Rumours Read online

  ‘Thank you so much.’ Stella extended her hand to shake but Art looked as embarrassed as if she’d tried to give him a tip. He turned and walked off. ‘Art,’ she called after him, ‘Art?’ On purpose, she didn’t say it loudly, just her regular speaking voice. He turned, cocked his head. ‘Why does she say you’re deaf when you’re not?’

  ‘She doesn’t know I’m not.’

  ‘She doesn’t know?’

  ‘I find it – helpful – for her to think me so.’ And he winked, thereby alerting Stella to which eye was his good one.

  ‘Does she know you’re half blind?’

  ‘No. Mustn’t know – she’d’a never let me drive the Roller, let alone the fancy ride-on mowers.’ He shrugged, tipped his cap and went on his way.

  Stella returned to the apple store once Art was gone from sight and stood in the dimly lit interior, thinking about apples and gunpowder and how, for such a long time, Longbridge Hall had been a fully functioning, self-sufficient vibrant world-in-little; somehow sheltered by, yet also providing for, a small village in Hertfordshire.

  * * *

  Xander was halfway through a second lap around what he termed the Killer Loop which circumnavigated Long Dansbury and skirted Little Dunwick in seven and a half arduous hilly miles. He didn’t usually take much notice of specifics when he was running, especially not if he was going against the clock; instead he’d tick off a mental checklist of landmarks. Today, though, from the hill high above Longbridge Hall, a glint coming off a mirror-like slab caught his eye. It was the sunroof of a Mini, parked in the driveway. Deludedly, for a moment he thought it might be Verity – but the last car she’d had was a clapped-out, orange VW Beetle whose bodywork had no shine left and as far as he knew, she’d had no cause to change it since. As he ran on, he glanced again at the vehicle and, as he dropped downhill a little, the company’s branding emblazoned along the side came into view.

  Elmfield Estates.

  What the—!

  He remembered Caroline’s text a couple of weeks ago. It couldn’t be! Bang outside Longbridge Hall? Where was Lydia? Did she know? Thank goodness he’d decided to work from home today. He ran fast – too fast for the gradient, really, and for this stage in his run, with twelve miles done at a pace and three left to go. But he felt strangely compelled to get there at all odds, as if expecting the whole estate to have been sold and new owners unpacking by the time he arrived.

  Xander knew every gap in every hedge, every low part of every wall because, over the years, it appeared he was the only one who knew they were there as they’d never been fixed or filled. Down into the estate he sprinted. He ran; across a meadow, through the kitchen garden, along the drive and up to the front door. He rang and knocked but even through the great slabs of mahogany, he sensed the house was empty. Anyway, it wasn’t really Lydia he needed – because he couldn’t believe that this could possibly be within her control, imagining instead an idea foisted upon her and now taking hold, like an infection, with a momentum of its own. No, Lydia wouldn’t be the perpetrator.

  There! In the garden! Noseying near the statue of Lord Frederick Makepeace William Fortescue, the first Earl of Barbary. Some woman, walking around in a tailored suit and heels, looking frankly ridiculous – both out of place and unwelcome. Xander tempered his pace and approached.

  Stella heard panting, sensed the rhythmic beat across earth of someone approaching fast. She looked over and recognized at once the jogger who’d sent her flying on her very first visit to Mercy Benton, her very first visit to the village. And as he approached, Xander recalled the woman taking up the entire pavement that day, flapping around with her papers flying, getting in his way and messing up his timing. They stared at each other, Xander feeling as if he was running on the spot for the last few yards, Stella feeling as if she’d be sent flying at any moment. He was right there. Stopped.

  ‘What!’ she said defensively, because his displeasure was worn as an emphatic frown.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ Hands on his hips, his damp hair plastered to his skull resembling a Roman emperor, his forearms all a-glisten, his chest rising and falling fast.

  ‘I’m Stella Hutton, actually,’ she said officiously. ‘Elmfield Estates.’ She didn’t offer her hand because she had no desire to take his.

  ‘But what are you doing here?’ And he fixed her with his blue-grey eyes which appeared to darken the longer they kept her caught. ‘Why are you snooping around?’

  ‘Firstly, I am not snooping around.’ Stella was indignant. ‘Secondly, I’ve been invited, thank you very much. And thirdly, what business is it of yours?’ She glanced over to the house, as if willing Mrs Biggins to come out brandishing a rolling pin or, better still, Lady Lydia to appear with her spear-sharp tongue.

  ‘Actually, it is very much my business,’ the man said. ‘Leave the Fortescues alone. They’ve been here for generations and the last thing they need is you filling their heads with notions of millions. And the last thing Long Dansbury needs is a bloody property developer carving up the history of the place and disrupting the dynamic.’ He looked thoroughly triumphant. ‘Do you know how many lives – entire families – this estate provides for?’ He’d stopped panting. His arms were crossed but still his eyes wouldn’t release her.

  ‘Who are you?’ Stella asked, regarding him as if he might be the village lunatic. She backed up a step, feeling bolstered to be standing side by side with Lord Fortescue, the very first Earl of Barbary, even if he was bronze and looking the other way.

  ‘I grew up here.’

  ‘You’re a Fortescue?’

  ‘Er – no.’ And he was helpless not to laugh a little. ‘No.’

  Stella bristled. She didn’t like being shouted at and she didn’t like being laughed at. ‘Then I’ll thank you to leave me to my work.’

  ‘But what are you doing?’ He scratched his head, causing his hair to stand up in jaunty spikes.

  ‘I am here at Lady Lydia’s invitation and you’re in my way. You’re holding me up.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Because I have work to do!’ she chided.

  ‘I mean – why are you here? I’ve heard the rumours, you know.’

  ‘Well, you’ll have to discuss it with Lady Barbary,’ said Stella before thinking, No! That’s not her name.

  Xander snorted and Stella reddened, feeling as if he now thought her more of a silly impostor than a threat. She cast her eyes down at her shoes. Stupid high heels. Muddied.

  ‘Just don’t bully her,’ he said. ‘She’s not as steely as she likes people to think.’ It was almost impossible for Stella to ally this to the Lydia she had met twice in the last twenty-four hours.

  ‘Look, I need to work,’ Stella muttered, ‘and if you have some sentimental attachment to the place, then I’m sorry.’

  Xander stared at her hard and then he backed away a few steps, still shrugging, before turning and running off whence he came. She didn’t know why she watched after him nor why she sensed he’d turn again. But he did; timing it perfectly at the precise place just before the land climbed and the path curved and Lord Fortescue’s part of the garden would disappear from his view. And then he raised his hand; this weird, stroppy bloke. He raised his hand and Stella wasn’t sure why, whether it was a wave or a halt sign. Either way, it threw her and she found herself raising hers back even though it conflicted with her better judgement. For goodness’ sake, woman! She gave herself a shake and turned to the bronze statue of Lord Fortescue, or Lord Frederick as she now thought of him, then stood on tiptoes until she felt she was looking right at him.

  ‘Good God, sir,’ she said, ‘this place is full of the most peculiar people.’

  And she looked at his face and thought of him shagging the Prince Regent’s mistress and building this fine house and securing this wonderful land and planting these beautiful gardens and squirrelling away his secret porn collection and staring at that horse’s enormous backside every time he went up and down the stairs.
r />   ‘Actually, sir, I hope a property developer doesn’t buy it.’

  ‘Longbridge without a Fortescue?’ he seemed to exclaim. ‘How preposterous!’

  And then Stella giggled a little. In a bizarre and surreal way, all of this was ever so slightly wonderful. What on earth was she doing here, conversing with a bronze statue? Having a stand-up row with a strange man dripping with sweat? Wearing high heels and a borrowed suit, when she was slowly sinking into the soft lawn and she really wasn’t warm enough. She hadn’t done the final figures – how could she, she hadn’t known until an hour ago about a whole other house in a whole other garden – but she could already estimate Longbridge Hall to be worth well over ten million pounds. Was she really being chosen to handle it all? She wasn’t a property guru. She was a single mum, a divorcee, an erstwhile art historian currently masquerading as an estate agent because she desperately needed to claw back money and stability into her life and fast. But could an eye-watering commission really be coming her way? The difference it would make to her life. The difference the sale of this place would make to so many lives. But that simply had to be no concern of hers. She had to look after herself. And answer to her client.

  ‘Where’s the Barbary money gone? Why does Lady Lydia need to sell?’ she asked Lord Frederick.

  ‘Buggered if I know, m’dear,’ he replied. ‘You need to ask her yourself.’

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘I’m not remotely interested in who gets it.’

  Lydia was suddenly at Stella’s side, as if butting in on the private tête-à-tête Stella and Sir Frederick had been having.

  ‘Lady Lydia!’

  ‘As I said, I don’t care who buys Longbridge,’ she said. ‘It’s not like selling a horse, you know. Gracious me, the hoops I’d have potential owners jump through before I’d let one of mine go. I turned down thousands for Percy – no one was quite right. He lived out his days right here in the garden, where the grass was sweetest. Used to drive Art absolutely potty.’ The women gazed at the lawns awhile, as if the ghost of Percy was present. ‘So don’t come to me with any “Mr and Mrs Buggerlugs will cherish this place and breathe life back into it” nonsense,’ Lydia continued. ‘All I’m interested in is who’s going to pay the most – then it’s theirs. Plenty of rooms at Longbridge – but no room whatsoever for sentiment.’

  Stella reflected quietly for a moment. Usually, she could assess a house within minutes of seeing it. But in her two lengthy visits, she felt she’d merely scratched at the surface of Longbridge, as if peering in through a dusty window at an angle and knowing she wasn’t seeing all the details. Yesterday, the house itself – unexpected rooms, hidden shelving, veiled insults from a future king to a Fortescue and from a current Fortescue right back at Stella. This morning, with Art, she’d discovered that behind the crumbling walls of the old barns, in the secret garden of the dower house, in the reverential shadows of the apple store and the cold interior of the empty boiler house, a jewel was hidden. Despite the faded walls, balding rugs with dog mess, nasty kitchen and general chill in the main house and direct frostiness of the owner, today Stella sensed that Longbridge Hall had secrets and riches that had been peculiarly downplayed. It was as if someone had switched off the central heating – but if it could be put back on again, the warmth and colour would flood the place. Even the old brass nameplates, now tarnished and suffocated by ivy but still fixed to the southern wall of the kitchen garden, told a more detailed story than simply naming the long-gone espaliered fruit trees. How would she bring all this across in the particulars? A mammoth task but with potentially huge rewards.

  ‘Longbridge Hall is worth millions,’ Stella said, looking at the statue of Lord Frederick as if he’d approve.

  ‘Of course it is,’ Lydia rubbished, ‘but how many millions?’ The breeze had lifted strands of her hair and it made her look overexcited.

  ‘I didn’t know about the dower house,’ said Stella.

  ‘The what?’

  ‘Garden House – as you call it.’

  ‘What is there to know?’

  ‘Are there any other dwellings here? In addition to the apartments in the stable courtyard?’

  ‘No,’ said Lydia. Then she thought about it. ‘Well, there’s a groom’s flat over in the livery yard – but that’s not for permanent residence.’ She thought about it some more. ‘And then the cottages on Tramfield Lane – they fall within the Longbridge curtilage too. As does the patch of land opposite the shop where people park.’ Lydia glanced at Stella, who was gawping, and looked away with barely concealed irritation. ‘You’re catching flies.’

  Stella closed her mouth. ‘And everything’s for sale?’

  ‘The lot!’ Lydia said, with a dismissive wave of her hand. ‘The whole rotten lot. Crumbling barns. Ancient tenants. The whole shooting match!’

  ‘You see, we could market it as an estate entire – or divide it into lots.’

  ‘I don’t want to be left having to auction off the dregs, I want the whole thing gone. It’s an utter bore now – not to mention an absolute sinkhole when it comes to money.’

  Stella paused. ‘In that case, I’ll need to see the other places – the cottages.’

  Lydia stood expressionless. Then she nodded. ‘Of course,’ she said.

  Stella glanced at Lord Frederick, who seemed to be goading her on. ‘A man came up to me this morning – right here in the garden,’ she told Lydia. ‘He charged up to me – I thought he was going to send me flying. Extremely rude – started telling me off for being here and told me in no uncertain terms to leave you alone and that Longbridge wasn’t for sale.’

  ‘Art?’

  ‘No, not Art. A younger bloke – all sweaty and panting and in jogging gear. He was really stroppy. I thought he might be a trespasser but he claimed to live here.’ Stella paused. ‘Of course, I could tell he wasn’t a Fortescue. So ill-mannered,’ she stressed, as if that in itself made him the polar opposite of a Fortescue. Fortunately, the irony was lost on Lydia and actually Stella had managed subtly to appease her. Lydia’s expression had softened around the eyes and even a smile was threatening to crack out from the corners of her pursed lips.

  ‘I see.’ Lydia walked on ahead. ‘There’s lunch, if you care to take it,’ she called over her shoulder. ‘We’ll go and see the cottages, and the rest, in thirty minutes.’

  * * *

  ‘Where the hell is she?’

  ‘Second day on the trot.’

  ‘Phone her again, Belinda.’

  ‘Her phone was off half an hour ago.’

  ‘If she doesn’t call in, I’m taking on the Bengeo property. Mr Winterton has phoned twice already, wondering what’s happening with the survey.’

  ‘I reckon the job’s too much for her.’

  ‘What did I tell you?’

  ‘Well, I think we should let Douglas know. I mean, what did any of us actually know about her?’

  ‘Those other properties she’s sold – a kid could have shifted them.’

  ‘If you’re so intrigued, why don’t You Three ask Douglas where she is?’

  ‘He’s not in either – or haven’t you noticed, Geoff?’

  ‘You phone her, Geoff – she has a soft spot for you.’

  ‘We’ve heard you like a younger woman, Geoff.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘For God’s sake – it’s a joke.’

  * * *

  Stella was sitting down to the lunch which Mrs Biggins had presented to her with all the stroppy flourish of a celebrity chef before flouncing accordingly out of the kitchen. On a plate: a hard-boiled egg, two celery sticks, a hunk of cheddar, a whole tomato, a glob of pickle boot-polish brown, and a slice of thickly buttered wholewheat bread. She imagined lunch for the workers had been pretty much the same throughout the history of Longbridge. When her mobile rang, its jaunty polyphonic ring tone seemed vulgar, too harsh for a house which had only three old-fashioned Bakelite telephones.

  ‘Hullo?’ she
answered quietly.

  ‘Oh. Yes. Hi, Stella – it’s Geoff – from the office?’ It touched her, the way he turned anything about himself into a question, as if today he was unsure whether he was who he thought he was, let alone whether he was in the office or not.

  ‘Hullo, Geoff – everything OK?’

  ‘Well, it’s fine, Stella. Yes, everything in the office is fine – but we haven’t seen you.’

  ‘No –’ she paused – ‘no, you haven’t.’ Her uncle had told her not to mention a thing until they knew whether or not Elmfield Estates would be representing Longbridge Hall. She could hear Belinda in the background, hissing to Geoff to ask Stella where the hell she was. ‘I’m just –’ she paused – ‘I’m just following a lead. I alerted Mr Hutton I’d be out of the office – apologies if you weren’t informed.’

  ‘Right,’ said Geoff, because he’d thought it quite wrong to phone her in the first place.

  ‘Right,’ said Stella. ‘I was hoping to be back after lunch, but it’s unlikely now.’ She looked at the tomato, punctured and deflated from where she’d sucked. Delicious.

  ‘Mr Winterton wanted to know about the survey – at Bengeo.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ said Stella who’d quite forgotten. ‘I have his number, I’ll call him directly.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Geoff, wishing the others would stop hovering. Belinda was wearing ghastly perfume today, the heavy musky type that clung to the clothing of anyone near, and Steve had had curry for lunch. ‘We’ll see you tomorrow then?’

  ‘You will indeed. First thing,’ said Stella. ‘Thanks, Geoff.’ And she was grateful it had been him calling, not one of the others. Though she’d managed to foster a workmanlike cordiality with the others, she knew it was paper thin. Geoff was kind and, in his weary way, an ally. She phoned Mr Winterton, put his mind at rest and, after that, found to her consternation that she’d quite lost her appetite. What would she do if she did secure Longbridge Hall on their books? Belinda, Steve and Gill would want her head on a plate and Geoff, dear Geoff, would probably just give up.