by Anna Hartman
“No Edward, I absolutely agree this is not how you treat loyal friends or business partners, but this is how you treat liars, cheats and traitors. If you go quietly we can keep this off the papers, so you’ll still have a business. If you cause a scandal, you can be sure that we will not let you get away with it”
“Sylvia, I don’t understand what you are talking about. Can I come and see you, I want to make sure you are not making a mistake and selling your only asset for peanuts”
“Edward, wasn’t it your contact who wanted to buy all this for £3 million? In fact I have a business meeting about to start, so goodbye, give my love to Anthea” She hung up without waiting for response.
Rosalind who had been standing in the doorway and had heard every word was gobsmacked, her mother had kept her cool and looked completely calm as she turned to look at her.
“Darling, I think your father’s death has brought out new sides form both of us. Now let’s go and negotiate this deal.”
Mr Graham arrived right on time in a silver Porsche. He was wearing a business suit, the navy of the jacket matching perfectly his eyes. If Rosalind had met a man like him at a party or in a bar, she would definitely have made a beeline for him. He oozed success and wealth and was one of the best looking men she had ever seen. Not model perfect, that would be boring but there was tangible charisma and confidence that added depth to his attractiveness that handsome looks on their own could never achieve.
She had to snap herself out of her daydreaming. This was not a bar, he was off limits and this was strictly business.
Lady Langley welcomed Brockley dressed in her dusty pink Chanel suit, looking sharper and more switched on than usual. Her blonde hair blow dried to perfection, she looked elegant and soignee and surprisingly relaxed considering that this meeting would change her life. Brockley observed.
Rosalind had a simple navy dress on with long sleeves, fitted body and slightly flared skirt to the knee, one she had designed herself and that fitted her like a glove. She looked demure and serious.
They would be having tea in the formal living room that they haven’t used for months. So the last few days Susan had been busy making sure it was dusted and hoovered and had fresh flowers like it used to have when Lord Langley was still alive.
Susan served them tea in the delicate bone china teacups that went back to 1930s. The sponge cake was light as air, the finger sandwiches had classic fillings, cucumber and salmon with cream cheese and the scones were still warm , light as air sponge cake. A perfectly traditional and classically British high tea. It was clear to Brockley that the Langley ladies wanted to set the scene, to show him that this was a house with a long history and tradition and it should not be messed with.
Lady Langley started the conversation.
“So Mr Graham, could you kindly recap your offer. My daughter has briefed me of course, but I would like to hear it from the horse's mouth, so to speak”
Wow, straight to business. Brockley had expected a lot of pleasantries being exchanged before getting into the details of the deal. He had always liked the aloof Lady Langley but just realised that he liked her even more when she was assertive.
“With pleasure lady Langley. So what BG Hotels would like to do is to take over the house and most of the grounds on a long term lease for 35 years. We’d convert the house into a hotel, maybe build an annexe or some luxury cottages to accommodate more guests in the near future. But the hotel is the priority and it would have a luxury spa and a fine dining restaurant. We would also like to build a golf course and a clubhouse on the unused fields.”
“And you’d want us out of the house immediately?”
“Not immediately but before the works start of course. As a part of the deal we’ll refurbish the groundskeeper's cottage to your specification to make it into a comfortable home for you, and you would also always have a suite available at the hotel, a table in the restaurant and pretty much full use of the services at your disposal”
“So no cost to us for all this?”
“No, it would all be part of the deal”
“Right, so if we decide to take you up on your offer. We insist on the following conditions.
Firstly, the groundskeeper's cottage is fully refurbished at your expense before any works starts on the main house and the grounds, And secondly Rosalind will work with you and your team closely throughout the hotel project and she will have the right to veto choices that don’t make sense for the house itself . And of course she will be paid a going rate for the work she does”
Brockley raised an eyebrow, she had not expected this. Rosalind Langley stroke him as a girl who had never worked in her life. And she definitely didn’t have any experience of refurbishments of this scale or the hotel business for that matter. She would probably just be a petulant child sticking her nose into things that she shouldn’t and over complicating things just because she could.
“Lady LAngley…” Brockley started
“I haven’t finished. I also expect you to keep the stables going, pay for the upkeep of the horses we currently have and pay the staff. Both Rosalind and I will have access to the stables and my horse Hunnewell will be kept there, I will pay for her upkeep but you will supply the staff.”
“Lady Langley, I definitely agree to you first condition, but I’m not sure what value your daughter could add to the refurbishment, we have world renowned, award winning architects and designers ready to start working on this, with plenty of experience”
“Yes of course, but none of them know this house and it’s special character like Rosalind does”
Rosalind stepped in
“Mr Graham, although my experience is in fashion I still have a degree in Art history, not to mention a lifelong love and knowledge of this house, it’s history and its quirks. I believe that my father would have stipulated the family’s involvement in the refurbishing project had he lived long enough to do so.”
The pushy bitch, had she suddenly got a message beyond the grave? Brockley remembered Lord Langley mentioning that he expected a family member to be involved in the renovation and refurbishment and at the time he had expected it to mean that he would present the plans and give regular updates to Lord Langley himself, he would have never agreed to take this young girl with zero experience to put spanners in the works.
“Fine, I need to think this through and speak to my design team. I am running a business and will pay you a generous amount of money to lease the property so I expect to have the final say. If you and my design team disagree, I decide.”
With gritted teeth Rosalind nodded. She could easily see how everything she suggested would be vetoed. Although she knew BG hotels had a great reputation of staying true to the original characters of the properties they converted, it still worried her that the bottom line was all they were interested in, not really looking after this house.
“So Lady Langley, I’ll get my lawyers on the case to start drafting the agreement, should he be in touch with your lawyer or business manager to discuss the details? In the meantime can we arrange you to meet with one of my project managers to talk through how you’d like the cottage to be refurbished. We could have you living in the cottage have you living in the cottage by Christmas and we are looking to open the Langley Manor hotel on New Year’s eve next year. I will send my architect and design team here next week, so they can start planning.
“We wish to be very closely involved so please get your lawyer to contact me in the first instance.” Rosalind said. She was never going to let him know that she had found proof that the deal had been agreed before her father’s death, and she also didn’t want him to know they no longer had a lawyer or a business manager. She would have to seek legal help with the contract but she didn’t know who from quite yet.
“With due respect Miss Langley, don’t you think this is a very big and complex deal and as far as I know, you are not very experienced in negotiating such things, so don’t you think you should ask for professional
advice. Even I consult my lawyer with every contract I sign and I have been doing this for nearly 20 years?” The girl was crazy.
“I will, but you can still send all the paperwork to me first”
“Sure, also could you pass a list of all the furniture and artwork that will be included in the lease to my lawyer so that can be included in the agreement.”
As they finished their tea they exchanged a few pleasantries and after a while Brockley got up ready to leave.
“It’s such a pleasure to meeting you again Lady Langley, Miss Langley, my team will be in touch”
The following week Lady Langley and Rosalind started the massive job of taking an inventory of all the furniture and artwork and choosing things they wanted to take with them. The cottage wasn’t huge so most of the antique furniture would be out of place. Rosalind wanted her father’s desk and the old green armchair and the french armoire she had had in her room. Lady Langley picked two painting they have bought on their honeymoon in Italy and her dressing table. To Rosalind’s surprise she didn’t want her own portrait.
“Darling, it would never fit in the cottage and I quite like my portrait keeping an eye on things here” She winked at her daughter “Just make sure that it stays exactly where it is on the landing, it has the best view.”
Rosalind laughed, “Yes mum, it definitely should stay there!”
Two days before the meeting with Brockley’s project manager Sylvia and Rosalind decided to pay a visit to the cottage.
The cottage had not been lived in for nearly 30 years as their current groundskeeper lived in the village with his family. The house had been used mainly as a storage for gardening equipment. It was dusty, full of cobwebs and it needed a lot more work than just a little cosmetics. The kitchen was from the 1950’s and falling apart. There was no indoor bathroom and all the floors were covered in tatty paisley carpets. There was also damp on the walls of the bedrooms.
Lady Langley and Rosalind were shocked of the depilated state of the house and for a moment it felt like a desperate idea to make this into something else. But then Lady Langley pointed out the pretty windows with their wide sills, the Victorian wooden floor that clearly was under a the ugly carpets and that should the kitchen be extended it could become a large homely eat in kitchen, with access to a small patio.
So they sat down to make draft plan for what they needed from the house. Three bedrooms, two bathrooms and a downstairs cloakroom. The kitchen would be the heart of the house and the beautiful old fireplace would have to be renovated, although underfloor heating would be put in, it would be lovely to have a real fire on cold winter nights.
Lady Langley had had a heavy heart when she first walked into the house but now she felt excitement taking over, the kind of feeling she had not felt for years. Not since she had her first taste of freedom and independence as a young woman in Paris. This would be the first home she would be able to completely design and decorate herself. It would be small but it would be hers. She was also delighted that she could wipe away her financial problem and have enough to pay for Rosalind to finish her studies in New York. It had been a stressful few years, she had known they had money problems for quite a some time, but as long as her husband was there she could lull into a false sense of security that he would take take care of it, like he always did. She felt a little guilty for having made Rosalind to take charge, she should have done it herself being her mother. And from now on she would. No more sleepwalking through life, she Lady Sylvia Langley would take the reins of her own life.
CHAPTER 5
The following week, Chris Johnstone, the project manager, who had worked for BG hotels pretty much from the start came down to Bradenbury for their meeting. He was given a tour of Langley house before taken down to see the cottage and then they sat down for lunch that lady LAngley had prepared herself as Susan had a day off. Over lunch they spoke about the plans, Chris made some suggestions with his years of experience doing up old hose and Lady Langley found herself strangely attracted to this man. He was from the wrong side of the tracks but clearly knew his work inside out. Having started as a bricklayers apprentice at fifteen, Chris Johnstone was now, at 55 an expert in remodeling Victorian buildings into attractive homes and hotels with all the modern conveniences.
“So Lady Langley” He started
“Sylvia, please. We’ll be working closely together in the next few months so don’t you think Lady Langley is a bit too formal?” She said rather coquettishly. Today she was wearing a pair of jeans and a simple shirt, her version of casual. and she looked radiant.
“Well Sylvia then, what about your wardrobe? I expect a lady like you to have a a lot of clothes that need to be accommodated, shall we build a large walk in wardrobe to the master bedroom? It would mean leaving the other bedrooms a little smaller though”
“No, Chris, can I call you Chris?.Yes I have a lot of clothes now, but my new lifestyle doesn’t really have much use for ball gowns and Chanel suits, I'm going to donate a lot of it to charity just keeping my favorite pieces. I will also need a safe for my jewellery, although most of it will be auctioned off. But what I would like is a mudroom by the kitchen. I’m planning to keep my dogs and hopefully will still be able to go riding so I need somewhere to leave my muddy boots as I come in”
Chris Johnstone laughed.”Aren’t you something else Lad..., I mean Sylvia, You shall have your boot room, I’m even going to build a shower there so you can wash the mud off the dog.”
By early November the cottage was ready and Chris Johnstone who had been personally supervising the works, although normally he would have left it to somebody else in his team to supervise such a basic refurbishment. But he really liked Lady LAngley and Brockley had been adamant that this cottage was as important as the main house. So he took Lady Langley to see the house. Since their first meeting they had spent a lot of time together, first to discuss the project and later making any excuse to see each other. Rosalind suspected there was a romance blossoming, but her mother denied such a thing. Whatever it was it had a rejuvenating effect on Sylvia Langley. She looked younger, more alive and had a sparkle in her eye she had not had since she was a young girl.
For months now they had been Sylvia and Chris to each other, instead of Lady Langley and Mr Johnstone.
Sylvia had not been to see the house for the last month being too busy selecting furniture and getting the main house ready for the builders. All artwork and furniture had been carefully packed and shipped to storage, some personal items sent to auction houses and sold to collectors and she had wanted to oversee all that herself.
But as they walked towards the cottage, Sylvia’s golden labrador HAmish running in front of them. As the cottage appeared behind the trees she gasped in delight. Although the overgrowing ivy bushes had been tidied there was still ivy climbing up the walls, all the windows and doors where new but keeping with the style of the cottage they didn’t look out of place. As it was a wet day and they were both wearing boots they entered via the mudroom, and it was marvellous. The wall next to the door had hooks to hang coats, hats and dog leashes, the boot rack was on the opposite wall next to the corner where the floor sloped downwards and there was a drain on the lowest point with a handheld with a shower attached to the wall above, so it could be used to wash dirty boots and muddy dogs before letting them inside the house. The room was really well designed. Sylvias eyes sparkled when she turned to look at Chris.
“I can’t tell you how happy I am with this room”
Chris laughed “you ain’t seen nothing yet, let’s go upstairs”
He took her hand and together the climbed up the stairs, from the landing there was entrance to the two bedrooms and then a smaller staircase leading up to the attic which was converted into a study. The master bedroom has east facing windows overlooking the lake in the distance, the big four poster bed was already in place directly opposite the large french doors, so you could lie in bed and enjoy the view. The en suite bathroom had a large roll t
op bath, a separate shower cubicle and those white old fashioned white tiles on the walls and larger tiles on the floor, and Sylvia could feel under her shoeless feet that the underfloor heating was already on.
The second bedroom was smaller and only had a tiny shower room as the ensuite, originally Sylvia had suggested making the attic into Rosalind’s room but she had refused saying that as she wouldn’t be living here permanently she didn’t need that much space. Her room would look wonderful, light airy and feminine, she was suddenly really happy that the only piece of furniture from Langley house she was going to bring into this bedroom was the old french armoire, everything else was new. A proper fresh start.
Chris approached the door that was almost hidden away in the corner.
“I know you said no walk in wardrobe, but when we were renovating we found this”
He swung the door open and there on top of two steps there was a large walk in wardrobe.
“This room had been blocked off, I don’t really know why, so I decided to take the liberty to make it into your dressing room, we even built a safe for your jewellery.”
The elegance and beauty of the room moved her as did the thoughtful kindness that Chris was showing to her.
Sylvia could feel tears burning behind her eyes, she felt that she could so easily fall for this man. To have somebody so good and strong to lean on, no matter what.
“I may not be married but I have a mother and five sisters, and I have never met a woman who can fit her wardrobe in a french armoire”
“Thank you” Sylvia said simply and kissed Chris on the cheek.
“You are welcome” he responded quickly fighting the urge to pull the woman closer and kiss her properly. “Let’s go downstairs to see the rest”
Downstairs Chris opened the double doors to the lounge and even on this grey November day the whitewashed floor boards made the room feel light and airy. There wasn’t very much furniture yet just a few things that she had ordered and that had been delivered directly to the house.