LITMIR.BIZ

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she exclaimed. ‘Why ever would you, of all people, stay away from Cavendon for so long?’ Her face betrayed her bemusement.

      ‘Because I can’t really bear it here any more,’ Daphne answered. Her voice was level, steady, ‘I can’t live here with the public milling around the house and gardens any longer. They seem to be everywhere. I keep stumbling over them. It’s perfectly ghastly.’

      Daphne paused and stared at Cecily for a prolonged moment. ‘It’s become far too commercial for me, Ceci. Almost like a giant store, an extension of Harte’s, what with the shops, the café, and the art gallery. I’m afraid you’ve turned it into a rather horrid tourist attraction.’ She shook her head, her beautiful face suddenly grim, and without uttering another word she left the library, closing the door quietly behind her.

      There was a stunned silence.

      Diedre and Dulcie looked at each other. The amazement on both sisters’ faces proclaimed that this was as much of a surprise to them as it was to Cecily.

      Aunt Charlotte spoke first, her voice quiet. ‘I think we must excuse Daphne and what she’s just said. She’s been exhausted for a long time and has put a lot into Cavendon. I do believe a few weeks of quiet and tranquillity in Zurich will help her feel better.’

      ‘She blames me,’ Cecily said in a low tone. ‘Ever since the end of the war she has been saying I have been making Cavendon too commercial. She and Hugo have never stopped grumbling – about the house tours, in particular. She’s been very off with me lately.’

      ‘But it’s the money we make from the public that keeps us going!’ Dulcie cried, her voice rising slightly. ‘And she blames me too, because you let me create my little art gallery. But all of the profits go to Cavendon, not to me.’

      In a soothing voice, Diedre interjected, ‘Don’t let’s get excited about this. Frankly, I agree with Aunt Charlotte. Daphne’s been bone tired for years and I think she deserves a long rest. She loves the villa and Switzerland. She’ll get her strength back, soon be her old self again.’

      Dulcie, looking from Diedre to Aunt Charlotte, asked, ‘What do you mean, bone tired? Do you both think Daphne has some kind of illness?’

      Aunt Charlotte shook her head. ‘Not really, but she has put so much of herself into the house, she’s sort of, well …’ Charlotte paused before finishing, ‘A little possessive of it, should we say?’

      Diedre nodded in agreement. ‘The public does get on her nerves, but if we didn’t have the house and garden tours, and the shops …’ She broke off, her hands raised in a helpless gesture. ‘I don’t know where we’d be.’

      ‘Broke,’ Cecily said. ‘Well, not quite, but almost.’

      ‘And aren’t we lucky the public are so terribly fascinated by Cavendon Hall and the gardens,’ Dulcie remarked. ‘Especially since they pay through the nose for the privilege of touring them.’

      She laughed, and so did the others, breaking the dour mood.

      ‘Perhaps we should just skip the meeting, go on about our own business,’ Diedre suggested.

      ‘If there’s nothing else to discuss, I think I’ll go and finish packing,’ Dulcie announced, rising. ‘There are lots of my clothes here which I want to take with me to Beverly Hills.’

      Diedre remarked, ‘Talking of packing, I’d better go and do the same thing. Will and I leave for Beaulieu-sur-Mer early next week.’ Glancing at Cecily she went on, ‘Will’s brother Ambrose is letting us have his house in the south of France for six weeks, and we’d love you and Miles to come down and stay, Cecily. And why don’t you come along as well, Aunt Charlotte?’

      ‘That’s a lovely invitation, Diedre, and I just might do that, providing Cecily and Miles are coming. You see, I do prefer to travel with someone these days. I’m getting to be an old lady, you know.’

      ‘Nonsense!’ Diedre exclaimed. ‘You don’t look or act your age, and you’re as fit as a fiddle. But I know what you mean about travelling alone. Just let us know when you can come.’

      Cecily gave a distracted smile. Her emotions were running high. She said nothing until her sisters-in-law had left the room, then walked to the window, looking out at the grounds.

      ‘What do you wish to tell me, discuss with me?’ Cecily asked her great-aunt, keeping her voice calm.

      ‘The estate,’ Charlotte answered. ‘As you are aware, I was the personal assistant to David Ingham, the Fifth Earl.’ She glanced at her. ‘And, as such, I know more about the entire estate than anybody else, even Miles. It struck me about ten days ago that Great-Aunt Gwen had no right to leave Little Skell Manor to Diedre, because she didn’t actually own it. Neither did her sister, who had left it to Great-Aunt Gwen. You see Cavendon Hall, all of the buildings on the estate, the thousands of acres of land, the grouse moor and the park belong to whomever is the earl. However, for the past fifty-five years or so, the last few earls have allowed family members to live at the two houses rent free.’

      Cecily looked at her great-aunt. ‘Do you mean that James and Dulcie should be paying rent, because they live at Skelldale House, and so should Diedre and Will, because they are occupying Little Skell Manor?’

      ‘That’s correct,’ Charlotte replied. ‘To be absolutely sure, I checked in the files I created years ago and came across the relevant documents, which confirmed what I’ve just said.’

      ‘It will, but we must convince Miles to accept the idea. He might not want to do it.’

      ‘There are the papers I found to prove my point,’ Charlotte reminded Cecily. ‘I know they were overlooked by the Fifth Earl, because I worked with him, and obviously the Sixth Earl did the same thing. Now the Seventh Earl can put it all straight.’

      Cecily wasn’t so sure. She knew her husband would loathe the idea – especially as his sisters believed the houses had been given to them. And it was going to seem, once again, that the Swanns were meddling with the Ingham ways.

      She stood up wearily and excused herself.

       TWO

      In moments of sorrow, or when she was troubled, Cecily went to a special place at Cavendon to be alone and calm herself.

      It was no longer the rose garden, which she had used as a sanctuary for years, although she did still visit it occasionally. These days she usually went down to DeLacy’s grave, where she would sit and talk to her dearest friend. DeLacy Ingham had been tragically killed in the war, when the South Street house had been struck by a flying bomb, and Cecily continued to miss her childhood companion, the missing sister of the ‘Four Dees’, as they’d been known.

      Leaving the house, Cecily walked to the cemetery, located across the park near the woods. When she arrived she saw at once that someone else had been there before her. The vase on the grave was filled with late-blooming pink roses.

      Instantly, she choked up, touched that another member of the family had also recently felt the need to visit DeLacy. That was the way she always thought of these visits – going to see DeLacy, never going to DeLacy’s grave. Because she couldn’t bear that thought. Cecily sat down on the grass and leaned against the headstone. In her mind’s eye she could see her friend as clearly as if she were standing there, could hear the lilting voice telling her something special, their laughter echoing in the air …

      She missed Lacy so much it was a physical pain, an ache inside, a terrible longing for someone she had loved and lost, whom she would never embrace or laugh with ever again. DeLacy’s untimely death in the Second World War had been the biggest loss of her life.

      Cecily thought now of the years they had grown up together, here at Cavendon, always close, never far away from each other. They were the same age, with the same needs. While DeLacy was an Ingham, one of the Earl’s

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