The House (Armstrong House Series Book 1)

by A. O'Connor

  “Well, why didn’t you tell me about them then?”

  “I was going to after I had read them.”

  “Well, how bloody long does it take to read them? And they are not yours, they belong to my family!”

  Her temper rose. “Well, if you want to investigate that legally – go ahead! There’s an argument they belong to us as they were part of the sale of the house.”

  “It’s all about ‘legally’ with you lot, isn’t it? You think you can get anything you want by just hiring a hot-shot lawyer. Whatever about ‘legally’, and that argument is nonsense anyway, they are documents from my family’s past, so belong to my family. And that’s what you’re after, isn’t it? A past – a history like my family’s?”

  “I didn’t realise you could patent history,” she snapped back.

  “And what’s all this about you trying to track down Clara’s relatives?”

  She doubly cursed Tony’s big mouth. “Why not? It’s a free world. I can do what I want. As you say, Clara’s things belong back with her family, but you’re not her family. You have no respect for her items, you’ll just throw them away like you did her other stuff and that’s why I didn’t hand them to you. You’re not descended from her, and I want to return them to the Charter family.”

  He shook his head. “I think it’s a bit more than that, isn’t it? You’re researching for your new role, actress that you are. What is it – do you want to be Clara?”

  “Oh shut up, Nico,” she snapped, mounted the horse and trotted off to the stables.

  From the upstairs bedroom window in the house Tony had observed them arguing.

  A little while later, he was walking down the stairs as Kate came storming in.

  “You can fire that Nico Armstrong-Collins, or whatever he calls himself, first thing in the morning!” she said.

  “I can’t! I’ve signed a contract with him.”

  “You always said you leave in a secret clause to be able to get out of any contract – now use it and get rid of him!”

  “What’s wrong now?”

  “Why did you tell him about Clara’s letters and me looking up the Charter family?” she demanded.

  “Didn’t realise it was a state secret.” He looked at her, amused.

  “Ahhh!” she shouted in frustration and pushed past him up the stairs.

  Nico slammed the door of Hunter’s Farm behind him and marched into the sitting room. Damn that Kate Fallon! He poured himself a drink and sat down. Who did she think she was? Parading around the place as she did. Grabbing letters not belonging to her, looking up distant relatives of his. It was none of her damned business. As he calmed down he realised what had really upset him was overhearing how she had described him earlier. She had dismissed him as being insignificant. And that had hurt. He didn’t want to be insignificant to her. But to retaliate by calling her a thief and a liar was going too far, he realised. He had just wanted to hurt her back. He knew he had handled the situation disastrously.

  101

  The public relations company had mailed out all the invitations to the ball, and Kate had collected the post and was going through it in the drawing room, sorting out the RSVPs. Amongst the mail, she found an impressive white envelope with an English postage stamp, addressed to her. She opened it and read:

  156 Nell Gwynn Apartments

  Sloane Street

  Kensington

  London SW 1

  Tel. 0207 8761462

  Dear Mrs Fallon,

  Your details were given to me by a cousin who in turn had been contacted by the curator of the museum at Charters Chocolates. I believe you have come into the possession of some items once belonging to my relative Clara Charter, the former Lady Armstrong. I would very much be grateful if you contacted me at the above. I look forward to hearing from you.

  Dr Amanda Charter

  Kate felt excited as she reread the letter. She had been giving up hope of making contact with any relative of Clara’s. She immediately reached for her phone and dialled the number.

  The taxi pulled up outside the Nell Gwynn apartments in Chelsea. Kate got out, and entered the mansion block. It looks like the Charter family still have plenty of money, she thought as she looked around the opulent building.

  “I’m here to see Dr Amanda Charter,” she informed the concierge.

  “Mrs Fallon?” asked the concierge, checking his appointments book.

  “That’s right,” confirmed Kate.

  “She’s expecting you. The fifth floor, Number 156.”

  “Thank you,” said Kate and headed over to the lift.

  She reached the apartment and rang the bell. A few moments later a middle-aged woman answered.

  “Dr Charter is expecting you – if you care to follow me?”

  She led Kate down a hallway and into a large expensively furnished living room with fine views across the city. A woman was waiting there, aged in her sixties, expensively dressed with a neat blonde bob and a slim neat figure.

  “Mrs Fallon, nice to meet you,” said Amanda as she stood up and shook hands.

  “Thank you for meeting me,” said Kate.

  “Please take a seat,” said Amanda as she sat down and lifted a silver teapot. “Tea?”

  “Please,” Kate answered.

  Amanda filled two cups. “I was intrigued to hear about you, Mrs Fallon, from the Charter museum.” She handed over the cup of tea. “You’re the actress, aren’t you?”

  “That’s right. Myself and my husband bought Armstrong House in Ireland and, well, we found some old photos, letters and a brooch belonging to Clara, and wanted to return them to her family.”

  Kate observed Amanda to be a shrewd woman, self-composed and confident, and although her looks were faded somewhat she still cut a striking figure.

  “Armstrong House – that is a name I haven’t heard in a long time. I thought it had burned down?”

  “Parts of it, but we managed to restore it,”

  Amanda sat forward expectantly. “Could I see what you have?”

  “Of course!” Kate quickly opened her briefcase and, taking out a large envelope, she pulled out the photos it contained and handed them over.

  Amanda put on her glasses and began to study the photos.

  “They are taken inside Armstrong House,” said Kate. “In various rooms.”

  Amanda smiled. “They didn’t exaggerate her beauty, did they?”

  “They?”

  “People who knew her when she was young, relatives of mine . . . I only knew her later in her life when I was a child, but she had changed by then.”

  Kate then handed over the letters. “Most of the letters are from friends of hers fighting in the First World War. The rest are letters from Clara to her husband Pierce. They were returned to her unopened, I don’t know why.”

  “You opened them?” Amanda asked, looking up.

  “Well, yes –”

  “And read them of course?”

  “I did, yes.” Kate suddenly felt intrusive.

  Amanda sat back and crossed her legs. “How can I help you, Mrs Fallon? You didn’t come to London just to hand me a few photos and letters. You could have sent them in the post if you were that anxious for them to be repatriated to her family.”

  Kate sensed there was a no-nonsense toughness in Amanda.

  “I – I confess I was curious to find out what had happened to Clara after she left the house.”

  “You are just being a bit nosy then, are you?”

  “I hope I’m not coming across like that.”

  “Perhaps you’re researching an idea for a new movie project you’re working on?” Amanda raised an eyebrow cynically.

  “I haven’t worked in film for years, Dr Charter, and have no intention of returning to that business,” Kate said sharply.

  Amanda studied her. “No, and I guess with a husband as wealthy as yours you have no reason to.” There was a silence before she spoke again. “I’m sorry if I was rude. It’s just hea
ring again about Armstrong House and Clara – it’s brought back a lot of difficult memories for my family. Clara, you see, had a very difficult time there, especially towards the end. When Clara met Pierce Armstrong, she fell head over heels in love with him. She could have had anybody but chose to have him. The trouble was, he didn’t particularly want her, but took her anyway – because he could, I imagine. She endured a terrible cold and unloving marriage, that was when he was there, which wasn’t often because he was fighting in the war. She tried everything to make her marriage work with him, but he basically told her he had never had any feelings for her.” Amanda picked up the letters to Pierce from Clara. “He didn’t even open and read the letters she sent him at the front. He returned them to her unopened. Clara had really no options. There was little or no opportunity to exit an unhappy marriage. She finally found solace with a member of their circle, a neighbour, the artist Jonathan Seymour. They had a relationship and fell in love and were to elope. Pierce was in a high command position and Ireland was under martial law at the time with the War of Independence raging. When her husband Pierce found out they planned to elope, he had Seymour arrested and interned . . .” Amanda’s voice trailed off as she picked up the photos of Clara again.

  “And Clara?”

  “Clara was held prisoner in Armstrong House. He told her if she tried to escape he would have her put in prison as well on some charge to do with subversive activities Seymour had involved her in.”

  “Oh!” Kate got a shock at the thought of this beautiful woman so unhappy and unable to leave the house.

  “Jonathan Seymour spent some months held in isolation in prison as ordered by Pierce. When the war in Ireland was over and Pierce’s power gone, Clara expected Jonathan to come for her. But he never did. I believe prison changed him considerably. He had some sort of breakdown and left for America as soon as he was released where he concentrated on his art, and as we know went on to find considerable success.”

  “And what happened to Clara?”

  “After Ireland was given independence the Armstrongs evacuated from the house, fearing reprisal. But this was her opportunity to break free of Pierce and she refused to leave with them. She intended to wait in the house for Jonathan to come for her. Then the republicans came, removed her forcibly and burned the house down. She never spoke of what happened that night fully. She returned to London in disgrace. When Pierce discovered she was leaving him for good and there was nothing he could do about it, he immediately filed for divorce, citing her adultery. For a woman to be divorced on those grounds back then was a scandal. She didn’t contest it. She was thirty-three when she arrived back in London. If she had been born ten years later and never met Pierce she might have been one of those bright young things of the twenties you hear about. From what I know that era would have suited her perfectly. But she was born just ahead of her time, and broke all the conventions of her time. Her family, my family, were horrified by the scandal of the divorce. Their connections managed to keep it out of the papers, but everyone in society knew about it and her affair with Seymour. She became persona non grata. She was sent down to her grandmother’s estate in the countryside and that’s where she lived quietly for the rest of her life.”

  “I see.” Kate picked up one of the photos and stared at it.

  “You look disappointed,” Amanda said.

  “I’m very disappointed for her.”

  “Were you hoping she would have gone on and done something dramatic with her life? We don’t expect people like her to drift into ordinariness, do we? We expect people like her to be as glamorous and exciting all their lives. But people break, and then if they are allowed to be ordinary that’s the best they can hope for. I just remember everyone saying it was a shame what became of her – that she had been a great beauty, the centre of everyone’s attention, had married into the aristocracy. I suppose she was quietly destroyed by her experiences.”

  “Well, I’m very sorry to hear that. I thought – I don’t know what I thought.”

  “She followed her heart, and that was her undoing. But then we can’t help where our heart takes us, can we, Mrs Fallon?”

  “No – no, we can’t,” sighed Kate.

  Amanda studied her. “What troubles you, Mrs Fallon?”

  “Sorry?”

  “Women don’t go around chasing fantasies from a hundred years ago when they are happy with their own lives.”

  “I wasn’t chasing a fantasy. I was just –”

  “Returning photos and letters of Clara to her family. I know and thank you. Well, you found out what happened to her, but I don’t think it’s given you any answers.”

  “I don’t know what I was looking to find out. I felt I had some bond with her. Maybe in the same way I always bonded with the characters I played. I felt I knew her and could feel her in the house. Maybe I wanted to be her. We bought the house from Pierce’s grandson, Nicholas – Nico – Collins. And he told me about her, about her affair with Jonathan Seymour. We employed him to renovate our house and got to know him very well.”

  “Yes, Pierce did get married again much later, to a lovely young Dublin socialite. He seemed to have attracted the same type as Clara again. They were married only a short while before he was killed in the Second World War, before he had a chance to destroy that girl’s life like he had with Clara. They had a daughter, I believe?”

  “Yes, Jacqueline, who was Nico’s mother.”

  “She has passed away?”

  “Yes, a few years ago, I believe.”

  Amanda nodded and looked at the floor.

  “And what’s Pierce’s grandson, Nicholas Collins, like?” Amanda asked.

  “Oh, he’s – he’s a little bit arrogant, takes himself quite seriously, cynical. Can be sarcastic at times, but amusing.” Kate smiled.

  Amanda studied her. “And does Nico Collins know you’ve fallen in love with him?”

  Kate looked at her and blinked a few times.

  “Oh,” nodded Amanda knowingly. “It’s that serious, is it?”

  Kate said nothing.

  Amanda sat forward. “If you felt Clara was somehow communicating with you, maybe she was warning you. Warning you not to let your emotions run away with you. Not to ruin your life over thinking you want someone, that the reality is very different from what you might think it is.”

  Kate wordlessly picked up the brooch and gave it to Amanda.

  Amanda glanced at it briefly and handed it back to Kate. “You keep this. I think it will mean more to you than to me.”

  “Thank you.” Kate took it and put it in the briefcase and then took out a DVD.

  “There’s a film also. We found an old film roll taken of Clara at a party in the house.” She handed it to Amanda.

  The front door of the apartment opened and closed, and a tall distinguished man came into the lounge.

  “Oh, hello there,” he said.

  Amanda and Kate stood up.

  “Mrs Fallon, this is my husband, Harry Beaumont – I use my maiden name, Charter, in my professional life.”

  “Ah, you’re the lady who was bringing the photos over from Ireland.”

  “Yes,” said Kate.

  “Very kind of her to track us down, don’t you think?” said Amanda. “Is there anything else we can do for you, Mrs Fallon?”

  Kate picked up her briefcase. “I’d better be going. I have to get to the airport.”

  “I’ll show you to the door,” said Amanda as she led her down the corridor.

  “Nice meeting you,” said Kate to Harry and she followed Amanda.

  Harry walked over to the coffee table, picked up the photos and began to look through them.

  Amanda came back into the room.

  “Strange woman,” she said.

  “Did you find out what she wanted?” asked Harry.

  “She wanted to know what happened to Clara.”

  “And did you tell her?”

  “No, Harry, I’m not in the habit of discussi
ng personal family business and secrets with strangers. Besides, she’s friends with Pierce Armstrong’s grandson Nico. We certainly don’t want the Armstrongs finding out the truth at this stage. Let sleeping dogs lie.”

  He studied the photo of Clara. “Do you ever regret what Clara chose to do?”

  “No, she made the right choice.”

  She crossed over to the DVD player and placed the tape in it.

  The film of Clara at the party came on the screen. Amanda watched it intently. It was only then that Harry saw Amanda’s ice-cool exterior crack as her eyes filled with tears.

  “Seeing her there in her youth, so full of life. I heard what she was like but to actually see it . . .” She trailed off.

  Harry smiled and put an arm around her.

  102