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- Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
- Kategorie: Krimi
- Serie: Lake District Mysteries
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
From the author of the bestselling Cotswold Mystery series ... Two days before an auction of the contents of High Gates House in Borrowdale, Christopher Henderson bumps into Jennifer Reade, the heir to the entire estate, and the expected recipient of the proceeds of the house clearance sale. She discovers a dead man in the cellar of the house but threatens and cajoles Christopher into remaining silent about it until after the auction to avoid complications and delays. The auction begins but is soon halted by the police with the news that a murder has been committed. Simmy, Christopher's wife and amateur sleuth, applies herself to the mystery of the deaths but not everyone is as they appear and Simmy will have to contend with a ruthless and determined killer in her fight for the truth.
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3
The Borrowdale Body
REBECCA TOPE
5
For old friends Liz, Sally, Margot and Mary
And with thanks to Prue Harrison for such great friendship and help on the ground
Contents
Author’s Note
As with other titles in this series, the story is set in real places, but High Gates House is an invention.
Prologue
‘Superb!’ breathed Christopher Henderson to himself as he stood alone on the bridge at Grange in Borrowdale and looked up and over to the right at the very handsome house he had come to inspect. He could only see half of it in the jumble of rock and wall and river that typified the landscape in this spot. The bridge itself was a thing of beauty. The road that crossed it veered around a succession of bends, bringing a three-dimensional slideshow of surprising views to the traveller. Christopher had never been here before.
High Gates House was built of dark Lakeland stone, and stood apart from the tiny village, as so many such proud mansions did across the whole region. Its history was a chequered one, with rises and falls and ultimate decline into shabbiness under the care of its latest resident. Christopher had done his homework and had a basic grasp of events leading to its unhappy current state.
Grange was barely five miles from Christopher’s auction house in Keswick, and yet he had barely been conscious of its existence until now. The Borrowdale valley – some romantically called it a glen – was a world apart, reserved for walkers and birdwatchers. Great crags loomed above it, the steep sides unusually well adorned with properly indigenous trees, as opposed to the conifers that had been planted elsewhere. At the end of April, the different shades of delicate new leaves were a painter’s delight.
The house had a grandeur that shouted money and influence, even through the shadows of its unhappy recent state. It was providing Christopher with the most exciting house clearance sale of his career so far. The contents of twenty rooms and more were to be transported to the auction house in Keswick and a special sale devoted to selling it all. His staff – two of them taken on specifically for this undertaking – would have to work overtime to catalogue everything, and extra drivers and vans employed to convey it all. People must be found who knew how to handle delicate porcelain, marble busts, tattered first editions and faded pictures behind fragile glass. Every rug, every aged teddy bear, every cup and plate and fork and spoon had to go. There would be issues of security, and reams of inventory.
He had left his car briefly on a patch of gravel beside a sign telling him not to park. It had seemed necessary to get a sense of the place before diving into business. Now he got back in and drove the short distance to High Gates, winding along a small road that led northwards towards Derwentwater. A motorbike came whizzing round a bend, missing him by a whisker. ‘Shouldn’t be allowed,’ Christopher muttered to himself. A car was parked at one side of a wide entrance to the driveway to an invisible house, and another had squeezed itself onto a verge that was much too narrow for it. In another month, the traffic would be a source of rage on all sides, even in this remote valley.
Strictly speaking, he had left the real Borrowdale behind him, but the crags on his left were impressive enough to make him feel small. At the front of the house there was space for four or five cars. Later in the year, desperate tourists would venture to park there, ignoring signs and cones. Anyone could see the place was uninhabited.
Inside the house, his first impression was of a wholesale presence of dust. It covered every surface and even coated the walls. The furniture had not been covered with white sheets, as he had half expected, but sat as if asleep or frozen. All that was needed was a magic wand for it all to come alive again. Drawers and cupboards were filled with the paraphernalia of daily life, as well as the trappings of opulence. The rugs were best quality, the pictures genuine oils and watercolours. In the study, a wall of shelves contained books that someone had actually wanted to read. Novels, histories, reference works and a magnificent big atlas all attracted Christopher’s interest. A lower shelf held stacks of very old magazines – Punch and The Illustrated London News going back well over a hundred years.
The last owner of the house – Sir John Hickory – had died in a room upstairs six months before, and from that time on, the house had been shut up and abandoned to the machinations of professionals who sent emails and made phone calls, but seldom went near the place itself. Sir John’s heir – a remote relative who had been hard to locate – had instructed it to be advertised just as it was and had been quite content with the three million pounds that had been offered for it. Christopher was the last in a long chain of personnel engaged in the transfer of ownership of everything the childless Sir John had possessed, and still the whole procedure had some way to go.
Sir John had been a peer of the realm, last in a not-very-long line of mill-owners and engineers. They had made money easily in the decades preceding World War One and built the house almost absent-mindedly, because that was what you did. An only child, John had reluctantly married another only child, and between them they failed to produce an heir. Poor Ruth suffered five miscarriages before removing herself from the marital bed and dying before she was forty. ‘I feel like Henry VIII,’ Sir John had sighed.
Christopher mused on all this as he explored the rooms and their multifarious contents. Tomorrow the real work would begin, and all he had to do now was make a rough assessment of exactly what would be required. His thoughts turned to families and inheritance and his own situation. His wife, Simmy, had given him a son, for which he was suitably grateful. The child was altogether wonderful, and they were currently engaged on trying for another. It was so far not going well. Simmy was pessimistic about their chances and impatient with his reassurances.
‘You know I’m really not very good at this,’ she reminded him. Her first child had been stillborn, and she was now convinced she was too old to manage any more. They lived in a converted barn in Hartsop just south of Ullswater. The property had been almost magically given to them by a distressed woman who only wanted to escape the area quickly and sever all ties. It suited them very nicely, but there were moments when Christopher felt he might have preferred to choose a place for himself. Hartsop was a cul-de-sac in more ways than one.
And then there were days like this when he got to see the inside of a neglected mansion, which was every bit as thrilling as walking into Aladdin’s cave would have been. It was more than he could absorb on his own, and instinctively he took his phone out and called his wife.
Chapter One
Just over a month later, Simmy was not having a very good day. An unexpected east wind forced her to go home again to collect a jumper, having set out for a brief walk with her child and dog. Robin was showing no signs of being chilly, but the dog was hunched up and reproachful.
It was not her turn to do the walk in the first place. Christopher had defaulted, thanks to the huge clearance sale he was embroiled in. Instead of taking his usual Tuesday off, he had worked every day that week, and into the evenings. Simmy felt abandoned and resentful. Robin was cutting a recalcitrant tooth and Cornelia was in the last few days of her first heat.
‘I never imagined a dog could be hormonal,’ Simmy grumbled, having found the whole thing much more trying than anyone had ever warned her. She was in much the same state herself, depressed at the confirmation that once again she wasn’t pregnant.
It was the last day of May and the Lakeland gardens were displaying competitive levels of flamboyant azaleas, cherries and other flowering things. As a florist herself, Simmy felt intimidated by the unrestrained burgeoning of colour. Business at the shop was slow, after the excesses of Mother’s Day and Easter. People were less eager to arrange flowers in their houses when everything was so exuberant outside.
The clearance sale had been all-consuming for the past two weeks. But the two-day event was finally upon them, starting in three days’ time and Simmy was determined to be there. It was the event of a lifetime, after all. Sir John Hickory had captured her imagination and she envied her husband his involvement with so much fabulous treasure. She had wanted to go to Grange with him on one of the many trips to transport the house’s content to the saleroom, but there had never been a good moment. After all, the Borrowdale valley itself merited a proper inspection – something her father had been saying for years, in vain until now.
‘But you need to climb Castle Crag, see the Lodore Falls, visit the mill, look at the church at Grange,’ he enthused. ‘I spent three days there in a tent about thirteen years ago.’
‘I’ll do it properly one day,’ Simmy had promised. ‘But at this rate I’m only going to get a quick glimpse, if Christopher ever takes me with him. He talks about it all the time, but I’ve still never been.’
Russell Straw suppressed his frustration. There had been a time when his daughter had gone with him on his walks amongst the crags and fells, before she had a baby and got married and everything changed. His wife had never been as enthusiastic about wide open spaces, and her knees were not what they once were.
But Christopher belatedly had an idea that would go part of the way to satisfying both his wife and his father-in-law.
‘Come with me tomorrow,’ he invited Simmy. ‘I’ve got to go through the house one last time, before we send the keys back. The lads can’t promise that they went through absolutely every cupboard and there might yet be corners of the cellar to look at. Jack said he thought it might have been partitioned off at some point, with more areas to explore. I never got round to checking. Mind you, if we do find anything, it’ll be too late to go in the sale. We printed the catalogue three days ago.’
Simmy hesitated. ‘You don’t want me to do any skivvying, do you? I’m not going to be there as an unpaid cleaner?’
He stared at her in mock horror. ‘Perish the thought! What an idea! The place isn’t our responsibility in any way. I was actually going to suggest we make a real little outing of it and have lunch at the cafe there. Besides, you keep saying you wish you could have seen the house – not to mention the whole area. Here’s your chance. It’ll make your dad happy too. He thinks it’s an outrage that you’ve never been there.’
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘But it will be all bare and scruffy now, won’t it? Faded patches where the pictures were, and everything sad. No carpets or curtains. Poor house.’
‘Actually, a few of the curtains are still there. You’re right about it being sad, though. I saw Fiona having a little cry over some of the lots, last week. It’s the man’s whole life, all laid out and catalogued. There is something horrible about it. People keep saying so. I doubt if it’ll put them off buying the stuff, all the same.’
Simmy had heard a great deal about the chief items going under Christopher’s hammer – a marble bust, paintings, collections of porcelain, rare books, Pacific Island carvings. Excitement had spread all around the world, enquiries and commission bids coming in great numbers. Two extra people had been shipped in to handle all the work.
‘And yet he wasn’t particularly rich,’ Christopher mused. ‘It was his grandfather who collected most of the good stuff a hundred years ago or more. He must have been in the right places at the right times and had a good eye. The things from the Far East are amazing. All Sir John did was give it house room. His main interest seems to have been local history, and that was only after he retired.’
‘It’s all amazing, according to Ben,’ said Simmy. Ben Harkness was nineteen and a university dropout. The thrills of an auction house had provided ample consolation for the disappointments of academe.
‘This could be the making of him. He’s going to learn more this month than I did in two years.’
‘So you’ll come with me?’ he prompted, a few moments later.
‘Of course I will. Just try to stop me.’
She prepared for the excursion by phoning her father and asking for hints as to what to look out for in Borrowdale.
‘I can’t believe you’ve never been there,’ he said, not for the first time. ‘Pity I can’t come with you, but I’ve got an eye test. I’ve got a pretty fair grasp of the Hickory history, though.’
‘I should have gone before this, I know,’ she replied readily. ‘So now I’m making up for it.’
‘It’s a glen,’ he began. ‘With a hazy history. It was always regarded as inaccessible, until a century or so ago. Grange is lovely. It’s at the northern end. There’s a remarkably comprehensive display, all about it, in the Wesleyan chapel by the bridge. I saw it last year. Gives you an excellent overview, but it takes a while to read everything.’
‘No time for that. I phoned you instead. Christopher wants to show me High Gates and then have lunch. We’ll have the baby and the dog with us.’
Russell sighed loudly. ‘So, what do you want me to tell you?’
‘Just what’s special about it, I suppose. All I know is that Grange is close to Derwentwater and has a good bridge.’
‘Let me think, then. Sounds as if you’re not going to be seeing much of the real Borrowdale. But Grange itself is interesting. The main thing I remember is the woodland on the north side. A brilliant tree cover, right to the top of the fell – shows you what it could all be like if they took the sheep away.’
‘Christopher already mentioned the trees.’
‘Oh. Well, there was a woman, Margaret Something, who built the church and the school and lived in that big hotel when it wasn’t a hotel, and did all sorts of influential things.’
‘Would Sir John have known her?’
‘Don’t be daft. She died in the 1880s. But he might have known people who remembered her, I suppose. Just.’
‘Barely,’ said Simmy sceptically. ‘They’d have to be born in the 1870s.’
‘So? They’d have still been alive in the 1950s, and your Sir John was born about 1935. That works, doesn’t it?’
‘Only if he lived there all his life.’
‘He did, you idiot. That’s the whole point. I thought you knew all this. His great-grandfather built the house, and now there’s nobody to follow on, which is why everything’s being sold. End of the line. Tragic. There must have been a time when the house was full of family and servants. They lost three sons in the First World War, but still struggled on. Surely Christopher’s explained the story to you?’
‘Not really. Or if he did, I wasn’t paying proper attention. I’ve always had trouble with ancient history, as you know.’
‘This is recent history, Sim. Which you should probably bear in mind. There could be people around who hold strong views and passionate feelings about the whole business. The sale of a prominent property like that will rock quite a lot of boats.’
‘Don’t say that,’ begged Simmy, aware of a throbbing premonition that the Borrowdale business might well prove all too memorable.
Chapter Two
The weather that day was unreliable, but Christopher insisted that it would improve. ‘It won’t stop the hikers,’ he said. ‘They don’t like it too hot.’
They drove out of Keswick, and onto small roads that defied any attempt to maintain a sense of direction.
‘I got lost the first time I came,’ Christopher admitted. ‘Went round in a big circle. Then I thought I was facing south when it was actually north.’
‘I’m not surprised. Half the signs are hidden behind clumps of cow parsley. I would have turned right here.’
‘This is the crucial one. Well spotted. Most people get the bus, apparently. There’s nowhere to park in Grange.’
Three miles further on, they noticed a bus stop near a turning into Grange itself. Simmy duly admired the double-humped bridge and the lavish covering of trees.
‘Where’s Borrowdale, exactly?’ she asked. ‘If this is Grange.’
‘It’s no single spot. The real drama is to the south of here – Honister Pass and some sort of museum. If you go north along the side of Derwentwater, you don’t see much of Borrowdale, I suppose. That’s what we’ll be doing. People keep talking about how remote and mysterious it is. Have you heard of Hugh Walpole?’
‘I think not.’
‘Nor had I until Jack started on about him. He wrote novels set here. It’s a family saga, sort of thing, very popular in its day.’
‘I never had Jack down as a reader.’
‘I think it’s more his wife, actually. But he’s pretty clued up about the local area and the history.’
‘When did the Walpole man write his books, then?’
‘Must have been in the twenties, I guess. We can google him if you’re interested.’
‘I’ll leave it to my dad – although he probably knows it all already. I’m surprised he hasn’t got round to giving me a little lecture all about him.’
‘Ta-da!’ sang Christopher suddenly, bringing the car to a halt. On the back seat, the child and the dog both jerked into alert interest. ‘How about that, then?’
The house was constructed of the dark local slate, the deep grey sometimes glowing blue in certain lights. Well proportioned, it had a timeless dignity and confidence that inspired a kind of awe. ‘Gosh!’ said Simmy.
‘Isn’t it superb! When I first saw it from the bridge, that’s the word that came to me.’
‘It looks as if it’s always been here. It’s better than the other one we passed, lower down.’
‘Borrowdale Gates – yes. Mind you, that’s a handsome building as well. The Heathcote woman had it built. I was reading about her the other day.’
‘She must be the one my dad was talking about. He says she’s crucial to the history of the place.’
‘I think he’s right. She must have come here quite often. She and Hugh Walpole and Arthur Ransome and Beatrix Potter. Except I have a feeling they weren’t all alive at the same time. Your dad would know, I suppose.’
‘Indubitably. It’s lucky we’ve got at least one historian in the family. I get a headache as soon as I try to imagine how it must have been two centuries ago. It all goes blurry in my mind when he tries to explain it.’
‘You need a sense of history when you work with antiques,’ said Christopher pompously. ‘But I have to admit I’m a slow learner.’
They drove through the gateway, where one gate was so askew that any attempt at closing it had long been abandoned. The other was upright, but its black paint was peeling badly. Simmy looked up at the great house in front of her. It seemed to have been built right into the rock face, looking east as far as she could tell. ‘Derwentwater’s that way, is it?’ she asked, pointing vaguely.
‘More or less. There’s a good view of it from the top floor.’
‘Poor house. It looks so neglected.’
‘I know. It’s a miracle it wasn’t burgled while it still had all its contents. I suppose nobody really knew about it. Everything was handled very quietly until we’d shifted most of the stuff. It’s been bedlam since then.’
‘Tell me about it,’ said Simmy with heartfelt resentment. ‘I’ve hardly seen you this last fortnight.’
‘Soon be over,’ he assured her. Then he sighed. ‘It’s been a real roller-coaster ride. I’m going to be sorry when it stops.’
‘Which is why we’re making this sentimental journey for one last look,’ she summarised. ‘What’ll happen to it now?’
‘Almost certain to be turned into a hotel. New bathrooms everywhere, windows replaced, probably new floors as well. There’s plenty of scope.’
‘Not much space for cars, though. Where’s everybody going to park?’
‘They’ll work something out. There’s more space than you think.’ He looked at the two youngsters on the back seat and said, ‘We can leave Cornelia for a bit. It won’t be too hot for her.’
They all – except for the dog – got out of the car and approached the front door. Simmy felt as if she was intruding where she had no right to be. Christopher took an old-fashioned key from his pocket and operated the single lock halfway down the door.
‘Haven’t seen a door like this for a while,’ he said with a laugh. ‘I’d almost forgotten they could be so simple.’
Their own front door in Hartsop had been installed in place of the wide opening it had possessed when a barn. It had a fancy system designed for maximum security that both Simmy and Christopher faintly disliked. For a start, it needed two hands to get the door open, which was never convenient.
‘The past was a better country,’ said Simmy, quoting her father. ‘They did things more easily there.’
‘Which is a lesson I’ve been learning ever since I took this job,’ her husband agreed. ‘It applies to almost everything. I often wish I’d been born a century earlier.’
She looked at him with interest. ‘Do you?’
‘Well, I have been lately. I think it might have something to do with Sir John and this place, actually. I’ve got foolishly fond of it.’
‘Oh.’ She stepped into the substantial hallway, with patterned stone floor tiles and a broad staircase at the far end, and left Christopher to bring the baby buggy in. Despite having heard little but stories about the place for weeks, nothing had prepared her for the reality. There was a strong sense of decay and despair. The thought of one man living here alone, into old age, with nothing but memories, was painful. ‘Didn’t he have some sort of servant? A cook or something?’
‘A woman came in twice a week. He wasn’t incapable. I suppose she washed his sheets and things, and ran a vacuum round. The carpets were phenomenal. All pure wool. The moths had found some of them, though. He cooked for himself, apparently. And made marmalade.’
‘Pardon?’
‘Marmalade. There were forty-one jars of it in the kitchen, all carefully labelled. The oldest went back to 1994. I think he was using the newest ones first, which was naughty of him.’
‘Were there any old diaries or letters?’
Christopher shook his head. ‘Nothing like that. He doesn’t seem to have been very introspective. Plenty of books, though. Walter Scott, first editions. Lord Lytton. Lots of authors I’d never heard of. They won’t fetch very much. The old newspapers and magazines are more interesting. Lovely bound copies of Punch. We’ve had to get an expert to look at them for us. Come and see the study.’ He took his wife and son into a room at the back of the house, where there were two walls of empty shelves and pale patches on the other two where pictures had been. ‘It didn’t look as if he used it much. The dust went back much further than when he died. Except in a few places where there were gaps. We think he might have started selling some of the oldest stuff.’ Christopher looked round at the emptiness. ‘There was a fantastic old globe in that corner, and a nice hand-illustrated map hanging there.’
‘You really got to know your way around, didn’t you,’ Simmy said.
‘I came six times altogether. So did Hughie, Ben, Jack – and sometimes Kitty. And the really big stuff was moved by professionals. We all got to know it inside out.’
Robin was kicking his heels vigorously against the bar of his buggy, demanding attention. A few weeks earlier he had taken his first steps, and now wanted to walk everywhere – slowly and crookedly, clinging to a parental hand.
‘No, you can’t get out here,’ Simmy told him. ‘You’ll get filthy.’
‘I ought to go and have a look in the cellar,’ said Christopher, without enthusiasm. ‘I’ve avoided it up to now. They told me they’d cleared out some lamps and things that were down there, but it was dark and smelly, and they didn’t like it. I suppose it’s down to me to make sure one last time that we didn’t leave anything.’
‘Not me,’ shuddered Simmy. ‘Can I go into the living room?’
He smiled. ‘Help yourself. But it’s called a “drawing room”, to be precise. Pity you missed seeing the kitchen in all its original glory. The copper pans alone will fetch hundreds. Pewter, silver, cast iron – all the stuff collectors go mad for. Honestly, Sim, the place was a gold mine. Lucky Jennifer is going to get a very nice sum at the end of all this.’
‘The heiress, you mean?’
‘Keep up, Sim. I must have told you at least three times.’
‘Sorry. It still seems like a fairy tale. Surely she must have known it would all come to her?’
‘She says not. Sir John’s grandfather was her great-grandfather’s cousin. That’s pretty remote. She barely knew he existed, and obviously never met him, and thought there had to be people with better claims than her. Apparently, she argued about it with the lawyers when they told her she was the only one.’
‘Are they absolutely sure she is?’
‘Looks like it. Enough to satisfy me that she gets all the proceeds of the sale, anyway.’
‘Seems a bit odd. All those generations and nobody to show for it.’
Christopher nodded. ‘I know. As breeders, the Hickorys must have been abject failures. Most of them barely managed one child.’
‘Like us,’ murmured Simmy, wheeling her little son back and forth in the hope of keeping him entertained.
‘At least ours has got some cousins,’ said Christopher bracingly. ‘And no great mansion to fight with them over.’
Simmy forced a laugh. ‘I’m sure that’s bad grammar,’ she said.
‘I’m going down to the cellar,’ he repeated. ‘Back in five minutes.’
Chapter Three
It was barely one minute before Christopher came up from the cellar, looking pale. ‘Nothing down there, after all,’ he said. ‘I’d better go upstairs next.’
‘Wait for me. I want to see the view.’
‘What about Robin?’
‘You can carry him. We can’t leave him down here.’
Without another word, Christopher lifted the child out of his straps and went ahead, taking the stairs quickly. Simmy followed, trying to absorb every detail of the staircase, and the landing at the top.
‘This must be five times the size of Beck View, and I thought that was big,’ she remarked, thinking of her parents’ former home in Windermere, which they ran as a B&B. ‘Look at all these doors!’ There was a broad passageway down the centre of the house, with bedrooms leading off it on both sides.
‘A mere eight bedrooms,’ said Christopher. ‘So nowhere near five times the size. That’s on this floor. There’s three more above this, for the staff. Only one bathroom, though. Can you believe it? Plus a separate lavatory, and a privy downstairs.’
‘So primitive,’ laughed Simmy. ‘However did they manage?’
‘I don’t think they bathed very much. It’s a very modern obsession.’
Simmy had gone into one of the bedrooms and stood in the middle of the huge space. ‘You could get six beds in here, easily. And a fireplace! But no view.’ The window looked onto the stone face of the fell, only eight or ten feet away. ‘Must get very cold and dark in the winter.’
‘Hence the fireplace,’ said Christopher. ‘These back rooms weren’t much used, I suspect.’
‘But it’s so big.’
‘This one had two double beds, a cheval mirror, two wardrobes, a couch, plus writing desk, trouser press, bookcase and three very nice floor lamps. More than enough to amuse anyone without needing a view as well.’
‘How’s the wiring?’ she asked, mindful of the endless regulations they’d been subjected to when they converted their barn to a house. ‘Is it legal?’
‘Very much not if it’s to become a hotel. But it’s only thirty years old, so it works perfectly well. Whoever did it then was extremely generous with sockets. Every room has at least four.’
‘Electric was cheap then, I suppose,’ said Simmy wistfully.
‘Mm.’
Simmy was opening her mouth to ask him if he was all right when Robin interrupted with his habitual squawking, indicating that he was not being given his due attention, and was certainly displeased with the current situation. ‘He’s bored,’ she said.
‘He’s a pest,’ said Christopher affectionately. ‘We should have left him behind.’
‘Huh! And the dog’s going to be feeling much the same, by now.’
‘Well, we’ll have to go, then. We’ll leave the car here and walk down to the cafe. Maybe the brat’ll be asleep when we get back here again, and we can have another look round.’
‘Don’t call him a brat,’ Simmy protested. ‘He might hear you. But it’s a good plan. And can we drive home a different way? Isn’t Honister Pass around here somewhere? I’ve never seen it. Is it like Kirkstone?’
‘Worse. Steeper and goes on for longer. I’ve only done it once. There’s a famous photo of it from the 1890s, with a poor horse pulling a buggy or something down it. It must have been terrifying. And we sold a painting not long ago, based on that photo.’
‘Presumably it wouldn’t have to pull to go down, if it’s so steep. What stopped the coach running away and dragging the horse after it?’
‘They had brakes, I guess,’ he said vaguely.
Simmy had a vivid mental image of the scene, arousing strong sympathy for Victorian horses in general and a faint understanding of the harshness of life in this isolated spot not so long ago. ‘It rains such a lot,’ she remembered. ‘The road must have been muddy most of the time.’
‘Snowy. Icy. And then bumpy and hard in summer. I don’t imagine the people of Borrowdale went out and about very much if they could help it.’
‘So – are we going to risk it?’
‘Not much of a risk these days. The car’s just been serviced, so the brakes should be okay. It’ll be good to see it again.’
Again she found herself wondering if he was all right. His voice was flat and the tone oddly distracted. ‘Did you—?’ Again her child interrupted, even more insistently, drowning her words.
‘Come on, then. This is hopeless,’ said Christopher. ‘But at least you get the general idea. I’m glad you’ve seen it, and we can have another go after lunch, if you like.’
They went back down the handsome staircase and out through the front door. Christopher carefully locked it, and they set off down the hill to Grange, having collected Cornelia from the car.
Simmy was still holding onto her question, and tried again as they reached the first bend in the winding little road. ‘What did you see in the cellar? You came back as white as a sheet.’
‘Did I?’ He made a poor show of trying to laugh. ‘Well, if you must know, it was rats. Two of them. Big ones. I didn’t want to scare you and have you screaming in front of Robin.’
‘Oh, God! Now I won’t dare go back in there for another look. They might be all over the house.’
‘At night they probably are.’ He shuddered. ‘It’s irrational, I know. But they completely freak me out. Did I tell you about that time in David?’
‘Guatemala, right? Yes, you did.’
‘It’s lucky you’re the same about them. You don’t just dismiss it as silly.’
‘It would be better if one of us could cope with them. If we get one in our house, we’ll both scream and run away, leaving Cornelia and Robin to deal with it.’
‘Which they probably would.’ This time his laugh was more successful.
The stroll down the gentle decline into the village and the river Derwent was easy and interesting. They passed the Borrowdale Gates Hotel, which felt like a kind of rival to High Gates. Christopher stopped suddenly for no apparent reason, and stared at something that Simmy assumed was a gatepost.
‘Look at that!’ he said.
She looked. ‘What is it?’
‘I don’t know, but it was never designed to be part of a fence. It’s from some kind of industrial machinery.’
The object was black, apparently made of iron, and about three feet high. It comprised cogs and bars that confirmed Christopher’s observation that it was thoroughly out of place. ‘I see what you mean,’ she said.
‘How on earth did it get here?’ he wondered. ‘Something dismantled, bits sold off, or left for anyone to just help themselves to. There’s got to be a story.’
‘Recycling,’ she suggested. ‘It’s a nice sturdy thing, and someone’s been clever enough to find a new use for it.’
‘Right,’ he agreed with a nod, clearly not quite satisfied. ‘I suppose we’ll never know.’
Ahead of them was a group of hikers, looking as if they were heading for the same cafe as the Hendersons. It was almost half past twelve and people would be feeling hungry.
‘I hope it’s not too crowded,’ said Simmy.
‘They probably sell food to take away. We can buy something and eat it near the bridge, if necessary.’
But it proved not to be necessary, and they all sat outside on a modest-sized area with six or seven other people and two other dogs. Simmy was facing the river, although it was invisible behind buildings. The view was of an almost entirely tree-covered fell rising steeply not far beyond the river. Her eye was caught by a massive boulder sitting high up amongst the trees, appearing to hover ominously over the settlement that was Grange. One day it would work loose and crash down without warning. Gravity alone must make that inevitable. She drew Christopher’s attention to it, and he turned to look.
‘The tree roots are bound to dislodge it one day,’ she said. ‘Don’t you think?’
He showed no concern. ‘In about a million years, perhaps.’
‘Or maybe next week.’
‘It’s attached to the mountainside. That’s just one small part of it that you can see there. I don’t think the trees will make much impression on it.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ she said. ‘But I won’t worry about it now.’
‘No, don’t.’ It was not Christopher who spoke, but a man at the next table. ‘Your husband’s right. We’re safe for at least a thousand years, if not quite a million.’
The speaker was obviously a hiker, with sturdy boots and a rucksack. In his fifties, perhaps, which put him at the younger end of the general run of fellside walkers. Next to him was a woman of roughly the same age. Simmy became aware how different she and her little family were from everyone else in the place. The only similarity was in the possession of a dog.
‘That’s all right, then,’ said Christopher with a laugh.
Their food arrived and both parents devoted some moments to ensuring their young son got some nutrition. Cornelia was under the table, whining to express her boredom. Their neighbour maintained his interest in them.
‘Not here for the hiking, then?’ he said.
‘Hardly, with this young man,’ said Christopher, sounding less friendly than he might have.
‘Not really dressed for it, either,’ said Simmy, who was wearing sandals and a fairly respectable pair of trousers. Christopher was even less suitably attired.
The man was clearly not satisfied. He kinked an eyebrow, and said, ‘So …?’
Christopher gave his wife a quick look, and said, ‘We came to see the church, actually. It’s a very unusual design.’
‘Don’t be so nosy, Steve,’ said the woman who was with the questioner. ‘Leave the poor people alone.’
Which Simmy felt was almost as annoying, in its way. It carried implications of superiority, and undue secrecy on the part of the Hendersons.
‘How old’s your little boy?’ the woman went on to ask.
‘Fourteen months. He’s just starting to walk. And the dog’s a bit younger and her name’s Cornelia.’
‘You’re here for the hiking then?’ said Christopher, turning the tables. ‘Have you come far?’
‘Got the bus from Keswick to Lodore, then we’ll get over the Pass and home from Buttermere. We’re here for another week or so. We’re very fond of this place. Like to see it in all weathers.’
‘Ambitious!’ murmured Christopher.
‘We’ve done it before,’ said the woman. ‘It’s a thrilling walk.’
‘Of course, the mining has left terrible scars up there,’ said the man.
In spite of herself, Simmy’s interest was caught. ‘Has it? They mined for graphite, didn’t they? And made pencils out of it.’
‘Slate, actually. Graphite’s somewhere else. The slate was for roofing. They had to take it down the Pass in horse-drawn carts. Apparently, the place was full of the noise of the squealing brakes. Can you imagine it?’
Simmy shook her head. ‘Poor horses.’
‘Indeed.’
‘We should go,’ said Mrs Steve, wiping her mouth with a paper napkin. ‘Long way to go still.’
‘Nice long evenings now,’ said Simmy idly. ‘You won’t be caught out in the dark, anyway.’
‘It’s the last bus we need to worry about. It goes soon after six.’
‘Not a problem,’ said Steve. ‘Even if we stop for an hour at the top.’
‘Good luck, then,’ said Christopher, making it very plain that he would be glad to see them go.
Ten minutes later, they too were ready to leave. Cornelia had made no attempt to hide her impatience, and Robin was showing signs of mutiny.
‘This isn’t really much fun for them, is it?’ said Simmy. ‘Isn’t there somewhere we can let her off the lead?’
‘Only if we head for the hilltops, and even then she might chase the sheep.’
Simmy was feeling lazy and bogged down with child and dog. Her mood of the previous day had only slightly lifted.
‘I don’t need to see the house again, really. Why don’t you go and fetch the car and we’ll potter about down here? You can be back in ten minutes.’
His disappointment was unmistakeable. ‘There’s nothing to do down here. They’ll drive you mad. Much better to keep moving.’
‘We’ll go into the church, then. Or that little chapel by the bridge. Or find somewhere to watch the river. Sorry, love, but it’s not working very well. It was a nice idea, but you’ve had your chance to say goodbye to the house, if that’s what you wanted. Let’s call it a day and go somewhere else. What about Castlerigg? Cornelia can really run about up there. Better still, you take her with you now. She’ll prefer that.’
Christopher and his dog set off at a brisk pace, having made no further demur. It was a short distance on a gentle upward trajectory, and they covered it in well under ten minutes. The car was where he had left it, and the house showed no sign of caring whether he bade it farewell or not. Next time he saw it, he supposed it would have changed drastically. If he ever saw it again, that was. There would be no reason to come here again – ever. In another week, with the auction lots all dispersed to their purchasers, and the finances settled, it would all be forgotten. Records might be broken in terms of the size of the sale. Bidders from around the world would flaunt their new possessions. Sir John Hickory would at best become a footnote in the history books, and his handsome house transformed into something quite different. Then a car came sweeping in through the crooked gates, stopping inches away from him, where he stood for a moment reflecting on it all. A woman jumped out, looking ready for a fight.
‘Who are you? What are you doing here?’ she demanded.
‘I’m the auctioneer,’ he said, rather daftly. ‘Who are you?’
‘I’m Jennifer Reade. I own this place – at least for a few more days.’
Christopher could not have abased himself any more if royalty had suddenly appeared before him. Here was the woman for whom he had effectively been working over the past month or more. It was her interests he was bound to serve and her disapprobation he would earn if he did it badly. The fact that she was young, tall, fair-haired and indignant all made him feel even weaker.
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Pleased to meet you.’
‘What are you doing here? Is this your car? What happened to the gates? Have you got a key? And you’ve got a dog.’
The final observation seemed to cause her most irritation. It also stiffened Christopher’s spine somewhat.
‘I’ve got a wife and child down in the village, as well. I came for a final look round, to make sure we haven’t forgotten anything. The gates have been like that for quite a while, I think.’
‘Your vans and things didn’t do it, then?’ She was still in accusing mode. ‘I saw it when I was here yesterday, and wanted to know what happened. You must have had to make a lot of journeys to shift everything.’
‘Seventeen, with two vans each time,’ he confirmed, with a hint of martyrdom. ‘But we didn’t hurt the gate.’
‘Let’s hope your substantial commission covers it, then. I gather, to my amazement, that you charge the buyers the same percentage as me. That’s extortionate. You’ll make thousands out of it.’
‘We like to think we’ll have earned it,’ he said.
‘Do you always take your whole family with you when you’re working?’
‘As a matter of fact, no. I was owed a day off, having worked overtime on this business for umpteen weeks. I thought we’d make a little outing of it, and I came here out of a sense of responsibility to the house.’
‘That doesn’t make any sense. Do you live near here?’
‘Not really. I’ve come to like the place, I suppose.’
The woman turned from him and stared hard at the house.
‘I’d never seen it before now. I thought I should come for a look – make sure I’m doing the right thing. I wasn’t going to, but Julian said I ought to. It took me ages to find it. I wasted most of yesterday driving all round the valley. Went south instead of north, I realised in the end.’
Christopher shook his head slightly. ‘Anywhere’s easy to find these days, surely? It’s even got its own postcode.’
‘I prefer to use a map. I belong to a movement – oh well, you don’t want to hear about that. You’ll think it’s ridiculous.’
He let that pass, with difficulty.
She seemed eager to tell him about her experiences. She stared thoughtfully at the house, before producing a key from her pocket.
‘I got this sent to me a week ago. I should use it now.’
‘Do you want me to come in with you?’
‘Like an estate agent? No thanks. Your dog’s got muddy feet.’
‘She hasn’t, actually. There isn’t any mud at the moment. And the house wouldn’t notice anyway.’
‘You mean it still hasn’t been cleaned? But I told them.’
‘It’s a lot cleaner than it was, and there are bare floors everywhere, nothing left to get dirty.’
Jennifer Reade bit her lip and stared again at the house.
‘It’s awfully big, isn’t it? It makes me feel like a person in a fairy tale. I never dreamt it would ever be mine. I hardly even knew it existed. And now here you are as well.’ She brandished the key like a talisman. ‘It’s all been such a whirlwind, forcing so many decisions on me. Things I’ve never even had to think about before now. It’s crazy. Now I’ll be a millionaire overnight. Things like that just don’t happen in real life. I feel as if I’ve turned into a whole different person.’
Christopher silently characterised her as a naturally competent person, currently somewhat out of her depth. She seemed to have a range of thoughts all nagging at her at the same time. Her words were almost random.
He tried to sound reassuring. ‘You’ll soon get used to it. You’re not the first person I’ve met in this sort of position. Families can be very surprising.’
Cornelia was pulling at her lead, reminding Christopher that he was expected down at the bridge.
‘I’ll go, then,’ he said. ‘Will you be at the sale?’
‘Pardon? Oh, probably. Julian says I shouldn’t because it’s going to be so sad, but I’m not sure I can resist.’
‘Up to you. You can follow it online, if that suits you better.’
She shook her head tightly, quick jerky shakes that suggested considerable impatience. ‘I don’t do online,’ she said.
‘Gosh! I felt sure we’d had some emails from you.’
‘You’re wrong. I wrote you letters and phoned you a few times. The lawyers emailed you, possibly.’
Christopher was standing beside his car, and now he opened the door and told the dog to get in. Cornelia did nothing of the sort but began to pull towards the house.
‘No, you can’t go in there,’ her master told her. ‘Just get in. We’re late.’
He had realised that he and Simmy had only brought one phone between them, and it was in his pocket. She would be getting worried – or cross. Or both.
Jennifer Reade was walking towards the house door, the key in her hand. ‘I’ll go, then,’ said Christopher. ‘Wish us luck for Friday. Both of us.’
‘What’s the matter with your dog?’
The animal was resisting all attempts to get her into the car. Jennifer Reade took very few seconds to unlock the door and push it open. The dog tore its lead out of Christopher’s hand and scampered after her, grinning triumphantly. Twenty seconds later, all three were in the hallway of High Gates House in various states of excitement.
‘I suppose it’s the rats she can smell,’ said Christopher recklessly. ‘They’re in the cellar.’
The reaction was unexpected. ‘Hey! Have you seen them? You didn’t go down there, surely?’
‘For about half a minute this morning. I’m not very good with rats.’
‘I don’t mind them at all. I might even go down and see what they’re doing. Don’t let your dog go, though.’
‘I don’t think she’s that sort of dog. But don’t worry. I have no intention of doing any such thing. Not her and not me. I don’t mind telling you, I definitely do not like rats. One glimpse is more than enough for one day. They didn’t seem very scared of me when I went down earlier on, either.’ He shuddered. ‘More the other way round.’
‘It’s bonkers to be scared of them. They’re completely misunderstood, you know. I’ve got three pet ones at home. They’re incredibly clever. I love them to bits.’
‘These ones might not feel so friendly. Especially if they’re hungry. They won’t find much down there except for a few beetles.’
Jennifer made a sound indicating impatience. ‘They won’t hurt you, you idiot. Maybe one of your drivers left a pack of sandwiches down there.’
