The House of Hopes and Dreams

by Trisha Ashley

  ‘It sounds like a lot of businesses have taken off because of the increased number of visitors it’s brought in, so if they’ve been creative in adding extra ghostly happenings, you can’t really blame them!’

  ‘Well, at least you can’t say Howling Hetty is made up!’ I said.

  Carey called the dog whisperer when we got back and then, losing patience with the dodgy and slow internet connection, took himself off to the pub, where he could use the free wi-fi to fire off a load of emails to contacts he was sure would love to help him renovate Mossby. And, such was his charm, charisma and popularity, I expect they would.

  While he was there, he also chased up the internet provider he’d chosen, who had promised connection within a fortnight, so he hoped they’d put their money where their mouth was.

  As I continued to work on my cartoon of the Lady Anne window, I slowly began to suspect that it was not the random design it seemed after all, but contained some kind of message.

  It had taken me many hours to copy every detail – and a servant with a stepladder to help me get high enough to ensure I had it all accurately.

  Coming down from this one day, after making a detailed drawing of the final top section, with its spiked sun, I suddenly felt strangely dizzy.

  I had been so busy both in my workshop and in my copying of the window that it only now dawned on me that there were changes happening that heralded the arrival of a new addition to the family.

  For some reason, this came as a complete shock to me. I had not said so to Ralph, for it seemed unnatural, but I had never yearned for children. But of course he must want an heir to carry on Mossby … though this could not have been his only reason for marrying me, since being so tall and handsome he could have married a far prettier girl!

  25

  On the Ball

  Just after breakfast next morning, Rufus rang to ask if it would be all right to come over with his van and take both sets of gates back with him. He had a couple of friends roped in ready to help.

  Carey went out to meet them at the top of the drive and I saw the big van go slowly up past the kitchen window a few minutes later, but by then I was talking on the phone to Molly. I’d suddenly realized that I hadn’t arranged to have my mail redirected and it didn’t look as if Nat and Willow were going to forward any on.

  ‘So if Grant wouldn’t mind asking Nat tomorrow if I’ve had any mail, that would be great,’ I explained. ‘Some of it might have gone straight to the workshop, rather than the cottage.’

  ‘I’m sure he will, and if he and Ivan could come up and see the workshop on Saturday, they could bring it with them?’

  ‘Of course they can, I was just about to suggest it. It’s taken me longer than I thought to help Carey finish his inventory of the house, but I’ll be down at the workshop first thing on Saturday, starting to clean it up, though it needs the plumbing and electricity updating first, really. I’m off to get gallons of white paint, rollers, brushes and cleaning materials later today, so I’m ready for action!’

  ‘I’ll follow them up in the car, because I’ve some apple pies and a batch of pasta sauces to put in Carey’s freezer, but then I’ll have to dash off to do the rest of my deliveries.’

  ‘OK – you’ve got your key to the back door now, so if no one is about you can just let yourself in and we’ll have a catch-up when you’ve got a bit more time.’

  I finished my coffee and went out with Fang to see how they were getting on with the back gates. I was just in time to see them loading the second one into the van. Carey was holding one corner, but the other three were also big men, so I hoped he wasn’t hefting that much of the weight.

  He spotted me and looked slightly guilty, but actually, apart from the slight setback of my falling on his bad leg earlier that week, he did seem to be gaining strength in it and only really used his stick when he was tiring.

  Rufus’s friends, Andy and Ben, were so alike that they must be either siblings or identical twins. They closed up the tailgate and got into the cab with Rufus and we followed the van down in the buggy to the much bigger – and even rustier – front gates.

  I’d thought of showing Carey the marks on the ground near the post, but when I looked, the leaves had been disturbed … Perhaps I had imagined them? There were lots of new small, round puncture marks, though, that hadn’t been there before and I had a good idea what had caused those.

  The round stone ball from the top of the column still lay at the side of the drive and it was at least handy to sit on while I watched them struggling to detach the first gate from its corroded hinges.

  They were just about to lift it off when I heard a rattle and clunk behind me and turned to see the improbable vision of Vicky teetering down from the Lodge, carrying a tray of mugs and a packet of custard creams. She was a very unlikely tea lady.

  She ignored me, and addressed herself to the unresponsive backs of the men. ‘I saw you were all busy and thought you’d be dying for a cuppa!’ she cried gaily, which I translated as her being so consumed with curiosity that she’d had to think up an excuse to come out.

  The only reply she got was a Neanderthal grunt or two, because at that crucial point they were too involved in what they were doing to register anything else.

  ‘Lower your end carefully, Andy!’ Rufus said. ‘Now, let’s swing it down a bit so we can lean it against the gatepost for a minute.’

  Vicky pouted disconsolately, so I got up and took one of the mugs, which was filled with such watery-looking tea that I immediately regretted it.

  ‘Is that the stone ball that fell off the gatepost?’ she asked as I re-seated myself. ‘Dad told me and I was horrified, because it could have hit anyone!’

  ‘It nearly hit Carey, that’s for sure,’ I said. ‘I’m surprised the thud it made hitting the ground didn’t spark off a small earthquake. Didn’t you hear anything?’

  ‘I wasn’t here. I’d gone into Ormskirk for some shopping and to get my nails done.’

  She twiddled them: they were a sparkly greenish blue.

  ‘What’s that shade called – glittery dead frog?’ I asked, and she gave me one of her uncertain looks.

  ‘Mum was going to come with me, but she had one of her migraines so she took a pill and went to lie down. She’s out of it for hours when she’s like that.’

  So … that seemed to dispose of my main suspect for the stone rolling, and I couldn’t somehow see Little Miss Sparkly Nails risking her talons on it, even if she wanted to squash Carey flat, which I was very sure she didn’t. Or at least, not like that.

  ‘It was very odd the way the stone ball simply rolled off just at that moment, don’t you think? I could see you’d been behind the gatepost, to have a look.’

  She stared at me with her round, pale-blue eyes. ‘How – I mean, I—’

  ‘You left your heel prints in the ground. I haven’t seen anyone else wearing stilettos round here.’

  ‘I was curious when Dad told me, so I did have a look,’ she said, then added, slightly pityingly, ‘Do you have to wear those big, ugly Doc Marten boots?’

  ‘I like them, and also they protect my feet while I’m working. Do you always wear stilettos so high they make the veins and tendons on your feet stand out like bunches of old ropes?’

  ‘They do not!’ she gasped indignantly.

  ‘I’ve often noticed it with women who wear really high heels all the time.’

  She squinted down at her feet, but they probably looked OK from that angle. ‘I think you’ve got a strange sense of humour,’ she said icily, and went to hang around the men. I could hear her gushing with girlish enthusiasm to Carey about how exciting the whole Mossby renovation project sounded and how she’d love to help whenever she was staying at the Lodge.

  ‘Of course, I’ve got to keep my hands nice, because I sometimes get hand modelling assignments for catalogues,’ she added, which seemed to rule out anything other than a decorative role in the proceedings.

  The men finishe
d loading the first gate and then finally took their mugs of tea, though from politeness, I think, rather than because they really wanted them. There wasn’t a run on the custard creams. I spotted Carey surreptitiously tipping his tea out on to the grass verge a couple of minutes later.

  When the second gate was in the van, Ben and Andy produced cans of Coke and sat on the open tailgate for a breather, while Carey and Rufus batted off up the drive in the golf buggy to look at the Victorian statuary in the outbuildings.

  Vicky, abandoned, gave up and went back to the Lodge looking disgruntled. Not long after the front door had slammed behind her, Rufus rang one of the boys to ask them to take the van up to the stable block. It looked as if he was interested in some of the things Carey had found in the outbuildings, at least.

  I had a little walk along the lane, then turned up a track marked Moel Farm, which eventually brought me back to the gap where the back gates had been. The alpacas were looking over the wall again, but they didn’t spit. In fact, they just looked amiable and inquisitive.

  Carey was in the kitchen, brewing a pot of strong coffee, which he said he hoped would take the taste of Vicky’s disgusting tea away.

  ‘What on earth do you think she did to it to make it taste that awful?’

  ‘At a guess, put one teabag in a large cold pot, poured not quite boiling water over it, and then filled the cups before it had brewed,’ I suggested. ‘Was Rufus interested in some of the things in the outbuildings, then?’

  I’d had a quick look at the statues myself and they were all ghastly: simpering naked maidens, holding wisps of material over their faces, or coyly looking down and sideways, as if suddenly aware they’d forgotten to put their clothes on. One of them was sitting nude and blindfold on a ball, which was a fairly weird idea.

  ‘Rufus wanted all the statues and he took about a mile of cable-edged terracotta garden edging tiles, too. He knows someone who’d probably make me a good offer for the old carriage and he’d buy the trap himself, but I’m thinking about that. There are all sorts of old gardening tools and wheelbarrows and stuff that I haven’t had a chance to sort properly, but when I do, I’ll give him first refusal on any I decide to part with.’

  ‘Those gates looked worse once you’d got them down, so I hope his assistant really does like scrubbing rust off things.’

  ‘According to Rufus, she can hardly wait to get her hands on them. And we’ve done a deal, so cleaning the gates isn’t going to cost me much … if anything.’

  ‘Well, that’s good,’ I said. ‘Who were those two nice boys, by the way?’

  ‘Benbows from the Summit Alpine Nursery – cousins of Lulu, I think. They are really interested in what I’m planning for Mossby and they’re going to come down and help out whenever they have a bit of free time. They both work in the nursery with their dad. It’s a surprisingly big affair and they send alpine plants all over the country.’

  Already I could see that Carey was doing his usual thing of attracting people, like a magnet pulling in iron filings. Only Vicky might be a bit of a dud, unless she could scrape paint and sand wood with her tongue, seeing she had to keep her hands nice for modelling.

  On my way out to my car to get all the painting and cleaning materials I needed for Saturday, Ella passed me, heading for the Elizabethan wing. Her face looked like an angry, bitter mask carved from granite and she cut me dead. I don’t know what I’d done to deserve that?

  On Friday, the day of the big spring clean, the usual team of cleaners had been augmented to the point where you couldn’t turn round anywhere in the house without finding a young man up a ladder dusting light fittings or a sprightly grey-haired lady steam-cleaning bathroom tiles.

  The specialists who handled historic house cleaning were a married middle-aged couple called Mitch and Jenny, and I showed them round the old wing because Carey was in the studio, about to do a telephone interview with a women’s magazine. A photographer had arrived and was waiting to take the pictures for it when he’d finished, so I hoped there would be one clean and unoccupied room in the main house they could use for background by then.

  Carey’s agent had set up the interview, having learned of the new documentary and become enthused … or perhaps he was trying to redeem himself for not spotting the small print in Carey’s previous contract. At any rate, there was also talk of a Sunday supplement spread.

  ‘It’s the human angle – the accident, being dumped from your old series and then getting – quite literally – back on your feet again,’ the agent had told him persuasively.

  ‘But I don’t want to be a sob story,’ Carey had protested to me afterwards.

  ‘You won’t be, just bravely picking yourself up and stoically getting on with life,’ I said. ‘The readers will love it and there’ll be a bidding war for the Mansion Makeover rights, so Nick will be delirious with excitement.’

  He grinned. ‘So will I – I’ve got shares in Nick’s company, you know!’

  ‘There you are, then: you need to raise your profile, then the series and the spin-off books will be a huge success and keep Mossby going for years.’

  ‘I suppose you’re right,’ he said, and then after the interview was done and the photographs taken, the electrician arrived to carry out a survey and estimate, and they vanished down into the cellars.

  I suppose they had to start somewhere.

  While they were still down in the depths, Mitch came over from the old wing, looking slightly worried.

  ‘A woman called Ella’s turned up. We were working and then I turned round and got quite a shock, because she was just standing there watching us and we hadn’t heard her arrive.’

  ‘Oh dear – she does seem to specialize in sudden, silent appearances!’

  ‘She told us she was a member of the family and she’d always looked after the old wing herself, and was very particular about the panelling.’

  ‘She’s a connection of the family by marriage and used to be the housekeeper,’ I explained. ‘She seems to have a compulsion to clean that panelling and when she gets to the end she must start again, like painting the Forth Bridge.’

  ‘It’s certainly the only thing in there that’s been properly cleaned in living memory,’ Mitch said critically. ‘I thought I’d better check with you if you want us to leave that to her. Only if so, we’ve got a better polish, one of the Stately Solutions brand that Dolly Mops orders specially for historic homes.’

  ‘If she isn’t being a nuisance, then I’m sure leaving the panelling to Ella, using the new polish, will be all right with Carey,’ I told him and he looked relieved.

  ‘Just as well, because I don’t think it’s going to be possible to stop her!’

  ‘Carey’s just showing an electrician round and he’ll be coming into your wing soon anyway.’

  ‘Good, because there are a few things I’d like to discuss with him when he does: you’ve been pretty lucky with moth damage, but I’ll put some moth traps down and I can give him the details of a good place to clean and restore the tapestries and bed hangings.’

  ‘I suspect that will be expensive, so possibly it’ll have to wait a bit,’ I said, and he went off back to his cleaning.

  Later, Carey said he and the electrician had come across Ella in the muniment room and he was sure she’d been trying to get in the locked bureau, though she’d pretended to be polishing it when she saw them.

  ‘Not that there’s anything of any importance in there, anyway. But it was odd: when I spoke to her she just ignored me as if I wasn’t there.’

  ‘I think she’s sent us both to Coventry,’ I said, and told him about Mitch coming over when she’d turned up and what she’d said about the panelling. ‘So I told him to let her get on with it, as long as she used the special polish.’

  ‘I suppose it won’t do any harm … though actually, when we left the room she was rubbing the linenfold panelling so hard it’ll probably look more like flat bedsheets when I see it again,’ he said gloomily. ‘I’m start
ing to think she’s a sandwich short of a picnic.’

  ‘I think she’s a sandwich, two sausage rolls and a jam tart short of a picnic,’ I told him. And when he’d signed his new will, I’d make sure he left a copy in the bureau, so she’d know exactly what was what!

  Apart from a couple of walks on his lead, Fang had been confined to the kitchen for most of the day and although he’d seemed happy to welcome the female cleaners when they came down for their elevenses, he’d taken exception to the three male ones and been banished to the housekeeper’s parlour till the coast was clear again.

  It did make things difficult, so it was a relief when Chris, the dog whisperer, called just after everyone had finally left, and whisked Fang away.

  ‘I’ll ring you in a few days, when he’s ready to come home – don’t worry, he’ll be fine,’ he assured us, but the house seemed very empty without Fang. He might be small, but he made his presence felt.

  And the house not only seemed empty, but amazingly, dazzlingly clean, too.

  When I said so, Carey remarked wryly that he was going to have a dazzling bill to match.

  ‘Never mind – the house will never be quite that filthy again,’ I consoled him.

  I kept my condition to myself for as long as possible, not wishing for any fuss, but since I had discovered it so late there was no hiding it for ever, so eventually I had to tell Ralph. He was quite overjoyed and kissed me, something that had not happened for so long that I felt quite shy.

  But unfortunately, once the first rapture had worn off, his delight expressed itself in a desire that I should do nothing but sit like a pudding till the baby was born, perhaps with little airings in the pony and trap with Honoria as a treat!

  However, I was not one to be inactive or wrapped in cotton wool and, apart from that one spell of dizziness, felt perfectly well. I was determined to carry on working until my girth made it impossible!

  Father was pleased at the news and Lily, who was herself in the family way, agreed that there was no need to mollycoddle oneself, and she passed on to me much of the sensible advice her mother and older sisters gave her.