The Golden Cup

by Marcia Willett

  Joss had already turned aside, probably to hide her expression of relief, but Emma’s eyes were round with shock.

  ‘But, George,’ she gasped. ‘Gone back to New Zealand? My goodness, I can’t believe it.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Coming on top of Mutt it’s a bit much, isn’t it? The trouble is, there’s no other way to break this kind of news.’

  He glanced rather helplessly towards Joss, who came forward to put an arm about her mother. She smiled at him and he saw more clearly the pallor of her face and the faint wariness of her expression. He guessed that she didn’t want her mother to know that his news was not too much of a shock to her and smiled back at her with a tiny nod of complicity.

  ‘Come into the kitchen,’ Joss said. ‘We’ve only just finished breakfast – somehow we simply couldn’t get started this morning – but there’s some coffee in the pot.’

  ‘It’s Joss’s day off,’ said Emma, allowing herself to be led back into the kitchen, ‘and I was trying to persuade her to have the morning in bed. Oh dear, what a time we’re all having.’

  ‘I couldn’t rest somehow,’ said Joss quickly. ‘You know how it is? I’m too tensed up, I suppose, and I didn’t sleep very well.’

  ‘Perhaps a walk would do you good,’ George suggested, anxious to get her to himself, longing to explain the happenings of the last twenty-four hours. ‘We could take the donkeys. You know how they love a stroll.’

  For one brief moment Joss’s face lighted with pleasure; from a child one of her greatest pleasures was taking the donkeys for a walk round the lanes and up the valley. It wasn’t so much of a walk but more a very slow amble, holding the end of their leading reins and waiting beside them patiently as they munched the wayside grass. As he watched her he saw the light die from her eyes and it occurred to him that she was taking her grandmother’s death very badly. He felt ashamed that he’d put his own needs before her grief but before he could make amends she smiled at him.

  ‘Perhaps later on,’ she told him. ‘That would be good.’

  Emma, distracted but still curious, raised her eyebrows.

  ‘Why not now?’ she asked. ‘It’s so much brighter this morning and it would do you so much good. You don’t have to worry about me, you know. I’ve got plenty to do, clearing out and tidying up. And your father will be arriving later.’

  George took his coffee, noticing that Joss’s hand trembled slightly. He looked at her, trying to catch her eye so as to exchange one of those private signals they’d shared since childhood, but she evaded him. It was as if the current of affection that flowed so naturally between them had been suddenly switched off and he felt a real sense of loneliness. It was clear that Mutt’s death had deeply distressed her, and his own news coming on top of it had now completely knocked her off balance. He realized just how important her reaction had been to him; that, ever since he’d left the cottage at Meavy, he’d been needing to share the news with her, to talk it through so that it could assume its proper proportions. He was passing through a period of transition and he’d hoped that Joss would make the journey with him.

  He saw, however, that it couldn’t be quite as he’d imagined it and he quickly assessed this new situation.

  ‘Later will be fine,’ he agreed, as if Emma hadn’t spoken. ‘Meanwhile, there must be something I could do. How are you off for logs?’

  Joss looked at him gratefully. ‘There are plenty in the woodshed,’ she said, ‘but we’ve used up all the smaller ones. Rafe usually deals with it but if you could manage to split some of the big ones … ?’

  ‘Not a problem.’ Maybe she would find the opportunity to come and talk to him while he was working. ‘I’ll finish my coffee and then get to it.’

  ‘I still can’t get used to the fact that we won’t hear her bell ring.’ Emma’s eyes filled with tears. ‘It just seems so impossible …’

  Before either of them could comfort her they heard the sound of an engine, a car door slammed and the front door was tried by someone who clearly expected it to be unlocked. The knocking that followed was loud and impatient. Emma got up and hurried into the hall.

  ‘Ray!’ they heard her exclaim. ‘My God, what time did you leave? I wasn’t expecting you for another hour at least.’

  George and Joss stood together in silence, listening.

  ‘I didn’t see much point in hanging around.’ His voice, booming round the hall and echoing up the stairs, was as insensitive to grief and death as his knocking had been and George felt Joss wince. ‘This damned fog held me up but it began to clear as I got nearer to the coast.’

  ‘I’ll crack on with the logs.’ George spoke quietly. He caught Joss by the shoulders and held them for a moment as if to reassure her. ‘You know where I am if you need me.’

  He bent to kiss her cheek, reached for his jacket and slipped out through the garden door just as Emma and Raymond arrived in the kitchen.

  Once he’d gone, Joss took hold of the back of one of the chairs as if for support. She hadn’t been prepared for the difficulty of seeing George again, knowing as she did now that she wasn’t the person she’d believed herself to be. It was as if, until this point, she and George had been all of a piece; not only because of similarities of mind and taste, and their love for this small valley hidden away on the north Cornish coast, but through blood and bone and family ties. Now, the truth divided them. Sympathetic though she felt towards her grandmother, still deeply moved by the thought of her letters, Joss was conscious that neither Mutt nor her descendants had any right here at Paradise and, the moment she’d seen George, she’d been struck by the utter impossibility of pretending otherwise. Even the news that Penny had gone didn’t have the power to affect her as it would have done forty-eight hours earlier. Only her mother’s grief and distress was preventing her from getting into her car and driving as far away from St Meriadoc as she could.

  Yet she’d been so certain that the truth must not be told. Perhaps, after all, it was different for Bruno. Whatever the deception, he was at least a Trevannion and had every right to live here in the valley, in The Lookout: he belonged. As her parents came into the kitchen Joss braced herself anew to deal with the weight of her knowledge; with this requirement to look at every aspect of her life from a completely different point of view. She was hardly aware of her father’s brief kiss, seeing only his familiar, assessing glance around as he sat down at the table.

  All this will soon be mine, his look seemed to say. There was a faint but unmistakable air of anticipation in his expression that made Joss shudder a little. His acquisitiveness had always repelled her; now, with her new knowledge, it appalled her.

  ‘When’s the funeral?’ he was asking. ‘You said the undertakers had been, dear?’

  Joss stared at him. She’d always hated the way he called them both ‘dear’; there was a lack of intimacy about the word, as if he used it because he felt an endearment was appropriate to his wife and daughter without it really mattering what it was: she’d had bus conductors call her ‘love’ with more real affection.

  ‘I’ll make some fresh coffee.’ Emma hurried to the percolator.

  Joss could see that her mother was slightly ruffled by his arrival, no longer at ease. Already she was less the Emma of Paradise, Mutt’s child, and more the compliant woman who was Raymond’s wife; even her attitude to Joss was undergoing a change. Joss recognized it at once. Emma was on edge, prepared for a falling-out between her husband and daughter, and instinctively adopting a cheerfulness that might, with luck, placate the two of them.

  Joss was seized with remorse. She wondered just how much of her life her mother had spent being a kind of buffer and how different she was with Bruno and Mousie and those with whom she felt at peace. Joss bit her lips. Impossible, in that case, she told herself, to remove the comfort Emma received from these relationships.

  ‘The rector thought Monday but he’s going to telephone this morning.’ Emma paused in her coffee-making and shook her head. ‘I
simply can’t take it in,’ she added miserably.

  Raymond stretched out his large square hand and patted briefly the piece of Emma he could reach.

  ‘She’s had a good run for her money, dear,’ he said, not unkindly. ‘At least she hasn’t suffered.’

  ‘She suffered quite a bit in the last few weeks, actually,’ Joss said. ‘The break was quite a bad one.’

  Her father smiled. ‘I’m sure you were a great help,’ he said, as if she were ten. ‘All that expensive training must have come in very useful.’

  ‘She was wonderful.’ Emma was defensive. ‘Mousie said so.’

  ‘Ah.’ His eyes became watchful. ‘And how is Mousie?’

  Emma looked so uncomfortable that Joss was puzzled.

  ‘She’s fine,’ her mother answered briefly. ‘So how long did the drive take you?’

  The question was so clearly meant as a diversion that Raymond didn’t bother to answer it: his fingers tapped out a rhythm and his eyes were speculative.

  ‘Did you manage to get a look at the will?’ he asked, following out his own train of thought.

  ‘No.’ Emma glanced uneasily at Joss. ‘No, of course not. Won’t it be with Mutt’s lawyer?’

  She managed to sound quite indifferent and Raymond frowned.

  ‘It might be anywhere,’ he answered irritably, ‘but I’d like to see it all the same.’

  ‘Why?’ Joss couldn’t contain herself. ‘Do you think Mutt might have left you something?’

  He looked at her consideringly, as if reminding himself that she was grieving for her grandmother, recognizing – but indifferent to – her contempt. Emma stood between them anxiously but neither of them looked at her.

  ‘I have to look after your mother’s interests,’ he answered almost genially. ‘Surely you must see that?’

  Various retorts jostled at Joss’s lips but now none of them was relevant. She let go of the chair-back and smiled at her mother.

  ‘No more coffee for me,’ she said. ‘See you later,’ and, taking up her plaid shawl, she let herself out quietly, closing the door behind her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  For a moment the only sound was the dull thud of George’s axe. Emma pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. She began to pour coffee, her lips compressed, her eyes anxious.

  ‘So you haven’t seen the will?’

  It was as if the exchange with Joss hadn’t taken place and Emma stirred irritably.

  ‘I’ve already told you I haven’t. Why should I? Honestly, Ray, you’re so … so tactless.’

  He shrugged the criticism away, his face indicating that he was concentrating on the possible problems ahead.

  ‘It’s important to be prepared,’ he told her, as if this were an excuse for his tactlessness. ‘Surely you can see that? Anything might have happened in those last few weeks.’

  Emma stared at him. ‘What kind of thing?’

  She was clearly hostile and knowing that he would need her assistance he made an effort to gain her understanding.

  ‘Have you thought where the Inheritance Tax will come from this time?’ he asked. His voice was softer now, almost meditative. ‘When your grandfather died there were farms and land to sell but now there’s nothing except Paradise itself. Or The Lookout and The Row. It’ll be a tidy bit to pay.’

  He saw that he had her attention; her face was shocked.

  ‘But what are you saying?’ she cried. ‘How could we sell Paradise? Or any of it?’

  He laid a thick white finger to his lips, knowing only too well how likely it was that a member of the family might walk in on them.

  ‘It’ll have to come from somewhere,’ he murmured. ‘We’re probably talking at least a hundred thousand.’

  ‘A hundred thousand pounds?’

  He raised his eyebrows at her amazement. ‘Why do you think I’ve been suggesting for years that Mutt should hand some of the estate over? If she’d given Bruno The Lookout and passed Paradise to you we’d have saved a fortune.’

  ‘But Bruno’s never said a word about tax.’

  Raymond snorted with contempt. ‘Bruno wouldn’t have a clue,’ he said. ‘Stuck in some other world with his damned books. Well,’ he shrugged, ‘let’s hope he’s making enough money to get himself out of trouble.’

  ‘But surely we won’t have to sell Paradise?’ She gazed at him fearfully. ‘You know I’ve always wanted it for Joss.’

  Raymond drew down the corners of his mouth. ‘Well, it might have to go. It depends how the will is set out.’ He wondered if she were frightened enough for him to play his development card and decided to scare her a little more. ‘The whole estate might have to come under the hammer and then, when it’s all sold up, you and Bruno would share out the remaining money.’

  ‘But that would be dreadful.’ Her eyes were huge with shock. ‘I can’t believe that could happen.’

  ‘Oh, my dear,’ his laugh was indulgent, ‘you clearly haven’t had any dealings with the Inland Revenue. They won’t give a damn how they get their money, I promise you. Of course,’ he pursed his lips thoughtfully, picking up his coffee cup, ‘there might be another way, if only I could get a look at the damned will.’

  She watched his leisurely gulps of coffee with fascinated revulsion, swallowing in unison with him, disliking his single-mindedness at such a time yet believing that if anyone could find an answer to a financial problem it would be Raymond Fox.

  ‘How would it help?’ she asked tremulously – and he saw that she was now on his side. ‘Just looking at it can’t alter the facts, can it?’

  ‘It can’t alter the facts,’ he agreed, ‘but we can be prepared. For instance, you know I’ve always seen that old boatyard as ready for development.’

  ‘Oh, no.’ She shied away from the idea. ‘Bruno says you’d have to knock down The Row to make that work.’

  ‘Not necessarily.’ Raymond dismissed Bruno’s fears with amused disdain. ‘He has simply no idea about anything outside the pages of fiction. Nonsense.’ He chuckled again, as if in amusement at Bruno’s naïvety. ‘Of course I can see his point. It would certainly spoil his view, although the architecture would be very carefully monitored, but at least he’d be able to stay in The Lookout. However, if that goes against the grain, we’d certainly get a good price for this place. It would make a first-class hotel …’

  For a moment he was distracted by the idea of Paradise as a top-class retreat for the wealthy: saunas and a swimming-pool; a golf links right there beside the sea; a celebrity chef. He could hear people talking: ‘You need a few days in Paradise, darling. It’s utter heaven. Of course you have to book months in advance…’ ‘It’s tiny but simply wonderful and very exclusive. Paul and I are going again this spring. The food is delicious …’ Perhaps he could buy it himself from the estate – at a special rate, of course – and put in a manager …

  ‘I don’t know how you can even bear to think about it.’ Emma was staring at him with such disgust that he feared that he might have lost her reluctant co-operation.

  ‘I’m only showing you the facts.’ He tried to sound as if he were doing her some kind of favour. ‘The next few days are going to be bad enough for you as it is, poor old girl, without the shock of this coming on top of the funeral. I just want to spare you as much as I can, can’t you see that?’

  She nodded unwillingly. ‘I suppose so. It’s just—’

  ‘Look.’ He leaned forward, almost conspiratorially, smiling at her. ‘Why don’t we see if we can find the will? You’re entitled, as her only daughter, to read it, especially if it’s been left here in the house. It’s got to be located anyway. If it isn’t here then you’ll need to have a word with her lawyer about it but it has to be found.’ His smile was kindly. ‘These things are always difficult, dear, but it’s got to be dealt with sooner or later. Better that you and I know the worst so that we can be prepared.’

  She nodded again, albeit reluctantly, and he sat back in his chair with a silent gasp
of relief.

  ‘I suppose you’ve no idea where Mutt might have kept it?’ He tried to keep his voice casual, though he was willing her to get on with it – God knows who might come wandering in – but he didn’t want to undo the good work. ‘In that old desk in her parlour is as good a place to start, I suppose.’

  ‘I suppose,’ she agreed wearily. ‘I’ll go and have a look.’

  She got up and went out and he heard the parlour door close behind her. He stretched with relief and poured himself some more coffee, resigning himself to patience.

  Joss could hear the thud of the axe as she slipped down the drive. Her one thought was to see Bruno; he was the only person with whom she could now feel entirely at ease. She told herself that she needed time to adjust and that a moment or two with Bruno would give her a breathing space. Also, she wanted to know where he’d found the letters. Last night, after Emma had gone to bed, she’d continued her search for Goblin Market in the parlour but she’d been unable to bring herself to go into Mutt’s empty bedroom. It seemed in some way unthinkable to go rooting about her grandmother’s personal possessions so soon after her death but now she wondered if she should have ignored her finer instincts. Her father, she was certain, would not be so nice; he or her mother might now start to look for the will and come across Goblin Market quite by mistake.

  Joss found that she was almost running, trying to keep pace with her fears. She slowed down, lest Mousie or Rafe might see her in such a hurry and imagine that something was wrong, and, walking more slowly now, turned up the steep path to The Lookout. She wondered briefly what George was thinking, whether he’d finished the logs and was puzzled by her disappearance, and gave a small groan of despair. He must have been surprised that she’d taken his news so coolly, merely offering him coffee and sending him out to split logs, when it had been the most important moment of their lives.

  She saw that her knowledge would lie between them like a sword, cutting them off from each other, and more especially so if there should prove to be unfair provisions in the will. It would be intolerable now if she or her family were to benefit at Rafe’s or Mousie’s expense, and the arrival of her father had shown her even more clearly the difficulties that might lie ahead: his presence, determined and resilient as rubber, crystallized her fears into reality.