Deception in the Cotswolds

by Rebecca Tope

  Deception in the Cotswolds

  REBECCA TOPE

  In fondest memory of Martha Grutchfield.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Maps

  Author’s Note

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  By Rebecca Tope

  Copyright

  Author’s Note

  As in other titles in this series, the story is set in a real Cotswold village. Cranham is much as described, including the pub, and the ‘mushroom yews’ in the churchyard. However, the Manor and other individual houses, as well as the people, are all products of my imagination.

  Chapter One

  Light was streaming into the entrance hall as Thea walked in. Her spaniel’s claws clicked on the polished wooden flooring, and the scent of beeswax brought with it associations of affluence and solid English stability. Hollywell Manor, in the village of Cranham, was to be their home for the next two weeks, and the weather seemed set fair. Cranham was – she hoped – an undiscovered gem of the western Cotswolds, and the house-sitting responsibilities a lot less onerous than usual. Despite a lurking sense of caution, Thea felt optimistic and light-hearted.

  The month of June was about to begin, with all the usual mixed feelings that accompanied the start of an English summer. A cold wet June was a loss that could never quite be compensated for by July and August, however lovely they might turn out to be. A flaming heatwave in June, however, could bring with it a surge of Continental well-being, a pretence that real summers could happen, even here on the north-western corner of Europe where the Atlantic troughs habitually held sway through much of the year. Weather, thought Thea, became increasingly important the older you got. Or perhaps it was just her – spending so much time outdoors, often involved with livestock and at the mercy of the elements.

  The Manor was approached up a steepish drive, the entrance to which had been difficult to locate in the confusing lanes. ‘There’s a Lodge,’ Harriet had told her, when she had made her preliminary visit a month earlier. ‘You can’t miss it.’ It wasn’t the property itself she missed, but the entire section of the village in which it sat. Twice she had failed to take the required turning, dismissing it as too insignificant to be the one she wanted.

  But she got there eventually, to be welcomed by Harriet and given a comprehensive tour of the house and a list of her duties. The Manor, it turned out, was something of a fraud. Built of the ubiquitous honey-and-cream Cotswold stone, which had faded to an unpretentious pale yellowy-grey, it had never actually been the manor house in the parish. Harriet Young, the owner, had manifested some irritation at Thea’s questions as to its history. ‘Oh, I think it was built around 1860,’ she had said, with a challenging look that added, Isn’t that old enough for you? Harriet was American. To her, 1860 was pretty much as old as anything got. When Thea hurriedly expressed her profound and genuine admiration for the proportions, furnishings and situation, Harriet had been mollified. ‘It’s completely unchanged,’ she insisted. ‘No additions or alterations since the day it was built.’ She indicated the oak panelling, the boxed-in staircase, the first-floor gallery, all of which Thea thought wonderful. Outside, Harriet pointed out the impressive pair of wrought-iron gates at the foot of the long drive. ‘They were done by hand,’ she said proudly. ‘The letters from the owner to the blacksmith still exist.’

  Thea had not, on that initial exploratory visit, properly calculated the size of the house, but it clearly had space for a large family with numerous servants. The fact that Harriet Young lived there alone was so outrageous that Thea found it almost funny.

  But she was not entirely alone. There was a capacious cellar, which was home to dozens of creatures, living in tanks full of greenery and difficult to discover amongst the leaves and stems. ‘They’re geckoes,’ Harriet had explained. ‘I breed them for pets. You’d be surprised how many people keep them.’ She had fished out an example, and let it walk onto Thea’s hand. It clung with bulbous fingers, pressing coolly into her flesh, rolling prominent eyes at her. The light-brown skin was matt and rather beautiful.

  ‘Breed?’ she queried. ‘How?’

  ‘They lay eggs, which I take away and incubate for them. It’s an extremely precise science. Everything has to be just right. And of course, this climate’s completely wrong.’

  Thea took a step back. ‘Whoa!’ she protested. ‘I’m not qualified for anything like that.’

  Blithely, Harriet had assured her that it was easy, and there would be no recriminations if things went wrong. ‘But why,’ asked Thea, ‘don’t you get somebody who knows what they’re doing?’

  Something in the woman’s face hinted at the answer. Her eyelids lowered, and she avoided Thea’s gaze. ‘Well, I’m not entirely orthodox,’ she admitted. ‘It’s still a bit of an experiment, you see. If I got involved in it professionally, I’d be in for a whole host of regulations and restrictions. As far as you’re concerned, they’re just a few pets living in the basement – OK?’

  Thea had no qualms about regulations, but she still worried about letting the wretched creatures fall ill or die under her care. ‘Well …’ she had prevaricated, already knowing that the village, the house and the time of year would suffice to persuade her to take the commission ‘… so long as I won’t be liable for any disasters.’

  ‘You’re insured, are you?’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ laughed Thea. ‘I agree with you that the less paperwork the better, in all areas of life. Why – you don’t think I should be, do you?’

  ‘Not if you don’t. I’ll trust you if you’ll trust me. Nobody sues, whatever happens. Right?’ Harriet heaved a long sigh. ‘That’s one of the main reasons I left the States, you know. Everything you do runs the risk of some sort of litigation.’

  ‘It’s getting as bad here,’ Thea told her. ‘You’ll have to move to somewhere like Greece or Mongolia next.’

  ‘At least that’d suit the geckoes,’ Harriet had smiled. ‘Oh, and there’s Donny to consider as well,’ she’d plunged on. ‘You’ll need to understand about Donny.’

  She had understood only too well – or thought she did. Donny was seventy-nine, and suffering from a distressing collection of ailments which prevented him from driving or walking very far. He lived in the former Lodge of Harriet’s large house, under the official care of his daughter, Jemima. ‘And he has a lady friend, Edwina,’ Harriet had added. ‘But she’s away at the moment. They’re very close friends, but she doesn’t live with him.’

  Donny, it seemed, had developed the habit of visiting the Manor most afternoons as part of an exercise regime his womenfolk had ordained for him. It would be incumbent on Thea to make him a drink and let him talk for half an hour before launching him down the drive on his tottering journey home. ‘It is a bit restricting, I’m afraid,’ said Harriet.

  Thea had found the balance of pros and cons rather more even after that particular disclosure. ‘Anything else?’ she had asked warily. ‘You don’t mind me bringing my dog, do you?’

  ‘Your dog is adorable,’ Harriet gushed. ‘It’ll all be fine, trust me. And I promise you the weather’s going to stay p
erfect the whole time you’re here.’

  The well-designed house compensated for everything. Cleverly positioned on a south-west-facing slope, with views across one part of the village, including the square church tower and beyond to the sprawling beech woodland, it was exactly right in all particulars. Thick walls, with window seats in the main rooms as a result; old flagstones on the kitchen floor; good-quality carpets upstairs – she recognised that it had been built by an Arts and Crafts aficionado along medieval lines as far as the basic structure went. The overlaid Victorian elements gave it the best of both worlds, despite the concerns that purists might have as to its hybrid character. How on earth did Harriet afford it, Thea wondered, without having presumed to ask the question aloud. The American appeared to be in her fifties and without visible means of support, if she was at home every afternoon to receive Donny. Even if the Manor was a fake, it was still a property of very considerable value. And it was fabulously comfortable. The hot water worked effortlessly, which even in June was a high priority, and the sitting room was a joy to relax in. Hepzibah, the cocker spaniel, found a favoured corner on the two-seater sofa, moulting gently as she turned round to get herself more comfortable. ‘I can brush the hairs off on my last day,’ Thea told herself, ever mindful of the inevitable mess her dog caused in other people’s houses.

  Harriet had gone to Lindisfarne for two weeks’ retreat. There was no conceivable reason to contact her, she insisted. In fact, she would like to place a total veto on doing so. ‘That’s another reason for hiring you,’ she said, obscurely. ‘If I’d gone through some stupid agency, they’d have forced me to leave a number.’

  Thea closed her eyes in a silent prayer, and wondered again about such extraordinary levels of trustfulness.

  The first afternoon was spent in assessing food supplies, examining a large-scale map of the area and pondering the possibilities of Cranham’s single pub. Routines were minimal where house-sitting was concerned, but this, her ninth commission, could hardly fail to fall into something like a familiar pattern. None of her friends or relations had undertaken to visit her, but she supposed she might tempt one or other to come over for an evening or weekend. She had been disappointed to realise that she had just missed the famous Coopers Hill cheese-rolling race, which had been a local tradition for centuries. Even though the authorities had tried to cancel it in recent years, because of the dangerously large crowds, some hundred of determined stalwarts kept it going. It had taken place the previous Monday and sounded like a highly entertaining day out, watching people of all ages launch themselves down a near-vertical grass slope.

  But there were plenty of other attractions: Painswick was close by, an obvious destination for a long country walk. Slad, made famous by Laurie Lee, was further on, in the same direction but in another valley.

  The dog itself forced certain absolutes into place. She had to be walked, preferably along pathways free from traffic and sensitive farmers. Woodland was ideal – something Cranham possessed in abundance. The settlement was in a deep natural bowl, far from busy thoroughfares, its little approach road continuing aimlessly on to join another road scarcely larger. The landscape altered rapidly to the north, where it swept upwards in a dramatic lift. Any sense of direction became unreliable in the village itself, where points of reference disappeared amongst high hedges and wooded hollows.

  The evening was as long and golden as anyone could wish for. Harriet Young’s garden was disappointing by Cotswold standards, but it managed to provide a patch of healthy lawn, and a magnolia which had just dropped the last of its blooms. For herself, Thea would have planted a lot more shrubs and small trees to fill some of the oddly naked areas that made the house seem unduly exposed. A closer inspection revealed that substantial trees had been cut down in recent times, their stumps still visible. Inwardly tutting at the vandalism, she arranged herself comfortably along a hardwood bench, and let the slowly descending sun illuminate the book she was reading. Hepzie left the cosy sofa indoors and flopped contentedly onto the patch of shade beneath the bench cast by her mistress.

  ‘This is the life,’ said Thea.

  Next morning, her first glimpse of the sky from her bed brought sharp disappointment. It was altogether the wrong colour: dove-grey when she had expected forget-me-not blue. A thick blanket of cloud spread from east to west without interruption. A sense of outraged betrayal gripped her, as she realised it wasn’t just cloudy, but actually raining in a fine drizzle that more closely suited February than June.

  The geckoes in the cellar were invisible, as before. Thea checked the temperature gauge and humidity monitor, then she peered at the dozen or so eggs in the incubator. Harriet had said that there was a slight chance that one or two would hatch, but it was very unlikely. ‘Just leave them, if that happens,’ she instructed. ‘I don’t think they’ll want to go anywhere for a few days.’

  The walls had been painted brilliant white, with a large mirror to catch all available light from the small window high in the south wall. It was the antithesis of a classic cellar with the expected cobwebs and shadowy corners, but it still carried the aura of isolation and strangeness that came with underground rooms. It was low-ceilinged, approached by a flight of stairs from the kitchen, and the floor was rough stone. A faint smell of drains was discernible. In the early years of the house’s history it would have been used to store wine, perhaps, and cheese. At first Thea had assumed it might also have housed the coal used to heat the many rooms, but she had found a more obvious coal-hole on the other side of the building during her initial explorations.

  Breeding geckoes seemed a very peculiar activity, when she thought about it. The poor things had a dull existence in their restricted tanks. Harriet had manifested little affection for them – she had not given them little treats or cooed sweet nothings at them. If all the eggs hatched, surely they would earn far less than had been spent on refurbishing the cellar. How many hundreds would have to be sold in order to realise enough for even a modest income? Of course, people did pursue strange hobbies of this sort. Thea had encountered a number of weird pets since she began the house-sitting. One of the main reasons for employing her had almost always been to take care of livestock, indoors and out. A parrot, donkey, ponies, cats, dogs, rabbits – she had managed them all with varying degrees of success.

  It was mid morning, and the drizzle persisted. The sun-filled bowl that had been Cranham the previous day was now a dark and unappealing trap. What would it be like in winter, wondered Thea. If the roads were icy, it would be hard to escape up the steep hills. If it snowed heavily, the whole place might disappear completely. Torrential rain must surely fill the main street with running water that would threaten many of the houses.

  To make matters worse, it was a Sunday – a day when one might justifiably plan long rambles or lazy days in a sunny garden. Irritably, Thea made herself an early lunch and considered activating her laptop for some time-killing games of Scrabble with strangers from foreign lands. It was something she had been doing on and off for the past two years and more, and which maintained its sporadic appeal when life turned dull and aimless as it had that day. An hour or two passed with the help of the radio and the computer, but the sky showed no sign of lightening.

  She saw the old man approaching some minutes before he reached the front door. His head, with its covering of floppy white hair, was unprotected from the rain, and he wore no jacket or raincoat. It was as if the weather made no impression on him at all.

  ‘You must be Donny,’ she greeted him, when he finally arrived. ‘I’m Thea Osborne and this is Hepzibah.’

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed with a nod. His shoulders were narrow and slumped, his legs spindly inside the cotton trousers. A constant tremor kept his whole body moving as if he were shivering in a cold wind. His eyes were a faded brown, peering through lids that seemed to lack the energy to open properly. Stubble covered much of the lower half of his face, suggesting four or five days without a shave. But there was a vitality to
him that Thea recognised instantly. This was a man who made things happen, and didn’t wait for life to come to him. Wasn’t he here on a drizzly Sunday, ready to meet somebody new and take his chances with her, rather than huddling in his little house watching inanities on the television?

  ‘Cup of tea?’ she suggested.

  ‘Coffee,’ he corrected, with a hint of reproach, as if she should have known his preference. ‘Black, no sugar.’

  He followed her into the kitchen and sat at the table watching as she hunted for a mug and teaspoon. ‘The blue one’s mine,’ he said, in his light piping voice.

  She gave him a look. ‘Is instant all right?’

  ‘Perfectly, thank you.’

  The kitchen had fewer modern gadgets than many Thea had experienced. Harriet Young was pleasantly normal in that respect, it seemed. A faintly grubby microwave sat on one counter, near a large wooden bread bin. The fridge-freezer was stuffed with anonymous bags and trays of assorted meat, bread, ice cream and vegetables. The top of it, too high for Thea to reach, was piled with dusty-looking cookery books and a fat half-used candle. Fruit for the geckoes was in a special plastic box, with some dried insects that looked like raisins.

  ‘Managing, then, are you?’ Donny asked.

  ‘So far. It’s not very difficult, really, although I’d banked on decent weather. I’m trying not to worry about the geckoes.’

  ‘Silly things,’ he smiled, his head quivering in the perpetual tremor. ‘Don’t know what she was thinking of.’

  ‘Oh well. They’re quite sweet, I suppose.’

  He waved the topic away, and cautiously sipped the coffee, holding the mug tightly in both hands. It was a tense business, and Thea realised she should have made sure it wasn’t filled too close to the brim.

  ‘Never get old, not if you can help it,’ he said, having managed a swallow of the hot drink. ‘It’s a miserable business.’