by Karen Swan
Willow blinked, feeling a flush of panic.
‘I understand,’ O’Leary nodded. ‘That was just a suggestion. I’m sure there are other business ideas that might come to mind.’
If there were, they weren’t presenting themselves to anyone in a hurry.
‘I know this is a lot to take in, and it all seems like bad news, but there is some relief in the form of the specific bequests, which I’ll go on to now, and then we can come back to the over-arching plan afterwards,’ O’Leary said, moving on and clearly uncomfortable with the high degree of feminine emotions at play. ‘Serena, in the event of An Taisce not accepting Declan’s gift, the bequest clearly cannot stand, so the will reverts to the preceding version which Declan drew up three years ago.’
Willow watched as her mother straightened her back as though bracing for the next onslaught.
‘Ottilie, as the eldest child, your father wanted me to start with you. He has bequeathed you the land currently used for the campsite, referred to in the deeds as Sawday’s Patch. This includes the private beach at the southern end and the boathouse where you currently reside.’ Ottie bit her lip hard but nodded frantically, indicating she understood, one hand pressed to her chest. ‘Had the bequest to An Taisce been accepted, he had stipulated this land would have been deemed inalienable, meaning it was separate from the rest of the estate. As it is, it is yours, regardless. He also gives you his mother’s ruby and diamond earrings and necklace, and the Singer Sargent landscape in the yellow drawing room, which you always admired so much.’
‘The Sargent?’ Ottie echoed, tears beginning to track her cheeks. Their mother reached over to clasp her hand, pressing it to her lips.
He looked at Pip. ‘Philippa, the stables – the land, animals and all contents – are bequeathed to you. In his proposed plans to the Trust, your father had ring-fenced off the land from Coppers Beech in the north, down to Finnegan’s Gallop in the south, and stretching from Broad Oaks in the east to Clover Field in the west. Again, had the bequest to An Taisce been accepted, this land would have been deemed inalienable, meaning it was separate to the rest of the estate. As it is, it is yours, regardless. You father also wanted you to have his mother’s emeralds, and the Lorne Cup.’
‘The Lorne Cup?’ Pip echoed, looking stunned. It was a relic that had belonged to the 1st Knight of Lorne, back in the thirteenth century, made from pure gold and studded with rubies. But that wasn’t what made it priceless – as a little girl she had loved to run around the castle with it on her head, pretending to be a Viking. Their father had remembered that?
‘Wil—’
‘Don’t call her Wilhelmina,’ Pip said quickly, a friendly warning look in her eyes.
O’Leary smiled and nodded, but not before glancing at their mother. He took a deep breath and Willow felt her body brace. ‘Willow, with the exception of the specific bequests previously mentioned, the contents of the castle and the Dower House, your father has bequeathed you the entirety of the estate.’
There was a long confounded silence as everyone relayed his words in their heads. Your father has bequeathed you the entirety of the estate.
Her mother laughed, a shrill hysterical sound as her hand fluttered to her throat, fear winging through her eyes. ‘What?’
‘What?’ Ottie demanded too, unusual thunder in her voice. ‘Willow’s getting the castle? Not Mam?’
Nor her?
‘Serena, Declan has bequeathed to you the Dower House and contents of the castle,’ O’Leary said quickly.
Serena blinked back at him, a film of tears shimmering in front of her eyes. ‘. . . No,’ she whispered, smiling weakly, beseeching him for signs that this was a joke. ‘No, that . . . It makes no sense. He wouldn’t . . . he wouldn’t do that . . . Thomas?’
Willow stared over at her mother in dismay, seeing how ashen she looked – even her lips were pale – and knowing she looked the same. Her mother was right, this couldn’t be what he’d meant. It was a mistake. Some perverse joke. How could her father have left effectively everything to her and not his wife? She wasn’t even the eldest child, or his favourite. She had walked out of here three years ago and not looked back. She had abandoned them. Rejected them. Him. He wouldn’t just give her the very home she had turned her back on.
‘I appreciate this comes as a shock,’ O’Leary said, looking between her and Serena. ‘Please bear in mind Declan had thought that gifting the estate to An Taisce would override this version of the will and circumvent the problem altogether. These were not his final wishes. It didn’t sit well with him at all – he was concerned you might construe it as being evicted from your own home – but in the absence of any other alternative he was also adamant he did not want the burden of the upkeep of the castle falling to you—’
But it’s okay for it to fall to me? Willow thought, seeing the shock on Pip’s face too. She was white and open-mouthed, not blinking. None of them thought she was deserving, not even her.
Serena was shaking her head, looking distressed. ‘But . . . but poor Willow, my baby. What can she do with it that we couldn’t? She can’t be expected to take on that burden. What was he thinking?’
‘I’m fine, Mam,’ Willow said into the void as everyone turned to look at her. ‘Really. I’ll be fine.’ Her voice felt scratchy and foreign, her throat still raw from the silent screams the night her father had died.
‘You live 150 miles away, darling. You’ve made a life for yourself in Dublin. What are you going to do with this old place and eight hundred acres?’
‘Actually, taking into account the land apportioned in the specific bequests, the estate’s inalienable acreage now stands at four hundred and thirty-five acres,’ O’Leary corrected.
Oh, much more manageable, Willow thought to herself bitterly.
‘This can’t be it, Thomas,’ her mother said pleadingly. ‘Declan wasn’t in his right mind when he wrote this. He can’t have been! He never would have done this to his youngest child!’
Willow stiffened.
‘I’m so sorry, Serena, I know it’s hard. But although this wasn’t Declan’s first choice, it was his second and any judge would rule this will stands.’
A tense silence expanded and hovered in the room like an unwelcome rain cloud on a summer’s day.
‘Mam, we’ll work it out,’ Ottie replied in an uncertain voice, but shot a sharp look towards her, as though Willow had wilfully betrayed her in some way.
‘So Willow’s expected to abandon her life in Dublin to take on all the stresses of running this place and I’m to move to the Dower House?’ Serena asked, beginning to cry, her fingers rubbing over her string of pearls frantically. ‘That’s what you’re telling me? Declan wanted me to move to that dingy, dark, depressing place?’
‘Serena—’
‘No, I don’t believe you. Declan wouldn’t do this to me or Willow. He wouldn’t. He loved us. He adored me.’
O’Leary leaned forwards on the desk, trying to appease her. ‘Declan did indeed adore you, Serena, but he was a good man forced into making hard choices. His aim was to reduce the burden upon you; he wasn’t trying to punish you.’
Willow stared at the solicitor, her heart hammering. The man in the suit was right. This wasn’t about punishing his wife. It was about punishing her.
Chapter Five
Ottie sat by the boathouse window, staring out into the blackness and letting the tears fall. On her own at last, they just kept coming and she felt powerless to stop them. Mrs Mac had urged her to stay at the castle again tonight but she hadn’t been able to spend another minute up there, not even to swallow down the stew the housekeeper had lovingly made them all. Pip had felt it too, she knew, escaping back to the stables on the pretext of feeding horses that had been looked after perfectly well for the past week by one of the village girls, Kirsty.
There were so many memories tightly packed in the castle walls, it was as though the air itself was Lorne-tinted and she couldn’t breathe there, she had ne
eded space. Their father’s will had changed things, shifting the molecular structure of their family dynamic and they each needed time to process it. Willow’s new status as the official heir of Lorne, the legal owner of the castle, had dumbfounded them all. Nothing about it made sense: this was their mother’s home – where she had raised her family, fought to keep the place going by her husband’s side. For him not even to have told his own wife he was pulling the castle rugs out from beneath her . . .? It was eviction, no matter how much O’Leary tried to sugar-coat it. How could her father have kept such a major decision from his wife?
His daughter?
She closed her eyes, easily conjuring the image of him walking across the field towards her, one hand planted on the top of his head to keep his flat cap on, cheeks ruddied, bright-green cords tucked into wellies. Every day for the past five years she’d worked with him shoulder to shoulder, helping to free a sheep tangled in barbed wire, or cutting up a fallen tree. They’d have their packed lunches together, sitting on moss-covered rocks, or making sandwiches at her cottage and eating them on the beach, looking out to sea. If he was going to leave the estate to anyone but her mother, surely it should have been her? Even if she wasn’t the oldest, which she was, she was also his estate manager! His right hand. What did Willow know about maintaining the coastal footpaths on the Wild Atlantic Way that wended over their land? What clue did her baby sister have about coordinating signage for dog walkers to keep their pets on leads during lambing season? She, if her Instagram feed was anything to go by, just drank matcha lattes and held the tree pose and went to parties and concerts and took laughing selfies with good-looking but anonymous men who never cropped up on the grid more than twice.
But then, Willow hadn’t exactly looked thrilled by the revelation either. She didn’t want this, Ottie knew, and she certainly hadn’t had any inkling it was coming. Apart from one feeble protest that she would be fine, she had fallen deeper into the same stunned silence that had gripped her since their father’s death: a second shock; a second grief.
Ottie dropped her head again, silky sheets of long strawberry-blonde hair falling forwards, her hands pulling into fists. She didn’t want to hate her sister for this. It wasn’t her fault, and yet . . .
Who else could she be angry with? There was no one to rail against. Not her mother, not O’Leary, for he was just the messenger. As for her father, the architect of all this mess, he wasn’t here. It wasn’t like the Holland poem; he wasn’t in the next room at all – he had departed for another time and place altogether, leaving them with stone walls and sheep and trinkets and each other. And all of it counted for naught.
Her head was spinning, anger and bewilderment making her blood rush, and the rocking chair creaked as she rocked herself faster, trying to self-soothe, her dressing gown pulled tightly around her skinny frame.
The phone screen had gone dark again but it was still open on the latest text she had sent: Emergency. Leaky valve. Water pouring down the walls. Please hurry.
How many had she sent? She had no idea. She didn’t even know how long she’d been sitting there. The sun had seemingly set a while ago now but she hadn’t noticed, the staggering view over the curved bay to the purple hills beyond steadily slipping into the dark folds of the night. But what she could not see, she could hear – the heavy crash of the sea booming through the thick, double-height plate-glass window that filled the gable end wall of her beloved beach cottage. Her father had arranged the installation of the picture window as her twenty-first birthday present; while all her friends had received cars or strings of pearls or deposits on a flat, he had given her the gift of light. It had been the best present she had ever received.
The knock at the door made her jump. The campsite was currently deserted, the expected onslaught for the weekend not due before tomorrow at the earliest so she wasn’t expecting visitors. But that was no ordinary knock, and that meant this was no ordinary visitor. With a sob of relief, she flung off the blanket and flew across the old blackened elm floor, flinging the door open. ‘You came,’ she gasped.
‘Of course I did,’ he said in his melodic low voice, his eyes taking in her pale face and tear-streaked cheeks, red eyes, shivering slight frame. ‘I came as soon as I could get away. I’ve been so worried about you. Come here.’
Like a gazelle, she leapt up and into his arms, her legs clasped around his waist, her face pressed into his neck, the sobs coming faster now. He was her release, her safety. He always had been.
‘My darling,’ he murmured as she wept, stepping into the little house as though she weighed nothing more than a bag of shopping and kicking the door shut with his foot behind him. ‘You’ve been so strong. So brave. It’s killed me not being able to get over here.’
She cried even harder as he carried her through the cottage and sat down on the sofa opposite the little woodburner, Ottie straddling his lap. He pulled back to see her better, pushing her hair away from her wet face, his thumbs sweeping over her skin, drying away the tears and smoothing out the sorrow lines that felt embedded in her forehead. She knew she must look wretched but he always looked at her with such awe and tenderness, making her feel she was enough. More than enough . . .
He kissed her slowly, his lips gentle against hers. She pulled away and looked at the face of the man she loved – the only man she had ever loved. There was none of the stomach-skipping glint in his eyes today, only sadness.
‘You look wrecked, my darling,’ he said, concerned.
Another sob escaped her. ‘It’s been so terrible, I can’t tell you how awful it’s been. Mam’s such a wreck and Pip’s so angry and Willow’s so . . . fucking quiet. Everyone’s on the edge and I don’t know how to keep them okay. I feel like if I turn to one, the others will fall.’
He slid his hands inside her dressing gown, feeling the chill of her skin, and gave her a disapproving look; he knew she always became cold when she didn’t eat. His hand felt warm against her and he ran his touch up her torso, cupping her breasts and feeling the weight of them in his hands. ‘It isn’t your responsibility to look after everyone.’
‘But how can I not?’ she cried. ‘They’re not coping.’
‘That’s just the shock, the suddenness of your father’s passing, no warning . . . But every day, it will get a little bit better, a bit easier, I promise.’ He swept her long hair off her shoulder, reaching up to kiss the nook between her neck and shoulder, sliding down her bra strap.
She shook her head. ‘No. It won’t. You don’t understand. It’s just getting worse and worse.’
He frowned at her words, popping out one breast from its bra cup, that familiar look of awe spreading over his face every time he saw her naked body. It was a moment before he remembered to answer.
‘How is it getting worse? You got through the funeral, which is always the hardest part. Your reading was superb, darling.’
She put her hands over his, stopping his caresses. ‘We had the reading of Dad’s will today.’
‘Oh?’ He arched an eyebrow interestedly although whether that was the sight of her nipple or the topic in hand she wasn’t sure.
‘He’s gone mad! He’s given the estate to Willow.’
‘What?’ He looked away from her bare breast to read her expression.
‘Exactly! Willow! Willow, our millennial snowflake who knows everything about social media branding and jack all about estate management.’
He frowned, looking baffled. ‘What did she say about it?’
‘Nothing! Didn’t you know? Willow barely speaks these days. She’s taken a vow of silen—’ She swallowed, feeling instantly guilty for the bitchy remark. ‘She looked traumatized actually,’ she said in a quieter voice.
‘I bet she did.’
She looked at him imploringly, as though he held all the answers. ‘What the hell did Dad think she’s going to do with it that he couldn’t?’
‘It’s very strange, I agree,’ he frowned. ‘And what does it mean for—’
/> ‘Mam?’ She rolled her eyes. ‘Dad wants her to live in the Dower House.’
‘The Dower House? Where’s that?’
‘On the furthest side of the estate, hidden by trees. It was built by some vindictive ancestor wanting revenge on his mother-in-law or something and he put it in the darkest, coldest, shadiest spot he could find.’
He frowned. ‘Ah.’
‘Exactly. And Dad’s basically evicted her to go and live there!’
‘. . . I can’t believe he’d do that to your mother.’
‘Well, he did!’ She realized she was almost shrieking, her body tense and rigid. She forced herself to breathe deeply and she closed her eyes, trying to relax as he shushed her comfortingly, his hands sweeping over her hair and skin, staunching her fear with kisses. He always knew exactly how to calm and soothe her, to bring down those flighty, fluttering feelings of anxiety that left her breathless and unrooted. She pulled back again, too distracted by her mind to lose herself in her body. ‘That wasn’t the only thing. Apparently he tried to give Lorne away.’
‘What?’
She was pleased to see he was as shocked as she. ‘Offered it to An Taisce. It would have meant we could continue to live here – only they refused! Apparently you can’t give things away for free these days, you have to pay through the nose for the privilege.’ Sarcasm dripped from the words like treacle.
He nodded slowly. ‘Ah, yes: endowment or proven profitability, I did know that.’
Of course he did. He knew everything. ‘Anyway, that was his actual last wish but because it got knocked back, the preceding version of the will stands and Willow gets the lot.’
He frowned. ‘Surely he left something for you?’
She gave a small groan knowing she was being unfair, flagging only the headlines. ‘Ugh, yes . . . I don’t mean to suggest he disinherited the rest of us. Dad would never do that. He loved us.’ She sighed. ‘I’ve got this place and some land. Some jewellery and a painting I always loved.’ She stared at a spot on the wall beyond his ear. ‘In every other regard, it was all so . . . well chosen. Perfect, really.’ She stared into space, not seeing the hairline crack in the wall, a spider tiptoeing across towards the corner. ‘It wasn’t too much, just everything he knew I truly loved or admired. He knew what this place means to me and why: that view, the light here, being in the elements.’
