Mum escaped because she was off working as a Land Girl, my uncle Jim was away in the navy, chasing Japanese aircraft carriers somewhere in the Pacific and my uncle Tom was giving Jerry hell in Italy, so they were the only surviving family members. Sadly, Tom then died just as his unit got off the beach on D-Day and Jim, who decided to stay in the navy after the war, died of something he caught off a Japanese lady of easy virtue, sometime in 1949, so I never knew either of them.
Hands trembling with excitement, I dialled the number on the elegantly headed note paper and asked for Mr Swann, he of Swann, Upping and Ditchford, the partner who had signed the letter.
'I'm sorry, madame,' the arch female voice on the other end replied, in a tone that had about as much regret as I've got testicles, 'but Mr George Swann is away for the Christmas and Mr Graham Swann is off with the flu at the moment. Which one was it you needed to speak to?'
Did it matter which one, I asked myself? If neither of them was there, what bloody difference did it make anyway? However, I held my impatience and my temper in check and explained the purpose of my call.
'Oh, that will be Mr George,' the woman said. 'Would you like me to make you an appointment?' I heard a rustling of paper in the background, accompanied by a slightly off-key, hummed rendition of Peter Sarsted's Where Do You Go To My Lovely. I drummed my fingers - not in time - on the telephone table in our hallway.
'January the fifth, three-thirty?' It was meant to sound like a question, but she said it in a way that left me in no doubt that it was almost a take-it-or-leave-it thing. Leave it and the next offer would probably be somewhere in February.
I took it.
Angelina twisted against her bondage, in a vain attempt to ease the growing strain on her arms, but there was no real hope of relief, for the maids had stretched her tall in order to shackle her wrists and whoever had determined the lengths of the cords which held the leather straps had apparently intended that she should be forced onto tiptoe, so that her feet arched even more than the delicate shoes required.
Tears trickling down her exquisitely powdered cheeks, she tossed her head in anger and frustration, the now tangled mane of blonde curls sweeping about her bare shoulders with a mocking whisper. She groaned, biting her lip savagely, and then the groan turned to a whimper of fear as she heard the scuttling sounds from somewhere behind her in the shadows. She threw back her head and screamed with all her might.
'Gregory! Help! Gregory!' The sound echoed around the blank stone walls and out through the open door of the corridor beyond, but as her screams died away there came no answering shout, no sound of booted feet upon the paved floor beyond.
'Infamy!' she muttered between clenched teeth. 'Oh, such cruel infamy, but you shall pay for this, Sir Gregory Hacklebury, or my name is not Angelina Thyme!'
Chichester in January. Much the same as it is all the rest of the year round, though there are fewer tourists, the culture vultures who descend on cathedrals and Roman ruins and suchlike. Also, it tends to be colder in January, though not always.
I'd taken the bus up to Havant, on the mainland, and then the train, passing through the small stations that were mostly little more than halt stops, and then walked my way up to North Street, carefully avoiding the puddles where the paving stones had sunk somewhat, though my new platform-soled boots would have kept my feet at least two inches above the waterline. They also drew a few looks from the more conservative shoppers who were on the streets that morning.
Swann, Upping and Ditchford. Obviously Mr Graham Swann hadn't yet served his half century apprenticeship that would one day entitle him to be part of a Swann, Swann, Upping and Ditchford, or maybe they were just saving money on gold leaf and sign writing, working on the premise that Mr George would die (solicitors never retire) and therefore there would only be one Swann to worry about anyway.
Their offices were situated in a very old converted house, tucked away in one of the myriad lanes that form a maze for the unwary who stray from the four main, compass-point named streets that form the centre of Chichester. Former front parlour, small desk, vapid looking girl behind a desk marked Reception. I got rather a bland one - reception, that is - but then I suspect she greeted all prospective clients in much the same disinterested fashion.
Take a seat.
Wait.
Upstairs. Second door on the left.
The corpse of Mr George Swann. No, the corpse moved.
Mr George Swann rose from behind his desk, like Dracula arising from his coffin. He smiled. No fangs, at least. He held out a white and skeletal hand. I shook it and it felt cold, like ice.
'Miss Spigwell-Thyme?' he greeted me. Well, his voice was warm, at least. 'Do please take a seat.' He came around the desk and ushered me into an ancient, leather-backed chair, the leather cracked and worn, the seat dented by God knows how many generations of backsides.
I passed over my birth certificate, the passport I'd sent off for but never used when a sudden bout of flu put paid to my intended holiday in Spain the previous summer. I handed him the envelope with my school reports in, my parents' wedding certificate and two gas bills addressed to my dad at the house at Sandy Point. Mr George Swann extracted a pair of half moon glasses from his jacket pocket, perched them on his gothic nose and peered.
And peered some more. He was pretty thorough with his peering, was Mr George Swann, and I found myself wondering, somewhat irreverently, whether he ought to have been a Peer of the Realm. Well, you think funny things when you're just sitting there, looking and feeling like a stuffed daisy.
'Well, everything seems to be in order, Miss Spigwell-Thyme.'
'Please,' I said, 'do call me Teena.'
'With two "e's",' he said, smiling at me over the top of my latest school report. So, he was human after all. I nodded.
'My dad,' I said, shrugging, by way of explanation.
'Ah,' he said, and I could see he understood completely. He lowered my report and placed it back with the rest of my identification kit, which he then pushed gently back across the desk towards me. He sat back, twined his long fingers together and smiled at me.
'I expect you're impatient to learn the reason for my asking you to come here?' he began. Stupid question. I smiled back and nodded. He reached down, opened a drawer and took out a manila folder that was not just bulky, but untidily stuffed. He laid it on the leather top between us and I peered at the upside-down writing on the cover, but it was a waste of time. The handwriting was so scrawly I'd have struggled to decipher it even the right way up.
'Miss Amelia Jane Spigwell,' he said. He folded back the cover, revealing a top sheet of paper covered with scrawl identical to that I'd already seen. 'Miss Amelia Jane Spigwell, born in Lavant, West Sussex, eighteenth of December, in the year of our Lord, eighteen hundred and seventy-one. Died March first, nineteen hundred and seventy-four. Last year,' he added.
'Last year,' I agreed. 'And?'
'And you've never heard of her, I presume?'
'Never.' I shook my head. 'Who was she? A distant relation, I suppose?' Not that distant, I thought to myself, not if she'd lived in Lavant all her life. Call it a dozen or so miles, at a guess? But of course, we weren't talking distances measured in miles.
'She would have been. Let's see now and make sure I've got this right...' He wrinkled his already wrinkled forehead into several more lines and I could almost hear the antique cogs meshing. 'Yes, Amelia would have been your great-great-great aunt. On your father's side, of course.'
'Of course,' I said. Mum's family name was Hooper, in case you were wondering.
'Amelia Spigwell never married,' Mr Swann said. 'She was apparently once engaged to a young army officer, but according to her diaries, he was killed in the Boer War, at the beginning of this century, that is.'
'First or Second Boer War?' I asked. He looked surprised, but then, as I said, I was good at history in school. He peered back down again and I guessed that he did a lot of peering, as he had it off to a fine art now.
'Second,' I said smugly, hoping to God I was right, but guessing that he wouldn't know the difference anyway.
'Yes, that's right,' he said, but I suspected he was guessing. Unless, of course, he'd actually been there in person - he certainly looked old enough. He coughed and cleared his throat. 'Anyway,' he continued, 'as I was saying, Amelia Spigwell never married and, when she died, by the terms of her will her estate was to go to her oldest surviving female relative.'
'Me?' It came out like a squeak.
'You,' Mr Swann confirmed, with another nod.
'Are you sure?' Stupid Teena, of course he was sure, otherwise he wouldn't have sent for you. Any doubts were quickly dispelled.
'We've searched all the relevant records,' he continued, 'and though there are a few gaps here and there, the law only requires that we search what exists to be searched and that we also advertise in the proper quarters for any other possible claimants, which we did last year.
'None,' he said, with suitable gravity, 'have been forthcoming. There was a Nigel Spigwell from Cumberland, but if he ever did have any connection with our Spigwells, then it would have to date from well before Amelia's birth, so it wouldn't count.'
'I thought you said eldest surviving female relative?' I demanded. I don't miss much, as you'll see. Mr Swann nodded. He nodded as efficiently and neatly as he peered.
'Yes,' he said. 'Nigel Spigwell has a daughter, Hayley.'
'Ah.'
'But don't worry,' Mr Swann assured me, smiling again. 'As I say, any claim in that direction couldn't possibly hold up, so you, miss, er, Teena - with two "e's" - are the rightful heir, or heiress, perhaps I should say, to the entire estate of Amelia Jane Spigwell.'
'Wow!' I said and let out a long breath. I hesitated. 'And?'
'And you'd like to know how much,' he said, reading my mind. Not that it took much reading, I suppose. After all, anyone would have been wondering the same thing, wouldn't they? He did some more peering, some more nodding and then peered again.
'There's a cottage,' he said.
'Lavant?' I guessed. He shook his head, which made a change from all the nodding.
'Rowlands Castle,' he said. This time I nodded.
'Nice,' I said. 'Pretty area.' Pretty expensive, too, or at least it was in those days.
'The cottage is called Rose Lea,' he continued. 'That's Lea spelt with an "a", nothing to do with Gypsy Rose Lee. It has three bedrooms, two reception rooms, a kitchen and a bathroom. Oh yes, and a quarter of an acre of garden.'
'Full of roses?'
'Quite possibly.' He peered over his half moons and smiled at me and I could tell that he liked me. Actually, it might just have been my short skirt and the several acres of black tight clad thigh I was displaying when I first entered his room. My legs have that effect on men - unless they're gay, of course.
'There are also shares in several companies,' he went on, 'plus you now own the freehold on four other cottages, though there are sitting tenants in all of those. Ah, and you also own a one third share of The Ploughman's Respite. It's a public house, I believe, on the road between Rowlands Castle and Havant.'
Double wow! A pub! I love pubs. I mean, not that I was an alcoholic or anything, but I was prepared to practise and learn. Mr Swann did yet more peering and finally laid his sheet of paper down.
'All in all,' he summarised, 'the current valuation of your inheritance, including the money on deposit in various bank accounts and allowing for death duties, etcetera, etcetera...' he paused, '...the current valuation, which isn't strictly current as it takes no count of interest accrued on deposits since it was calculated three weeks ago, is a grand total of four hundred and eighty-nine thousand pounds and seventy-three pence.'
My previous self-control, kept together mostly by my slightly obtuse sense of humour and my ability to treat most things as if they aren't really happening to me anyway, collapsed. And I collapsed with it.
'Wh-what?' I managed to gasp, eventually. 'How much?' He repeated the figure and I held my hand to my head, as if it might fall off at any moment. My head, that is, not my hand.
A moment here, for explanation and expansion. Nearly half a million quid - pounds to you overseas readers - a lot of money. A real lot of money. Not many eighteen-year-olds get that sort of thing thrown into their lap. But wait - there's more.
This was nineteen seventy-five we're talking about. Nearly half a million pounds in the mid-seventies would equate to something like three million in today's money, give or take the odd hundred thousand here and there! I felt my stomach contract, go cold, turn a slow somersault and then try to vacate my body through a part of it that no lady should ever mention in polite company. And, as I already said, I know all about being a lady.
I also know all about not being a lady, too, and who says you're polite company anyway? So, all right, I nearly soiled my new knickers and, if it hadn't been for the timely intervention of Mr Swann, who's obvious previous experiences of traumatised females had led him to secrete a bottle of brandy and a glass within easy reach, I think I would have passed out.
A generous double measure of Hennessy Cognac coursed its velvet way down my frozen throat and then I heard myself let out a long, low groan. No, not of pain; it was just a reaction and, a moment later, it was all I could do to stop myself from jumping up on Mr Swann's two hundred year old desk, platform-soled boots and all and dancing around, screaming: "I'm rich! I'm rich!"
Very unladylike.
She heard him approaching from afar, the sound of his heavy measured stride reverberating along the passageway and, when he paused before entering, it was all Angelina could do to prevent herself from trying to look round. Her small jaw set firm, she closed her eyes and kept herself pressed tightly against the wooden rack.
'You seem very quiet now, my little spitfire,' he drawled, and there was no mistaking the mockery in his voice. 'The benefits of a spell of solitude, no doubt.'
Angelina made no reply, neither did she open her eyes, but she could picture him clearly in her mind: the languid posture, the broad shoulders, with the tightly cut jacket emphasising every muscle, the close fitting breeches and, probably, his favourite riding boots. His face, however, suddenly refused to form itself clearly in her head.
She could see the shock of black hair plainly enough, with the unruly curl that perpetually flopped across his brow, but below that his features seemed to swim in a mist, so that even his square and arrogant jaw seemed to be dissolving into a constantly shifting mist.
'Still nothing to say?' he said, and she heard his boots sound twice upon the floor as he moved further into the room. Angelina swallowed hard and clenched her teeth. 'I see,' he said again. 'Then perhaps a proper and fulsome lesson is in order.
'Madame,' he continued, taking yet another step closer to her, 'your reticence and feigned innocence have become very tiresome to me and the prospect of the dowry offered by your guardian cannot compensate for the icy aspect you have continued to present.
'God knows that I have tried everything and have been patience personified, but your pretended saintliness has finally cracked my resolve. You shall be my wife and you will learn that I am the master in this house. And do not for one moment think that your guardian will come to your aid in this matter.
'Indeed, I think - nay, I know, madame - that Lord Pickering will be only too relieved to be shot of you as a responsibility. His fortunes, of late, have suffered and the merest hint from myself that I would accept a smaller dowry to take you off his hands would be more than enough to stifle whatever might remain of his scruples.'
'You think that money is the answer to everything,' Angelina snapped, unable to maintain her silence any longer. 'Well, sir, I tell you this. There is not enough gold in the world to buy what you expect from me. I would rather rot in Hell.'
'Boldly said,' Hacklebury chuckled, 'but perhaps you would not be so willing if you truly knew what Hell was. Mayhap I sha
ll give you a glimpse, albeit of a hell that is of this world. I think,' he continued, his voice suddenly sounding unnaturally hard, 'that I should have done so these many weeks past.'
Mum went one better than me when I broke the news to her and dad, later that day. She fainted, but then she was sitting in that big old armchair of hers, so she didn't come to any harm and, following Mr Swann's example, I had a small bottle of something reviving in my handbag.
Two double cognac's later:
'Teen, you're rich!' dad exclaimed. Not slow, my dad. You can see where I get it from.
'Very rich,' mum said. She had gone very quiet, even though the colour had come back to her cheeks.
'I'm still getting used to the idea,' I admitted. I paused, thinking. 'Will you both come over with me and see this cottage?' I asked eventually. 'Dad?' Dad still drove regularly, though his battered Wolseley saloon had of late been wearing far worse than he was. He nodded.
'Of course,' he said. 'I'll drive us all over tomorrow, if you like.'
'And I'll buy us all lunch at my new pub,' I said. 'Well, my third of it, anyway. We'll have to stop at the bank in Havant, though,' I added. 'I need to give them my signature and then I can draw some money out.'
Oh, that sounded good. I was warming to the idea of being an heiress. Me, an heiress - and with a part share in a pub. Ye gods, I was every man's dream girl and blonde into the bargain.
Suddenly I started laughing and I couldn't stop, not for ages, not until the tears were running down my cheeks and dripping all over the front of my new top and soaking it through to my new bra, the one that matched the new knickers that nearly met an untimely end in Mr Swann's office.
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