Wild Grapes

by Elizabeth Aston

  As Gina was taking her leave of the vicar, a woman with streaky blonde hair, wearing a dress and shoes classified by Vogue as being suitable for the country, came up to them and interrupted her without any attempt at an apology.

  No manners, whoever she is, thought Gina, edging away.

  “It’s the altar flowers, Geoff,” the rude woman said. “I’ve brought some hibiscus, glorious colours, quite beautiful. Molly Gartsop isn’t very keen, but I do think they would look particularly good there.”

  A hunted look came into the vicar’s face.

  “Um,” he said. “Well, the altar flowers do present a problem.”

  “Of course, I understand that Molly usually does them, and that her father was vicar here in the year dot, but really, if you want to attract visitors to the church, you do need to have a more contemporary approach to the arrangements, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

  The vicar clutched at the nearest straw. “Don’t go,” he said to Gina in a desperate voice. “Lori, this is Gina Hartwell. Her family come from here. Gina, Lori Mowbray. She lives at Heartwell House.”

  Lori’s eyes swept over Gina, taking in her shorts and polo shirt and her sandals; not a designer item to be seen. “Hi,” she said, with no great enthusiasm.

  “Hello,” said Gina. And then, to the vicar, “Thank you again.”

  “How long are you staying at Heartsease?” asked the vicar.

  “I’m not sure,” said Gina.

  “If you have time, come again. I’ll gladly get the parish records out for you.”

  “That’s very kind.”

  “Heartsease?” Lori said sharply. “Are you staying in the village?”

  “Miss Hartwell is staying at the Hall.”

  “What, with the Cordovans?” Lori was clearly incredulous. “Are they friends of yours?”

  “Miss Hartwell is a relation,” said the vicar, who was enjoying himself.

  Charm flowed out of Lori, and a wide professional smile sprang on to her face.

  “Hartwell. Goodness, how slow I am. Your family might once have lived in my house. Did they? Have you ever been there? No, well, you absolutely have to come and see it. Of course it was in the most shocking state when we bought it, primitive, quite primitive, but it’s amazing how people with taste can transform a house. No, I insist, you can spare a quarter of an hour, of course you can. I’ll ring up Heartsease Hall and explain where you are. In fact, I can run you back, we have a four-wheel drive, it takes bikes, everything. No, it’s absolutely no trouble.”

  Gina’s protests were words on the wind as she was shepherded away from the church porch.

  “Don’t worry about those altar flowers, Geoff,” Lori flung over her shoulder at the vicar. “I’ll be along later to finish them.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Harry thought it was terribly funny when he heard where Gina had been. She arrived back at Heartsease, red-faced and breathless, at ten past five. “You needn’t have hurried,” he said. “Five o’clock was only an indication, we aren’t talking appointments here.”

  “I hurried to get away from that dreadful woman,” said Gina. “She wouldn’t let me go, I had to see all round the house, well, it is a lovely house, I will admit, but even so! And the questions! She obviously thinks the whole family at Heartsease are appalling.”

  “She doesn’t know us,” said Harry. “At least, we don’t know her.”

  “That’s what annoys her,” said Gina.

  “Don’t you find it very difficult at the Hall?” asked Lori, throwing open the door to her artfully cosy kitchen, which had an Aga at one end and a fat sofa at the other. Dog baskets, gingham cushions, and darkened beams with kitchen tools and bunches of herbs and dried flowers hanging on black hooks completed the look.

  “Difficult?”

  “Such strange people. Impossible to talk to, they don’t seem to live in the real world. Of course, we don’t really know them, but since we moved down here we’ve naturally become very involved in everything, I do think one has to be part of the village, don’t you agree? Just because we live in the big house, it doesn’t mean we don’t want to be involved in ordinary village life. But anyhow, those people at the Hall, I’m sorry, they’re family, I know, but they don’t have any sense of community. I do believe in contributing to social life around you, but you never see any of them doing anything.”

  “I think they all work,” said Gina cautiously.

  “Work! Well, they hardly need to, from what I hear. And what kind of work? I mean, I know what work is. Although we’ve moved out of London, and now with the girls - I have two daughters - I don’t work full time, I still freelance. And of course Gareth works all the hours there are, desperately long hours, he gives everything to his work, he slaves.”

  Gina was starting to feel very defensive about the Cordovans, although I can’t think why, she said to herself, they’re no family of mine. “Victor works, he runs several businesses,” she said. “And farms. Prim farms, too, and there’s the vineyard.”

  Lori had gone quite pale. “Farming!” she said. “I know all about that. Victor Cordovan’s prize cattle come marching through the village here, mud everywhere. Nobody seemed to want to do anything about it, I suppose they’re all overawed by the thought of the Cordovans and let them get away with anything. It’s going to change, there are one or two other families who have moved recently, and they are appalled, appalled by the way those cows are allowed to stampede along and tear up the road edges.”

  “Country usually means cows and mud, doesn’t it?”

  Lori had got the bit between her teeth. “And then the tractors. Early in the morning, the most terrible racket.”

  “I expect people here are used to it,” said Gina, trying to calm her down.

  “Well, it’s time they stopped being used to it, and made a fuss,” said Lori. “It won’t do, spoiling an attractive village like this because the local landowners choose to treat the roads as though they belonged to them.”

  “Which they do, of course,” said Harry, still highly amused.

  “What, all the way over there?”

  “Oh, yes. What then?”

  “This is all gossip,” said Gina.

  “I love gossip,” said Harry. “Come on, spit it out.”

  “If you really want to know,” said Gina, laughing, “she thinks the whole family is amoral, with attitudes and behaviour that have no place whatsoever in today’s world.”

  “I like it,” said Harry. “Almost, I think I want to know this Lori person.”

  Gina shook her head. Take it from me, you don’t.”

  “Next thing, of course, she’ll be round, claiming you as a friend. Do you think she’d be Victor’s type?” Harry added lightly.

  “If she comes round, I will be elsewhere,” said Gina. “And what is Victor’s type? I would have thought Julia was enough for anyone.”

  “Heifer-eyed Julia,” said Harry thoughtfully.

  “That’s hardly polite.”

  “No, Julia’s all right, but she does have a knack of knowing where the weak spots are and going for them.”

  “You sound sore.”

  “I am. Marriage, that whole business, Julia pushes it very hard, and she wants me to get married as quick as poss; give up the boys, settle down to normality. Oh well, if you marry me, then we’ll find out what it’s all about.”

  Gina was just about to say, not to worry, she had no intention of marrying him when Zoe’s warning about the Popplewell came back to her.

  “We hardly know each other yet,” said Gina.

  “No,” said Harry with a sigh. “But it’s hardly a coup de foudre, is it?”

  “Do coups de foudre ever really happen?”

  “I’m sure they do,” said Harry, looking out over the terrace to the distant sea. “That’s what I long for, to be overwhelmed by love for someone. On first meeting, to see someone and just know, this is it, this is a hand out to eternity.”

  “Hmm,” said Gina, sl
ightly put out by this, and startled by Harry’s unexpected romanticism.

  “Come on,” he said abruptly. “It’s too hot to worry about silly neighbours or married life. Let’s go for a swim. We can drive to the sea, there’s a cove where we can bathe; but I warn you, the sea will be distinctly chilly. Or we can use the pool here.”

  “This one?” said Gina, looking at the round pool with a statue of Neptune on an island in the centre.

  Harry laughed. “No, this is strictly ornamental, and fish, for the use of. There’s a swimming pool, I thought Hester showed you round the house.”

  “She did, but no pool.”

  “It’s in one of the conservatories. This is Prim’s territory, full of growing things, you see, so Hester doesn’t take much notice. Get your swimming costume, unless you’re going to bathe in the nude, and I’ll meet you by the kitchen door. And don’t look so prudish, Victor never wears a costume in the pool, nor do Julia and Prim. Noble, nude and antique, that generation.”

  “Oh, my!” said Gina.

  “Do you know you do sound pure American sometimes,” said Harry. “Of course, it’s hardly surprising.”

  “No, it isn’t,” said Gina, trying to make herself sound entirely English. “This is just amazing.”

  The conservatories had been built beyond the stable block some time in the last century, when a Victorian Cordovan had been struck by his visit to the Great Exhibition. The guidebook didn’t like them at all.

  These Victorian glass buildings are quite out of keeping with the fine, unspoiled mediaeval appearance of the Hall. Unfortunately, past and present owners of the house have preferred to let them remain, and now the planning laws would prevent their being demolished.

  Harry led the way through the small entrance house, which took them into the central part of the glass houses. “This is the Great House,” he told her.

  Gina looked up in awe at the glass which arched elegantly over ornate metal supports and struts.

  “All of thirty feet,” said Harry, looking up as well. He patted a thick palm trunk. “This is a banana tree. No monkeys, unfortunately, but several kinds of tropical birds.”

  Gina could hear them, and see flashes of exotic plumage. “Heaven,” she said.

  “Yes, a positive garden of Eden,” said Harry. “It’s all very clever, actually. Victorian ingenuity at its best. There’s a spray system which comes on about every forty minutes, that’s why it’s so tropical in here. The water is drawn from a stream higher up, it’s all terribly energy-efficient. The heating is underground; not necessary in the summer of course.”

  Gina put out a hand to brush against the thick, shiny leaves. “Wonderful smells.”

  “Plants from all over the place, here. One or two so rare that Kew came to take cuttings. Another ancestor spent most of his life up and down distant swampy rivers, sending back specimens. Wouldn’t be allowed these days, and in the end he was eaten by a crocodile.”

  They wandered through the paths set in the foliage, emerging at a set of double doors. “The Small House,” said Harry, standing aside to let Gina through. “This is the pool.”

  “Oh!” was all Gina could say.

  Harry looked sideways at her rapt face, and smiled. “Nice, isn’t it? I’ve always liked the classical touch.”

  Gina gazed at the elegant columns ranged round the pool, which did indeed give a classical effect. The pool was rounded at one end, and above it water poured out of a dolphin’s mouth into a huge shell, running over the edge to splash down into the pool.

  “That is neat,” she said.

  “It was originally an ornamental pool,” said Harry. “Pa had it made into a swimming pool years ago, when Charles was little.”

  “Charles?”

  “My half-brother. Julia’s son. He’s lame, from an accident when he was a baby, and swimming was supposed to help his leg. I don’t think it did, he’s still very lame; however, we all have the benefit. Changing rooms over there, ladies to the right, gents to the left. Shower and so on are self-explanatory. Lots of towels, robes and so forth about - help yourself.”

  Gina floated on her back. A faint breeze from the line of doors and windows at the far end which opened out on to the gardens ruffled the surface of the pool. She could just hear the birds in the adjoining house; otherwise it was completely tranquil.

  Only I don’t feel tranquil, she thought. This place assaults the senses, not just at first, but all the time. Tranquil was not the right word for it; there was none of the peace promised by the lush surrounding countryside, none of the peace she’d felt in Heartwell churchyard. This house dazzled and captivated you, with its perfect setting and countryside, with the lush leaves and flowers of the gardens and the luxuriant tropical growth in the glass-houses, but it didn’t make you feel safe, Gina decided. As a home should. At least in her book it should. On the other hand, homes were rarely exciting, and Heartsease House undoubtedly had an atmosphere of life and excitement about it.

  Perhaps it was the remarkable people who lived in the house and had a larger-than-life quality to them. Lori saw them as old-fashioned and arrogant. Georgie saw them as rich cousins. The villagers saw them as a family rooted in the place in the same way as the church or the hills. She, Gina, found them - well, what did she find them?

  Disturbing. That’s what they were.

  Harry dived into the pool and swam up beside her. Then he turned and floated on his back too.

  Gina gave a snort of disbelief, and plunged her head under the surface. Harry pulled her up and trod water beside her, his eyes mocking.

  “Seen something?” he enquired guilelessly.

  “You’re swimming naked.”

  “Yes, well, I always do. When I’m among friends.”

  “We aren’t that friendly,” said Gina firmly.

  “I’ll swim entirely on my front, so as not to offend,” said Harry, spurting off. “Then you can admire my behind. My best friends tell me I have a wonderful bum.”

  Gina swam decorously to the end of the pool, retreating under the shell so that the water came down in front of her like a curtain.

  “Go and put a costume on,” she shouted through the cascade.

  Harry pulled a mournful face, and then slowly pulled himself out of the water and on to the side.

  “Don’t you find water and the tropical ambience terribly sexy?” he asked. “I do.”

  One look showed Gina that this was so. “Off,” she yelled fiercely. “This minute. And have a cold shower while you’re in there,” she added to his back, as he strolled at an easy pace towards the changing room.

  “Prude,” he countered. “Besides, I’m basically not that interested in women.”

  I don’t think I’d take a bet on that, Gina said to herself as she ventured out from her shell. And I am not a prude.

  “If you are in a temper, Guy,” said Maria, “then please go away. Temper will spoil my parfait, no one can cook in a temper.”

  “Aw, that’s not right,” said Esme, who was passing through the kitchen looking huge in a tennis skirt and shirt. “You’re always in a temper.”

  Maria banged her wooden spoon on the table. “Impertinence I will not have.”

  “Okay, okay, keep your hair on,” said Esme, continuing on her way to the tennis court. She stopped at the door. “Oh, Harry says he’s going to take Gina out, so we’ll be two less for dinner.”

  Guy put the mixing bowl back on to the Hobart and snapped it into place with a loud thunk. “It’s too bad,” he said. “Harry took her out last night, they’ve been swimming together, and now he’s taking her out again.”

  “Ha,” said Maria. “Harry learns what it is to be a man, which is, I think, a very good thing.”

  “Harry is extremely masculine,” said Guy indignantly.

  “Yes, but with men; this doesn’t count, being unnatural and against all principles. Now, it is time for Harry to grow up and forget about beautiful boys and friends from school and all these English vices an
d become a proper man, learn how to please a woman. This cousin is very pretty, very lively, a good sense of humour. She will be good for him.”

  She gave the table another thump with the spoon, and sent Guy off to get the ice cubes. He muttered disconsolately into the chilly depths; that was all the thanks you got for putting yourself out the way he had.

  Maria was having none of that. “Making big eyes at Harry and Mr Victor is not putting yourself out. And all this is to your benefit, all experience for when you open this grand country house hotel you dream about. So you be quiet, and watch to see how you put this mixture in to make the parfait exactly as it should be.”

  This time Harry headed towards the coast. “There’s a good restaurant down near the cove,” he said. “Only don’t tell Maria, she takes it as a personal affront if we eat French food.”

  “Maria is a very good cook,” said Gina, enjoying the air rushing past her face from the open window.

  “Maria is a genius,” said Harry. “On the other hand, you’re never alone when you eat Maria’s food, because some member of the family is always there.”

  “Here, too,” said Gina, enjoying Harry’s momentary discomfiture as they went into the beamed dining-room to find Aimee ensconced at a small table with a much older man. And a very dashing one, too, thought Gina.

  The man was so busy gazing at Aimee, who was looking extraordinarily lush in a red and white silk dress, that he didn’t notice her brother waving from the other side of the room. Aimee smiled a devastating smile at Gina, gave a tiny wave, and returned her attention to the matter in hand. Literally in hand, as the man was now kissing the inside of her wrist.

  Harry frowned. “Aimee’s going to get into serious trouble one of these days,” he grumbled in the manner of brothers down the generations.

  “I expect she can look after herself,” said Gina. How could you criticize someone who was as entrancing as Aimee?