House in the Hills

by House in the Hills (retail) (epub)

  Seth Armitage made no response, but perceived that this nostalgia had a purpose. Everything Walter said led somewhere. But he made no comment about the family’s history. Walter Shellard received enough flattering comments without him adding to them. The truth was that he was the shrewdest and perhaps the cleverest of his line.

  ‘Presuming you’ve got something in mind, I’ve sent Arthur Freeman a note for you to meet at your club,’ said Seth.

  Walter half turned and half smiled. ‘You have the knack of precipitating my next move, Seth. How come you know me that well?’

  Seth lifted that snowy eyebrow again and fixed him with his own half-smile. ‘You forget. I served your father before you. You’re just like him and though I’m old I still think on my feet. Pity I won’t be around to give the same service to your son.’

  Walter laughed and slapped his old friend on the shoulder. ‘You’ll live to be a hundred, Seth.’

  Seth shook his head. ‘I doubt it.’

  ‘Right,’ said Walter, his mind already working out a plan of action, a plan that would give him more vineyards, more power, more wealth. ‘What time?’

  ‘Eleven.’

  ‘Eleven. I’ll be there.’

  ‘He hasn’t confirmed yet.’

  ‘He’ll be there. I’ll guarantee it.’

  Seth Armitage didn’t doubt it. When it came to business, a cunning look came to Walter’s eyes as easily as his smile. Like a fox he was out to make a kill, and also like the fox he measured his risks, not committing himself unless he was 100 per cent sure of success.

  ‘I doubt whether he’d consider a directorship in exchange for a half-interest. No matter what you offer, he’s likely to drive a hard bargain.’ Walter’s eyes narrowed. Again he thought of that long-dead ancestor and how a marriage to a moneyed woman had founded a dynasty. Seth couldn’t read his thoughts, so continued imparting sound, but repetitive advice. ‘He’ll require some kind of affirmation of title; a surety that he’d still have some say in the running of the company. And a guarantee of income, of course. He’s looking for long-term benefit. That’s the only way we’ll get him on board. Do you have something in mind?’

  Walter was still looking out of the window. The city light made sharper the already sculpted brow, high cheeks and strong chin. There was no emotion in his voice when he spoke, only determination and an unfailing belief in himself. ‘Like kings and queens of old, my family made favourable marriages in their time. There are great advantages in making your opponent your business partner and a family member – albeit a very minor one.’

  * * *

  Clifton Gentlemen’s Club smelled of beeswax, brandy and hair oil. Black-suited retainers padded over the shiny brown floor carrying a single glass on a silver tray.

  Walter was sitting in a leather armchair reading The Times. One of these neat suited men had brought him a single malt. He’d sipped sedately as he waited, appearing engrossed in his newspaper. In truth his eyes never missed a thing.

  A mouthful of malt remained in the glass sitting on the small circular table at his side; just enough to swallow in one gulp before ordering another. The object of this visit entered without being aware that Walter had spotted him. Robert Arthur Freeman had arrived. Though his shadow had fallen over him, Walter gave no sign that he noticed. Best to let Freeman make the first move, he decided.

  ‘Shellard. I hear you wanted to see me.’

  ‘Good timing, Robert,’ said Walter, laying down his paper. ‘I was just about to order another drink.’

  Saying that, he drained his glass and ordered a malt for himself and a gin for his guest.

  One glance and he had committed Arthur Freeman’s details to memory. Average height, grey suit, overlong hair; he had a handsome face, boyish almost, although he was around forty years old. His mouth was wide and betrayed his sensual nature. He wore a rose in his lapel and carried a silver-topped walking stick and was foppish edging on the melodramatic. His reputation went before him. He loved the good things in life; women – very young women – wine and an opulent lifestyle.

  So did Walter, though he never allowed any of those things to intrude on his ambitions. Power, wealth and the acquisition thereof would always be the prime movers in his life.

  ‘I haven’t got time for preamble,’ said Arthur Freeman, after swallowing a third of his drink. ‘I’ve stated my price.’

  Walter was not rattled by his brusqueness. On the contrary, his behaviour was exactly as predicted; success in business was all about good research and knowing your opponent.

  ‘Quite so,’ said Walter, his fingers interlaced across his chest in the manner of an older man, like Seth perhaps, as though checking the beating of an ageing heart. ‘An amalgamation of our Spanish properties would be advantageous to both of us.’

  Robert tipped more of the clear liquid into his mouth and swallowed. ‘At the right price,’ he said, draining his glass and calling for another. ‘On my account,’ he said to the waiter.

  The waiter looked nervous. ‘I’m sorry, sir, but it has to be…’

  ‘Here.’ Robert threw him two half-crowns before the embarrassed-looking man had a chance to say that his account was large and in need of being cleared.

  Walter missed nothing. He already knew Robert’s situation. The man had debts everywhere. Those two half-crowns were probably all he’d had in his pocket. He needed money, as much money as possible. He was a widower with children, a household, an extravagant lifestyle, but no wife, no wealthy fiancée in the offing. He smiled to himself. Walter understood that one of this man’s children was the issue of a barmaid in King Street. If he thought he was going to bluster his way into getting more money from Shellard and Co, he had another think coming.

  ‘I’ve decided not to buy your Spanish vineyards.’

  Although he tried to hide it, Walter could see that Freeman was taken aback. He drained his glass swiftly – a common ruse to hide a dismayed expression.

  He’s gathering his thoughts, thought Walter, worrying as to how he can reopen negotiations without losing face.

  ‘But I thought you favoured owning the land that divides your acquisitions. What made you change your mind?’

  Walter had no intention of elaborating. While waiting, he’d firmed up an option that had come to him the night before.

  ‘Keep your vineyards. They’re your birthright, after all. But what say you we amalgamate our resources? All three vineyards can work in tandem using the same labour, the same transport and the same fermentation arrangements. And of course, your family started the business with wine rather than port as my family did. As I think Seth Armitage told you, we’re looking to expand in both Portugal and Spain. The time is ripe – the war’s seen to that. We’ll look at expanding our operation in other European countries – including Germany. Their white wines have great potential. Shellard and Company has already been renamed Shellard Enterprises. We are going to grow very big. Very big indeed.’

  Robert eyed him warily. For a split second he appeared to give the offer favourable consideration before his hooded eyes narrowed as though he were concentrating more deeply. But Walter had judged his prey well. The thought of expansion and an increasing fortune would reel him in.

  ‘Are you offering me a directorship?’ He looked slightly nervous asking.

  Walter took a deep breath and a sip of his drink before shaking his head. ‘No. I was thinking of a more “personal” arrangement.’

  This man, who Walter had decided was a wastrel and a fool, frowned as he tried to work things out.

  He’s wondering what I’m offering, thought Walter and felt a surge of excitement. Business excited him in the way that racing, or adventure or even a beautiful woman excited other men. Business was everything, the force that drove him on.

  With the resultant money he could not only maintain his lifestyle, but enhance it further. First and foremost, extra money would go to maintaining and refurbishing his beloved Castile Villanova.

  �
��Continue,’ said Robert, looking seriously interested.

  Now was not a time for embarrassing moments, so Walter ordered and paid for another drink. Not for himself. He intended to keep a clear head and only sipped at his drink, sometimes not swallowing anything but merely keeping up the pretence. In his experience the opponent would continue, the drink dulling the intellect and therefore the judgement.

  ‘I understand you are a widower,’ said Walter.

  Robert eyed him curiously. ‘Yes.’

  ‘What if we became related? Isn’t that the strongest reason for men to work together? For businesses to combine as one? You are a man of the world,’ said Walter, looking at Robert as though they both had secrets to share. ‘What if you were to marry someone of my family, someone who would bring a dowry with her? We would then be related. So would our vineyards, though yours would still be yours. I could instruct that your property is run in conjunction with my own. Your costs would thus be less than they presently are, which of course would generate greater profits. What do you say?’

  Looking as though he’d been hit by a steam train, Robert Arthur Freeman blinked rapidly and sucked in his lips.

  Walter guessed that his mouth was dry. This was a man who wanted more money but also wanted the prestige of owning a vineyard that his family had left to him through his mother’s line.

  He didn’t ask for time to think it over. Walter had not expected him to.

  ‘This relative of yours, is she pretty?’

  Walter nodded. ‘Pretty, ripe and just eighteen years old.’ He wasn’t too sure he had the age right, but it didn’t matter. Eighteen was old enough to be married, but young enough to whet Robert’s appetite. Walter had heard the rumours; Robert liked them young, the younger the better. Each man to his own predilection, he counselled. This was business and Leonora’s daughter – his daughter – was no longer a child.

  ‘And the dowry?’

  ‘A substantial sum. Shall we say half of what I originally offered you? Just think, half of that plus keeping your own property. In time of course, when we are dead and gone, everything will go to your heir – who will also be heir to a large segment of the Shellard Company.’

  Walter waited, watching as the hooded lids flicked over the unusually flecked eyes.

  At last, Robert stopped considering and made a decision. Walter had no doubt that it would be the right one; right as far as he was concerned, that is.

  Fourteen

  Rain clouds were gathering in the west, piling like mountains as more and more surged in from the far Atlantic Ocean. The rain was heavy enough to beat leaves from trees and grapes from the vine. Arrows of rain speared into the dry earth, puffs of dust shooting upward with each hit. Soon the dust had turned to mud, and although the rain ceased, the sky remained overcast. The rain returned, beating on the sodden earth and the drooping vines.

  Catherine stared out at the marbled clouds and the driving rain. Dust-covered leaves drooped wet and dripping from trees. The world had turned grey. She told herself that the weather was the reason that Francisco didn’t come. In the back of her mind his mother’s presence lurked like a malign shadow.

  A strong hand landed on her shoulder, disturbing her thoughts. ‘It’s just the weather. He will come.’

  Catherine placed her own soft fingers on the work-worn ones of Aunt Lopa. Silently she stared out at the lonely landscape seeking that one form, that one smile certain to brighten the day. He never came that day, or the day after or the one after that. In the meantime the weather brightened a little, though not for long. More clouds were accumulating in the west and the thunder rolled across the valley.

  Francisco was her salvation. Marrying him would save her from the terrible temptations that had darkened her soul on the day Father Umberto had dismounted from his bicycle and raised his hat.

  Their eyes had locked for a split second, and although they had recognized each other, neither had acknowledged this fact. It was as if they were back again in that gloomy chapel, sending messages with their eyes or scribbled on to scraps of paper hidden between the pages of a Bible.

  Aunt Lopa had taken to the young priest immediately, inviting him for meals and also taking him into her confidence regarding her will and the contents of the iron-bound coffer.

  ‘I’ve made him executor of my will in place of Father Benedict. If anything happens to me, he’s promised to take care of you.’

  Catherine had refrained from blushing at the thought of what Umberto’s interpretation of ‘looking after’ her might be. Sometimes at night, to her great shame, it was his ultramarine eyes she saw in her dozing moments, not the burnt sienna of Francisco’s. Her school friend’s comment about temptation also came back to her.

  She rolled over in her bed, folding the bedclothes up under her chin. Soon, I will be safely married and out of the way of temptation. This was what she had hoped for, but still Francisco did not come.

  The bad weather showed no sign of abating. The track to the quinta remained slick with water and empty. Even Father Umberto stayed away, preferring the more easily accessible parishioners further down the slope.

  At night her body writhed with longing. She felt his hands on her, though in fact they were her own. In her dream she opened her eyes, looked up into his and saw they were not brown, but blue, and the young man was Umberto and not Francisco.

  Lopa was aware of her great-niece’s melancholic moods. Sometimes Catherine caught her looking at her, her wide face bathed in concern and a strange worldly look in her eyes. ‘Whatever will be, will be,’ she’d say once Catherine had caught her looking. ‘Whatever will be. Yes. That will be so.’ And she’d nodded and dropped her attention back to her busy fingers.

  At night when she was saying her prayers, her great-aunt would call up, one foot braced on the bottom rung of the ladder.

  ‘Ask God to do something about the weather,’ she said before retreating to tend the goats prior to going to bed. ‘Otherwise I will.’

  The comment brought a smile to Catherine’s face. She could imagine Aunt Lopa giving God a good talking-to if he didn’t do something to change the weather.

  The only person who did get through the mud and downpour was an old man who made goat’s cheese in a quinta some way back down the track. It was he who brought Aunt Lopa a letter, a letter that she read quickly before tucking it down the front of her blouse.

  Catherine was wrapping her own home-made goat’s cheese in scraps of muslin when she saw her do it. ‘Is it important?’ she asked, mildly curious.

  ‘No!’ Aunt Lopa was abrupt, much more so than usual. Instead of sitting down with her lacemaking and crochet hook as she usually did late afternoon, she went out to milk the goats – even though they’d been given a good measure that very morning and it wasn’t yet sunset, their designated time.

  Aunt Lopa remained strangely silent at suppertime, her lips tightly closed; her conversation more abrupt than usual.

  Catherine eyed her from beneath a lock of fallen hair as she spooned vegetable soup into her mouth. She was no fool and calculated when this mood had first manifested itself. The arrival of the letter had started it. Before that she’d been chirpy enough, not that Catherine was that concerned. The only question that filled every waking moment was how Francisco had fared telling his parents about their plans to marry. And then I’ll be safe, she told herself, the rest of my life mapped out.

  Sometimes the life she envisaged seemed mundane, without sparkle, without adventure. And what about romance? Marriage is about being comfortable with someone and she was certainly comfortable with Francisco. Staring at the rain reminded her of her mother’s tears when her father had been expected and he hadn’t turned up. Her mother had always been crying, so it seemed. But I won’t, she told herself. I’ll be happily married. Francisco is totally dependable and a lovely boy. As for the only boy to have inflamed her passions, Umberto… well… he’d chosen his vocation. He’d married the church.

  It still surprised h
er how circumspect they’d both been when he’d turned up at Aunt Lopa’s. Their attitude had remained the same on future visits, not once acknowledging each other as old acquaintances. Sometimes she laughed and wondered what Aunt Lopa would say if she knew about their dark lingering looks and secret messages during mass! Horrified or amused. It was difficult to say. Aunt Lopa could be either as far as religion was concerned. It was as though two factions were fighting for her soul.

  The ongoing storm intensified until the sky was so dark lamps were lit an hour before they were due. The old farmhouse trembled with each roll of thunder and the rain found ancient fissures in the walls and roof until there weren’t enough vessels in which to catch the drips.

  Catherine cleared up the dishes in a methodical manner. Just for once she wanted to immerse herself in simple chores so she didn’t have to think. There was no room in her thoughts for anything or anyone but Francisco and this spurious future of hers.

  ‘Catherine!’

  At the sound of her name, Catherine jumped and a metal dish clattered across the floor.

  Aunt Lopa was apologetic. ‘I’m sorry. But there is something I have to do. I’m going over to see Francisco. I think it’s the only solution that will have you looking cheery again.’ The nervous chuckle that followed made Catherine think that she wasn’t telling the whole truth.

  ‘Nothing to worry about,’ said Aunt Lopa. ‘Stay here and clear up.’ She patted Catherine’s hand. ‘Leave things to me.’ She winked in the mischievous way Catherine had become accustomed to.

  Catherine didn’t need to ask where she was going and why. The only question that remained was why now? They’d both been concerned that Francisco had not returned, but why go over there now it was dark? Did the letter she’d received have something to do with it?