay the church, the primary school, two good pubs, a Spar general store which also sold newspapers and stamps, and Michael Lazarus’s ironmongery – which was more of a museum than a shop, if the number of people who ventured into the Dickensian interior simply to look rather than to buy, was anything to go by. The houses along the high street were defined as being either at Top End or else at Back End, though in fact from the centre, which was marked by the gates and long, snaking driveway to Longbridge Hall, the high street sloped upwards to either end. But Top End had always been known as such because here the finer, larger houses sat spruce and proud, like dapper Georgian gentlemen keeping an eye on things. In comparison, like a scatter of peasant children, were the cottages which defined the Back End; some standing on their own like shy sheep, some in a chatter of four or five in short terraces. What made the high street so pretty was that all the buildings, whatever their size, had frontage. Even in winter, flowers and well-tended shrubs proudly sang forth.

Beyond the cottages, a thatch of woodland bristled to either side of the road, after which the new houses stood in an embarrassed huddle. These were, in fact, pre-war and far more sensible family homes than the old cramped cottages. But they would always be known as the New Houses in a gently dismissive way. Even the people who lived there gave their address with a slightly resigned tone.

Pride of place, not just in the village but in the wider locale itself, was Longbridge Hall, seat of the Fortescue family, the Earls of Barbary, for eight generations. It was as if Longbridge Hall had sat down so firmly, so emphatically, directly at the centre of the village, that the road to either side had been pushed upwards; rather like a portly old uncle settling himself right in the middle of a sagging sofa. The house itself was not actually visible from the high street; set some way back, its presence was nonetheless felt – the wrought-iron gates with handsome stone supports and the parade of lime trees lining the imposing driveway and heralding something undeniably grand beyond.

When Stella arrived on the Saturday morning, to meet Mrs Benton at number four Tidy Row Cottages, she couldn’t believe that, as a Hertfordshire girl, she’d never once been to Long Dansbury. Parking her car, as she’d been instructed, in the gravel rectangle opposite the Spar, she was glad to be early and she walked slowly, taking in the surroundings. In fact, she was so enthralled by the houses, she wasn’t actually looking where she was going. And Xander was so busy checking his pedometer as he ran, estimating he’d need to sprint up Back End, that he saw the woman only at the last minute.

The runner clipped Stella’s shoulder hard, sending her Elmfield Estates folder flying.

‘Oi!’ she turned and glowered, rubbing her arm indignantly.

He ran on the spot for a step or two, held his hands up in mock surrender and panted, ‘Sorry!’

‘Honestly!’ Stella muttered as she chased the scatter of sheets. ‘You could at least help.’

He jogged in an exasperated arc back to her and gathered some of the papers, thrusting a scrunch of them at her, before belting off.

As she sifted and sorted, somewhat flustered, a passer-by stopped to help.

‘Don’t mind Xander,’ the good Samaritan said. ‘He’s in training.’

‘He’s a public liability,’ Stella muttered. ‘Joggers – like caravans and big lorries – should only be allowed out after hours.’

The other woman picked up the Elmfield Estates terms and conditions and thought how Xander would have something to say about being called a jogger. ‘Do you know where you’re going?’

‘Er, Tidy Row Cottages. Number four.’

‘Mercy,’ the woman muttered and for a moment Stella wondered if there was something she should know before she remembered the appointment was with a Mrs M. Benton.

‘Mrs Benton,’ Stella said.

‘Fancy that,’ said the woman, looking Stella up and down. ‘John Denby won’t be pleased.’ John Denby’s For Sale sign had been outside Mercy Benton’s cottage for quite some time. Houses in Long Dansbury were only ever sold by John Denby. Fancy that. Wonder if they knew! She’d call Margaret as soon as she was home. See if she’d heard anything.

‘Well, thank you for your help,’ said Stella, sensing slight resistance when she tried to take the Elmfield forms from the lady.

Mercy Benton’s cottage was compact and immaculate and though the kitchen was old it could be modernized with minimal fuss. Stella walked around with the owner, genuinely charmed by the features and also by the owner’s furniture and trinkets. It reminded her of her late grandmother’s place. A porcelain ornament of a Shire horse and foal. A cut-glass lidded bowl full of stripy humbugs. Antimacassars on an olive-green velvet sofa and armchair. Photographs of family on top of the telly.

‘I love it!’ Stella told her.

‘I do too,’ said Mrs Benton. ‘But it’s time to go.’

‘And you’ve found an apartment at Summerhill Place?’

‘Oh, it’s lovely. It really is.’

‘So I’ve heard,’ said Stella.

‘You know it was once a country mansion? How grand that I’ll be living there! They’ve done a lovely job. It’s all self-contained apartments now – but with tea served in a smashing room downstairs for residents every afternoon. And a cleaner once a week. And bridge on Tuesdays. Bingo on Thursdays. Recitals and the like on Saturdays. And an emergency call button. All sorts going on. Such lovely grounds – ever so grand. Beryl went there a year ago. Loves it. We were at school together, you know.’

Stella nodded. ‘Was Beryl from Long Dansbury too?’

Mercy Benton laughed. ‘Of course!’ She paused. ‘Silly bugger.’

‘Sorry?’

‘That fast-talking chappy from John Denby.’ Mercy thought about it quietly. He’d expressed no interest in her home – only in the house. He couldn’t see the intrinsic difference. He hadn’t even asked a thing about Summerhill Place. That’s why, twelve weeks later and with only a dribble of viewings, Mercy had decided to invite Elmfield Estates to cast an eye. She liked this young woman. Look at her now, peering at the face on the toby jug as if it was someone she recognized; running her fingers lightly back and forth across the tasselled edging of the tapestry cushion. She had gazed and gazed at the view of the garden from the back bedroom. She’d asked Mercy what flowered out there. Made notes on her pad of all Mercy told her.

‘Would you be considering Elmfield as joint agents? Alongside Denby?’

‘What do you suggest, dear?’

‘Between you and me, Mrs Benton, if you haven’t had an offer in three months, they are showing the wrong people around. Off the top of my head, I have two clients on my list – this beautiful home would suit either of them down to the ground. Also, if you give Elmfield a crack as sole agents, the commission you pay is much less.’

‘Will it be you?’

‘I wish I could afford it. I’d love to live here.’

‘No, dear – I mean, will it be you who does all of the everything?’

‘All of the everything,’ Stella smiled. ‘Yes, it’ll be me. I assure you. Everything. Phone calls, visits, negotiations. The lot. Just me, Mrs Benton.’

‘Call me Mercy.’

‘Well, Mercy, I’ll need a couple of days to organize the particulars, photographs and red tape – and hopefully, by midweek at the latest, I’ll be back, with my clients.’

‘Would you like a humbug?’

‘I’d love one. Thank you! And Mercy – when I bring people to view, offer them a humbug too, or a cuppa. It helps.’

That brash young man from Denby’s had recommended she go out when he brought anyone to her home. ‘Thank you, dear.’

‘Thank you.’

Despite the sprint home, Xander wasn’t particularly happy with his time. And he couldn’t really blame the young woman who’d all but floored him. She hadn’t really slowed him down more than a few seconds. He’d rest tomorrow. Possibly the next day too. His legs felt heavy. He was heading towards the run less run faster period in his training which, though he knew it was sensible, today still seemed like a contradiction.

He looked in his wardrobe. Tea with Lydia. He chose a white Oxford shirt with button-down collar and looked from his choice of ties to his one good jacket. It would be one or the other. He couldn’t bear both at the same time, he’d feel trussed up and garrotted. Ultimately, he went for the tie. It was vivid blue with a pale lemon stripe. He couldn’t remember when last he’d worn it.

The afternoon was bright and the morning’s breeze had subsided – a brisk walk to Longbridge in shirtsleeves would be fine, but home again later, he knew the air would have chilled considerably. He grabbed his North Face jacket and set off with it slung over his shoulder, strolling down from the Back End along the high street to the gates to Longbridge. He could have gone the back way – walked uphill to the end of his lane and along the footpath, over two fields and through the side gate hidden in the yew hedge after the farmyard. But the track could be muddy this time of year. And it was lambing season. He waved to Mercy Benton, her headscarf tied neatly under her chin, pulling her old tartan shopping trolley as if it was a reluctant, aged dog. He spoke to the Pickards, out for a stroll, and he told the Pittman kid who lived at Wisteria House to pick up the crisp packet and put it in the bin. They were dreadful, that family – money, but no manners.

Up the driveway to Longbridge, a force of habit compelled Xander to try and count each of the two hundred and fifty-two panes of glass in the twenty-one sash windows by the time the avenue of limes had ended and the formal box hedging had begun. The approach to Longbridge was an exception to the rule of distances seeming shorter, places seeming smaller, than childhood memories decreed. Though he knew the house well – even down to the one missing stone support on the balustrade parapet high up where the brick walls ended and the hipped slate roof began, or which of the window panes were new glass and not the beautiful shimmering original – familiarity had not compromised the pleasure of the sight of this grand old building. He still felt awestruck by its sedate, imposing grandeur. He never climbed the broad stone entrance steps without patting one of the stone lions that stood guarding it, he never rang the clanking great doorbell to the side of the mahogany double doors without looking up and marvelling at the fanlight – vast yet as delicate as lacework.

He waited, wondered whether he should ring again or give the doors a polite rap. But he didn’t want to be given short shrift – he’d been on the receiving end of that, once before, when he was a teenager and he’d seen Lydia a little way ahead of him along the high street. Yoo hoo! he’d called that day. Yoo hoo! The public dressing-down she’d exacted had been mortifying.

No. He’d wait. Up until a couple of years ago, Barnaby the black Labrador would have retaliated at the doorbell with a cacophony of howls – but he was deaf now. And it had been a long while since there’d been an excitable posse of Jack Russells at Longbridge bred, it seemed, precisely for the purpose of nipping the ankles of any visitor.

‘Xander!’

But the door hadn’t opened.

He turned to find Lydia standing at the bottom of the steps, swamped by an ancient waxed jacket, a headscarf neatly under her chin, a walking stick used so naturally, so deftly, that it was more like an extension of her arm than a crutch of any sort. She climbed the stairs slowly, not taking her eyes off him.

‘You’ve grown!’

‘You always say that,’ Xander laughed. ‘It’s only been a month.’

‘Five weeks. And you never say I’m shrinking,’ Lydia said, ‘but I’ll bet you think it.’

‘Not when you have that walking stick with you!’ said Xander. ‘Your cheek, Lydia, what have you done?’

‘Nothing, just a silly knock. Looks far worse than it feels. Have you rung the bell?’

‘Yes.’

Lydia sighed, exasperated. ‘Where is that wretched woman!’ She tapped hard against the doors with her cane and Xander noted all the little dents, flecking into the wood like rain against a windscreen. ‘She’s in there, you know. Reading the Mail.’ Lydia spoke the newspaper’s name with such disdain it might as well have been Mein Kampf.

Through the doors, they could hear footsteps and the sound of someone talking to themselves. ‘Is someone at the door? I didn’t hear. I’ll just check.’ The door was opened gingerly and Mrs Biggins’ face peered out. ‘Oh,’ she said, glancing at Lydia, ‘it’s you. And Xander! Xander! Come on in!’

‘You’re an utterly useless woman,’ Lydia told her housekeeper.

‘And you’re forgetful – you must remember to take your keys.’

‘I have my keys!’ Lydia protested.

‘Then why did you knock?’

‘I didn’t. Xander did.’

‘Xander – did you knock?’

He paused, feeling like a ping-pong ball caught in a particularly vicious rally between two dab hands in this long played-out game. ‘I rang the bell,’ he said.

‘You see – you knocked. He rang the bell.’

‘Well, you didn’t answer the bell when he rang. He was probably standing there for yonks. You’re as deaf as Barnaby.’

‘I am not!’

‘You were reading the Mail, then.’ Lydia brushed past Mrs Biggins and into the entrance hall.

‘You’re not going to hang that stinking old coat here,’ Mrs Biggins warned her.

‘No,’ said Lydia, ‘you’re going to hang it in the boot room.’ And she stood still, while Mrs Biggins eased the coat off her, in much the same way as the butler would remove her mother’s mink stole decades ago. Not that any butler who wanted to keep his job would have pulled a face such as Mrs Biggins was currently wearing.

‘We’ll have tea,’ Lydia announced. ‘In the drawing room.’ And Xander thought, one day Mrs Biggins might well say get it yourself.

But not today.

* * *

Tea in the drawing room. It was an institution that Xander enjoyed as much now as then. The anticipation of the tray being brought in, counted down by the frustratingly slow, patient tock of the grandfather clock, while legions of Fortescues observed the event from their slightly tarnished photograph frames crowding the grand piano, the mantelpiece, the ledge in front of the glazed bookcase.

The selection was always the same: sandwiches of fish paste or butter and cucumber slices, and a plate of cakes. Today, it struck Xander how the food seemed to personify the irascible dowager and her cantankerous housekeeper – the cucumber sandwiches delicate and refined like the former, the fish paste slightly common yet comforting like the latter. Similarly, the pastries so elegantly put together with the fancy toppings, just as appealing as the plain but reassuringly doughy Chelsea buns.

‘Will that be all?’ Mrs Biggins asked.

‘Thank you, Mrs Biggins, that will be all.’

‘Thank you, Mrs B.’

‘Lovely to see you, Xander. You send your ma my love. And don’t be a stranger.’

With the large French-polished coffee table between them, Xander and Lydia sat opposite each other on matching sofas – faded, capacious rather than comfortable, fleshed out by a growing collection of daily-plumped cushions to counteract the general sag and lumpiness. Xander offered the sandwiches to Lydia and then took one of each for himself. Lydia poured the tea, the same tea cosy warming the pot that Xander remembered his mother knitting when he was still a boy. There was so much about Longbridge that stayed the same. There were the sounds – the clocks, different in each room, the water in the crunking old pipes complaining its way around the house, the whistle of the kettle on the Aga as dramatic as an air-raid warning. And the smells – Assam tea, ancient tobacco, a faint mustiness from old soft furnishings, a subtle drift of floral arrangements that needed changing, of vegetables cooking in the kitchen, or lavender secreted in little muslin pouches in between cushion and cover. And there was the set-up of each room – the photograph frames and various porcelain ornaments just so, the furniture whose configuration never changed, the heavy folds of the enormous curtains as vertical and precise as the fluting on Greek columns. And the portraits of the ancestors, positioned around the house like sentries, some gazing benignly, some fixing sternly, all staring directly.

‘Little changes, Xander.’

‘I’m pleased.’

‘You still look from portrait to portrait, as if answering questions asked of you in a particular order.’

‘I know.’

‘You’re wearing a tie.’

‘I could have worn a jacket.’

‘Mostly, these days, I see you scampering around in all that ghastly sportswear.’

‘I’m training – I have a half-marathon next week.’

‘Does that mean you’ll be begging me for sponsorship?’

‘Most definitely.’

‘African babies again?’

‘Cancer, this time.’

‘Jolly good. Pastry?’

Xander finished a jam tart and waited for Lydia to raise her eyebrows at the platter for him to help himself to another. ‘Longbridge plums,’ he said, ‘incomparable.’

‘Jars and jars of the bastard stuff in the pantry – help yourself when you go,’ Lydia said. ‘Surplus from the summer fete – the first time we’ve come back with unsold produce. Ever.’

‘Don’t take it personally,’ Xander said. ‘People are holding on to their pennies. Anyway, I heard it was more to do with politics within the committee.’

‘That wretched bouncing castle monstrosity?’

Xander laughed. ‘And the rest.’

‘Personally,’ said Lydia, ‘ I blame all that shopping people do nowadays on those computers. It’s an obsession and, if you ask me, absolutely unnecessary! All those supermarket vans double parking along the high street and all those delivery companies doing the postman out of a job. More tea?’

‘Please.’ He offered his cup because Lydia liked to pour and she wouldn’t tolerate people stretching. ‘How are things here?’ He looked around – it looked the same, but Longbridge was so much more than the house itself. ‘I hear Mr Tringle made a good recovery – pneumonia is no laughing matter, especially not at his age.’

‘I’ve always thought, if they dropped one of those nuclear bombs, he’d be the one creaking his way out of the debris. Extraordinary chap, really.’

‘How about the barns?’ asked Xander. ‘Did you get anywhere with the planners?’

Lydia looked a little uncomfortable. ‘I’m just going to have to let them crumble – it’s too much work and too much money. And Xander, how are you? Are you any closer to marrying?’

Xander stirred his tea thoughtfully, despite not taking sugar. ‘No.’

‘Are you one of the gays?’

‘No, Lydia. I’m not.’

She raised her eyebrow, archly. ‘I’ve heard people talking.’

‘Talking?’

‘Village tittle-tattle.’

‘And you listen to it?’

‘Sometimes I like to remember dear Alice Roosevelt who used to say, if you haven’t got anything nice to say about anybody, come sit next to me.’

‘And people are saying I’m not nice?’

‘Well, if you won’t provide the real story of Laura – then the only option you give them is to rumour.’

‘Whatever the gossip is,’ said Xander, ‘it’s probably far more salacious and entertaining than the reality. I don’t care what people say about me.’

‘If you’re sure you haven’t joined the gays – perhaps you’ve become a playboy?’ Lydia chuckled. ‘A cad?’ She laughed. ‘A gigolo?’ And she pronounced it with hard ‘g’s.

Xander shrugged – coming from Lydia, none of this irritated him. ‘I haven’t met the right girl, Lady Lydia.’

‘But you’re having lots of fun with all the wrong ones, for the time being?’

He loved it when Lydia turned saucy.

‘Your mother must be so proud.’ She paused. ‘I bet your mother doesn’t know the half of it.’

‘I sincerely hope not,’ said Xander.

‘Are you a two-timer?’ She said it as if it was some modern phrase she wasn’t entirely sure she was using correctly.

‘No, Lydia, I’m not. I just don’t invest much time, or importance, in – relationships,’ Xander said, as if it was a word whose meaning he was unsure of. He loosened his tie, feeling hot under the collar.

‘I hope you’re a gentleman,’ Lydia said sternly.

‘I’ve never made a girl cry,’ Xander said, with a theatricality that had Lydia chuckling.

‘I’m sure your Laura shed a tear or two over you. I know your mother did, at the time.’

‘That was well over two years ago.’

Lydia could see Xander’s discomfort. ‘I always said you should have tracked her down sooner. Said sorry with something sparkly from Garrard’s.’

‘Lydia – she moved to the States and she’s married. You know this.’

‘More fool you.’

‘I have no regrets.’ The Chelsea bun was sticking in this throat.

‘You’re a catch, young man. An eligible bachelor. You oughtn’t to go to waste – that would be a travesty.’

‘I’m not so young these days – I’m heading for forty. Look at all the grey.’

Lydia rubbished this with a dismissive wave of her hand. ‘Very distinguished. Silver fox, we’d call it. Like my fabulously expensive coat. Which reminds me – it’s still in cold storage. Don’t you go putting yourself in storage, Xander, you’ll grow cold. You’re a whippersnapper – I’m seventy-eight.’

A phone began to ring. There were no modern cordless phones at Longbridge. In fact, there were only three telephones in the whole house; one in the kitchen, one in the staircase hallway and one in the Victorian wing. They listened to it ringing.

Lydia blasphemed under her breath.

‘Why the wretched woman won’t answer the telephone or the door I do not know. I should dock her pay, I really should.’ And she heaved herself away from the sofa, rubbing her shoulder and wincing as she made her way. ‘She’s an atrocious housekeeper, that Mrs Biggins. I really ought to sack her.’

But she keeps you on your toes, Xander thought tenderly, as Lydia left the room to answer the phone. And she’s company. Mrs Biggins and Lady Lydia Fortescue, practically the same age, diametrically opposed backgrounds, together longer than either of their marriages – together, realistically, for ever. He listened to Lydia curtly admonishing the caller for phoning in the first place and then barking something in the general direction of the kitchen where Mrs Biggins was no doubt still ensconced in the Mail.

He’d phone his mum and dad when he was home. They lived, now, in Little Dunwick five miles away and Xander wondered why he always felt compelled to phone them when he’d been to Longbridge. He’d tell them how nothing had changed apart from Lydia growing thinner and Mrs Biggins plumper, that everything at Longbridge was just ever so slightly more dusty than in the days when his mother was nanny to the Fortescue offspring and the house bustled with staff.

Chapter Six

Stella was prepared for it to come and yet, when it arrived, though she knew exactly what it was, she felt thrown. She stared at the envelope and re-read her name and address carefully, underlining the words with her finger, as if to be absolutely sure that the contents were indeed intended for her. It was something she’d applied for, paid quite a lot for; waited over two years for but didn’t want. Not today. Today was about other things, positive things. The Marshalls were due to exchange on Mercy Benton’s little cottage in Long Dansbury – less than a month after viewing it, record time for Elmfield Estates this year. Today, Stella was viewing a large property in Cold Christmas and another in Bengeo. Today the Haddams’ mortgage offer for the house in Bramfield should be through. Today should be filled with all the excitement of here and now, not sullied by then and there. And tonight, parents’ evening (or parent’s evening – Stella was fastidious about the correct position of the apostrophe in her case) at Will’s school and there was nothing more uplifting than being nourished by the warmth of compliments and praise bestowed upon one’s child. So damn you, bloody brown bloody A4 envelope with the franked mail mark and correct address.

But she knew what she had to do. She’d been prepped. She texted Jo.

it’s here. Sx

A moment later, the response Jo had been waiting a long time to give.

do not open – will try to be there by 8. Jxx

She wasn’t expecting Stella’s response.

not poss – parent's eve. Sx

who’s bbsittng? J?

Mum Sx

Jo thought, much as Stella loves her mum, she won’t be opening it with her.

cant do 2moz – Mike out. Soz Can you hold on til w/end?? Jxx

Stella thought, I’d rather not open it at all.

K. Sx

U ok, babes? Jxx

Yep xx

Everyone had told Stella that, if there was an optimum age when change would have a minimal effect on a child, then she’d taken that decision for Will at exactly the right time in his life. Home. School. Just the two of them. Stella bit the bullet and went for change. Her loved ones had praised her, as if it had been a canny choice she’d systematically made and not the only angst-ridden option she’d felt she had. Actually, the only choice she’d really had was between Harpenden and Hertford and her big brother had made that an easy one, with the cut-price offer of his rental house.

That evening, listening to the teacher praising Will, the feeling of Stella’s heart expanding even more for her popular, industrious and bright little boy was tempered by the presence of the little low red plastic chair empty next to the one on which she sat. It was as if the full impact of all the wonderful words was somehow reduced because it was heard by only one set of ears. Parent’s evening.

Four terms in, she no longer felt conspicuous as the lone single parent in Will’s year. If anything, she was pleased to have moved to a community in which stable family values were strong and she’d grown to enjoy the genuine warmth extended to her. Waiting outside the classroom, busily browsing art folders and maths books, admiring the displays of Words Into Pictures on the walls as if the corridor was an overflow for the Royal Academy, Stella felt happy, lucky, that she and Will were there. He had his little gang of chums – and she was now very much one of the mums.

‘Mums’ night out next Friday, Stella – Will can come for a sleepover if babysitting’s a problem.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Wasn’t Will fantastic in assembly last week! Quite the little actor!’

‘Thank you.’

Much to be very grateful for. Just that hiccup of an envelope at home, waiting to be opened. Its contents already known yet the effect they might have, strangely unfathomable.

* * *

Whenever Douglas Hutton asked to see her in his office, Stella was never sure whether she’d find her boss or her uncle in there. When she was summoned on Friday, the morning after parent’s evening, she just couldn’t tell who’d be behind his desk. Belinda, Steve and Gill eyed her suspiciously; Geoff, though, didn’t look. He liked Stella and had decided early on to turn a blind eye on any rumoured favouritism and focus on his files instead whenever Douglas Hutton put his head around his office door and said, Stella – a quick word.

‘A strange one, this,’ was Douglas’s opening line. He looked at Stella quizzically, as if alternating between seeing her as his niece and as his newest member of staff who was already proving her worth. ‘You’ve been asked for. By name.’

‘Oh?’

‘Really, I ought to be taking this myself – if it comes off. Being head of the company, and more experienced than any of you. And you’ll have to steel yourself – if it comes off – to that lot out there baying for your blood. But whatever I want – and whatever the others won’t want – has no bearing, whatsoever, on what this potential client wants.’ He paused. ‘Are you all right?’

Stella wasn’t sure how to tell him she had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. ‘I’m fine. I’m just not entirely sure I understand.’

‘You can’t understand,’ he said gruffly. ‘I haven’t told you yet.’ Douglas was famous for his lengthy scene-setting, whether it was an introduction to a choice anecdote recounted at Christmas dinner or a preamble to a pep talk during Monday meeting here in the office.

‘Sorry.’

‘I don’t think you will be!’ He regarded her with a rare and wry smile. He shook his head gravely, contradicting the gesture with a chuckle. ‘You’ve been sent for – asked for by name. There’s no achievement greater, no seal of approval more valuable, than personal recommendation. That’s what you have. Your reputation precedes you already. From tiny acorns, Stella – from wee little acorns.’

She tried hard not to look confused.

‘That little acorn of a cottage at Long Dansbury may have turned into the mighty oak of Longbridge Hall.’ He fell silent before continuing to himself. ‘Unlikely though. It’s the Fortescue seat.’

She couldn’t even nod. She knew of the Eames Lounger but not a Fortescue Seat. Longbridge Hall meant nothing to her. And contracts on Mercy Benton’s cottage had been exchanged – so there couldn’t be any problems there. She tried to think tangentially about trees – subsidence? She couldn’t remember any strapping great oak that could undermine the cottage’s foundation.

‘You will go on Tuesday morning. Eleven o’clock – be prompt.’

‘OK. I’ll do that.’

‘Good girl. Your mother’s asked me for Sunday lunch – will you be going? I am looking forward to seeing young William.’

The sentence was said in an altogether lighter tone at a faster pace and enabled Stella to speak more freely.

‘Uncle Douglas – I’m sorry to sound vague. But can you just tell me exactly where I’m going on Tuesday morning at eleven – and why?’

‘Longbridge Hall, Stella. In Long Dansbury.’

‘Right.’

‘Right at the centre of the village, give or take a half-mile driveway.’

‘OK.’ She paused, hoping she didn’t look bewildered. ‘Oh – and why?’

‘The Lady Lydia Fortescue has asked for you.’

‘For me? Lady Fortescue?’

‘It’s Lady Lydia,’ Douglas corrected. ‘Actually, for a while she was The Lady Lydia Huffington-Smythe – but that was her late husband’s surname and he was a commoner so when she inherited her own family seat, she was quite happy to revert to The Lady Lydia Fortescue. But her family are also the Earls of Barbary. Between you and me – they probably make it up as they go along.’ Douglas could see that Stella was too confused to speak. It didn’t matter, really. ‘Anyway, she was rather taken with the recommendation given to her by Mrs Benton whose cottage you sold. That’s all I know.’

‘I see.’ But Stella didn’t.

‘I don’t know what it’s about – she wouldn’t say. But she owns other properties in Long Dansbury – some would say she owns the entire village. And the villagers too.’

* * *

Friday night. Stella reached across to the bedside table to check the time. Saturday morning, really, at just gone two. The working week done, the weekend upon her. A cup of tea with Jo and her daughters after Will’s football club in the morning, Sunday lunch at her mum’s with any number of the extended family. Perhaps the new Pixar movie after that – she might treat herself and Will to a 3D showing. Where had she put the 3D glasses after their last outing? And why it was suddenly so important to find them, at silly o’clock, just then? She left her bed and tiptoed into Will’s room, smiling at his fidget and gruffle when she leant over to kiss him. She peered into his toy box but knew the glasses were unlikely to be there. Still, though, she sat in his room, on the floor, her back to his bed, awhile longer. The most peaceful place in the world.

Downstairs she went, to look through the odds-and-sods drawer in the kitchen before having a satisfying flashback and going to the coat rack. There were the glasses, in the pocket of her Puffa. It made her realize how long it had been since their last trip to the cinema. It made her realize how much warmer the weather had become, that this billowing black padded mainstay of colder climes hadn’t been worn since. She tried on each pair of glasses, then buffed the lenses as best she could before placing them, side by side, on the radiator cover near the front door. It was as if Buddy Holly and Elvis Costello had come to visit and left their specs there.

Stella went back to bed. Briefly.

She said to herself, you’re seeing Jo tomorrow, remember? Remember what she said? Remember what you’d planned?

It was useless. Sleep would elude her while that envelope remained under her bed. She tried to flatter herself that it was a Princess and the Pea scenario. Actually, the envelope was inside the old canvas and leather suitcase, in which she’d kept all her secrets and treasures since adolescence. She pulled the case out, unbuckled the straps and jostled the slightly warped lid away. She could lose herself in teenage love letters and the doodles in her Rough Book from school. She could distract herself with old photos and hark back to the days when camera film was sent off to BonusPrint and returned fourteen days later as unique memories preserved on Kodak paper – not stored on an iPhone and randomly scrolled through, in little. She could do any of these things, while away time until she was tired enough to put it all back in the case and clamber into bed. But that envelope had put up some kind of impenetrable barrier between the Stella sitting cross-legged on the floor of her bedroom at thirty-four years old and the youthful Stella epitomized by all the keepsakes in the case. Halt! Who goes there! Access denied!

It’s me.

It’s Stella.

Let me in – I want my life back.

So she opened the envelope at half past two. She remarked to herself, as she did so, that the tacky adhesive could close against itself easily enough, if she lost her nerve or if she wanted Jo to think she hadn’t opened it. But when it tore a little, in the last inch or so, she acknowledged she’d gone past the point of no return. She felt inside. A paper clip holding a compliment slip against just a few pages, A4 size. She knew the paper clip would be pink or red or orange. Something bright and certainly not steely. And the compliment slip would have a handwritten personal message on it. She knew the essence of what would be on the sheets behind it – just not the precise wording.

It’s just going to say what it is.

It can’t say anything else.

You know what it is.

You asked for it.

She slipped the contents out and in one movement, took off the paper clip (turquoise) and gave a cursory glance to the slip of paper (handwriting in red pen with some kind of doodle in the lower right-hand corner – how lucky she was to have such a sweet-natured solicitor). To one side, she placed a page which was a letter. In her lap, face up, lay a certificate over the other pages. She read it in an instant, absorbing all the information in the blink of an eye and then, immediately, read it again, out loud sotto voce, into the stillness of her bedroom.

‘Certificate of making Decree Nisi Absolute (Divorce).’

The type was tiny – as if the words were shameful and should be read in a whisper.

Underneath this, the font was much larger and in upper case. Stella raised her voice a little, accordingly.

‘IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE

PRINCIPAL REGISTRY OF THE FAMILY DIVISION.’

She reverted to a lower tone for the next part, as it was in the same point size as the first.

‘Matrimonial cause proceeding in Principal Registry treated by virtue of section 42 of the Matrimonial and Family Proceedings Act 1984 as pending in a divorce county court.’

She looked at the next part quietly before clearing her voice.

‘Between Stella Ruth Hutton Petitioner

and Charles John Taylor Respondent

She read to herself again, before repeating it out loud.

Whereby it was decreed that the marriage solemnized …

At St Peter’s Church, St Albans

Between the petitioner and the respondent be dissolved

‘Dissolved,’ said Stella. Thinking of soluble aspirin. Of tears. Wondering if destroyed or deconstructed or even dismembered were better words.

Out into the night she continued to read aloud. ‘… final and absolute … said marriage was thereby dissolved. Dated this 13th day of April.’

There were notes but Stella just skimmed these again. The type was small, the language dense and the content non-personal. The information she’d needed to see in black and white, that she needed to hear herself say, that she’d applied for all that time ago because it was the right thing to do, the only thing to do, had sunk in. It coursed through her blood like anaesthetic. She was surprised to simply feel numbness, not pain. She felt flat and it was bizarre. She’d assumed that in spite of it all she’d be upset, yet the tears she’d anticipated didn’t come. Instead, her eyes were kept busy by the majestic, circular red crest of the court’s stamp, with its emblem of lion and unicorn, just overlapping the words ‘absolute’ and ‘dissolved’.

Divorced.

It is done. It is gone. I am a divorcee.

It was final, confirmed, official, legally binding. It was what she wanted but still, it was so blunt. Yet it didn’t hurt her – there wasn’t pain the way there’d been pain when she’d left Charlie. She just felt tired. Very very tired. As exhausted as if she’d scaled a mountain she’d spent so long in training for. She could sleep now. And when she woke, she’d take in the view that daylight would bring, of all that stretched ahead.

Chapter Seven

With a dog under one arm and three-year-old Sonny wriggling under the other, Caroline Rowland manoeuvred the buggy with her foot so it didn’t block the entrance to the Spar. She then plonked the dog beside it with a look that said Stay – Or Else, and into the shop she went, managing to buy only what she’d come in for and cajole Sonny into thinking the dried apricots were his idea of a snack.

Caroline made multitasking appear effortless and her willowy beauty was unruffled by the daily challenges of two very young children, a dog and a husband who commuted to London. Her self-deprecating sense of humour, delivered in her upbeat Geordie accent, helped – as did a copious supply of Nicorette gum. She was one of Xander’s closest friends and that they should live in the same village, having met nearly two decades ago at Nottingham University, was no coincidence. They’d dated, briefly, or rather they fell into a bit of late-night snogging at the Students’ Union disco in Freshers’ Week, but neither of them could remember much about that. It wasn’t long after that that Caroline met Andrew and adopted the role of older sister to Xander (though she was in fact younger by two years) and Xander, an only child, couldn’t believe his luck, or what he’d been missing all those years. After university, they’d all shared a house in Highbury and then, when they finally decided that they’d be grown-ups – and Caroline married Andrew and Xander set up his own company – they all ended up in Long Dansbury.

The village’s links by road and rail to London meant that Andrew had the best of both worlds – miles of track to run with Xander, as well as a tolerable commute into work. For the children, having Xander close by was brilliant because he loved watching SpongeBob, he was always up for kicking a ball even with a three-year-old, or rough-and-tumbling over their mum’s furniture, and best of all she told him off far more than she scolded them. The Rowlands had lived in the village for six years, the children had been born there and Caroline loved the way that, despite this and despite all the activities she joined in or indeed organized, she was still frequently referred to as ‘Caroline – the Northern Lass’ as if Newcastle was somewhere very foreign and rather exotic.

‘Hullo Caroline, dear,’ Mrs Patek, shop owner, greeted her. Deftly, Caroline chatted back whilst shaking her head before Mrs Patek could say, sweetie for Sonny? and the little boy remained none the wiser. ‘It’ll shake the village, wouldn’t you say?’

‘What – Mother Refuses Son E-Numbers and Sugar?’

Mrs Patek laughed. She was proficient at holding down umpteen conversations at once whilst packing the shopping, doing mental maths before the till came up with the total and managing to remain resolutely jolly all the while. ‘I was just saying, dear, to Nora here, that it’ll shake the village.’

‘What’ll shake the village, pet?’ Caroline asked.

‘She hasn’t heard yet,’ said Nora who needed drama daily and added it to most topics of conversation. She sucked her teeth thoughtfully. ‘Longbridge Hall – it’s for sale.’

‘Never!’ Caroline was surprised. Xander had said nothing about it when he’d popped over to watch the football with Andrew last night – and if anyone was to know, it would be Xander.

‘Nora, dear, we really must say “apparently” until the sign goes up,’ said Mrs Patek.

‘Apparently,’ Nora conceded, touching her blue-rinsed perm as if to check it was still there.

‘How do you know?’ asked Caroline.

‘Her Ladyship was in here the other day, when Mercy was in here, and I overheard her saying “Denby’s?” but Mercy said, “No, Elmfield’s.” And then Her Ladyship asks Mrs Patek here for a piece of paper and wrote down something about someone at Elmfield’s.’

Caroline put her change in her purse, hitched Sonny on her hip because he’d decided he couldn’t possibly stand, let alone walk, and took her shopping from the counter. ‘Perhaps Longbridge isn’t for sale – perhaps Lady Lydia fancies a spot of gazumping.’ It all sounded so far-fetched.

‘Gazumping!’ Nora was thrilled. ‘What’s that?’

‘Perhaps she fancies Mercy’s cottage – and is going to make a higher offer.’ Caroline was jesting but Mrs Patek and Nora considered this gravely.

‘The Fortescues have always thought they own the village,’ said Nora.

‘They mostly do,’ said Mrs Patek.

‘Maybe Her Ladyship is making sure of it,’ said Nora. But she, too, couldn’t really imagine Lady Lydia selling – she must be buying.

‘She’ll never sell me that plot of land opposite my shop – even though you all think it’s the shop’s car park.’ Mrs Patek paused. ‘She can’t be selling. Why would you move if you owned a place like that? And anyway, she’s part of things. And really, we’re all part of Longbridge.’

‘If Lady Lydia is doing a gazump, then I wonder if Mercy’s happy about that. Mind you, if it’s more money, she’s likely to be. She’s from Scottish stock, you know – they like their money, that lot,’ said Nora.

‘And I like brown ale and coal, me,’ Caroline laughed. ‘I’ll see you ladies later. Ta-ta,’ and, smiling to herself, she walked away.

‘But if Longbridge is sold – what’ll it mean for the village?’ she heard Nora say.

As she pushed the buggy, maintained a conversation with Sonny and navigated the dog who had a tendency to wander into the path of anything, stationary or mobile, Caroline texted Xander.

Rumour has it Longbridge is on the market … Cx

The reply came almost immediately.

Bollox! Xx

What a lot of X’s he uses, thought Caroline.

Xander texted again, before she’d replied.

Where did you hear that?!

Village Shop

I rest my case … Xx

‘Mum?’ The front door was unlocked and Xander stood in his mother’s hallway thinking, if I was a burglar, I could swipe her handbag, her car keys, various pairs of shoes, library books, two terracotta plant pots and a selection of Paul Newman DVDs by barely crossing the threshold. Last week, her car keys had been in the car, actually in the ignition; the passenger seat piled high with interestingly bulky Jiffy bags ready for posting and a clutch of Steve McQueen films loaned from Mrs Patek’s esoteric DVD-rental service.

‘Mum?’ Where was she?

‘Hullo, darling!’

She was behind him, making her way up the garden path.

‘Mother – what are you doing?’

‘Your dad forgot his jacket – it’ll be chilly later on. I don’t want that bronchitis coming back.’

Monday night – card night at the pub.

‘But you left your keys.’

‘I didn’t lock the door.’

‘Exactly – you left everything in here.’

‘Xander!’ she chided and laughed. ‘Stop worrying! I only popped out – I’ve only been gone five or ten minutes. Don’t start putting the willies up me about thieves and the like. This is Little Dunwick, remember.’

‘It’s cloud cuckoo land.’

‘Don’t be cheeky.’

Xander shrugged.

‘You think Long Dansbury is small and friendly – well, here in Little Dee, we’re a tiny happy family in comparison.’

Xander smiled as if he acquiesced. His mother still needed to justify her move away to this neighbouring village over a decade ago.

‘Come on in and give your old mum a kiss.’

Audrey Fletcher made herself sound ancient though she had only recently celebrated her sixty-fifth birthday and looked much younger albeit in a windswept way. She had thick, iron-grey hair worn at one length to her shoulders and a fringe she kept too long so that she blinked a lot, which gave the impression that she was always concentrating hard when actually she chose to listen only selectively. It drove Xander mad, but his father greatly appreciated it, not being one for involved conversation. If Audrey lost track of what people were saying, she never asked them to repeat themselves, she never interrupted and she never murmured, ‘Hmm?’; she simply smiled and blinked in a calmingly beatific way, which gave everyone the impression that she liked them very much and was pleased for them to talk at length. This, combined with the way she dressed – loose trousers or long skirts overlaid with smocks in heavy fabric and a penchant for Native American patterns and colours – invested her with the semblance of someone worldly, wise and contemplative; a modern oracle, a latter-day soothsayer.

In her day, she’d been the only member of staff at Longbridge to resolutely refuse to wear uniform without having to say a word. Certainly, she didn’t dress like the Norland Nanny who predated her there and if the Fortescues had requested a uniform, she probably didn’t hear them. (Lydia was privately quite sure that the clothes Audrey wore now were the same as then – and secretly, she marvelled at the longevity of such fabric.)

Xander kissed his mother. She cupped his face in her hands and smiled at him.

‘Let me look at you.’ She’d seen him the week before. ‘How’s my boy?’

‘He’s fine.’

‘Soup?’

He followed her into the kitchen and sat down at the table. It came naturally to Xander to say a sentence at a time and wait for her to respond; that way nothing was wasted and everything was heard.

‘If you must leave the door unlocked, please don’t leave your valuables in the hallway.’

‘It’s leek and potato.’

He didn’t respond.

‘I’ll try to do that, Xander – for you, rather than to fox any neighbourhood villain.’

Good. ‘Leek and potato sounds good.’

‘How’s work?’

‘Not bad. How’s Dad?’

‘Very good.’

‘This is delicious.’

‘You can come again!’

‘Thanks, Mum.’

‘You saw Lydia recently?’

‘Yes – and Caroline overheard some village gossip about Longbridge going up for sale.’

‘Longbridge?’ Audrey laughed. ‘How absurd.’

‘I thought it would tickle you.’ Xander laughed with her. ‘But you know what Nora’s like – if there’s no real gossip, she’ll invent some.’

‘I’m visiting Lydia later this week – I’ll ask her. Mind you, a rumour without a leg to stand on still gets around somehow.’

‘I can imagine her response,’ said Xander. It was not unknown for Lydia to hiss the word ‘peasants’.

‘I thought I’d take a stew. I don’t like the thought of Mrs Biggins lifting heavy pots – despite the size of her we have to remember she’s nearly as ancient as Lydia and not nearly as strong as her mass would suggest.’

‘You’ll say it’s leftovers.’

‘Yes – and Lydia will laugh and be very rude to me but she’ll eat it all up and never let me know if she liked it.’ She looked at her son thoughtfully. ‘Will you take some soup home with you?’

‘It’s delicious – but I’m out most evenings this week.’

She looked at him again. ‘Oh, yes?’

‘Clients.’

‘Clients – oh, yes?’

‘No one you know,’ he said and they laughed at his pat answer.

‘One day you’ll surprise me,’ Audrey said. ‘One day you’ll come over and say, Mum! Meet Amanda!’

‘Who the hell is Amanda?’

‘Amanda is simply generic, Xander. You know what I mean.’

‘Mother – will you please just leave it?’ He was serious. Why was everyone so concerned with marrying him off? ‘I should have married Verity Fortescue when she proposed to me when I was seven years old.’

‘I had a letter from her last week. Which reminds me – did I post my reply?’ Audrey tailed off to rummage through a pile of paper on the dresser and found the postcard she’d written Verity. ‘Blast.’

‘I’ll post it – and yes, I’ll put a stamp on it for you!’ Xander said wearily, but in jest. He noted the postcard depicted an illustration from an old Enid Blyton book. He skimmed over his mother’s blowsy handwriting, not dissimilar from Verity’s.

‘When did I last see Verity?’ Xander said quietly.

‘She didn’t come at Christmas.’

‘She doesn’t “do” Christmas any more,’ Xander said.

He and Audrey shared a wistful moment, quietly recalling those long halcyon days of his childhood when he and Verity were together from sun up to sun down. Playing and laughing and climbing and swimming and imagining a time when they’d be grown-ups and Longbridge would be theirs and they’d paint everywhere purple and green and pink and blue and there’d be lollipop trees in the garden and the hens would lay chocolate eggs and there’d be cows in the meadows who’d give them strawberry milkshakes.

Xander dreamt of Verity that night. They were in the clock tower above the stable courtyard at Longbridge only it wasn’t Longbridge, not that it mattered. In the dream, he was young again – he could see himself with his ridiculous pudding-bowl haircut and his knock knees and some dreadful knitted sleeveless pullover his gran had made for him. He could taste the musty air that squeezed through the gaps in the tower as skeins dancing with dust. The silken waft of Verity’s strawberry-blonde hair as refined as his tank top was coarse. Their laughter peeling out like the long-gone bell in the tower. The day speeding away and yet time, up there, standing still. But it was grown-up Xander inside young Xander’s head, watching Verity. Smiling and laughing along with her but watching her closely, careful to make her feel equal and relaxed and normal, while all the time guarding her as if, at any moment, she might fall, or she might fly away or, worse, just fade from view and simply disappear. Verity – ethereal and beautiful and so very vivid – saying, Xander! Xander! Come this way! She was going for a door he’d never seen before. Come with me, Xander! But she disappeared beyond it before he could say, Verity – no, don’t! Please stay.

Chapter Eight

If one didn’t know of Longbridge Hall then one might well assume the gates off the high street heralded a country park. Certainly, Stella was surprised that in all her visits to Mercy Benton’s cottage in Long Dansbury, she’d never given more than a passing glance at them. On the Tuesday morning, at 11.00, she drove through the gates, noting how one was slightly crooked and both needed painting black again. Halfway up the drive, she said, oh God, where on earth is the house – I was here at 11.00, I’ve been going for miles and now I’m going to be late. However, even in the April shower that had suddenly descended, when the house came into view it was a breathtaking sight. Stella followed the driveway around it, until it ended in a flourish: a vast turning circle the size of a roundabout, with a small maze of box hedging at the centre. Stella checked her reflection and smoothed her hair and wondered if she should use the main front doors or what looked like a tradesmen’s entrance off to one side. She also wondered whether she should curtsey. Clearing her throat, she made her way past the two stone lions at the base of the steps leading up to the front door. She gave the bell pole a pull and then did so again, with more force, and heard it clanging inside the house.

‘Open the door, woman! Open the door!’

Stella panicked that the voice was shouting at her but even though she heaved her shoulder against them, the front doors were definitely shut.

Did she dare ring that bell again?

Luckily, a plump woman, wearing what her mother would call a pinny, opened one of the doors a fraction. She said nothing.

‘Hullo,’ said Stella.

‘Hullo.’

‘I’m expected.’

‘Who are you?’

‘I’m Stella – Hutton.’

‘One moment.’ The woman left the door ajar and disappeared. Was that Lydia? Lady Fortescue? Mrs Barbary?

‘Is it Elmfield?’ she could hear another voice asking.

‘No, it’s Stella Someone.’

‘Well, it’s probably Stella Someone from Elmfield’s. Gracious me!’

That must be Lady Fortescue.

The plump woman returned. ‘Are you from Elmfield’s?’

‘Yes,’ said Stella. ‘Sorry – I should have said.’

‘Come this way, please. Coat.’

But what Stella really wanted to do was stand still for a moment and take it all in. Beyond the entrance hall was the grand stairwell, lit from above by a beautiful glass lantern roof, a swooping double staircase leading upwards to a galleried landing. But her coat was being all but wrenched from her back.

‘I’m Mrs Biggins – I’m housekeeper here. Lady Lydia takes coffee at this time – would you like coffee?’

‘No, thanks. Well – just a glass of water, please.’

‘Or tea?’

‘Tea! Oh yes, please – I’m gasping for a cup.’

The woman looked her up and down. ‘You’ll take it strong – like me.’ Stella was unsure whether she was referring to her own strength or a well-brewed cup, whether the woman’s remark was an observation, or a statement not open to dispute. If the housekeeper was this disarming, what could Lady Fortescue be like? Mrs Biggins opened the soaring double doors in front of them and gave Stella a little shove. The room was so stunning, in a thoroughly Alice in Wonderland way with everything oversized, that momentarily Stella forgot all about locating the owner of the house and making her introduction. It was dual aspect, occupying three bays of the east front of the house and one bay south, and the four magnificent sash windows, at least eighteen feet high, flooded the room with light despite the dreary day outside. Stella was, quite literally, dazzled.

‘Good morning.’

Sitting in a wingback leather chair, Lydia slowly folded the Telegraph and placed it across her lap. Her knees were together, her legs neatly at an elegant angle; hair in a chignon with stray strands like spun silver. She wore a woollen skirt the colour of peat and a twinset the colour of heather. Her shoes were buffed and the decorative buckles shone. Neutral hosiery gathered just perceptibly in creases around the ankle – like a ploughed field seen from a distance.

‘Mrs Fortescue, I’m Stella Hutton.’ And immediately, Stella thought, oh God, I’ve addressed her incorrectly already. ‘Lady.’ No! That sounded plain rude.

Lydia did not rise. Indeed, she sat motionless and expressionless. ‘I see.’

‘I’m here on behalf of Elmfield Estates.’

‘Yes.’

Should she backtrack and apologize for the botched greeting? Stella was unsure. She didn’t know what she was meant to do next. Sit, stand, talk, wait, what? She was being looked at, assessed; she could feel it. It was as nerve-wracking as the one time she’d been hauled in front of the headmistress at the age of thirteen. She felt hot and self-conscious. Did she appear suitably estate-agenty? Or was the fact that she really didn’t do the navy skirt-suit and court-shoe thing actually in her favour? She was today wearing slim-fitting black trousers and black suede ankle boots with a Cuban heel and a white shirt. Perhaps she looked too much like a waitress. Damn it! She’d been in the pale blue shirt first thing, but had changed at the last minute. Perhaps Mrs Lady Barbary-Fortescue was waiting for her to be a little more estate-agenty. Perhaps she should deliver the Elmfield Estates mission statement.

What Stella really wanted to do was to sink into one of the sofas and say, wow, what an extraordinary place, how long have you lived here, tell me about the house, who is the lady in the painting – is it School of Reynolds? The rug is Persian, isn’t it?

She was enamoured by everything: the carved frieze above the fireplace of cherubs apparently hunting down a deer; the wealth of photos from sepia, to tinted, to full colour, in a crowd on the grand piano, the thick velvet drapes, the Chinese paintings on silk. The glass-fronted book cabinet. The vast silk rug – yes, most certainly Persian – threadbare in one or two places but still magnificent, yet which went only some way in covering the impressive run of wide floorboards. Huge, heavy columnar curtains with flamboyant pelmets that reminded her of a theatre. More furniture than she, her brothers and her mother had between them. Finally, she noticed the archaic-looking electric bar heater standing in front of the capacious fireplace, trying valiantly to take the chill off the room and adding a warm down-to-earthness too. If there was so much to look at even in this one room, what delights could the rest of the house hold?

‘Let me look at you.’

Stella felt like Tess being summoned by Mrs d’Urberville. But then she thought she remembered Mrs d’Urberville being blind and suddenly she felt very self-conscious that she really wasn’t smart enough and why had she popped her slightly greasy hair into a hasty pony-tail when she’d had the time to wash and dry it? As she approached, Stella decided to polish up her vowels and use words like ‘frightfully’ and ‘splendid’.

‘You’re not as I expected.’ Lady Lydia sounded disappointed. ‘But then, Mercy Benton’s powers of description have always been limited. She described her own daughter’s wedding dress as simply a “nice frock” and her son-in-law as a “nice lad”. She said you were a “fine woman” and “everything one could hope for” in an agent.’ She paused, as if waiting for Stella to take the bait. But Stella just nodded with a wry smile in a ‘Gosh, well – you know Mercy Benton’ kind of way.

Lydia rose a little shakily. ‘You look like a girl – a waitress.’ She was not impressed.

‘That’s probably why my clients like me, Lady Fortescue,’ Stella said meekly. ‘I don’t boss them around. I take their order – be it for a house or a sale – and I deliver it to them.’ Stella thought about it. ‘With no spillage.’

The women regarded each other. Though Lydia was pretty much the same height as Stella, her aquiline haughtiness made her appear far taller. Or perhaps Stella just felt small in this grand room in this phenomenal old house and, for the first time in her life, in the presence of someone titled.

‘And have you ever been in a house like this?’

Stella was diplomatic. ‘There can’t possibly be another like it.’

Lydia looked at her as if she’d seen straight through her words. ‘Mrs Biggins, wretched woman – she never came with my coffee. Would you care for a sherry?’

‘It’s a little early for me,’ Stella said as if she didn’t take her sherry until after lunch. Lydia looked at her witheringly, as if she’d heard sarcasm. She walked over to the walnut drinks cabinet and inadvertently chinked the crystal stopper against the decanter and then the decanter against the glass. She took her sherry and walked to the sofa, spilling a little on her skirt as she sat herself down. She motioned to the companion sofa opposite and Stella sat. Lydia took a thoughtful sip. And then another.

‘I detest Asians.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘All agents – whatever their industry.’

Oh – agents.’ Stella’s relief was worn as an expansive smile which Lydia appeared to baulk at.

‘I am going to sell Longbridge,’ she said levelly, ‘or at least, you are.’

Stella felt herself sinking into the sofa, as if her surroundings were suddenly growing and she was shrinking under the weight of the realization that this is why she was here. This couldn’t be real – this had to be Lewis Carroll. A joke. A dream.

But Lydia was continuing. ‘I have been thinking about selling Longbridge for some time. Sometimes I stop thinking about it – but not because I’ve changed my mind. The whole concept is so very tiresome.’ She stared at Stella, who tried to nod purposefully and to stop gawping, wishing she’d said yes to sherry, just to have something to hold instead of her hands feeling like clodden sponges awkward in her lap.

‘I’m haemorrhaging cash in upkeep.’ Lady Lydia gave a little cough for emphasis. ‘It’s preposterous! All that money just to keep the rain out and the heat in.’

The look she threw Stella as she knocked back her sherry suggested she was waiting for a response.

‘I hope I don’t sound ignorant or nosy –’ Or obsequious, Stella thought to herself. ‘But would a house like this not be handed down to the next generation?’

‘There is no next generation,’ Lady Lydia barked before going heavily silent, staring into her sherry glass as if, usually, it refilled spontaneously. ‘I am the eldest of four girls. Cordelia died young. Anne never bred. She was a lesbian – still is, I believe, though at her age that’s quite unnecessary. Margaret moved to Connecticut and remained barren despite landing herself three American husbands in quick succession.’

‘You have no children – offspring?’ She shouldn’t have said that – it sounded intrusive, impudent.

‘I had a son,’ Lydia said quietly. ‘And I have a daughter. She doesn’t want to live here. She lives with the Welsh.’ She made it sound as though her daughter had converted to an extreme religion and was living as part of a cult in a compound.

What could Stella say to that? Though desperate to know more, she bit her tongue and looked at her hands. Lydia’s were bony and long; papery skin over navy veins like very old corduroy. A signet ring loose on the little finger of her right hand, an antique diamond ring and thin gold wedding band on her left. Stella had a very strange impulse to lean right over the coffee table and take Lady Lydia’s hands in hers, give them a gentle rub. Perhaps Lydia sensed it because she took to her feet and demanded that Stella follow her on a tour of the house.

Sell? Sell all this? Is that really why I’m here? Me? Can’t be.

‘Of course, we’re the wrong way around,’ Lydia said of the drawing room. ‘When I was a girl, this was the dining room – one never had a south-facing drawing room because all the oil paintings would take a thrashing by the sun. That’s why the good paintings are currently in the dining room – which was once the drawing room because it’s north facing. That’s what my father told me – though my mother told me it was because my Fortescue ancestors were atrociously ugly.’ The slicing look Lydia sent Stella informed her that her giggle was inappropriate. ‘Hence them being consigned to a room less used.’ She was leading on, along the flagstone hallway, to the room in question. The same beautiful tall double doors and fanlight as the drawing room, the same lofty windows, but just two of them in here, east facing. The room was light but undeniably cold. The fireplace was bereft of logs, nor was there an electric heater in its place. The cherubs on the plaster frieze weren’t hunting stags here, but hefting urns about. Their naked little bodies made Stella feel the cold on their behalf. The eyes of generations of Fortescues appeared to glower at her from the confines of their florid gilt frames as if to say, who on earth do you think you are to sell our ancestral seat as though it’s a commodity akin to a sack of apples?

‘They’re not so ugly,’ Stella remarked diplomatically, ‘they just look a little – humourless.’

She checked Lady Lydia’s expression. She looked horrified. Stella shivered.

‘Bastard!’

‘Oh God – I’m so sorry – I didn’t mean … I only meant—’

‘Bastard bastard bloody dog! Barnaby! Mrs Biggins!’

It was then that Stella noticed a furl of turd that had been deposited (quite some time ago, it seemed) on the floor just by the head of the table.

‘It’s testimony to the airiness of the room that one cannot – detect it,’ Stella said.

Lydia stared at her, unblinkingly, before nodding slowly. ‘You are most certainly an estate agent,’ she said, but Stella was unable to tell whether this was a compliment or an insult. ‘You call it spin, don’t you. This way.’ They left the door open and the dog mess for Mrs Biggins to deal with; crossed the staircase and entrance hallway and went into the library. This room was as warm and inviting as the dining room was cold and uncongenial. Stella thought, I don’t care how common I might appear – and she said ‘Wow!’ out loud as she beamed at the three walls given over almost entirely to handsome mahogany bookcases – mostly carrying leather-bound volumes. Stella estimated the longest was at least twenty feet. Three leather Chesterton sofas at right angles to each other were set around a low table in front of the fireplace stacked with logs. A desk with a dark green leather inlay was positioned by one window, a writing bureau at the other. Stella perused the titles. French and English novels, encyclopaedias, dictionaries, atlases, monographs and a whole section of art books.

‘I studied art,’ she said quietly, as if to remind herself. She ran her fingertips gently over the routered wooden shelves right to the end. She stopped. It couldn’t be! She looked at Lydia and smiled.

‘May I?’ but she didn’t wait for an answer. Where the bookcase ended in a long, slim vertical column, Stella gave a little press and a pull and the front of the column popped open like a secret door to reveal that it was a false front – behind it, the shelves continued, with just three books’ width, for the full height of the bookcase. There were books on these hidden shelves too, but their spines were blank. ‘Are they very rude?’ Stella asked.

Lydia laughed. It was an unexpected warm, earthy cackle. ‘Eye-wateringly so – that is, if you were a dainty eighteenth-century lady prone to fainting at the very thought of even a naked forearm. Hardly the Kama Sutra. They’re frightfully tame to me, so goodness knows what you’d make of them.’ Insult or compliment – again Stella wasn’t sure and Lydia’s voice had become cool by the end of her sentence.

‘Have you had them valued?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous! Cart the lot off to Christie’s for them to be pored over so publicly? Lady Lydia, your collection of two hundred years of pornography might fetch one hundred pounds at auction.’ Stella laughed – but Lydia gave her a look to silence her. She led on, back through the hallways and up one side of the double staircase.

‘Now that,’ Stella murmured, ‘is a backside to behold.’

‘You insolent young woman.’ Lydia rounded on Stella who, for a split second, feared she might be pushed down the stairs. She’d already tripped over a threadbare section of runner.

‘Lady Lydia – no! I didn’t mean—! I was referring to – that.’ Stella was holding on to the banister with both hands so she moved her head fast as if banging it against an imaginary wall, to signify where she was looking. It was a huge oil painting of a horse and rider, portrayed from behind. Only an eye and an ear of the horse were visible, while the rider looked most uncomfortable turning around in an already cumbersome military get-up. It was the horse’s rump which all but filled the canvas, its tail mid-swish, revealing its arsehole.

‘I’m sorry, I—’ Stella glanced at Lydia who was staring at her. ‘I studied art. It was my world before I—’ And then Stella thought, Oh, for God’s sake, the woman’s not going to bite you. And then she thought, I studied art before all the shit fell on me from a great height and I clawed my way out and am where I am today. And then she thought, But this woman doesn’t need to know that. ‘Before I went into property.’ She made it sound like a sensible choice, that her current career was as dignified and hallowed as the study of art. Lydia’s ice-pale blue eyes were still scoring straight through her, like a welder’s flame through sheet metal.

‘This painting was a gift – to Lord Frederick Makepeace William Fortescue, the first Earl of Barbary, who built this house.’

‘Is it Mallory Beckinsford?’

‘As I just said,’ Lydia said slowly, witheringly, as if Stella was dim as well as deaf, ‘Lord Frederick Makepeace William Fortescue, the first Earl of Barbary, who built this house.’

‘I’m so sorry, I meant the artist – is it Mallory Beckinsford?’ Stella could tell Lydia hadn’t a clue who the artist was, and hitherto hadn’t been remotely interested.

‘Beckinsford,’ Lydia said, in what she thought was a cleverly non-committal way. ‘It’s a portrait of the Prince Regent.’

Stella dared to take one hand from the banister. ‘It’s just Beckinsford was taught by Reynolds – and Reynolds painted a similar portrait of the Prince Regent.’

Lydia brushed the air. ‘Longbridge is full of portraits. Fortescues, royalty, Fortescues with royalty, with swords, guns, with horses, dogs – it’s who we are.’

Stella worked hard to keep her tone conversational, but she was excited. ‘I think this painting would have been given to Lord Frederick Makepeace William Fortescue, the first Earl of Barbary – but as a rather barbed gift. It’s a slur – an elegantly concealed two fingers – from the Prince Regent. He did it to others. A very nicely painted insult, quite literally shoving his horse’s great big bum in the face of Lord Fortescue. But no doubt the Earl knew that and turned the joke on its head by graciously accepting it and hanging it right here, pride of place.’

Lydia was looking at the painting again, her eyes travelling over it in little bursts. She turned to Stella and nodded.

‘So one oughtn’t to look a gift horse in the mouth – but up the arse?’

‘Something like that,’ Stella smiled at the painting. ‘You might want to have it valued. Do you know of any fracas between the Prince and the Earl?’

‘There is some salacious family rumour about the Earl and one of the Prince’s mistresses and the billiards table right here at Longbridge.’ Lydia’s tone suggested it was all beyond ridiculous. ‘I’ll be sure to call Christie’s,’ she said. ‘They can come and sift through all the historic backsides at Longbridge – human and equine – whether hidden in the library or hanging, bold as brass, right here.’

She sounded sharp and Stella felt deflated. Best leave all art in the past – her own as well as the Fortescues’. Leave it behind. Move on. Here to sell the house, remember. Then a notion sent a shot of adrenalin which almost winded her.

‘How many bedrooms?’ Stella asked, taking a sweeping glance at a queue of closed doors and that was just in this semicircular landing of the house.

‘Five.’

‘Sorry?’

‘Sorry?’

‘Only five bedrooms? Here? At Longbridge?’

‘What are you talking about? Twelve bedrooms including the three in the Victorian wing,’ Lady Lydia said.

‘Pardon me, I thought you said five and I thought to myself surely not—’

‘You are pedantic – it’s tiresome,’ she barked. ‘These days, five of the rooms have beds in them – so the other rooms are not bedrooms, are they?’

Stella was tempted not to bite her tongue, she was tempted to say, well, if I’m pedantic, you’re downright rude. ‘Logical,’ she said instead. ‘It’s the estate agent in me – we’re trained to call even a store cupboard a bedroom if the headroom is sufficient and it is physically possible for someone to stand and also sleep in it.’

‘The more bedrooms, the higher the price?’

‘Square footage is the priority,’ Stella said, ‘and you certainly have that at Longbridge Hall – never mind the quota of bed frames.’

‘Well,’ said Lydia, ‘you’d better see if the servants’ rooms right at the top count too.’

‘How many bathrooms?’

‘Three.’

‘I don’t mean with baths – I mean, rooms in which there is the relevant plumbing.’

‘Three,’ Lydia said loudly, giving the ‘r’ a good roll around her tongue, as if Stella had reverted to dim and deaf again. ‘Mind you, there was only one until after the War.’

Oh dear, Stella thought. Three bathrooms? That’s it?

‘Chop chop,’ said Lydia, leading on; opening door after door and giving Stella just enough time to walk to the windows and back. ‘Do keep up.’

‘In there?’ Stella motioned to a door they passed that Lydia didn’t open.

‘Slaves.’

‘What?’

‘Don’t say “What”, say “I beg your pardon”,’ Lydia snapped. ‘It’s one of the slaves’ quarters. We don’t have them any more – not even Mrs Biggins. She’s a useless slave because she won’t do a thing I ask. But the house was once full of them.’

‘Staff,’ Stella said, relieved, when she went into the room and realized it was a sizeable store for linen and laundry.

‘The Fortescues have always called them “slaves” – in jest, of course. No one has ever minded,’ said Lydia. She ran her hand lightly over the butler’s sink by the window. ‘At least, no one said they minded.’ She looked around the room. ‘We didn’t call them slaves to their faces – we didn’t say, “Slave! Come here!” The youngsters were called by their first names, which was fairly liberal of the Fortescues. And the senior staff by their surnames. Apart from the housekeeper, who was allowed to keep her title. Hence, Mrs Biggins – though, really, she ought to be called Useless Woman.’

‘I love this,’ said Stella, fingering the embossed brass plate above the three taps. ‘Hot. Cold. Soft.’

‘For rainwater,’ said Lydia. She ran the tap and placed her hand under the water. She kept it there, as if the feel of it hastened a memory just coming back into focus and one that she wanted to revisit. ‘All the children had their hair washed in this sink – rinsed again and again with the water from “Soft”.’

Corridors that started poker straight and then suddenly veered off at angles with stairs to trip and confuse. Room after room after room. With clever wording in the particulars and positioning of furniture for the photos, Stella reckoned she could list twelve bedrooms at least. The three bathrooms were a worry though, not least because the most modern of them all, the only en-suite, was a homage to 1970s design with a corner bath, bidet, basin and toilet in a dull avocado shade.

It surprised her to find they were back on the ground floor. She’d quite lost her bearings.

‘Kitchen,’ Lydia said, opening a door and revealing a space so sizeable that even Mrs Biggins, ensconced in the Daily Mail, looked diminutive. Stella’s heart sank a little. Of all the rooms she’d been fascinated to see, this was the one she’d built up in her imagination. She’d anticipated flagstones and a vast range, scullery, pantry, cold store, gleaming copperware and all manner of utensils of historical importance. Instead, she stood in a large space in which rather nondescript units varnished an unpleasant amber sat haphazardly under a melamine worktop, like bad teeth. The fridge and the oven were free-standing and akin to those she remembered her grandmother having in her small flat in Wheathampstead. At least there was an Aga, if a relatively small one. It was some consolation finally to be shown a sort of pantry with lines of shelves painted soft white and an impressive run of slate worktop. Most of the shelves were empty; the ones that weren’t were stacked with jars of all sizes filled with jam.

‘I’m tired now so you must go,’ Lady Lydia announced, still walking ahead and not turning to look at Stella. ‘You will come back again tomorrow. To see the grounds. To see Art. Eleven a.m. Prompt, please. Mrs Biggins, show Miss Hutton out please. Goodbye.’

And with that, Lydia went.

‘Coat,’ said Mrs Biggins, bundling it into Stella’s arms. ‘Ta-ta, duck.’ And she chortled a little as if, perhaps, this was a scenario that had been re-enacted many times over the years.

The rain had stopped, everything glistened and shone but Stella shivered and put her coat on, hugging it tightly around herself as she walked across the driveway to her car. Inside, she put the heat on high and realized how that old house had quite chilled her to the bone. She thought again of Tess Durbeyfield, how Tess had wondered about Mrs d’Urberville.

‘If there is such a lady, it would be enough for us if she were friendly …’

Chapter Nine

Stella gave herself a stern talking-to as she raced to pick up Will from after-school club.

Lady Whatnot didn’t say you won’t be representing Longbridge.

She said you’re to come back tomorrow.

Money she may have – manners she has none.

She’s just an old dragon.

But Stella felt despondent – as if she’d failed a test and a carrot that had been dangled in front of her had been snatched away in a harsh peal of upper-class laughter; as if she’d been one of the balls hit around in a game of croquet. Why would she want to work for the old battleaxe anyway? She felt impotent – it seemed she didn’t have a choice. It appeared if Lady Up-Her-Bum wanted Stella, then Stella she would have.

‘Shall we go over and see the Twins? Aunty Ju said it’s fish and chips for supper.’

Will was delighted. Actually, Stella had food prepared at home for Will but her need for adult company – sane, sweet, adult company – overrode her usual timetable of homework, supper, telly, bath, bed and a long evening alone muttering at the telly. She’d phoned Juliet who was only too pleased to hear from her and to be able to help.

‘But it’s a school night, Mummy.’

‘I know!’ Stella said, as if it was the coolest, most daring concept ever.

With Will upstairs with Pauly and Tom, happy not to touch a thing, just to look at their stuff and be in their company as if hoping their cred was catching, Juliet had Stella to herself downstairs.

‘You all right, chook?’ Juliet asked nonchalantly while rooting around the cupboard for the ketchup.

‘Can I borrow a suit, do you think? One of yours?’

‘Well, I hardly thought you meant Alistair’s. Yes, of course.’ She looked at Stella, who looked glum and distracted. ‘But why? There’s not a funeral I don’t know about, is there? Uncle MacKenzie?’

‘No – Uncle Mac is still hanging on. I just need to look a bit more formal and estate-agenty tomorrow.’

‘Charming! Is that your sartorial judgement of me, then?’ Juliet gave her a long look, up and down, as if assessing which suit Stella would be entitled to. ‘You’re not wearing my Paul Smith then – I’ll dig out my old one from Wallis for that!’

Stella laughed. ‘You know what I mean – and I just need not to look like a waitress in a gastro pub.’

‘Firstly – you don’t, you look lovely. Secondly – why?’

‘Awkward client.’

‘Oh?’

‘Lady Up-Her-Bum Fortescue-Barbary OK-Yah Di-Fucking-Da.’

‘Oh,’ said Juliet. ‘Her.’ She paused. ‘Who?’

‘Lives in a Georgian pile over at Long Dansbury. It’s worth millions. She called for me – and then spent most of this morning being rude yet demanded I come back tomorrow.’

‘Can’t you send someone else from the office?’

‘She asked for me by name.’

‘Perhaps it’s just her manner.’

‘She may be a Lady – but she has no manners. She’s horrible.’

‘Yes, but blimey, Stella – have you calculated the commission?’

‘Exactly – it could be the solution to everything. That’s why I have to go. I’ll have to swallow my morals and sell my soul to the old devil – but hence the need for your suit.’

‘And you think she’ll be more polite if you dress the part?’

‘She said I was to see the grounds and art.’

‘Then you ought to go in wellies and a Puffa – with your own clothes underneath. Not your worky-waitressy garb – your off-duty clothes.’

‘Why?’

‘Because first and foremost you’re an art historian – and that’s who you are. Not a suity person. Dress as the real You.’

‘I’m an estate agent.’

‘In the interim.’ Juliet looked at her sternly. ‘Remember – that’s your game plan.’

Stella’s head dropped a little as she nodded. She fiddled with a frozen oven chip that had missed its place on the tray.

‘And my divorce came through.’

And then Juliet thought, sod the suit – that’s not why she’s here. ‘Good,’ Juliet said. She wiped her hands on her jeans and put her arms around Stella. ‘At long bloody last.’

‘I know.’ And Stella was shocked to feel tears scorch the back of her throat. She attempted to cough them away. ‘Actually, it came last week.’

‘Why didn’t you say?’ Juliet was upset.

‘I felt OK about it. Flat – but OK.’ Her throat still ached. A tear dropped. ‘Shit. I can’t believe I’m going to cry.’ She groaned at herself and stamped.

‘You haven’t heard from him, I suppose?’

Stella shook her head and then reached for some kitchen roll to blow her nose. ‘I’ve been fine – and I’m absolutely fine.’ She was frustrated – more at her tears and herself than at any number of the transgressions that could be pinned on Charlie. ‘Why am I crying now? I’m not really.’

‘I know you’re not. It’s just relief and closure and you’ve waited a long time for it. Welcome to the rest of your life. Come on, chook. Let’s go and raid my dressing-up box.’ Juliet led the way upstairs, pausing with Stella to watch, unseen, Will sitting on Pauly’s bed in utter heaven as one cousin strummed a few chords on his guitar and the other chewed gum and texted on his phone.

‘Try the Paul Smith,’ Juliet said, proffering it for Stella’s approval like a maître d’ presenting a Dover sole.

‘Is that because you feel sorry for me?’ Stella asked wryly, hauling herself back on form – a person who, once a good cry had been had, gathered herself together, dug deep for a smile and wore it until it worked independently.

‘Yes,’ said Juliet. ‘Of course not! Just try it on – the more it’s worn, the more the cost-per-wear goes down and the quicker I can justify the purchase.’

Stella undressed and, though she stood there in black socks and mismatched underwear, Juliet thought what a cracking figure she had. ‘Promise not to bite my head off?’

‘Pardon?’

‘Just – promise.’

‘I promise.’

‘Not to bite my head off.’

‘I promise not to bite your head off!’

‘Please let me sort out a date for you – please?’

‘When? To do what?’

‘No – a date, date.’

Stella wanted to bite Juliet’s head off but as a girl who’d never break a promise, she fell silent and just sent Juliet a black look instead.

‘Do you not feel ready, Stella – is that it?’

Stella didn’t answer, didn’t appear to have heard.

‘It’s been over three years, lovely.’

Stella shrugged. ‘I’m busy. I have Will. I’m fine. Actually, I’m just not interested.’

‘Then you ought to go to your GP and have your hormone levels assessed.’ Juliet thought that might have sounded a little sharp. ‘You’re bloody gorgeous – it’s a waste! And you’re denying yourself the chance to have someone really lovely in your life – not to fill a gap, just to enhance it.’

‘My life is good,’ Stella said and she really believed it.

‘Not all men are like Charlie,’ Juliet said quietly. ‘In fact, few of them are. You know that deep down. I know you know that.’

Stella turned for Juliet to zip up the skirt.

‘Look at your peachy bum, missus!’

Stella looked at herself in the mirror. ‘That’s the genius of Paul Smith tailoring,’ she said.

‘Rubbish!’ said Juliet. ‘It doesn’t look half as good on me, you cow.’ She held the jacket as Stella slipped it on. ‘Just look at you!’

Stella looked. And had to grin. ‘Blimey.’

‘That’s an understatement,’ Juliet said. ‘It would be nice for you to have a little fun,’ she said softly. ‘You deserve it. It’ll be good for you – for your self-esteem.’

‘You sound just like Jo – different vocabulary. She witters on about my mojo.’

‘Go, Jo.’

Stella didn’t want to be drawn. ‘I just don’t think I’m that bothered any more.’

‘If that’s the case, you’ve let bloody Charlie define the rest of your life – and yet he’s now out of your life. You’re really good in a couple, even when the other half was a prize shit. Don’t let what you went through change something that naturally suits you.’

Stella hadn’t thought about it that way. ‘But – Will,’ she explained, as if Juliet (like Jo) had missed the point. ‘It’s too complicated.’

‘No,’ said Juliet strongly. ‘That’s an excuse. It needn’t be complicated – and there’s no reason for Will to be involved. You need to have you-time, doing grown-up stuff. You need to pep up your self-confidence. You think your divorce has diminished you – but actually, it gives you your life back. You’ve probably forgotten what that’s like.’

Stella sighed. She stroked the suit as if it was living. ‘If I say yes, will you stop lecturing me?’

‘Yes,’ said Juliet.

‘But no gynaes.’

‘Roger.’

‘And no one called Roger.’

‘Noted.’

‘And no one too much older or too much younger.’

‘No grandpas, no toyboys.’

‘No facial hair.’

‘No?’

‘No!’

Juliet counted off on her fingers. ‘Mid- to late thirties. Height and weight proportionate. Clean-shaven. Anything else?’

‘No addictions,’ Stella said quietly.

Juliet took her hand and gave it a little squeeze as if to say, you needn’t even think it, let alone say it out loud.

* * *

Siobhan was late, but there again, she’d never been on time. Xander thought about it while he waited – if she’d been a girlfriend, officially, it would be a bone of contention to grind between them; but keeping it casual meant the irritation he felt came also with a sense of relief that no tiresome confrontation was necessary. He hadn’t seen her for a couple of weeks, hadn’t had any contact. But she’d sent him a text which he’d received at lunch-time, alone in the office when Mrs Gregg was taking her hour. Mrs Gregg always took exactly fifty-five minutes so that she had sufficient time to sit back at her desk, pat her hair, wriggle her fingers, look around her desk and then say, ‘So!’ in a bright voice.

The text came through when Xander was thinking, not bloody tuna mayo again, and wondering whether to see what sandwiches Caffe Nero had instead.

Horny. SEx

Siobhan Elliot. Always signed herself SE, the strategically placed kiss turning the whole thing licentious.

I have a cure for that. X

It remained unclear to Siobhan whether that was X for Xander, or a kiss.

They always met at a pub in Standon that neither of them went to at any other time; they always had bar food and a glass of wine, Xander always paid. If they went back to Siobhan’s, Xander left after sex. If Siobhan came to his, she usually stayed the night but not for breakfast. Neither had met the other’s friends nor even knew much of their lives beyond their rendezvous. They’d been seeing each other a couple of times a month for the past six months and the arrangement suited them both.

Her customary lateness was premeditated as it presented her with the opportunity to sashay in, swish her way across to him, sit herself down sinuously. Everything about her was consciously feline. A performance, an act. Everything was about calculated seduction but Xander had done his sums and it all added up. He was therefore a little taken aback at a pair of cold hands covering his eyes when Siobhan came up behind him without him noticing. But there again, a gaggle of women had just come in and he hadn’t thought to look amongst them for her. He encircled her wrists and pulled her hands away from his eyes.

Only it wasn’t Siobhan.

It was Caroline.

At any other time, Xander would have been delighted to see Caroline. But not here, not tonight and not when Siobhan’s arrival was imminent.

‘Hullo, monkey,’ she said.

‘What the fuck are you doing here?’ said Xander.

‘Bloody charming!’ she laughed.

‘Sorry, Cazza, I meant—’

‘You can buy me a pint for that, tosser,’ and Caroline swept her patterned shawl over her shoulder, catching Xander across the cheek with the soft bobble fringing. ‘You’re lucky I don’t give you a slap. Pint, please!’ she said to the barman. ‘He’s paying.’

The landlord gave Xander an odd look as if to say, this isn’t a pick-up joint, you know. And Caroline gave Xander an odd look because she’d never seen him appear so awkward.

‘What are you doing here?’ he asked.

‘Mums’ Night Out,’ Caroline said. ‘We’re bored of Dansbury pubs and your dad’s probably playing dominoes in Little Dee. Pet – are you feeling all right?’ Caroline placed the back of her hand across his brow before stroking his cheek. And that’s what Siobhan saw when she walked in. And that was the moment Caroline clocked the two glasses of wine in front of Xander. She grabbed her pint and look a long drink. ‘Bloody hell – you’re on a date!’

‘Xander?’ Siobhan was here.

Neither Siobhan nor Caroline had ever known Xander to redden nor heard him tongue-tied. Caroline thought it most amusing. Siobhan didn’t.

‘I’m Caroline,’ and she offered her hand, slightly wet with beer, to Siobhan.

‘Siobhan,’ Siobhan said, declining to take it.

‘Siobhan – Caroline, Caroline – Siobhan,’ Xander said, wearily. Caroline was beaming sunnily at Siobhan, as much as Siobhan was staring unimpressed at Xander. Caroline was just about to ask Siobhan a checklist of questions when one of the other mums called her to take her seat at the table and suddenly Xander didn’t know whether he’d rather she stayed rather than went. Or whether he’d rather he and Siobhan went rather than stayed. He drank his wine and couldn’t think what to say to either of them.

‘Right, well, I’ll be leaving you two lovebirds to enjoy your evening then,’ Caroline said and slipped off the bar stool, offering it theatrically to Siobhan who took the seat without acknowledgement. As Caroline backed away, she pointed from her eyes to Xander and then back again. She winked lasciviously and made a telephone gesture with her hand and, with a big grin, joined her party.

‘Old friend,’ said Xander, though Siobhan hadn’t asked. ‘Best friend, really.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘Married, two kids, lives in the village.’

He’d never mentioned Caroline to Siobhan. He didn’t think he’d mentioned anyone in his life to Siobhan, not by name. And, just then, he thought perhaps that was disrespectful – not to Siobhan as much as to Caroline. And then he thought, I’m not here to think.

Siobhan had lasagne with garlic bread and Xander had cottage pie. He’d quite fancied a pudding but the innuendo of spotted dick put him off and he wasn’t keen on anything else. The two of them always arrived and left separately, which made the whole thing slightly detached and clinical but part of their dynamic. No banter in the car, no hand on leg, no sudden eye contact, or sensing the other person’s physical presence. Just a quick look, every now and then, in the rear-view mirror to check that they were still together. And, six months on, together they still were in this ever so liberal, coolly casual way.

They parked and then walked together to Xander’s house in separate silence, Siobhan behind while Xander unlocked the door. She could sense detachment in him – a physical detachment which was not what this whole game was about. The emotional detachment, yes – but hitherto that had enhanced the physical side. Tonight, though, something was different. Usually, they’d be all over each other before the door had closed behind them. Though they always made it into the bedroom, it was having romped and humped their way there from the sitting room, up against all the walls en route and usually a bit of doggy-style halfway up the stairs. But tonight, Xander walked ahead, going straight through to his kitchen, keeping his back to Siobhan, filling a pint glass with water and drinking it down in agitated gulps. He hadn’t let the tap run and the water was unpleasantly tepid. Siobhan stood self-consciously on the boundary of the sitting room and the open-plan kitchen, as if unsure of what came next in this change to the script. Was there to be dialogue? A scene change? There were no stage directions and she felt a little stuck. He was still standing there, his back to her. Did she want a glass of water, she asked herself? No, she didn’t think so. At that moment, it struck her how unnatural all of this was and, just then, she didn’t like the way it made her feel.

Still drinking, Xander turned and faced her and they looked at each other silently. He offered her the glass and she stepped forward to take it. She took a dainty sip and then, locking eyes with Xander, she trickled the rest down her neck where it reached her silk top and spread quickly like ink on blotting paper, turning the silvery tone into gunmetal grey and causing the fabric to cling to her body, her nipples to harden and stand proud. Xander knocked the glass out of her hands and onto the floor where it landed on the rug with a muffled thud. He nudged it away, where it rolled off onto the wooden floor and knocked against the skirting board. And then all was silent again and Siobhan had moved up close to Xander, grabbing fistfuls of his shirt as she reached for his mouth with hers. His hands moved across her body, feeling her flesh through the silk, wet or dry. She was rubbing at his groin where his erection was tantalizingly restricted. Falling onto her knees, she unbuckled his belt, hoicked down the zip and pulled sharply on his jeans and his boxers in one fell swoop. He could feel her breath hot above his cock and could sense how agonizingly close her mouth was, trying to stand steady while the sensation of her caressing his balls with one hand and tracing the crack between his buttocks with the other threatened his balance. And then he was between her lips, deeper into the sucking wet cavity of her mouth; it felt as if she was swallowing him whole.

She pulled away and looked up at him beseechingly. ‘Do you want to come in my mouth? Or my cunt?’

He pulled her to her feet and pressed his tongue into her mouth where it met hers. He grabbed at her skirt and delved his hands up her thighs, foraging through her knickers and into the slippery promise behind. And then he thought, she absolutely reeks of garlic. And then he thought, I don’t have any condoms. And then he thought, oh God, I’m losing my hard-on.

‘In your mouth,’ he whispered as they folded down onto the rug, clawed away the remaining clothing and settled head to toe, tonguing and sucking at each other until they were sated.

Don’t stay the night. Not this time.

‘I’m exhausted,’ Siobhan said. And she headed off to Xander’s bedroom before he could suggest otherwise.

He looked around the sitting room. Strewn clothes. A severely rucked rug. A discarded glass on the floor with a crack now visible. A woman’s shoes – one here, one there. His shirt, in a scrunch and flung onto the kitchen like a wiping-round rag. What had seemed such a good idea had left him with an odd taste in his mouth – akin to feeling nauseous but unable to pinpoint the offending food. Pulling his boxers back up from his ankles, he went to sit in his leather tub chair, taking the phone from his jeans pocket. Two texts. Both from Caroline.

So … you dark horse. Dish the dirt – who is she?

She’d sent another, about ten minutes ago.

Want to come to dinner Fri? With your lady friend?

How to reply? His closest friends – who’d always supported him, who wanted only the best for him and who’d been there for him when his relationship with Laura came to grief. Xander knew, quite categorically, that he didn’t want them to be part of this – this thing – with Siobhan. And that in itself made this thing with Siobhan not quite right.

Chapter Ten

Stella arrived back at Longbridge Hall at two minutes before eleven o’clock and sat in her car listening to the radio for the pips on the hour. She imagined that, for people like the Fortescues, it was considered as impudent to turn up early as it was decreed discourteous to turn up late. She rang the bell and gave a lively knock at precisely eleven o’clock.

‘You’re back?’ Mrs Biggins said, as if Stella might not be of sound mind.

‘I’m expected,’ said Stella, taking off her coat and giving it to Mrs Biggins.

‘One moment,’ Mrs Biggins said and Stella thought she could detect a glint of approval.

When Lydia appeared, Stella felt grateful for Paul Smith and high heels because she both looked and felt taller and more imposing than she had the day before and it was obvious that Lady Lydia had noticed. The woman bristled slightly, tipped her chin upwards as if competing for height. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘As you asked – eleven o’clock prompt.’ And then Stella saw a flicker of confusion scuttle across Lydia’s face and settle as dull discomfort behind her eyes. She softened her tone. ‘To see the grounds?’ Stella prompted in her more usual voice, ‘And art?’

Lydia gathered herself. ‘I’ll take you.’

However, the art wasn’t Beckinsford or any other painter remotely connected with Reynolds, nor was it portraits or landscapes or equine backsides. The Art Lydia took Stella to see was short for Arthur, a wizened old man little younger than Lady Lydia. He lived in an apartment in a wing of the stable courtyard which was some way from the main house and cordoned from view by the mighty wall of the kitchen garden. Made from the same rosy-hued bricks as the main house, the buildings ran three sides of a square, with a central archway crowned by a clock tower. The clock face itself was greening, the hands fixed at ten past three as if it had been dredged up from the pond where it had lain for some time and fish had feasted upon a great many of the numbers. The wing to the right had been converted into two dwellings. To the left, above what must have been the coach bays, appeared to be another apartment – Stella noted curtains at the windows but the glass was so dusty she was sure it was derelict.

Lydia rapped on the door. ‘He’s as deaf as a post,’ she said, with the same exasperation she extended to Mrs Biggins. ‘Art,’ she said when he appeared, ‘please be a dear and take Miss Elmfield around.’

‘It’s Miss Hutton,’ said Stella.

‘He doesn’t need to know, he won’t be interested and he won’t remember,’ Lydia said bitingly whilst smiling benevolently to Art, whose eyes shone like small beads of jet. He disappeared back into his home. ‘And you do not mention why you are here.’

Stella was taken aback.

‘You can be an historian, or a writer – something like that. But not an estate agent. Make it up.’ And she walked away, banging down her stick every stride as if expecting to find part of her land hollow.

‘Hullo!’ Stella said loudly. ‘Lovely day!’

‘It is,’ said Art in a soft voice which suggested she really needn’t raise hers. ‘Where would you like to see first?’

‘Everywhere,’ said Stella.

‘Where in Everywhere?’ Art asked measuredly. ‘Longbridge sits in over five hundred acres.’

‘Seriously!’ Stella had assumed the grounds extended to a posh garden and perhaps a paddock or two.

‘Four hundred arable, the rest pasture – used to be for cattle, just for ponies now – also woodland and the grounds around the house. Formal gardens, pool, kitchen garden, orchard, tennis. Which way to Everywhere do you want to go?’

She liked him instantly. She really liked him; the pared-down way he spoke, his shapeless clothing, old boots, unflattering cap and dark little eyes set into a craggy, haphazardly shaven face. She reckoned Art was either spoken at, or ignored, these days. And perhaps in those days too, if the current Lady’s manner was in any way a family trait.

Silently, Stella cursed Paul Smith and her high heels, not least because Art’s stride was surprisingly assertive and fast. He described the lay of the land, took her on a whistle-stop tour of the livery yard, which was modern and spruce, and an area of old barns the least dilapidated of which were now rented out as workshops. She felt herself being peered at – two young geeky-looking guys in one barn, from another a cabinetmaker whose face was the colour of mahogany. The third had an array of tree stumps outside – whether this was a tree surgeon or a sculptor Stella was unsure. All these people will have to find new premises, she thought to herself. And she thought how odd it would be to rent somewhere purpose built, modern, after being treated to barns like these. And Art would need to find somewhere to live too. And he’s been here decades. But she said nothing and just enthused, instead, about all he showed her.

The formal gardens, which ran in a curvaceous swoop around the house, were shielded from the drive by magnificent rhododendrons. They were set out as manicured swathes of lawn plotted and pieced by rolling herbaceous borders and grand specimen trees. There was a pond, which was really too large to be called such but a lake would sound too ostentatious, also a swimming pool which could have been bigger and, Stella noted, cleaner. Garden seats, small stone obelisks and spheres and statuary were positioned here and there, providing either focal points or surprises. All the while, the house itself appeared pompously to survey all that lay around it. The kitchen garden, however, was its own private world, shielded from the house by a long stone building whose purpose Art explained to Stella.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.