House in the Hills

by House in the Hills (retail) (epub)

  Seth raised his eyebrows. ‘All his business interests?’

  ‘Why not? He doesn’t seem to attach much value to them and, in the right hands, they could make a fortune.’

  Seth shook his head and his look hardened. He’d considered himself as close to Walter Shellard as anyone could be and just as hard-headed. But of late, knowing some of Walter’s more closely guarded secrets, he’d realized there was a widening gulf between them. For a start he would never have given one of his daughters – even an illegitimate daughter, if he had one – to someone like Robert Arthur Freeman. He’d heard some rumours – some very sickening rumours.

  ‘Increase his credit at the gambling club.’

  ‘If you say so,’ said Seth.

  ‘I’ll pull the rug out from under him when I see fit,’ said Walter.

  He showed no sign of any consideration, and neither did he allow emotion to enter his cut-throat dealings. And that, thought Seth, is why he’s so successful.

  ‘You’d make a good gambler,’ Seth Armitage said as he swigged back the last of the whisky before getting to his feet.

  Walter’s expression was unaltered. ‘I never gamble. I only back dead certs.’ He allowed himself a strangely self-conscious smile. ‘I’m luckier than most men who merely gain a son-in-law. I’ve gained a son-in-law and a ready-made business.’

  Seth nodded and ambled towards the door.

  ‘Seth?’

  The old man turned round.

  ‘I’ve noticed you’re slowing down of late. Understandable, of course – at your age. You’re no spring chicken; it’s time you stood down completely.’

  Seth looked shell-shocked. Just for once, both his snowy eyebrows rose to the same level.

  ‘I don’t want to stand down, Walter. Shellard Enterprises is my life.’

  Walter appeared to be concentrating all his efforts on lighting a fresh cigar from the still burning stub of an old one. ‘There’s plenty in the graveyard who thought their work was their life, Seth. Step aside, and don’t worry about someone taking your place. It’s all taken care of.’

  Thirty-Four

  It was a new challenge and excited her. Catherine had made up her mind to get Cornwallis House into some sort of order. She had a vision that she could make it something to be proud of – something to rival Castile Villanova. To this end she summoned the four servants the house depended on to a meeting.

  She gathered them in the drawing room, the lightest and most dust-free room in the whole house, and ordered that they come with a tray of tea and biscuits.

  Once everyone was settled, she proceeded to pour the tea herself. Four surprised-looking faces stared at her. Conclusions were expressed with swiftly exchanged looks. It was left to the butler to make comment.

  ‘Mrs Arthur Freeman, it’s for us to be doing this,’ said Gerald Collier, who as butler had acquired the job of servants’ spokesman.

  ‘I’m quite capable of pouring tea,’ said Catherine. ‘I’m not helpless. Now please take a biscuit if you want one.’

  She felt their eyes upon her before shifting their gaze sideways, exchanging more surprised looks as they sipped at their tea.

  ‘Now,’ said Catherine, who had rehearsed what she intended saying in front of the dressing-table mirror; a mirror as besmirched with grime and dirt as the rest of the house. ‘I’ve only been here a short time, but in that time I could not help noting that Cornwallis House is in a state of neglect. Now don’t think I’m picking fault because I’m used to living in grander places. Indeed, I lived in quite a rustic environment before coming here. So what I have to ask is why things are in such a bad way and whether anyone can enlighten me?’

  More looks before Gerald Collier made an attempt to explain. He cleared his throat first. ‘Begging your pardon, ma’am, but there’s only four of us and this is a big house to keep in order. And as you can see, we’re all of…’ He paused and exchanged worried frowns with his colleagues before continuing. ‘We’re all getting on a bit. Truth is we started work here with the old master and mistress. Things were different then,’ he said, his face lighting up at memories of better times. ‘There were twenty-four of us then. And we were young. Then when Master Robert took over…’ He lowered his eyes and his words melted.

  Catherine took a deep breath. ‘And my husband has proceeded to waste his inheritance.’

  She didn’t need anyone to explain any further about Robert’s shortcomings. It had become obvious that he squandered money more quickly than it was earned. She sighed audibly. ‘I plan to engage some young blood to help you. Until I find someone suitable, we shall finish our tea and then you can fetch me beeswax and polish. I’m going to attack that dining-room table. It’s far too good to leave unpolished.’

  Gerald Collier’s pale eyes opened wide in surprise. ‘You’re going to do it?’

  Catherine smiled at the old man whose wispy white hair barely covered his pate. ‘I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty.’ She held out her hands as she said it, scrutinizing their softness and remembering how they’d often been grimy from planting vegetables, or sticky from milking a goat. ‘And as you say, this place needs some serious attention.’

  The three women, not one of whom was a day below sixty, looked at each other before one of them came to a conclusion.

  ‘I’ll give ’e a hand,’ said Polly. She got to her feet in two stages; getting up from her chair, her bones creaking in protest, then straightening her legs, an action accompanied by yet more creaking.

  The other two, Florence the cook and Betty who doubled as maid and help to Florence when needed, followed her lead.

  ‘I’ll get these washed and put away,’ said Florence. ‘Though it’s not really my job,’ she added in case someone should forget her higher status.

  ‘I’ve got laundry to do,’ said Betty. ‘And if I don’t set to right away, there’ll be none clean and none ironed, and dirty sheets on the bed.’

  Catherine remembered the women who’d collected and laundered linens at Castile Villanova then brought them back when they were clean. She made a mental note to find out whether there were similar women hereabouts; but not yet, she counselled. Best to proceed slowly until she’d gained the servants’ trust and found out how much such a service might cost.

  Gerald Collier lingered, his loose bottom lip quivering as though he had something further to say.

  ‘If you don’t mind me saying something, madam; I wouldn’t want to be speaking out of turn…’

  ‘Please go on.’

  She wondered what was on his mind and prayed that, at least for a time, he wasn’t considering retirement.

  ‘Do you think there’s any hope of employing a gardener like we used to? It’s not just that the vegetable garden is in a mess, there’s also the sheep to consider. They’re leaving a mess all the way down the driveway and they’ve been getting into the vegetable garden and eating up what little remains there. I know Mr Freeman brought the sheep in to keep the grass down, but couldn’t we have a lawnmower like other people?’

  The vegetable garden was enclosed behind a high brick wall. Catherine had noticed the broken gate and the air of dereliction, both in the garden itself and the greenhouse adjoining it. The sheep had been noticeable since the very first day along with the gypsy encampment on the other side of the copse. Presumably Robert had considered employing the sheep to keep the grass down rather than purchase a lawnmower or, more likely considering the size of the grounds, pay an army of men with scythes or a man with a tractor to keep the grass down to size.

  ‘Presumably the gypsies pay something for their grazing and their campsite?’

  ‘They butcher a sheep now and again and bring it to the kitchen.’

  She jotted this information down on the paper in front of her. ‘I see.’ Indeed, she did see. A whole sheep was not to be sniffed at.

  ‘Will that be all, madam?’

  ‘Yes, thank you, Collier.’ She nodded thoughtfully, still looking at the list of possib
le actions to bring the house back up to a reasonable condition.

  ‘That really do look a picture,’ said Polly once they’d polished the Sheraton-style table to the point where they could see their faces in the honey-brown surface.

  Polly was small and wiry, and did everything at breakneck speed, quite a feat for a woman of her age. She told Catherine she was seventy-three years old.

  ‘I got called back into service at the end of the Great War.’ She shook her head despairingly. ‘Young women ain’t so keen on going into service nowadays. They can make more money in factories making paper bags or chocolate or cigarettes. No pride in domestic service any more.’

  The strength of her voice seemed to falter towards the end of what she was saying, and Catherine was sure she heard her give a little sigh. Looking up from polishing the very last chair, she saw that Polly’s pink face had turned pale and her head had fallen to one side.

  Flinging her duster aside, she ran and knelt at Polly’s side, took hold of her hand and patted her cheek.

  ‘Polly? Can you hear me? Polly?’

  Polly’s mouth was open. She was making short, cackling noises.

  ‘Oh, God,’ muttered Catherine, panicking.

  She heard someone enter the room and looked over her shoulder. It was Betty.

  ‘Polly’s not well,’ she shouted. ‘Quick. Fetch a doctor.’

  ‘No, no, no.’ Betty shook her head and came running instead. ‘She’s just having one of her turns,’ she said. ‘If you can help me get her up to her bed, ma’am.’

  Each took one of Polly’s arms and placed it around their shoulders. Between them they began ascending the stairs to the very top of the house. There were six flights and, although she was far from heavy, Polly’s feet were off the ground and they really were carrying her, so that their calves ached by the time they reached her room.

  ‘Good job she’s got a room to herself,’ said Betty as they lay her on the bed.

  The room was small, had plain brown wallpaper and rose-patterned curtains at the small, square window. A chest of drawers stood against one wall with a small chair to either side. A silver crucifix hung above the bed. A small rug was set beside the bed on dark-green linoleum.

  ‘I should think she would have it to herself,’ Catherine remarked. ‘It’s only big enough for one.’

  Betty made a chortling sound. ‘It used to sleep two years ago when there were more of us. Not now, though.’

  ‘Really?’

  Betty explained. ‘It were a tight squeeze, though fun at the time. Hard work, but then we was young and not afraid of hard work nor nothing.’

  ‘I get the impression that Robert’s parents were good employers.’

  ‘So I hear,’ Betty interjected, her round eyes brown and soft as a cow’s and her lips rubbery, always on the move. ‘I couldn’t vouch for it meself. I didn’t come ’ere till later. I was a lady’s maid to Mrs Gertrude Shellard, the first Mrs Shellard. You must know them; Shellard the wine people. Biggest wine people in the city, they are. I left when she died on account of there being no woman at Adelaide Court, so no job. I was out. So I came here.’

  Betty could not possibly guess what effect her words had had. Nobody in the household knew who her father was. Catherine felt herself turning cold. She could not look at Betty in case she saw the consternation in her eyes. Instead she fixed her gaze on Polly, sitting on the side of the bed, holding her hand as she slowly came round. She’d reached her own conclusion regarding the cause of Polly’s ‘funny turn’.

  Polly’s eyes flickered open. ‘Did I go queer?’ she asked.

  Catherine leaned closer. ‘It’s my fault. I think that polishing was too much for you.’

  Polly’s eyes opened wide with alarm. ‘But, missus, don’t turn me out. I’ve only got a small pension.’

  ‘That isn’t what I meant,’ said Catherine, already backtracking on suggesting that Polly might consider going back into retirement. Obviously such a suggestion would not be welcome.

  ‘I think you need some help. A young girl, perhaps, in need of a wage. And training, of course. She could learn a lot from you. Do you think you could do that?’

  Although Polly’s eyes didn’t exactly sparkle, there was a definite improvement in her colour.

  ‘I expect so,’ she said, as she closed her eyes and fell asleep.

  * * *

  She did not mention her plans to Robert, firstly because she didn’t think there was any point, and secondly he was rarely home until the early hours of the morning and wouldn’t care much anyway.

  He usually came in noisily, smelling of drink and cheap perfume. ‘But I only love you, darling,’ he slurred, his breath falling over her in thick, porous fumes in one of those infrequent moments when he found his way to her bedroom.

  Most of the time, she pretended to be asleep when he fumbled beneath the hideous nightdress she had worn on their honeymoon. He hadn’t yet twigged that because of its size, she could tie the back of the hem to the front. Stone-cold sober he’d be hard pressed to find his way to her body. Inebriated and already satiated by some cheap tart from a dockside inn, he gave up easily and was swiftly snoring.

  All the same, Catherine had made up her mind that she would not let things continue like this. She loathed him touching her, but sometimes a dominant veneer was not enough and intimacy could not be avoided. In order to limit their intimate relations, she’d decided to move into the room at the end of the corridor. She wouldn’t be completely out of his grasp, but he lacked energy and commitment when he came home drunk. She’d have some respite, and for that she would be grateful. She needed space to think and to make plans.

  Betty and Doris, a local girl, helped her get the room into some order. They brought a brass bed and a mattress down from the attic and found some cotton twill sheets and a silk counterpane lying forgotten on the top shelf of a linen press. The silk counterpane was a lovely shade of pale turquoise embroidered around the edge with pink flowers and pale-green leaves. The existing curtains were plain and of a similar colour and would have looked quite nice, except that Betty had found a laundry woman to wash them.

  ‘They were too old,’ said Betty, lifting what was left of the fragile curtains.

  ‘Too rotten,’ said Catherine on inspecting the torn fabric. Even as she inspected the hem, another tear appeared. ‘Throw them out,’ she sighed. ‘I’ll have to make do with what I’ve got.’

  The door opened suddenly and Robert appeared. ‘I’m going out,’ he said abruptly. ‘I’m taking the girls shopping in my motor car.’

  He didn’t ask whether she wanted to come. Neither did he question what she was doing. For that she was grateful.

  The house was beginning to come together and although windowpanes were still missing and the gypsies’ sheep were still messing up the driveway, she’d spent only frugally. Robert, on the other hand, had bought himself a motor car and was already contemplating hiring a chauffeur. Catherine wondered where the sudden windfall had come from, though wouldn’t ask him. Their relationship had deteriorated beyond mending. Their social life in the city was non-existent and the only time they shared any intimacies was when he was sober enough to join her in bed. Thankfully that particular scenario didn’t happen very often.

  As for the children – they kept out of her way, and it saddened her. Up until now the house had totally occupied every waking moment. There was so much to do; but conversely, except for the servants, she lacked human contact. She still had some money left over from the sum her father had sent her via his solicitors plus her cheese money. Sullenly, she’d counted it out. The Portuguese equivalent had been changed by the bank into twenty-five pounds. Not really enough to do much with. She sighed. She had to make a start somewhere. And little things can grow into big ones; Aunt Lopa had told her that. ‘You’d be surprised how the few coins I earn for my crochet work grow like mushrooms into crisp dollar bills.’

  Dollars? She smiled. Her great-aunt had used varied turns of phra
se, but for some reason whenever she referred to money, it was always in dollars. The chest! She got to her feet, overcome by the sudden feeling that there was money in the chest – possibly in dollars.

  Thirty-Five

  Catherine was standing on the top landing near the door leading to the servants’ quarters, waiting for the right moment to open her great-aunt’s chest. Her heart thudded at the prospect of finally unlocking that battered old box. It might contain the dollar equivalent of a few hundred pounds, a sum she could do so much with.

  It was silly to feel excited about such a mundane happening, but she’d put it off for so long. To that end she couldn’t help treating the event with something approaching reverence – like a mass, but far more exciting.

  As a result, she craved privacy for doing this, waiting until after dinner, until the children were in bed and Robert had left to pursue his nocturnal habits.

  The top-floor landing had become a significant refuge where she could gather her thoughts and try to work out the best way forward.

  She’d worked out that it would take a great deal of money to return the house to its former glory. Her problem was that Robert spent money like water and their income from the vineyards and warehouses appeared strangely erratic. She’d worked out that an upturn occurred in their bank account immediately following one of Robert’s boardroom appearances at Shellard Enterprises.

  Unblinking, she stared at the gathering darkness. Robert stayed out most of the night and lingered in bed until midday. Rarely did he put in an appearance at the warehouse and she wasn’t convinced that his appearances at Shellard Enterprises had anything whatsoever to do with business. Robert was allergic to work; that much was obvious. Hence the state of the house; which matches the man, she thought to herself and sighed. She remembered her life how it used to be; the warm walls of the Castile Villanova, the fresh air around Aunt Lopa’s quinta high above the Douro Valley. Both were beautiful in their own way, and both were cherished. Robert had no affection for anyone or anything but himself – with the possible exception of his children, especially the girls.