Chapter 26 Final Demands
Final Demands
Next morning, once the sun had come out, the snow just slowly sank like deflating meringue, then melted, until only small rims were left around the edges of things, and even those had vanished by the afternoon.
Our party was very depleted at lunch, with Opal and Verity keeping to their rooms, Cariad at the castle and Pearl and Timon at the pottery, where the gallery and cafe had now reopened.
Evie said she’d heard from the local history museum curator that he had found the diary of Gwendoline Sutler, an artist who lived in Seren Bach around the same time as Arwen’s visit, so she was going down after lunch to take a copy of it, or bring it back to scan, depending on how the curator felt about loaning it.
‘Even if there’s no mention of Arwen, I intend writing a life of Gwendoline Sutler too, so it will be useful for that.
After her death her companion, Effie Parker – I think read partner for that – gave the local historian who began the museum her friend’s diary and other items, including some paintings and sketches, so later I can explore those, too.
I’ll need to make a return visit to Seren Bach, but Noel says he will always be glad to put me up. ’
‘You’d always be welcome to stay here, too,’ said Nerys – rather generously, I thought, since she still seemed wary about what Evie might dig out of the family history.
‘Thank you, but I expect you cherish the times when you haven’t got a house full of retreat guests,’ Evie said, then added to me, ‘By the way, Ginny, Charlotte Vane says she really has now finally sent off the Memory Box.’
Seeing one or two puzzled faces, she explained, ‘Charlotte is the descendant of Milly Vane, Arwen Madoc’s friend, whom she lived with in Cornwall until her death.
I think I’ve mentioned her before, and that she has a box of mementoes that Milly kept with her in later life when she had to move into a nursing home. ’
‘Oh, yes, I remember,’ Rhys said.
‘Since she called it her Memory Box, we hope there might be some photos or other information about Arwen’s life with her in Cornwall,’ I said.
When we’d finished lunch, Rhys suggested he drive anyone who fancied an outing over to visit Portmeirion, the beautiful Italianate village with a pottery connected with it.
‘There are extensive wooded grounds, too,’ he said and then added, ‘And on the way back, we could collect Cariad from the castle.’
But it seemed I was the only taker, for the others were working. Toby said he was going down to have tea at the gallery cafe with Pearl later, and Evie, of course, was going into St Melangell to see Gwendoline Sutler’s diary, to her a much more exciting proposition.
*
Portmeirion was fascinating. Although Rhys told me it had been constructed by the owner of the estate, it looked as if it had grown there: an Italian-style village, the houses and little shops painted in ice-cream and sugared-almond colours.
It was in a sheltered valley on a wide estuary, which gave it a mild climate, like St Melangell.
There was a sunken area at the heart of the village, with a large pool painted a deep blue, fountains and a cluster of little shops around it, which I longed to explore, but Rhys suggested we walk around the grounds first and, while we headed along the side of the estuary and then struck up through great banks of rhododendrons and azaleas, and towering mature trees, he told me the history of the place.
The site was bought by a Sir Clough Williams-Ellis in 1925 and he spent the next twenty years creating his vision for it. Later his daughter Susan Williams-Ellis and her husband started the pottery.
‘And it was used as a location for a weird old TV series called The Prisoner,’ Rhys informed me as we came out into the Ghost Garden. ‘It’s still a bit of a cult series and there’s a Prisoner shop in the village.’
By the time we’d hiked all the way round the Ghost Garden, a very touching pets’ graveyard with memorials to the family pets, past lakes overlooked by gazebos, and headed back to the village, I was more than ready to sit in a cafe and eat real Italian gelato followed by good coffee.
The light was fading fast by then too, but I told Rhys that only made the village itself look more magical.
‘I’m glad you like it as much as I do. People either fall for its magic or they can’t see it at all. But I’ll bring you here again in spring, when the azaleas and rhododendrons are out. It’s quite a sight.’
‘Assuming I’m here then,’ I pointed out.
‘I thought we’d persuaded you to at least rent somewhere locally, while you decide where you want to live permanently,’ he said. ‘And you like it here, don’t you?’
‘Yes,’ I admitted. ‘I sort of felt at home as soon as I came to North Wales, which perhaps is my Welsh heritage asserting itself. And I can’t really face going back to live in Evie’s flat, even temporarily.
But wouldn’t it be difficult to find a short let here?
I mean, it’s probably all holiday homes and second homers. ’
‘No, I mentioned that the Prynnes own a lot of local property, which they only let to locals. If they’ve got anything suitable, I think I might be able to persuade them to let you have it short term,’ he said. ‘After all, you may be becoming a local. I hope so, and Cariad does, too!’
There was that warm light in his eyes again and I looked away quickly, stirring my coffee.
‘It’s odd that I write children’s books, when I’ve never had much to do with them,’ I said. ‘Cariad’s lovely – a really interesting and individual child.’
‘She’s all that,’ he agreed and, as if on cue, Nerys rang his mobile to say that Cariad was staying another night at the castle after all, because the nanny was taking the girls on a long trip next day to the Blue Planet aquarium, near Chester.
As we walked back through the dusk to the car, I was turning things over in my mind and I said, eventually, ‘I do think, if I can find a short-term rent, I’ll stay on here because it’ll give me time to really think about moving on to somewhere new, and where I want that to be.
And … well, it would be nice to be in a place where I know other people on the same wavelength,’ I admitted, surprising myself.
‘Then that’s settled. I’ll sound out Max Prynne later to see if he can help.’ Rhys smiled warmly at me. ‘But for now, we’d better make tracks for home or Verity will be announcing loudly again that they were about to send out search parties for us, as if we were lost in the wilderness.’
‘Not if she’s still in bed, feeling sorry for herself,’ I pointed out, meanly hoping she was, because I was getting very tired of Verity’s propensity for putting her foot in it!
*
It was late by the time we got back and I just changed and freshened up, before going down again to have a drink with the others.
They all seemed to have had successful days. Toby and Pearl were sitting together on one of the sofas, deep in a quiet conversation.
When I asked after the invalids, Nerys said Opal seemed to be improving, and had now arrived at the depressed and grumpy stage. Bronwen had been taking hot drinks and soup up to both at intervals.
‘And I’ve been up a couple of times too,’ she added. ‘I think Verity only has a bad cold, but if she wants to call it flu and stay in bed, I’d rather she did that than bring it into my studio!’
‘Or give her cold to the rest of us,’ agreed Evie.
Noel had come over for dinner as he so often did, and I caught snatches of Evie telling him about having wrested Gwendoline Sutler’s diary from the museum custodian long enough to scan it in, before returning it.
‘I’m looking forward to reading it in the morning,’ she said. ‘It would be good if there was a mention of Arwen in there, but since it covers the period when Arwen was in Seren Bach it will at least give me the flavour of the artists’ colony of the time.’
‘I’d be interested to read it myself,’ Noel agreed. ‘In fact, perhaps it ought to be printed, if only for sale locally.’
Kate, through a mouthful of cheese straws, suddenly announced that she was going to visit a fellow teddy bear collector friend the following day, whom she had met on the internet and been corresponding with.
She was a bit coy, but we gathered that he had written a very well-regarded book on the history of teddy bear manufacture.
‘I’ve got my edits off, so this will be a little break before I get down to my new novel in earnest,’ she said.
She seemed to have chilled a little, now her edits were finished, and was now looking forward to being able to concentrate on her new book. However abrasive her personality, I had to respect her as a professional.
‘She’s almost human when she’s talking about her little furry friends,’ Rhys whispered wickedly in my ear as he passed me a glass of advocaat.
‘Ssh! She’ll hear you,’ I warned.
‘Not over the crunching of canapés,’ he said, sitting down next to me. ‘Tudor says she has several teddy bears in her room, all shapes and sizes.’
Timon was telling Nerys how quickly Pearl was picking up the techniques of working with porcelain, when the phone in the hall rang and we heard Tudor’s voice answering it.
Then a moment later he put his head in and said that there was a call for me.
‘For me?’ I put my glass down, heart sinking. ‘It must be Will.’
‘Take it in my office on the extension, if you want to?’ suggested Nerys.
‘No, the hall will be fine,’ I said, getting up and mentally rolling up my sleeves. ‘It won’t take long to tell him to get lost.’
But there I was quite wrong, because it was several minutes later and Tudor had beaten the gong for dinner practically in my ear before I replaced the phone.
Evie looked at me critically as she came out of the sitting room with the others.
‘You don’t look like a Victorian-style depiction of love awakened, thank goodness, just a little poleaxed,’ she said. She linked her arm in mine. ‘Come along, you can tell us what he said over dinner. Everyone’s dying of curiosity, even if they’re too polite to say so.’
‘Only if Ginny wants to tell us,’ said Nerys, firmly. ‘It’s her own private affairs, after all.’
‘Oh, I don’t mind. In fact, I need to talk about it,’ I said, sitting down next to Rhys and unrolling my Christmas napkin.
‘He started off by trying to persuade me to see him. He intends coming down here on Friday and wants me to meet him at the pub in St Melangell. He was under the delusion that I only had to set eyes on him and all would be forgiven.’
‘I’m sure you soon disabused him of that idea,’ Evie said crisply.
‘But he always had an eye to the main chance, so I expect that woman he left you for threw him out and he thought you’d take him back.
And perhaps that computer game firm he runs with his friend isn’t doing quite so well any more, either? ’ she suggested shrewdly.
‘I don’t know – or care,’ I said. ‘But when I made it plain I had no interest in ever seeing or hearing from him again and told him to stop trying to contact me he turned … rather nasty.’
‘In what way?’ Rhys asked.
‘He said I should have told him I’d sold Wisteria Cottage, because it had been our shared home, and he was entitled to a share of the proceeds when it was sold, according to a solicitor he’d consulted.’
Kate was wrinkling her brow, pausing in the lavish buttering of a roll.
‘If it was your joint home and he contributed to the household expenses …’ she began.
‘The cottage was bought by Ginny with money left by my mother, long before Will crept out of the woodwork again,’ Evie told her.
‘Yes, it was always mine and he never shared it, just came for weekends – and for less and less time too,’ I said. ‘His sole contribution was to pay for a pub meal occasionally and bring wine down with him, because he wouldn’t drink my homemade wine.’
‘It sounds like it’s all pure bluff on his part, then,’ said Noel.
‘No shared bank account, nothing like that?’ asked Timon.
I shook my head. ‘So far as I know, he spent all his money on flashy cars and having a good time in London. He never even invested in a place of his own there. He used to stay in his friend’s spare room before he moved in with this other woman.’
Now the first shock of Will’s demands had worn off, I was starting to see more clearly.
‘It doesn’t really sound as if he has any claim on your estate at all,’ Timon said. ‘He’s just trying it on.’
‘He’s still coming down on Friday and wants me to meet him at the Star and Stone at eleven,’ I said. ‘He told me I’d be sorry if I didn’t. That’s when I told him to get lost and put the phone down, but he seems to have it all planned so I’m sure he’ll turn up anyway.’
Evie said, ‘I don’t suppose he knows I’m here; he just thinks you’re on a retreat with strangers, with no one to back you up.’
‘Then he’s going to find out he’s wrong,’ said Rhys, looking grim. ‘I think we should have a little reception committee waiting for him at the pub.’
‘Good idea,’ approved Evie. ‘You and I can be there. That should do it, Rhys.’
‘And tomorrow we can consult the family solicitor who lives in St Melangell,’ suggested Nerys. ‘Perhaps he ought to be at the meeting too, because I think Will saying he has consulted a solicitor of his own sounds like pure bluff.’
While we were talking, Tudor had been bringing in a great tureen and Nerys began to fill plates with goulash and pass them round the table.
When Rhys said softly to me, ‘Don’t worry, Ginny – we’ll sort it all out and get rid of him for you,’ I smiled at him and then, looking round the table at the others, felt I was not alone, but supported by friends.
*
Noel went home after dinner, and when Evie went with him, saying blithely as she left that she would take a key from the garden hall drawer and not to wait up for her, I gazed anxiously after her, feeling like the mother of a wayward teenager.