by Bill Kitson
The snow had reached blizzard conditions, and my pace had dropped to a crawl when I eventually entered a village my map had informed me was Mulgrave. I realized with some surprise that I hadn’t seen another vehicle since leaving the main road. If the snow continued much longer the roads would be impassable, and Mulgrave Castle would be cut off from the outside world. I chuckled aloud at my thoughts. The weather was turning the scenario into one reminiscent of a country house mystery. Eat your heart out, Agatha Christie.
It was with some relief that I saw the solid stone lodge picked out in the beams of my lights. I knew from Harriet’s letter that this was occupied by their resident cook and her husband, who also worked at the castle, and that the gates would be opened ready for my arrival. I swung past the lodge and headed between an avenue of trees down a long drive over half-a-mile long, which opened into a wide gravel sweep. In spite of the ever-thickening snow I could hear the gravel crunching on my tyres. The sound was muted by the snow, however, and my arrival would have gone unnoticed. I sat for a moment after switching the ignition off; admiring the front façade of the house. I was mildly surprised when the massive front door swung open and a figure came hurrying out towards me. I climbed out of the car.
‘Adam,’ the figure hailed me. ‘Hi, I’m Tony Rowe; let me give you a hand in with your bags.’ We reached the sanctuary of the building. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Adam, I’m sorry you must have had such a rotten journey getting here.’ Tony put down the case he had carried in for me and as we shook hands I glanced up at the sound of her voice.
‘You haven’t told him it isn’t over with yet, then?’ Harriet was standing on the half landing, where the broad staircase turned at right-angles midway to the first floor. She walked gracefully down the shallow flight and I could see the years had been kind to her. The beautiful girl had become a lovely woman. ‘Hello, Adam,’ she smiled warmly.
I shook her hand and kissed her with due formality on one cheek. ‘Harriet, you look lovelier than ever,’ I greeted her. ‘It’s wonderful to see you again. Thank you so much for inviting me. What was it you meant about it not being over with?’
Rowe cleared his throat nervously. ‘I was about to ask you a favour when Harriet interrupted. We have a bit of a crisis over the transport, you see. My BMW has decided to malfunction, I can’t get a spark out of it, and my estate manager’s borrowed the Land Rover to go off to Scotland for Christmas and the Hogmanay holiday. To be honest we haven’t another vehicle capable of tackling these roads in the snow,’ he paused and Harriet took over.
‘My sister Eve and Tony’s business partner Edgar Beaumont are at Netherdale railway station. They both caught the morning train up from London and got as far as Netherdale and they can’t get any further. Eve rang me just before you got here. I tried to tell her we couldn’t guarantee to be able to collect her, but without much success to be honest. Eve told me they couldn’t find a taxi driver prepared to venture out of town and demanded we send someone to pick them up. Eve can be a bit like that, I’m afraid. Then we saw you arrive in your Range Rover and it seemed like an answer to our prayers.’
‘Eve’s a bloody bad tempered, spoilt idiot, that’s what she is.’
‘Tony’s right,’ she confessed reluctantly. ‘Eve can be difficult.’ (I heard a muttered aside of, ‘Impossible more like,’ from Tony.) ‘So if you don’t feel up to tackling those roads again, Adam, just say so. Don’t feel obligated; Eve and Edgar can book into The Golden Bear or somewhere in Netherdale and keep each other company until the weather clears. They’re well enough matched in some ways.’
‘Don’t worry; I don’t mind going to pick them up. The Range Rover should be able to cope if I take it steady.’
I declined their offer that one of them should accompany me. ‘No, it’s fine, you’re far too busy. I’ll manage on my own.’
Harriet insisted I had a coffee before I left, so it was twenty minutes later when I set off. Despite my bold words to Tony and Harriet, I had serious reservations about the journey ahead. There was no sign of the snow abating and road conditions were worsening all the time.
I had almost reached the junction with the Netherdale ring road when a bumping vibration told me the Range Rover had picked up a puncture. I slowed gingerly to a halt and put on my hazard lights. The action was a reflex one; I had little expectation of their being any traffic as I hadn’t seen another vehicle since leaving Mulgrave Castle. I swore a bit – no, to be fair, I swore a lot – then got out to inspect the damage. The rear wheel on the driver’s side was the culprit. The snow, driven by a strong north-easterly wind, was driving almost horizontally into my face. I cursed Bing Crosby and Irving Berlin for wishing a ‘White Christmas’ upon the world and started to rectify the problem.
I unloaded the jack and the spare wheel. Changing a wheel is not my idea of fun at the best of times. This certainly was not the best of times. The operation must have taken in excess of half an hour, during which I got cold and wet, then colder and wetter. The biggest problem I faced was that when I had put the car in for servicing a few weeks earlier, the mechanic had used an air-powered wheel-brace to tighten the wheel nuts. This is a far more efficient device than a hand-operated one; the problem is it makes the nuts virtually impossible to remove by hand. I was forced to undo them one at a time, removing the jack and edging the car forward between each removal to get the next nut in a position where I could bring my full weight to bear by standing on the brace. When my foot slipped from the brace and the tool scratched my shin, I almost gave up.
But eventually, and with considerably more swearing, I completed the repair, replaced the punctured wheel in the boot, and let down the jack. When I had secured everything I climbed back into the car and started the engine. Although I was now sheltered from the weather I was cold, wet, dirty, and weary. My temper was not at its best either. I thought briefly about the couple waiting at the station. No doubt they’d have the refuge of a warm, well-lit coffee bar. I sat for five minutes or so, allowing the car heater to alleviate the numbness in my hands and feet. The heater did its best, but the difference it made was negligible.
The station yard was almost in darkness when I arrived some twenty-five minutes later. Obviously I had miscalculated. There would be no more trains stopping there before Boxing Day and the station staff had been ordered to save on electricity.
The car headlights picked out two figures huddled against the meagre protection offered by the wall of the building. Through the myriad of snowflakes dancing across the beam I could just make out that they were a man and a woman. Obviously these were my passengers. I pulled to a halt alongside them and climbed stiffly out. I was about to greet them when the woman spoke, ‘Where the bloody hell do you think you’ve been? Do you realize how long we’ve been waiting here freezing to death? Put the cases in the boot and get us to the Castle, pronto. Just you wait until my sister hears about this.’ She swept past me and climbed into the back of the car.
I turned to her companion; half hoping for a warmer reception. ‘You should have been here an hour ago. You’ll be lucky if you’ve still got a job once I speak to Sir Anthony, you’re a bloody disgrace.’
With that he joined the woman in the back of the car; my car. I walked angrily across to where they’d left their baggage. There were two suitcases and a hold-all. I examined these; then returned and opened the back of the Range Rover. The wind was driving the snow directly towards the back of the vehicle. I carried each case to the car individually, taking my time and being careful not to slip on the treacherous surface; then dumped them unceremoniously into the boot. I dragged the process out as long as I could justify and felt better for it. It was mean and petty, true enough; but I enjoyed it. When I had finished, I slammed the boot viciously; then the driver’s door with equal venom; apologising silently to the car as I did so; then set off back towards the castle.
Whether the two of them had run out of conversation during their long wait or not I wasn’t sure; and to
be honest I didn’t care much. They neither spoke to me nor to each other and that suited me fine. My attention was concentrated wholly on the road conditions which had deteriorated from appalling to ghastly since my previous journey. In parts the road was virtually impassable. For any other vehicle it would have been, but it is those conditions that a Range Rover is built for. Not for the first time did I say a silent prayer of thanks to the manufacturers and applaud the wisdom of my choice.
It took more than an hour before I saw the welcoming light of the lodge ahead. The snow; that had started as fine pellets was now a mass of large flakes falling in whirling, gyrating confusion. As I pulled to a halt outside the main entrance to the castle the woman broke the silence. If I had hoped that the warmth of the car would have mellowed her mood or even that I might get a word of thanks for my efforts on their behalf I was in for a rude shock. ‘Take the car round to the courtyard; unload our bags, and bring them to our rooms,’ she ordered me in an abrupt tone. ‘Your slackness has already made us late for dinner. By the time we’ve changed, the rest of the party will probably be onto the dessert course.’
She waited for her companion to get out then slammed the door in a bad-tempered manner behind them and stalked across towards the steps in front of the entrance. I watched her and the man trudging behind her. ‘And a Merry fucking Christmas to you as well,’ I muttered. I took considerable pleasure in seeing the man slip off the bottom step and deposit his fat arse in a snowdrift. It was the nearest to a bit of fun I’d had all day. My faith in natural justice restored, I drove round the end of the building and found my way to the courtyard at the rear. I parked as close to the door as I could and lifted their cases out of the boot before depositing them inside the nearby entrance. I locked the car and entered the castle, following the long corridor towards the sound of voices and the smell of cooking. I entered the kitchen; a huge room that at first glance seemed to be constructed purely from stainless steel.
To my surprise, Harriet was there, chatting with a slim, good-looking woman who I guessed to be in her late thirties; and who by her clothing seemed to be the cook. Harriet glanced across when I opened the door, ‘Adam, thank goodness you’re back safely. We were beginning to worry that you might have had an accident or got stuck in the snow.’ She examined me closely and exclaimed, ‘Your hands are filthy, what happened?’
‘I had a puncture on the way there,’ I told her ruefully. ‘That’s what delayed me.’
‘But where are Eve and Edgar?’
I grinned. ‘They’ve gone off to their rooms and are probably waiting for your chauffeur to deliver their luggage so they can change for dinner.’
‘Our chauffeur … but we haven’t got a chauffeur,’ Harriet said in astonishment. ‘He left us last month to go and work in America.’
‘I think they were under the impression I was the replacement.’
‘Oh dear.’ Harriet began to giggle. ‘But didn’t you explain; didn’t you tell them who you are?’
‘I wasn’t really given very much of an opportunity,’ I confessed.
‘Oh, I see. Don’t tell me, let me guess; Eve was in one of her moods? Was she very unpleasant?’
‘At the station she was extremely unpleasant; after that neither of them spoke a word to me until they got here.’
‘Just wait until I have a word with her, she’ll feel the rough edge of my tongue. I love my sister dearly but she can be a real bitch sometimes. Politeness forbids me to tell you what Tony reckons she needs but you can guess. Something you could give her but I couldn’t.’
A stifled chuckle reminded us we weren’t alone. ‘I’m sorry, Polly,’ Harriet said. ‘I should have introduced you. Adam, meet Polly Jardine: a maestro in the kitchen and my closest friend and confidante. Polly, this is Adam Bailey; he used to be famous.’
As we shook hands, Harriet leaned over to Polly and told her confidentially, ‘Adam was a TV reporter but I knew him long before that. We were at university together. I seduced him and he’s never looked back since.’
‘Harriet,’ I told her sternly, ‘stop trying to embarrass me in front of your friends. It didn’t work years ago and it won’t work now. Shouldn’t I make a move to get those cases up to the rooms?’
‘No you jolly well shouldn’t. If Eve and Edgar want them they can come down and get them. I can’t wait to give Eve a piece of my mind.’
‘No, please don’t do that,’ I contradicted her, ‘let me have the pleasure.’ I paused, struck by something in her expression. ‘You don’t like Beaumont, do you?’
‘No, I do not,’ Harriet said emphatically. ‘Neither does Tony. Beaumont’s father was originally Tony’s partner, and ever since he died Tony’s been trying to get Edgar to sell his share in the business. The trouble is, Beaumont knows he’s onto a good thing so he sits tight. Tony’s in a bit of a cleft stick. If he wants to get shut of Beaumont he’d have to engineer things so the company loses money. That wouldn’t do us any good. The only reason we’ve invited him is so that Tony can try to persuade him again.’
‘He might be tempted if you keep arranging accidents like the one he just had.’ I told Harriet and Polly about Beaumont’s fall.
‘I wish I’d seen that. Never mind, I’m going to enjoy watching you deal with Eve instead. I’d better warn Tony and his mother not to give the game away. Come on, let me show you your room.’
‘Harriet,’ Polly called after us as we turned to leave the kitchen, ‘what time do you want me to serve the first course?’
‘We’ll be ready as soon as Adam is, better ask him.’ Harriet glanced at me.
‘I don’t want to put you out, Polly.’ I smiled at her. ‘Would half an hour be asking too much?’
‘Of course not, no problem at all,’ Polly reassured me. ‘It’s been a pleasure to meet you; especially after everything Harriet’s told me about you.’
‘What did that final remark mean?’ I asked as I followed Harriet down the corridor.
Harriet grinned. ‘I should have warned you, Adam, had I been given the chance, that Polly is a dreadful tease.’
If I was to comply with the deadline I had promised Polly I would achieve, I scarcely had time to appreciate the luxury of my room. I had a quick shower, shaved, and was dressed but by the time I reached the ground floor the rest of the party had assembled in the dining hall. Tony had been deputed to meet me and guide me in the right direction. He met me at the foot of the staircase. ‘The entire rabble has gathered at the trough,’ he told me cheerfully. ‘When the butler summoned them they rushed through like a herd of Gadarene swine.’
The dining hall was a fitting chamber for a castle. It positively reeked of Mediaeval England. Was it, I wondered fleetingly, a genuine relic of the past, or had it been left over after the castle had been rented to an over-zealous Hollywood film director. From the stone flags on the floor to the vaulted ceiling supported by massive oak beams, from the panelled walls to the immense fireplace where a couple of trees were blazing fiercely upon a hearth that had been blackened by centuries of use, the whole room looked more like a film set than an eating place.
The centrepiece of the room was the dining table and this matched the antiquity and noble proportions of the rest of the room. It was comfortably larger than a full sized snooker table and of similar dimensions. I stared around in awe. ‘This is magnificent,’ I breathed.
Tony laughed. ‘Yes, I reckon all it needs is Douglas Fairbanks and Errol Flynn duelling with swords and we’ve got the lot.’
He indicated a space halfway down one side of the table and wandered off to take his place at the head. Harriet tried to introduce me but was barely able to make herself heard over the hubbub of a dozen conversations. ‘This is Adam, everyone,’ she cried out then gave up the unequal contest.
I took my seat and looked around. The room should have looked crowded but such was its size the party of eighteen gathered round the dining table merely seemed a comfortable number. As I looked along the table I was pleased to se
e Edgar Beaumont was far enough from me to make conversation impossible. I could not see my other anti-social passenger at first. To my immediate right was a friendly looking young girl, of fourteen or fifteen, I guessed. She smiled. ‘Hi, I’m Samantha Rowe, but everyone calls me Sammy.’
‘Hello, Sammy,’ I smiled, ‘I’m Adam Bailey, and everyone calls me Adam.’
Sammy thought about my statement for a second. ‘I don’t think you can shorten Adam much,’ she said a trifle wistfully, ‘except perhaps to “Ad”, and that doesn’t seem right.’
‘No I guess not,’ I laughed. ‘Maybe I got away lightly then.’ I glanced to my left and had to check myself from saying ‘Oh, no,’ out loud.
I ought to have guessed from Harriet’s mischievous grin after she had shown me to my room that she was up to something. ‘I have to leave you to it,’ she’d told me. ‘I must see to the seating arrangements for dinner.’
As I contemplated Eve, my immediate neighbour at the table I reflected ruefully on Harriet’s misplaced sense of humour. Not that Eve was less than easy on the eye. She would, I guessed, be ten years or so younger than Harriet, with very similar features and a very attractive figure. Her greatest asset however was a stunning mop of red-gold hair that framed her undoubtedly beautiful face. I’d caught a couple of glimpses of that face in the rear view mirror of the Range Rover. Then; huddled inside a hooded anorak and wearing a surly frown it had done the owner less than justice. Now it looked much better with a pleasant smile on display.
She turned to face me and the similarity with Harriet was enhanced, if it weren’t for the hair they’d pass for identical twins, I thought. ‘Hello, I’m Eve Samuels,’ she told me, her voice low, husky and very attractive in a smoky cocktail lounge sort of way.
