Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
Having taken a day off for the hearing, Matt had little choice but to go into the office the next morning.
Kate saw the children on to their buses, then went back to Trade Cottage with a new sense of trepidation.
The first thing she did was to check every room and window, to make sure no one had got in while she was out.
The very last room she looked in was the downstairs loo. She opened the door and recoiled. Splayed across the floor was a dead rat, a huge one, lying on its side, as if it was running.
Having one on the doorstep had been bad enough, but having one in the house felt even more of an invasion.
On the other hand, at least it was dead.
It must have come up through the drains – although she’d been careful about keeping all the other toilet lids closed, the ancient thunderbox-style seat in here didn’t have one.
Or, she thought, the person who’d left them the Pol Roger might also have left them this. But, if so, it must have been this morning – she and Matt definitely checked in here last night.
With a shiver of disgust, she grabbed some loo paper so she didn’t have to touch the long, scaly tail as she picked it up.
After she’d disposed of the rat, she went back inside.
It was very quiet – no gas guns, no motocross bikes, no chainsaws, just the silence of Trade Cottage.
Somehow, that only made it spookier, as if the house itself was holding its breath.
She’d feel safer when the builders and other contractors came back, but even Steve wouldn’t be restarting until later that day.
It was almost lunchtime when she heard footsteps crunching on the gravel. Going to the oriel window, she leaned forward slightly to see who it was.
Jamie Finch.
She watched as he pulled an envelope from his jacket and pushed it into their letter box. Just before he let it go, he pulled it out again, as if changing his mind, and reached for the knocker instead.
A sharp knock echoed down the corridor, followed by three more. For a moment, she thought about hiding. Then she reconsidered. Fuck it. We won, not you.
Going to the front door, she pulled it half open. ‘What do you want?’
He regarded her calmly. ‘I suppose I should congratulate you.’
‘I want your key,’ she said angrily. ‘You have no right to just walk in here and leave things.’
‘What?’ he said, frowning. ‘Of course I don’t still have a key.’ He looked around the front garden. ‘I think my parents did keep a spare somewhere, though. You’ll have to ask them about it.’
‘We’re changing the locks.’
‘Well, make sure you get permission this time,’ he said, amused. He indicated the door she was still holding. ‘That’s eighteenth century.’
When she didn’t respond, he added impatiently, ‘Look, fair dos. You won and we lost. But that doesn’t change the fact that I want to buy this house. So, this is my best and final offer. Everything my parents originally proposed, plus an extra two hundred thousand.’
‘We don’t want it,’ she heard herself say, even as she blinked at the sheer amount of money she was turning down.
‘You’ll see it comes with a couple of conditions,’ he continued, as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘For one thing, it goes down five thousand pounds every day. In four weeks’ time, in other words, it’ll be worth a hundred and forty thousand less than if you accept today.’
‘Then we want it even less,’ she said scornfully. ‘Take it away.’
‘And by the time I come back from America with my family in December, it’ll be down by almost a quarter of a million.’ He paused. ‘These are big sums, Kate. I suggest you don’t leave it too long.’
‘Why on earth,’ she said incredulously, ‘would we be interested in an offer that gets smaller?’
He smiled. ‘Seems counterintuitive, doesn’t it? But I think you will be.’
When she still didn’t take the envelope, he tossed it casually on to the mat. ‘Oh, and would you mind getting the rest of that leylandii cut? Dad says it’s blocking his light.’
This so-called final offer was just a parting shot, of that she was certain. A feeble attempt to make it look as if he was the one in control, rather than the sore loser.
Even so, she spent an hour searching for that key.
It soon became clear it wasn’t anywhere obvious, like under a flowerpot.
She recalled Damon telling her that Rosemary and Paul didn’t even lock up when they went out.
That suggested the spare wasn’t in frequent use either.
It could be almost anywhere in Trade Cottage’s garden.
Or in Jamie’s pocket, for that matter.
She was washing earth off her hands when her phone rang. It was Nikolas.
‘The decision’s been officially published on the council’s website now,’ he told her. ‘You should go through it carefully, so you’re aware of all the conditions, but basically you’ve got the green light.’
‘That’s great,’ she said. ‘Again, thank you so much.’
‘You’re welcome.’ He hesitated. ‘Look, this may be nothing, but . . .’
‘Yes?’ she prompted.
‘I was at a different committee meeting this morning, and afterwards I got chatting to a planning consultant I know. He does a lot of work on green-energy applications – landowners who want to invest in wind power, solar, that kind of thing. It’s pretty much an open door at the moment, given how ambitious the government’s net-zero targets are.
He’s just taken on a client who wants to set up a solar farm.
I don’t have the details, obviously, but the name and site location made me think of you. ’
He paused. ‘The company’s called Pelham Park Clean Energy Limited, and the location is Pelham Park Farm.’