by Banks, Evie
“Aye, I know. But that is all to be forgotten today.”
He led them through the house, pointing out objects of interest or relating an anecdote from his family’s history. His house was drafty and cluttered with an abundance of furniture, books, and heirlooms mixed with keepsakes that looked as if they had been obtained on various travels around the world. But it all looked artfully strewn about, ready for a magazine spread on the life of an English country manor. Renee gawked at the life-sized tiger above a large stone fireplace that looked as if it were about to pounce on the next person to walk into the room. “My great-grandfather shot that in India,” said Hughes. Cassandra made a little squeak of protest, but followed along. They passed a library fitted with bookshelves up to the ceiling and a polished brass ladder to reach the uppermost volumes, as well small mountains of books and newspapers that covered a settee, coffee table and reading chair. After they had been through the main portions of the house they settled in a sunroom where an enticing brunch was spread out before them on a table. Dust motes glimmered and tumbled in the rays of light that slanted in through the windows. Renee felt so immediately at home that she kicked off her shoes and curled up in her chair as she spread cheese on a cracker.
“Things aren’t looking so good for you,” said Erastus without preamble.
Roberts attempted to put up a defense, but Renee cut him off.
“No, he’s right,” she said. “It seems Bretton can do nothing wrong and I can do nothing right. I want to do what’s right, but it’s hopeless.”
“The accuser is always examined less than the accused, and people always want to be on the side slinging the mud rather than receiving. You’ve been asked to defend your lineage and your life choices since the first day. No one ever wants to look foolish by backing the wrong person, nor conventional by supporting the status quo. And you, my dear lady, represent the status quo at the moment because you are the legitimate continuation of the monarchical institution, and there is nothing more un-cool—if I may borrow the word—than the monarchy with all of its generations of history and outdated etiquettes. It’s rigid, adapts slowly and reminds people of a way of life they’d rather forget because it makes them feel ashamed for preferring their own slovenliness and penchant for Celebrity Death Match to something more refined.”
“I take exception to that!” said Roberts.
“I know you do, you fossil,” said Erastus.
Roberts sniffed and looked away.
“So what do I do?” asked Renee.
“The League of Royal Bastards is prepared to back you and offer you any assistance we can. There are some among us who even have political influence.”
“Why would you do that?” asked Renee.
“Despite the differences amongst such a varied lot as ourselves, we’re all traditionalists at heart. You’d be surprised what knowledge of lineage can do to a person. One minute you’re a radical, Molotov cocktail-throwing Socialist, and the next minute you’ve learned that you’re descended from a king who saved Christendom. It changes you; you see your place in the current of history in a different light. You want to honor that legacy and not destroy it or minimize it. We recognize that it is history and tradition that make our country great and we’re all proud to be a part of it.” His voice rang impressively.
Renee took another bite of her cracker and followed it with a sip of coffee, which had thoughtfully been provided in addition to the regular tea service. “What’s in it for you guys?” she asked.
Erastus smiled. “Recognition, of course.”
“Why am I not surprised?”
“Nobody likes feeling like an unloved step-child or, in our case, like the unacknowledged love children.”
Renee, Cassandra and Erastus managed to jump back in their chairs to avoid the tea spewed out by Roberts. “Pardon me,” he said.
Erastus dabbed at a speck of tea on his coat with a napkin. “There are also practical considerations. A large portion of the peerage was wiped out. Not all, of course, but enough to mean that the House of Lords is significantly under-populated. If you recognized us, the House of Lords would be filled with people loyal to you.”
Renee considered this.
“There’s just one problem,” she said. “The regent has no part in politics so it gets me nothing.”
“Aye, but the monarch in the modern era has always held a place in the hearts of the people and that trickles down to the monarch’s supporters. And when it comes time for a vote on the royal budget, friends would be a good thing to have.”
“Let me get this straight,” said Renee, picking up her fork and spearing a strawberry with it. “I would recognize the Bastards as legitimate descendants of royalty, elevate them to the aristocracy so that they can join the House of Lords and hold my budget hostage?”
“That’s a very unflattering scenario you are painting,” said Erastus.
“Mr. Hughes, I may be a foreigner, but politicians are the same all over. What comes out of their mouths is the same that comes out of their backsides.”
Erastus grimaced. The eyes of the others bounced back and forth between Renee and their host, but then he tipped his head back and let out a laugh which sounded like a bellow and dug into his plate of sausages, salad and stuffed Portobello mushrooms. “Lady Montshire, you are indomitable. Bretton doesn’t know what he’s up against.” He paused and locked his gaze with hers. “No, he does not.” He shook his head and ate heartily.
* * *
After the brunch Erastus took them around the grounds of his estate. Although she had worn flat shoes, recent rains had left the ground muddy and full of puddles. Erastus pulled a pair of ladies Wellingtons from a hall closet kept there by the housekeeper, which Renee put on. Renee’s fashionable coat also was no match for the gusts of wind that made the window panes of Highlowe rattle so Erastus disappeared upstairs and returned a few minutes later with a lined leather coat of his. “I haven’t been able to button that in well night thirty years and it’ll be too big for you, of course, but it’s better than nothing.” It draped past Renee’s knees and she had to roll the sleeves back several times, but it was very warm. For Cassandra he had a long flannel shirt and a sweater to go over it. She put them on and buttoned her corduroy jacket over it and then ran outside in her combat boots and high socks. Renee worried that Cassandra would be cold, but Erastus said, “Kids always make do. She’s fine.”
Leanne opted to stay behind as her leopard print stiletto heels were inappropriate for walking and the wind would ruin her carefully piled up hair. “I never go out in the wind,” she explained, “It’s bad for the complexion.” They left her with a plate full of cookies and Roberts, who was busy tutting over a guest list, also declined to come.
The oak trees that lined a stone wall that ran the length of the property were at the height of their Autumn brilliance and Renee was grateful for the heavy coat. They strolled down a lane while Erastus pointed out aspects of the property. “The land has been in the family since the 1500’s, but the house you see today dates from the mid-nineteenth, which replaced a smaller house, which in turn replaced a grand house that was destroyed during the unfortunate events surrounding the Montshire reign.”
“My family destroyed your family’s house?” said Renee, aghast.
“Not directly, no. The succeeding dynasty tore the house to pieces, stone by stone, searching for the youngest brother, George and their mother, Agnes. The Hughes and the Montshires had always been close; the Montshire estate—or what was the Montshire estate—is just over there, you know.” He pointed off into the distance. “And the Hughes supported the Montshire claim to the throne, and had been known to hide Protestants on the run from Mary Tudor. When the third Montshire brother fell, several of his backers were executed. I suppose we got lucky. They tore down our house, burnt the rest, and forced us at the point of a sword to commit our fealty to the new monarch.”
“Lucky?” said Renee.
“It’s better than the alternative,” said Era
stus. “We weren’t stripped of our property or put to the sword. We lost our titles, of course, and our fortunes didn’t really reverse themselves until we invested in a little start-up company you might have heard of: the East India Company. We did well enough with that to later build a factory with mechanical looms. We’ve been living off the proceeds ever since.” He smiled wryly. “It’s expensive to be an untitled Lord of the manor, you know. The maintenance on the house alone last year came to almost £500,000. I had to put on a whole new roof, reinforce some chimneys that were about to topple over and modernize the house. There were still some third floor rooms that didn’t have electricity and the plumbing was atrocious. For a few weeks we were reduced to using the outhouse by the barn. The house is called Highlowe because some of the property is high on the hill and some is low in the valley, but also as a reminder that fortune fluctuates and sometimes we’re high and sometimes low.”
They talked on about the house with many references to past generations that had lived there. Renee was struck by his use of the word “we” even though the people he was referring to had been dead for several hundred years. She looked around and wondered what it was like to feel such a connection to a piece of land and know that your family had lived there since, well, forever. She thought of her father’s ranch. It had been sold quickly after his death and brought just enough to settle his debts, but now she wished she hadn’t been so hasty in disposing of it. It would be nice to go to a place that she knew her family belonged to, where she could still picture him striding through the paddocked fields to approach a shy horse. She glanced back at the sprawling brick house. A structure had stood there for longer than the United States had been a country. The longest Renee had lived anywhere as an adult was the three years in the apartment she had recently vacated.
They reached the top of a hill. A beautiful vista opened up below them and the sun chose that moment to break through the clouds and cast its light upon the scene. For a moment she felt the warmth touch her cheek.
Erastus spread out his arm. “There, do you see it? Montshire Manor.”
Across the shallow valley, Renee could make out a large, dark building on a hill which looked like ruins.
“We’ll take the car there. It’s in disrepair now, but well worth seeing.”
Renee could hardly speak. It was hard to believe there was actually a house still standing that her ancestors had lived in. She wrapped the coat around herself while they walked as the wind was stronger up here. They continued their walk, but she kept stealing peeks at the house on the hill until it was lost behind a copse of trees. “Tell me,” she said suddenly, “why did the Prime Minister accept me as the heir and then change his mind?”
Erastus scratched his beard. “It has less to do with you than with politics. Rufus is very eager for full union with the European Union and knowing the Texan penchant for independence, he probably figures that Bretton will be easier to manipulate on this issue. Although the monarch hasn’t traditionally weighed in on these subjects, we’re in a whole new era of the unknown. The slate was wiped clean, in a matter of speaking. What is traditional now? What will be retained and what will be new? How much influence or popularity will the new dynasty have in this age of celebrity?”
Renee thought about this. “What about Britchford; can I trust him?”
Erastus chose his words carefully. “He’s not a bad sort—I campaigned for the bastard—and his heart is in the right place, but never forget that he’s a politician. His first loyalties will always be to his own success and to his party’s survival.”
Cassandra came running up then, her eyes bright and her smile wider than Renee had seen it in some time, to show them the bunch of wildflowers she had picked.
“Shall we go see Montshire Manor, then?” asked Erastus.
Renee and Cassandra eagerly agreed. They decided to walk back towards the house, taking the long way around so that they walked over a bridge that crossed a pretty stream and past the barn, a greenhouse and a stone cottage. When they arrived back at the house, pink-cheeked and windblown, they found Leanne still sitting in the chair where they had left her, her chin resting on her chest, which was full of cookie crumbs. A large snore startled her and then her chin fell forward again. “Best to leave her alone,” whispered Erastus and they left the sunroom. Renee was glad; this trip was about her father’s family, which Leanne could never appreciate. They found Roberts wandering the halls, issuing orders into his mobile phone. “No, no no. I said ironed linen, not rind of lemon!” Renee had no idea what he was talking about, but decided not to bother him. They and a security guard climbed into Erastus’s Range Rover and pulled away from Highlowe. It took longer to get to their destination than she expected when she had gazed at it from the grounds of Highlowe. The road twisted through a small village which Erastus informed his listeners had once been part of the grounds of Montshire. Renee shook her head in disbelief as the whitewashed houses with small windows flashed by, looking much as they must have hundreds of years before. The only things which determined the current era were the satellite dishes on the roofs and the cars squeezed into narrow spaces.
There was no real lane to Montshire Manor as it had become overgrown with grass long before. Erastus braked in front of the house and they all got out. Erastus played the role of tour guide. “This is where they would have got off their horses; you can still see parts of the courtyard wall.”
The size of the house became apparent as they entered the ruins themselves. Most of the roof had collapsed along with the majority of the walls. Apart from the sound of the wind whistling through chinks in the remaining blackened walls, there was a heavy hush. Ivy had worked its way up the sides and provided a sort of canopy in some corners. A crumbling staircase went halfway into nowhere with the rest of the stone steps piled in a heap beneath it. Moss covered several such mounds of rubble. Renee ran her finger along an immense blackened beam which must have held up the roof at one point. The rotted wood crumbled under her touch.
“Over here is the hearth and in that direction would have been the keeping room,” said Erastus.
Renee walked on without listening. The amount of destruction was overwhelming. She tried hard to remain dispassionate and just view it as another historical site. She bent down to examine some writing carved into a pillar that supported a stone arch. She started back in surprise. There it was in eternal stone:
Montshire anno domino 1425
She ran her finger over the grooved words, proof that her family had sprang from this place. Nothing could be further from the Texas ranch she had grown up on, but she was suddenly overwhelmed with the sense of place when confronted with evidence of how deep her roots ran here. Her family had lived here. They had loved here and prospered here until finally they had fallen. She was filled with a sense of loss.
“The fortunes of fate…” said Erastus, coming up behind her and guessing what she was feeling. “They went a little overboard, don’t you think?” he said looking around at the destruction.
“Yes, it’s very sad,” said Renee, hiding her emotions. She could picture the house before it was destroyed; she could see the tapestries hanging on the thick stone walls where now there was only moss and graffiti left by previous visitors. She could see dogs warming themselves in front of the hearth fire and children running up the central staircase, which now reached longingly towards the sky. An image of four young brothers, smiling and impish with their arms thrown about each other, appeared in her mind. She shivered.
The security guard kept her in sight as she continued to walk throughout the wreckage. She came upon a litter of kittens and a mother cat who hissed when she came too close to their den under a fallen lintel that was propped on two other stone blocks. There was a distant rumble of thunder and the ivy began to rustle from the falling raindrops. “We should head back,” said Erastus and Renee did not object. The air here was heavy with sorrow and tragedy. As it fell away behind them in the car window, Renee made a silent p
romise to return.
Highlowe was in full preparation mode for the evening’s ball. Catering trucks and hired staff clogged the driveway. Erastus yelled at them to clear the area and directed them to other areas to park so there would be space for the guests. He gave detailed instructions to the valets. When they entered the house, the clutter of the morning had disappeared. All the curtains were drawn back in the large living room to reveal sparkling windows. Vases of fresh flowers had been placed on every table, along with coffee and tea services on the antique sideboards. Piles of cups and silver trays of delicacies tempted them to each pluck a piece from the towering croquembouche before Erastus hurried forward to shut the doors to the ballroom, saying he wanted them to be surprised. Guests would be arriving in a couple of hours and he ordered up a light meal for Renee, Cassandra, and Leanne to eat in the quest rooms, excusing himself with an apology saying he had to attend to the preparations, but Renee was glad to have time to rest. The ladies ate in the guest quarters.
“God, it’s boring here,” said Leanne as she smeared butter over a roll. “I asked the maid what people around here usually did and she pointed me to the library. The library! How unexciting. They need a bowling alley or karaoke bar around here or something; I always take home the prize on karaoke night. I woke up and there was no one here. Y’all could have at least woken me up. I don’t appreciate waking up to a greyhound sniffing my crotch, although that was probably the most exciting thing that’s happened to me since I got here. Really, I thought life would be more fun since you’re an heiress and everything, but all I’ve seen is a hotel, another hotel, and some dumpy women selling cookies. There wasn’t even a Thin Mint or Samoa among them and you know how I love those Girl Scout cookies. I always bought your Girl Scout cookies.”
“I was never a Girl Scout,” said Renee.
“You weren’t? I could have sworn…well, it must be some other kid I’m thinking of.”
Renee didn’t reply. It hurt that her mother could recall so little of their life together. Renee tried to explain to her about the responsibilities that would be on her shoulders, but Leanne continued on with complaints that she wasn’t being given enough recognition as the Queen Mum. “You’d better hope it stays that way,” said Renee, but Leanne didn’t catch her meaning and told her she was being mean. Renee drifted to the window, which afforded a view across the valley to Montshire Manor. The sky was getting dark and the house was sliding into the shadows.
