Inheritance

by Ellen Kefferty

  A shabby young man claimed not to know either the groom or the bride, ludicrously claiming that he often went to weddings uninvited just for the free food and booze. Edith rolled her eyes at his obfuscation. She eventually made him admit that he was, almost just as unbelievably, Samuel’s piano teacher. ‘He’s surprisingly bad,’ was his assessment after a few glasses of wine.

  An old man was the long–term recipient of the Faircote’s charity, living rent-free since 1982 in a property owned by the family. Edith gently pressed him for information, given his long association with the family, but it seemed as though an industrial accident had left him with a memory the size of a sticky note. Given that roughly half of his prodigal mind was spent on recalling his name, address, and the circumstances which brought him to his current situation, she doubted that the other half contained anything more consequential. After declaring that the year was 1982 and implying that Jim Bowen was the greatest Prime Minister England had ever had, Edith left off asking anything more than whether he enjoyed his meal. He said it was the best he could remember.

  The one person Edith resolutely refused to speak to was Andrius. Though he sensed her anger he could not divine its cause and joked freely with her despite her silence. The rest of the table were charmed by him and his claims of doing business deals with Sam. His lies slowly became grander, almost monstrous, as he grew confident that the rest of the tables were nobodies. And as he grew more drunk.

  “At university we used to go hiking together, me and Sam,” Andrius declared as he placed his glass of wine down on the table after a long draught, forgetting that he had morphed from a business associate into an old friend, “up in the Peak, Kinder Scout, Mam Tor, the Hope Valley...”

  Andrius stopped suddenly upon receiving a kick under the table from Edith. He cast his gaze at her, facing down her stare, then turned back to the table to resume his story.

  “We would walk for miles and miles without tiring, just happy to be out in nature. He was always a great one for nature, and he introduced me to the English countryside, sparking a love which hasn’t yet waned. There’s nothing like it in Lithuania, especially not flat old Kaunas where I’m from.”

  Everybody on the table had stopped eating and listened in rapt attention. They could tell the story was going to be good. Andrius’s best out of the half dozen he had already fabulated for them. Pausing for a moment to take in the power he had over his listeners, he soon continued.

  “One morning in summer, just after four and with the sun only beginning to rise, Sam woke me and told me to get dressed and packed, ready for a hike. We had discussed plans for future walks many a time, usually over a beer or two, so I knew what he had in mind. He wanted to traverse the whole Peak, from Manchester to Sheffield, without stopping. Forty miles! And he just woke and decided to do it. What a man!”

  Andrius took another sip of wine. Edith glared at her plate of food, eating slowly, stabbing each morsel with a measured anger.

  “Well, we walked and walked and walked, it took us so many hours, and I won’t bore you with the details, but we were in Sheffield by seven that evening. We went to a pub, had a couple of pints, and as we left Sam turned to me and he said...do you know what he said?”

  The table looked at Andrius waiting to know what Sam said on this non–existent hike. The man with the sticky note mind had his mouth gaping open as he shook his head.

  “Sam said to me, ‘Now we walk back!’, can you believe that? It was nearly eight, we had been walking more than half a day, we wouldn’t get back until the next morning, yet this man—this incredible man—wanted to walk another forty miles. I argued with him, I said that the railway station was just over the road, and the train would take an hour. We could be in our warm beds before midnight.

  “But Sam wouldn’t take no for an answer. I threatened to go home on the train, and he threatened to walk home anyway, whether I joined him or not. But, he said, it wouldn’t make a difference to our friendship. And with that I knew the opposite was true: I had to walk home with him because I just couldn’t let him down. He would never think the less of me, but I would think the less of myself.

  “So we began to walk west, out of the city, climbing into the Peak as we went. We reached these three big reservoirs at the edge of the city, Redmires, and then up onto the moor and went by Stanage Pole. When we got to Stanage Edge, the cliff which marks the gateway into the valleys, Sam went up to the edge and pointed to the sunset. It was a beautiful vista of reds and purples, the wind blew warm from the south. He beckoned me to come nearer with a wave of his hand. Though he didn’t look at me, he addressed me with the most honest words I’ve ever heard.

  “‘Andrius, this is what it’s all about. This is the ecstasy of life. Look at this sunset! Look at the hills! Feel the wind on you face! It doesn’t matter that my family has money, that’s for the birds. The beauty of existence is the inheritance of every human. I could die today and be happy, for I have seen true beauty.’”

  Edith clenched her fists beneath the table. She looked at Andrius’s face and wondered what it would feel like to punch him there and then. He wasn’t finished. He couldn’t leave the story at that. He had to push it one step further.

  “I didn’t know what to say to Sam. I stood in silence for a minute and let him look. Then I protested that it would soon be dark and we should make headway while we had the light. I pointed to the path down into the dale and asked him to come.

  “As Sam turned I heard his shoe scuff on a rock and his saw head drop swiftly before my eyes. I swung out my hand. By pure luck I found his. Before I even had chance to think I was holding him, one–handed, above a twenty metre drop.

  “Sam spoke, coolly, to me as he hung there, ‘I’m glad you didn’t take the train!’ I hauled him back up and without another word we went on our way. We barely spoke at all that night as we walked. Nothing needed to be said to a man who had seen true beauty and faced death in the same five minutes.”

  The story was over. Andrius emptied his glass. The others barely knew how to respond. Here, sat before them, was a hero: a man who had saved Sam’s life.

  “Excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom.” Edith stood and stepped away from the table so that she was behind Andrius. She bent down to his ear and whispered. “One of us is full of shit.”

  Now was not the time for a crisis. Now was not the time to sit sobbing in a bathroom stall, ruining your make–up, and letting Andrius win.

  Edith had a job to do which she had barely begun. There were three hundred guests out there and she hadn’t spoken to more than a dozen. More members of the Faircote family gathered in a single place than maybe had been for years or would be again. Sunny had made this chance for her yet she was throwing it away.

  All because she let Andrius get to her.

  Edith knew Andrius could be a prick when he set his mind to it. Why was she even with a man who made everything a competition, a chance to show off? Winning was everything to him. Every day she stayed with him was a small victory for his self–esteem. Every time she was inattentive, refusing his invites or advances, it was a slight. It had been five years, off and on, since they met, and Andrius was caught in a trap of his own making. He had met the one woman who could live without him.

  Or so she thought. Edith knew Andrius better than anybody else, and better than she was even aware. The rich guy act, the big man pretence, the sheer confidence he wore every waking moment worked on her as a fantastic piece of theatre. The rare moments when it slipped, when she saw the man underneath, she looked into the eyes of a man who truly loved her. Nobody else could come near. That’s why she stayed. The act was magnificent and frustrating and exciting. The truth pierced her heart. She couldn’t be without him.

  In her absent thoughts Edith had stopped sobbing. She tore off a few squares of toilet paper and gently blotted her face, seeking to save as much of her make–up as she could. It would take a lot more to look presentable. Andrius could never be allowed to know just
how she felt. That was her act, one she even played on herself.

  At that moment the door to the bathroom swung open and a couple of women rolled in, chatting ceaselessly. Edith pulled up her feet and kept silent in the hope they wouldn’t know she was there. The women went into cubicles either side of Edith, making her attempted concealment ridiculous. The conversation kept going over her head. One woman was clearly very drunk, the other very stupid. Edith decided immediately that they must also be very ugly, based on the firmest foundations of prejudice alone.

  “They are just gorgeous aren’t they?” The drunk one sounded like she had visited this topic a few times already, “They’re just so gorgeous!”

  “I wouldn’t mind a man half as rich as Samuel,” the stupid one added.

  “But Sarah is just so gorgeous! So is Samuel, but Sarah is gorgeous!”

  “Do you think she has money herself?”

  “She must have,” the drunk one paused for moment to consider the logic of her assertion, “just look at her, she’s so gorgeous.”

  Edith rolled her eyes and hugged her knees. They would leave soon enough and leave her alone.

  “That first dance was something special, wasn’t it?”

  Edith looked at her phone, wondering how long she had been in the toilets. Clearly too long if the meal was over and the party had started.

  “They looked gorgeous together!”

  “Oh, they did, didn’t they?”

  “Did you see that gorgeous man?”

  “Which one?”

  The two women began to shuffle and pull on the toilet roll as they finished up. Edith wrinkled her mouth, forced to shamefully listen in silence.

  “The one who took Sarah for a dance after Samuel.”

  “The fat, middle–aged guy?”

  “No! He’s definitely not gorgeous! The man after him, the one who almost pushed in.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “He was gorgeous!”

  “What he look like look like?”

  “Oh, he was about six two, with the floppy blond hair, and that suit which made his arse look gorgeous!”

  Edith froze: Andrius. Andrius was out there, dancing with the beautiful Sarah, while she was holed up in the toilet. He definitely wasn’t thinking of her while she was sobbing over him. She had to get out there and do something, anything, because she just couldn’t sit around feeling bad when he wasn’t feeling anything at all.

  A growl slipped through her clenched jaw. The women were taking too long. They flushed and exited the cubicles, but spent forever washing their hands, chatting inanely—with the information about Andrius Edith had lost track and interest in their conversation—while she was forced to sit still. It would be too awkward to burst out of the cubicle now, pretending that she hadn’t sat in silence listening to their conversation and...

  Edith stumbled right out of her cubicle, unable to restrain herself any longer. She glanced at the two women, correctly judged which one was drunk and which was stupid, smiled that both were as ugly as presumed, and strode over to the mirrors. With a deft swipe of both hands she cleaned away the lines of runny mascara, pivoted on her heel, and made for the exit without attempting to explain a thing.

  Outside the party was well underway. A live band played on the stage. The dance floor eddied with couples well–practiced for dancing gracefully. Everywhere else knots of people stood drinking and talking the best they could over the noise.

  Edith weaved through the knots, gently nodding to a few she had spoken to earlier in the day. When she reached the edge of the dancefloor she stopped and searched for Andrius. He would be obvious by his height and his hair, but there were just too many dancers. After several minutes she still hadn’t spotted him.

  The search was cut short when a greater prize waltzed into view: Samuel Faircote. Edith didn’t know his dancing partner, but given that she didn’t know anybody at the reception, that was no surprise. It struck her that if she couldn’t find Andrius she could at least even up the score.

  Edith hovered on the edge of the dancefloor, sidling along to keep near to Samuel. As the song ended she made a final skip to his side, politely barged the other woman out of the way, and blocked anybody else who might have wanted to cut in. She clamped her hands on Samuel’s shoulder and arm and smiled wordlessly. He grinned self–consciously. The tenth dance of the evening already found him flagging.

  The band started up Beyond the Sea and the pair swayed gently. Edith carefully avoided anything daring. Despite Andrius’s best efforts at teaching her she was still mostly bereft of grace. Samuel let his shoulders relax. He could rest his feet and pretend her leaden moves were exactly the right thing for the music.

  “Congratulations,” Edith thought back to the women in the bathroom, “you and Sarah make a gorgeous couple. And happy.”

  “Thank you,” Samuel sighed without meaning to, “I’m very happy. Of course.”

  “I’m sure Lady Sisel is too.”

  Samuel let out a sharp laugh and looked up and away. “I see you’ve been doing your research.”

  “It wasn’t exactly hard. You put your coat of arms on your business card.”

  “That’s true, but I’m glad you’re earning your keep. What else have you found?” Samuel’s face fell suddenly as though a switch had been flicked.

  The stress of balancing joy and pain tore at his soul. Two of his relatives had been murdered. His wife was the most brilliant woman he could ever have imagined. He could be murdered next. They had a wonderful life before them. Nothing fitted together.

  “Is your father now on the case? I asked for that specifically.” He tightened his grip on her hand.

  “I...very much so,” Edith was unsettled by Samuel’s sudden change of mood. It had happened in the restaurant. She had to play it carefully, “he’s here. I believe that you spoke to, erm, Susan, our operations manager, didn’t you? Practically the whole of Pimlico Associates is on your case.”

  Samuel ignored Edith’s attempted diversion. “Can I talk to him? Your father?”

  “He’s...he has been watching guests from the distance,” Edith nodded slowly and meaningfully, “he lets me know if there’s anybody I should investigate further. I also have one of our associates as my plus one, as was agreed.” Edith pointed vaguely at another part of the dance floor where Andrius might have been dancing.

  “Good, good,” Samuel swayed thoughtlessly for a moment, then pulled her nearer and spoke almost in a whisper, “I need to know why. Why are they doing this?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “What possibilities are there?”

  “Your title.”

  “My title?”

  “Yes.”

  “Somebody wants it? They can have it.”

  “I don’t know if somebody wants it.”

  “Then why would you think so?”

  “I went to the College of Arms. Your pedigree...”

  “My pedigree? I didn’t know I had one.”

  “Yes. Well,” Edith wrinkled her mouth, “you did. Somebody has taken it.”

  “Why? No, wait, I’m not stupid. Of course I know why.”

  “They’re looking for...”

  “...their next victims.”

  Samuel fell silent. His dancing slowed to a shuffle. He hugged Edith tight, almost unseemly so given the eyes all around them. She couldn’t think of anything to comfort him. This should have been the happiest day of his life, yet he was terrorized by the cold realization that somebody, out there, wanted to destroy his whole family. Maybe even those not yet born.

  How could she be at this wedding, pretending to provide security, while doing nothing at all about it? Samuel expected more of her than Edith could offer. She needed to live up to the promise, however ludicrous.

  The song was ending and she had to think fast. Another woman would want to dance and she couldn’t claim him forever.

  “Are you staying in the house?”

  “Yes. Why?”
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  “Whereabouts?”

  “In the main chamber,” Samuel sighed, “it’s an honour really. Not many people get to do so. It’s really a museum. The rest of our family are staying in the estate’s cottages.”

  “So it will be just you two?”

  “And the house security, I guess”

  Edith took a deep breath. She had to sound cool and decisive. There was little chance of Samuel coming to harm that night, but he had to believe that too.

  “That’s not enough. With your permission I’ll have my people do a sweep of the house to ensure everything is safe.”

  “If you think that...”

  “That’s what we’re here for, Mr Faircote, to keep you safe.”

  Edith broke away from Samuel as the song ended and walked slowly to the edge of the dancefloor. She wondered if she had overplayed her promise. How was she ever going to look like she was fulfilling it?

  Edith strode away from the dancefloor with her head hung low, heading straight for the main door. She swung her arm militantly. He stare fixed ahead. The appearance of determination. Nobody would have the chance to stop her with the offer of another dance or an idle conversation. The crowd gently gave way as she walked by. She was nearly as the door...

  “Oh!” Edith cried as she bumped into a man stood by the door, “I’m sorry.”

  As she looked up the man said nothing. He smiled sweetly at her, his blond hair flopping to one side.

  “Andrius! What are you doing here?”

  “Babe, I’m your plus one, remember? You invited me!” Andrius chuckled as he put a hand on Edith’s arm.

  “No, I mean,” Edith shook off Andrius’s hand, “you know what I mean. Why aren’t you back there, on the dancefloor? I hear you like dancing.”

  “I could ask the same of you. Where are you going?” One hand rested on a hip.

  “I have to do something for Samuel. It’s important, he’s the reason why we’re here, after all.”

  “I thought we were just asking questions?” Andrius let his eyes wander over the party and away in silence. He planted his other hand on the door frame so that he blocked her way. “I saw you dancing with Samuel.”