Rumours

by Freya North

  ‘Takes one to know one,’ Xander said.

  ‘Cheeky!’ said Caroline. ‘Come on – there’s a hot dish with your name on at the Raj.’

  ‘About that,’ said Xander as they left Stella’s place and checked the door was closed. ‘She’s not my type.’

  ‘I was referring to a chicken jalfrezi – madras hot, pilau rice, a plain nan, Bombay potato,’ said Caroline pointedly. ‘Not Penny.’

  ‘She’s not my type,’ Xander persisted.

  ‘For God’s sake, Xander,’ said Caroline, ‘just get over yourself, pet. And live a little.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  When Lydia entered Elmfield Estates, unannounced at eleven o’clock on the Monday morning, Geoff was on the phone, and Belinda appeared to be checking notes between her phone and her desk diary though actually she was browsing Facebook updates. Steve and Gill had just glanced at each other and were busily rifling through papers on their desks, lest their colleagues should guess that they went home together on Friday and spent that night and most of the weekend in torrid entwinings on Steve’s black leather sofa. Mr Hutton was in his office. And Stella was in the kitchenette on mid-morning teas duty.

  ‘Can I help you?’ said Belinda, it being on the tip of her tongue to tell the old dear that this was an estate agent’s and that the Citizens Advice Bureau was two doors along.

  ‘Miss Hutton,’ said Lydia in a voice a great deal lower than Belinda expected. The timbre was such as to cause the others to look up.

  ‘You mean Mr Hutton?’ Belinda corrected.

  ‘No,’ said Lydia, as if the woman was boring her, ‘Miss.’

  ‘Stella?’ Belinda said it as if the notion that anyone really wanted Stella was preposterous.

  Lydia merely raised an eyebrow.

  ‘She’s out the back, making tea,’ said Belinda, returning to Facebook, assuming Lydia to be an aged aunt, thus foregoing any formality or indeed politeness. ‘She’ll be through in a minute – sit yourself down, love.’

  Lydia was so affronted that though her knees would have benefited indeed from a taking a seat, every muscle in her body locked and she stared witheringly at Belinda and coldly at the rest of the staff.

  ‘Bugger,’ Stella muttered to herself, watching as each mug splashed a little of its contents onto the tray. She couldn’t still be hungover, could she? Not after all the Alka-Seltzer she’d had yesterday. If she was, the sight of Lydia standing rigid and in full glower soon snapped Stella out of it.

  ‘Lady Lydia!’

  ‘Miss Hutton,’ said Lydia gravely.

  ‘Lady Lydia! Was I – expecting you?’

  ‘No.’ Lydia paused. ‘I thought I’d call in. I wasn’t passing – I have made a special journey.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Stella, ‘of course.’ She put the tray down and quickly took each mug to each desk, placing them wetly on the surfaces. ‘Would you like a cup of tea – or coffee?’

  ‘No. I want to sign on the dotted line. That’s why I’m here. It seemed appropriate.’

  Stella stood there, gawping. Her colleagues were riveted.

  ‘Providing you have a guide price for me. You should have, by now, after all the time you’ve spent at Longbridge Hall.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stella. ‘Yes,’ she said, a scurry of thoughts in her mind, the first being how to remove Lydia out of sight and earshot of the rest of the office. ‘Please, come with me.’ She led the way to her uncle’s office. Knocked, entered. He was on the phone. ‘Lady Lydia Fortescue is here to put the Longbridge estate on our books and I suggested the privacy of your office,’ she said loudly, in one long breath so that Mr Hutton hung up his call straight away.

  ‘Lady Lydia, delighted! Delighted!’ he said in an obsequious tone that was unbecoming and visibly irked Lydia. ‘We have met – a little while back.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, underwhelmed, ‘I remember.’

  ‘Douglas Hutton is my uncle,’ Stella turned to Lydia. ‘As managing director of Elmfield Estates, he will sit in on this.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Lydia. She took off her light summer jacket, handed it to Stella and sat herself down.

  ‘Very well,’ Stella echoed quietly, her adrenalin rising as she thought how ill prepared she was. Lydia waited for her to continue. Douglas just looked levelly at his niece, giving the impression he knew exactly what she was going to say because he was at the helm of everything. ‘Lady Lydia,’ said Stella, ‘I would value the Longbridge estate – as a whole, rather than separate lots – at fourteen million pounds. All land, all buildings. But I would suggest we put it to market at fifteen million.’ Her uncle fought hard to clear his throat as discreetly as possible.

  ‘Fifteen million,’ said Lydia, but her emotion was illegible.

  ‘Yes,’ said Stella. ‘These days, the feeling of a bargain is what secures a sale. Hence putting it on at fifteen but I would advise you to be content with between thirteen and fourteen.’ She paused. ‘Million.’

  ‘And have you clients suitable?’

  ‘Yes,’ Stella lied whilst smiling gamely at her uncle. ‘Oh, yes.’

  Lydia looked at Stella. Behind the ice blue of her eyes, a faint mist of entreatment was legible. ‘I have made it quite plain, my dear, that I care not who gets it.’ She paused. ‘But that’s not to say I am not entrusting you to handle the sale – elegantly.’

  Stella nodded earnestly, and smiled gently. ‘I understand.’

  ‘I know you do,’ said Lydia, sounding tired. ‘Where do I sign – and what happens next?’

  What happened next was that Lydia went home, inviting Mrs Biggins to join her in an early lunch, with wine, over which she confirmed her plans. With Stella at his side, Mr Hutton made an announcement about the Longbridge estate to the staff before disappearing back into his office to put word about to his contacts in the industry. Steve resigned on the spot and flounced out of the office. Belinda and Gill both felt they wanted alternately to kill Stella yet suddenly befriend her. And Geoff just sat at his desk and looked bleakly through his flimsy portfolio of properties.

  Stella asked her remaining colleagues whether she could pass all new clients to them and then spent the rest of the day phoning photographers, land agents, her contacts in the Planning Office and private property search connections, speaking with as much discretion as she was able while allowing herself to rejoice in the upward curve her path appeared now to be taking. It was real. It was happening.

  Geoff was given Steve’s clients. Gill received a text from Steve telling her to fake an appointment, to meet him at his so he could shag her senseless all afternoon. Belinda put on Facebook that she was going to get hammered that evening and who’s up for joining her. At the start of the year, long before Stella’s time, the agents at Elmfield Estates had voted unanimously to change the commission structure from group to individual. They could all resent Stella as much as they wanted for having secured Longbridge and for standing to make substantial commission on the sale – but each had to admit that they wouldn’t have put the effort Stella invested in Mercy Benton’s little cottage in the first place and that, realistically, Lady Lydia Fortescue would never have come by any of them.

  * * *

  There was home, and then there was Longbridge. There was Will, and then there was Lydia. For Stella, nothing else mattered. Nothing else warranted, or could be afforded, more than a passing thought. Every hour was so taken with one or the other, it provided a wonderful opportunity for only the briefest post-mortem with Sara about Riley. A slightly lengthier dissection with Jo which involved laughter and cringing on both sides and much mention of the word ‘global’. And that business with Xander and His Friend? Well, all that was best forgotten.

  So, Stella met the photographer at Longbridge on the Wednesday, which dawned fortuitously clear and sunny, the lawns mown as neat as baize the previous day by Art. Stella’s brief to the photographer wasn’t dissimilar from any regular property she’d marketed – she was specific about wide angles and lightin
g and, in this case, panoramic views of the extensive parkland. Lydia had warned her she wouldn’t be there. Lydia might want as much money as possible from the sale – but that wasn’t to say that, privately, Stella intended to work flat out to secure a buyer who also had the necessary taste and moral fibre to take on such a property.

  Mrs Biggins let them in, then disappeared. It was strange for Stella to have the house to herself; it was as if the old place had no idea what was about to befall it and she found she couldn’t look at the Fortescue portraits directly and felt as if Lord Frederick had told the Prince Regent to be a sport and place his horse’s rump right in her face to make his feelings plain. It was unnerving and, giving some flimsy judgement on the quality of light, Stella suggested to the photographer that they start with exterior shots. She was acting as photographer’s assistant, wanting to be behind every element of Longbridge’s epic journey to the market. She caught sight of Art mooching around with a wheelbarrow. Did he know? And how about Clarence, whom she had yet to meet? He was out again, his dwelling locked but, as the photographer said, while the building added great rustic charm to his shot of the farmland, you really wouldn’t want to concede that it was used for human habitation. Nor did he feel the peculiar thatched apple store was worth including in the brochure – but he took a few shots to humour Stella who was in paroxysms over it.

  ‘I’m starving,’ he said.

  ‘Why don’t I nip to the village to buy us something,’ said Stella, seeing it was nearly noon and Mrs Biggins had made no mention of the classic Longbridge ploughman’s lunch.

  ‘I’ll do the walled garden in the meantime,’ he said.

  ‘Make sure you get the little nameplates of all the long-gone fruit trees,’ she said.

  The photographer was finding her tiresome. The tiny tarnished brass plaques wouldn’t show in the photograph – and what was the point of a close-up? There were no trees – it was in blatant disregard of the Trade Descriptions Act. There again, she’d wanted him to photograph a bronze statue, imploring him to “show the Lord’s best side”. It’s a bronze statue! he’d said. We don’t even know if it’s included in the sale! Stella was taken aback at the thought of the first Earl of Barbary being separated from his estate. Photograph him anyway, she said. ‘It,’ said the photographer. ‘It’s an it.’

  It was in the car alone, heading for the village, that Stella suddenly thought of Xander. She was still on the Longbridge driveway and slowed the car down to a crawl. Her recall of Saturday night existed only as a series of hazy stills, but her memories of the daytime earlier, of Xander showing Will and her around, remained vivid. Seeing Longbridge through Will’s eyes. The taste of the buttery shortbread. The way she held her breath and Xander held her gaze as she squeezed past him. The feeling of being watched from the great house – Lydia shadowy in an upper window, Mrs Biggins with hands on hips at the back doorway. The way he spoke – lucid and with passion. Anyway, it’s Wednesday so Xander should be at work and now that everything’s official with Longbridge and she’s seen everywhere that needs to be seen, their paths needn’t cross again and there’s no point recalling the way he laughed with Will.

  She drove to the village, couldn’t park in the area opposite the shop so drove on a little and crept her car up on to the kerb, as other motorists had done. She passed by Mercy Benton’s cottage and waved at the new owner who was just entering. It’s not Mercy Benton’s cottage, Stella thought, it’s Mr and Mrs Marshall’s now. Would she feel that about Longbridge too, some day? Could the words Fortescue and Longbridge really be divorced? She realized how she felt a certain kinship with the village now. Look! Michael Lazarus’s shop was open – it had always been closed when she’d been by. Stella went in, wanting nothing other than a nosey but came out with a padlock and four small paintbrushes and some black shoe polish. Marvellous place. However wide the catchment of the out-of-town hypermarkets, hopefully there’d always be a place for a shop like Michael Lazarus’s in a village like Long Dansbury. Stella went into the Spar, amazed at how busy it was. Lots of mothers and toddlers. Must be end of session at the nursery. She placed sandwiches, cans of soft drinks, crisps and a packet of biscuits in the basket and went to join the queue.

  ‘Sonny, you little monkey – put that back!’

  The melodious Geordie tone was known at once to Stella. It belonged to the woman right in front of her; the woman who’d been so kind to her on Saturday. The woman who’d been with Xander. Who’d helped her home. And now, she was right in front of Stella.

  Please please don’t turn around. Come on queue – move! Goodness, could the shopkeeper talk for Britain. Stella thought about putting all the stuff back and leaving empty-handed. But found herself hemmed in by a display of canned goods and two shoppers now queuing behind her.

  ‘What’s that?’

  The little Sonny boy had surreptitiously plonked into Stella’s basket the tube of sweets his mother had told him to put back. Now he was pointing to the biscuits and gazing up at Stella, expectant for her answer. Just pretend you didn’t hear.

  ‘What’s that?’ He was more insistent.

  ‘Biscuits,’ Stella all but whispered.

  ‘Biscuits?’

  She nodded.

  ‘What’s that?’ he asked, pointing to the can of Coke.

  What do you think it is!

  ‘What’s that?’ He wasn’t taking Stella’s non-committal smile for an answer.

  ‘Sonny,’ his mother turned, her eyes on her son, her focus on the items in the basket of the shopper behind her. ‘It’s the lady’s shopping.’

  He took the biscuits out of Stella’s basket. ‘Biscuits, Mummy!’

  ‘I am so sorry,’ said Caroline, finally looking up at Stella whilst trying to wrest the package from her son’s determined grip.

  I know you. I know you!

  I know you too. But feel free to pretend you don’t.

  You’re Xander’s friend – Stella. Oh my God!

  It was a rare occasion for Caroline to be stunned into silence.

  ‘Hullo,’ said Stella. Then she winced. Then she rambled. ‘Look, I’m so sorry – and grateful. And fancy seeing you here. And you’ll have to forgive me but I can’t recall your name.’

  ‘I’m Caroline,’ she said warmly while Stella nodded and grimaced again. ‘It’s Stella – isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stella, ‘and – again – I am so sorry. And I can’t thank you enough.’

  Caroline laughed. ‘That’s quite all right. I wish I’d had the opportunity to thank my many saviours who’ve come to my rescue over the years, I can tell you.’ Stella still looked shamefaced. ‘The number of times Xander or Andrew – he’s my husband, we’re all old friends – had to give me a fireman’s lift home from some club or other. I’d say you were very demure.’

  ‘Hardly,’ Stella groaned.

  ‘You’d been on a date,’ Caroline said, as if it were explanation enough.

  ‘A disaster, more like,’ said Stella.

  ‘Don’t you like him?’ Caroline asked.

  ‘Well, I’m sure he’s a lovely bloke once you get to know him – but to be honest, he’s nearly bulldozed me down twice round here whilst he’s been running. And he can be moody. Quite rude, actually.’ Then she thought about Xander, up in his childhood home by the clock tower. And the shortbread. And the lonely chill of his bedroom. And her cold nose against his warm skin. The feeling of his laughter.

  ‘I didn’t mean Xander,’ said Caroline, regarding her oddly, ‘I meant the guy you were on a date with.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Stella. ‘Oh.’ Mortified. ‘Him.’ She paused. Caroline’s gentle, friendly face was creasing into a grin. ‘Between you and me,’ said Stella, ‘he was a tosser.’ She glanced down at her basket. Sonny was still fingering the biscuits. Nice. They were called Nice. She was never sure whether that was ‘nice’ as in the adjective, or Nice as in the place. She’d chosen them because they were comfortingly nostalgic, those sugar-encrusted oblong thi
ns with a subtle coconutty hint. ‘Xander,’ she said, ‘I mean – sorry – yes, he’s a nice chap too, I’m sure. Your friend.’

  ‘How do you know Xander?’

  And though Caroline was chatty and light, Stella wasn’t sure what to say because though the sale of Longbridge was official, it wasn’t yet on the open market. ‘Oh. I just know him – from around.’

  Caroline thought, with some consternation, oh, you’re not one of his fuck-buddies, are you? And then she thought, no, you’re not. And she thought, I know you’re not because unlike when I walked in on Xander at that pub in Standon, he wasn’t the least bit embarrassed to come across you on Saturday night, despite the state you were in. An image of Xander quietly holding Stella steady, Stella’s head against his chest, confronted Caroline. And Caroline thought, oh yeah?

  ‘Hope I didn’t ruin your evening,’ Stella said, bashfully.

  ‘Hope you didn’t ruin your Sunday,’ Caroline laughed. ‘Did you chuck?’

  Stella nodded, ruefully. ‘Thanks for the strategically placed washing-up bowl.’

  ‘All part of the service,’ said Caroline. ‘What are you doing here, by the way?’

  Stella liked this woman and wished she could be honest. ‘Some business, nearby,’ she said. ‘I’m working with a photographer today.’ That sounded good. And it was true. ‘So I just nipped in to buy some snacks.’

  Caroline nodded. ‘Well, it’s nice to see you again,’ she said.

  ‘You too,’ said Stella. ‘And thanks. And sorry.’

  ‘No problem,’ said Caroline. ‘Any time!’

  ‘There won’t be another time,’ Stella said grimly.

  ‘Oh, I always say I’m never going to touch a drop again,’ Caroline said, opening a pack of Nicorette not yet paid for and chewing as if her life depended on it.

  ‘Not that – the dating. First one in two years – a nightmare. Never again.’

  Suddenly, Caroline thought how she’d love to know more, that she’d probably enjoy chatting to Stella over a coffee; imagined them putting the world to rights, bantering; imagined it all getting gloriously salacious. But Mrs Patek was telling Caroline it was £7.42 but to call it £7.40 and Sonny was dangerously near the racks of chocolate. And she’d been queuing for ages. It really was time to go.