A Winter’s Tale (24 page)

‘Yes, and I didn’t want to disturb you so I came up the backstairs and listened from the gallery long enough to get the “all hands to the pumps or the ship will sink” message, then popped up to the attic. I’ve still got some stuff stored up here,’ he explained, closing the door behind him and leading the way back down the stairs. ‘Must sort it out sometime, because I don’t suppose you want my childhood junk cluttering up the place if you are having a big clear-out.’

‘I don’t mind,’ I replied, wondering what he had kept up there that was so embarrassing his first impulse had been to hide the bag behind his back. Old girlie mags, maybe? ‘Some of my and Lucy’s things are up there too, because it’s where Jonah put them when I sent them down. You’ll have to point out to me what’s yours eventually, but it’ll take ages to get the rest of the house in order before I even
think
about sorting out the attic floor and—’

‘I can see you want to clean the place up, Sophy,’ he interrupted me, ‘and as I’ve said, I’m all for that—but I did suggest you ought to defer any major plans until we’ve had the roof and timbers looked at, got some estimates, and discussed it all.’

I noted the ‘we’ with a sinking heart and turned to face him squarely as we reached the corridor outside my room. ‘Jack, I did mean it when I said on the phone to you that I couldn’t bear to give up Winter’s End, you know. I simply
can’t
sell it, even to you.’

‘But, darling,’ he said in his lovely, mesmerising voice, his blue eyes hurt, ‘I know it’s early days yet, but I thought you felt the same as me and—well, that you wouldn’t so much be
selling
Winter’s End as
transferring
it back to its
rightful owner, before we settle down here for ever—the perfect partnership! I want this always to be your home, too.’ He put his arm around me and looked down into my bemused face. ‘You know it’s the only thing to do, Sophy—the right thing to do?’

One little part of my brain—the everyday, sane, Sophy bit—was jaw-droppingly stunned, wondering what exactly he’d meant by a ‘partnership’ the rest of me was drowning in the deep, sincere, cerulean depths of his eyes. His soft voice lapped over me like warm waves, my heart was thumping away like mad and I was starting to go dizzy.

Then suddenly it felt as though someone had poured a bucket of iced ectoplasm down my back and Alys’s translucent face materialised, palely glimmering, from the darkness behind Jack.

‘I
wish
you wouldn’t do that!’ I said, with a gasp.

Alys shook her head, more in sorrow than in anger, before fading away, leaving me shivering violently.

The spell was well and truly broken, but Jack had clearly felt nothing, for he was still looking down at me expectantly. ‘Do what?’

I pulled back gently. ‘Jack, it’s so wonderful to find family I never knew I had, and you know you’ll always be welcome here, because it’s just as much your home as mine. But I didn’t realise how deeply I cared about Winter’s End until I came back, and now I feel that control of it simply
has
to stay in my hands. It’s what my grandfather wanted, what I want—and what the
house
wants too.’

I might have added that it also seemed to be what Alys Blezzard wanted, but thought that might be an assertion too far for him to take in at present.

‘I know just how you feel,’ he said, though going by his confident smile, I still didn’t really think he’d grasped what I was saying in the least. In fact, he looked like a man who’d
always known he could have anything he wanted, whenever he wanted it—including me. ‘But you couldn’t possibly take it on alone, with no resources, because it needs an awful lot of money spending on it. I’ll show you later. There’s woodworm up in the attics for a start—and probably worse.’

‘
Worse?
What do you mean?’

He shrugged. ‘Wet rot, dry rot…maybe even deathwatch beetle…’

I stared at him with horror. ‘Surely not?’

‘It may not be as bad as it looks,’ he assured me.

‘Oh God! Look, just let me change into my jeans and you can show me now.’

‘Sorry, didn’t I say? I’m going out to lunch.’

‘
Out?
But you’ve only just got here!’

‘I’ve got lots of friends locally, and we like to catch up when I’m here,’ he explained, and I immediately felt like Billy-no-mates, especially since he didn’t invite me to go with him. ‘I thought I’d get it out of the way, so we can spend the rest of the weekend together.’

‘Of course,’ I agreed, wondering if the friends included the luscious Melinda. ‘And actually, I’d decided to make a proper start on the cleaning today anyway. I’d better get on with it.’

He raised a quizzical eyebrow. ‘Not on your own, surely? Aren’t you going to get people in to help?’

‘No, rough cleaning has already done too much damage and I want to conserve what’s left. I’ll do it one inch at a time and get there in the end—you’ll see. I’ve got industrial-sized amounts of cleaning materials arriving early next week and Hebe has given me beeswax polish and bushels of rose potpourri.’

He looked at me strangely. ‘You look excited about
cleaning
the place!’

‘Oh, I am, I’m dying to see what a bit of TLC and elbow grease can do. Another pair of hands would be really useful, though, and there are one or two things you could help me
with while you’re here if—’ I had begun enthusiastically, when he glanced at his Rolex and exclaimed at the time.

‘Must dash!’ He kissed my cheek in a cloud of that delicious aftershave and dashed off, tossing gaily over his shoulder, ‘See you at dinner.’

Dinner?
Was he going to be out to lunch all afternoon?

Only after he’d removed his effulgent presence from before my dazzled eyes did I start to wonder how he’d got into the locked attic in the first place. At least, I was pretty sure I’d locked it…hadn’t I? I went back up and, opening the door, switched on the light. In the first room my and Lucy’s boxes and bags and sticks of furniture were stacked up, and I noticed that the top cartons were untaped.

Had they been like that before? I couldn’t remember—but maybe Aunt Hebe had been curious enough to come up here and rummage round when they arrived. Or perhaps neither she nor Jack had believed that I hadn’t got Alys’s book and one or both of them had searched my possessions for it?

It was not a comfortable thought. I could imagine Aunt Hebe thinking she had the right to do it, but I found it hard to believe that Jack would poke and pry into my personal possessions. He seemed such a sincere person, whatever everyone else said about him, though I suppose there must be a touch of ruthlessness about him where business is concerned, as both Mr Hobbs and Mr Yatton had implied, or he wouldn’t be a successful entrepreneur.

Alys didn’t seem to trust him either—did she know something about him I didn’t? Maybe I should buy a Ouija board and ask her.

I had a quick early lunch alone in the kitchen, helping myself from a vat of cockieleekie soup pushed to the back of the Aga, and then decided to start on Lady Anne’s parlour in earnest. I felt drawn to the room, but also I wanted to start
making my patchwork cushions in there in the evenings. They’re not just a lucrative sideline, they’re an addiction.

It was lucky I hadn’t advertised for a while, and so had completed what orders I had had before I moved here. Now I could start making a stock of cushions to sell in the brand-new gift shop-cum-tearoom instead, perhaps with the family crest embroidered on each one.

But first things first. I removed the grubby chintz covers from the furniture, revealing a rather nice bergère suite with faded red velvet cushions, a ladylike pair of small Victorian armchairs in a dull, mossy green and a padded tapestry rocking chair. I took the huge armful of dusty-smelling fabric through to the utility room and loaded the first batch into the washing machine on a cool cycle, hoping they wouldn’t shrink, before collecting a stepladder and cleaning materials.

‘I’ll be glad when everything else I ordered arrives,’ I said, finding Mrs Lark in the kitchen as I was on the way back, loaded down and shadowed by Charlie. ‘I need the proper solutions—
and
Renaissance wax.’

She popped a piece of rather chewy Dundee cake in my mouth, as though she were feeding a baby bird. ‘Grace’d love a Dyson. She says that old Hoover’s more blow than suck.’

I chewed and swallowed. ‘Good idea—and ideally we should have one upstairs and one down. I’ll put them on my list when I’ve got my hands free.’

I’d taken to wearing my little embroidered bag with the notebook, pen and big bunch of keys, permanently slung across my ample chest, messenger style, and the list was now assuming the proportions of a short novel. As soon as I crossed one thing off, ten others took its place.

A few hours later I stepped back and looked at the parlour, brushing strands of hair from my face with one grimy hand,
hot despite having opened one of the windows to let in the chilly breeze.

What had looked like a century’s worth of cobwebs were gone from the ceiling and light fittings, and I had taken the worst of the dust off everything, though careful washing and polishing remained to be done.

Using the stepladders I’d managed to unhook all but one of the heavy curtains, which now lay bundled on the floor, ready to be sent to the cleaners. I only hoped they would survive the experience. I was just struggling with the last one when Seth’s dark head suddenly popped in at the open window.

You know that bit in
Jurassic Park
where the velociraptors are chasing the children round the kitchens? Well, it felt just like that. My heart stopped dead and I nearly fell off the ladder.

He shot out one large hand and steadied it as I wobbled precariously, then regarded first me, and then the room, with mild surprise. ‘“And beauty making beautiful…”’ he quoted unexpectedly, adding complacently, ‘Shakespeare—one of the sonnets. I forget which.’

I blushed even though I wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic or offering an olive branch, in his own fashion. ‘I’m in a beautiful state of filth, that’s for sure! And the room still has a long way to go.’

‘A bit of dirt never hurt anyone.
I
revel in dirt,’ he said amiably.

I looked at him cautiously, wondering what had brought on this sudden friendliness. He must have seen my surprise, because he explained. ‘Ottie’s given me a rocket. As she pointed out, it would have been even worse if Jack inherited Winter’s End because there’s a good chance he’d sell it. That’s probably why he’s been urging me to turf the bottom terrace and leave the garden restoration at that, since Sir William died—he doesn’t want any more money spent on it.’

‘I know you don’t think a lot of Jack, but this is his family home and he wouldn’t sell it. You are quite wrong about that,’ I said hotly.

‘You really don’t know him that well yet, do you? No, Ottie’s probably right, so now I’m not allowed to be anything other than complaisant and helpful…even if I
do
still think that taking my gardeners off their own work, when we’re so near completing the lower terrace, is a bit arbitrary, to say the least.’

‘I haven’t entirely, they just have to help out with the house now too,’ I said patiently. ‘You must see that I need help and I can’t afford to employ more people in the house, so unless you want to lose a gardener or two entirely, this is the only solution.’

He looked around at my handiwork and had to agree. ‘I suppose you’re at least putting your money where your mouth is—you’ve already single-handedly transformed this room.’

I grinned. ‘Actually, I
adore
cleaning and have been dying to make a start. It’s my one skill. I’ve spent all my life mucking out minor stately homes. It’s something I know all about—that, and doing the tour guide thing.’ I turned on the stepladder and began to try to unjam the stiff brass curtain hooks again, and he pushed the window further open and climbed in over the sill.

‘Come down from there!’ he ordered. ‘Those curtains are too heavy. You should have got someone to help you.’

‘I managed fine, it’s just this last one that’s stiff.’

But I was glad to let him wrest the hooks into submission, and when the last curtain was down, asked, ‘Would you mind helping me to bundle them up for the cleaners, too?’

‘Will they survive it?’ he said doubtfully.

‘They’ve got two chances—but they’re heavy William Morris fabric, so probably. But if not, I know you can still
get the same pattern, at a price. I rather like it, don’t you? It’s Victorian, of course, but the furnishings and décor at Winter’s End are such an eclectic hotchpotch of ages and styles that they somehow blend together and I want to keep it that way.’

Charlie had been sneezing at the dust and getting in our way while we were folding curtains, but as the door swung open he turned and barked wheezily at Jack, not stopping until I picked him up.

‘That animal hates me,’ Jack said disgustedly. ‘It has no discrimination. Hi, Seth, how’s the trug and trowel trade?’

Seth sighed deeply, so I guessed he’d heard that line a million times before. ‘Fine,’ he said, putting the bundle of folded curtain down on the floor with the others. ‘See you later,’ he added, turning on his heel and going out by the terrace door, but whether he was talking to Jack or me I wasn’t sure. The room felt suddenly chilly and full of portents, and I was shivering.