Blood-Tied (8 page)

13

Esme eventually managed to get in touch with the gardener, Albert Jennings, through his wife Ada. She arranged to visit him, Albert being apparently unwilling to leave his cherished greenhouse to come to the phone. Ada explained that the greenhouse was where Albert was usually to be found, save for meals and the hours he was asleep in bed, and so it was when Esme arrived.

The Jennings home was a narrow Victorian terrace house on a busy road on the edge of town. Ada answered the door and showed Esme through the house and out into the garden. The greenhouse, which almost enveloped the entire back yard, had been a present on his retirement, Ada told Esme proudly. Albert had his plants and his very own greenhouse for the first time in his life and was content. Esme wondered whether his retirement had coincided with Sir Charles’s death or whether he had left before then, but decided it wasn’t relevant to the reason she was here. Her enquiries were about the distant past, not the recent.

She and Lucy had speculated as to whether Daisy was the result of the amorous attentions of Polly’s employer, Sir Charles Monkleigh, and whether he had left Polly the cottage for her to live there and bring up Daisy. But they dismissed the idea as doubtful. Wouldn’t he more likely have whisked Polly away to some remote location to have the baby in secret? Keeping her in a cottage on the estate for all to see would have only added to the scandal. Perhaps Daisy’s father was someone else in Sir Charles’s employ and Sir Charles had felt obliged in some way to intervene?

However intriguing it was to hypothesize, they decided to keep an open mind, for the time being. That Polly Roberts had, in some form or other, worked for the family and had been rewarded would remain their main theory, unless Albert Jennings revealed something to enlighten their speculation. Esme was optimistic.

Ada ushered Esme in through the open greenhouse door and coughed loudly to attract Albert’s attention. Albert looked up, his fingers blackened by the potting compost.

‘Close the door, woman, for goodness sake. My angels will take chill.’

Ada hastily shepherded Esme further inside and followed, pulling the door to behind her.

‘Angels?’ mouthed Esme to Ada.

‘Angel pelargoniums, dear,’ Ada said under her breath, indicating the beautiful array of small-leaved plants on the right-hand shelf. Esme detected the distinctive scent of the foliage and was reminded of her grandfather.

‘Mrs Quentin’s here, Albert,’ said Ada. ‘You remember. It’s about the family.’ She smiled up at Esme and with a clever manoeuvre reversed her round, dumpy shape out of the door rapidly and closed it again.

‘Good afternoon, Mr Jennings,’ said Esme. She was about to extend her hand but then she noticed the state of the gardener’s own hands and dropped her arm to her side instead. ‘I telephoned yesterday. I’m researching some family history and it seems to link in with the family you used to work for. I read about you in the local paper, in the article about the house.’

‘Oh ay,’ said Albert. ‘You said as much to Ada on the telephone.’

Esme couldn’t decide whether he was flattered to be in demand or irritated by another intrusion, mainly because he was studying her face with a frown. Occasionally people expressed concern about her scarred skin. Some even suggested remedies or treatments. Being approached in this way was something she had yet to come to terms with.

Esme cleared her throat and hurried on in case Albert was prompted to say something on the matter. ‘Would you mind if I ask you a few questions?’

‘Ask away,’ replied Albert, his face relaxing into a gentle smile. ‘Don’t mind if I carry on, do you?’ he added, turning back to his task of stuffing compost into clay pots and setting them in a neat row on the slatted bench in front of him.

‘I’m interested to find out a little more about the family,’ began Esme. ‘Sir Charles was married with a daughter, I believe?’

‘That’s right. I never knew her, though, if that’s what you’ve come about.’

‘Who’s that? The wife or the daughter?’

‘Neither, as it happens. Of course there was all the gossip and that when I first started, but it all happened before my time.’

‘Gossip?’

Albert completed the line of pots on the bench in front of him and started a new one on the shelf above. ‘I don’t remember much. I was only a young lad, you see. It had just happened when I went there.’

He seemed to assume she already knew much more than she actually did.

‘You’ll have to fill me in a bit, Mr Jennings, I’m afraid. I’m not quite –’

‘Albert.’

‘Albert,’ she repeated. ‘You said it had just happened when you went there. What was it that had just happened? Where?’

‘At the Brighton house. I was there with old Fred on some errand or other from up here. Only for a few days, like. I hadn’t long started, see. And the missis had been at Brighton since I’d been started. So, like I said, I never knew her.’

Esme tried to grasp what he was saying but it didn’t make sense. She decided to start at the beginning.

‘What year did you start working for the family?’

‘1939.’

Before the fire, then. ‘And something happened soon after, while you were in Brighton?’

‘The women was on about it for weeks, but it didn’t mean much to me, not never seeing her. She was the little ’un wasn’t she? Catherine.’

‘The daughter, you mean? Her name was Catherine?’ Esme fished out a notebook from her bag and noted the name.

‘That’s right.’ Albert turned towards her. He leant against the bench and folded his arms across his chest, expertly avoiding resting his soiled hands on his shirt. He chuckled.

‘I do remember there being a bit of a kerfuffle. It must have been the day after, I’m pretty sure. Yes, that’s right.’ He wagged a grubby finger in the air. ‘A young girl got the sack. I dunno what for, but I’m sure it was something to do with her ladyship and the little ’un going off.’ He smiled to himself at the memory. ‘She was pretty sore about it, I can tell you. I was rather glad she was going, I remember thinking at the time: wouldn’t want to get in to her bad books, I thought. She’d already walloped me one for leaving a muddy footprint on ‘er clean floor.’

‘What did you mean about her ladyship and the little one going off? They left?’

‘Buggered off the day before, apparently. Went abroad, so they say. Her ladyship had family somewhere foreign. India, I reckon it was. Left a note for his lordship, like, and was never heard of again.’

‘Never?’

Albert shrugged. ‘Not as I know, anyhow.’

‘How old was Catherine when this happened?’

He scratched his head. Getting compost in his hair clearly didn’t incur the same wrath as on his shirt. ‘Ooh, now you’re asking. Couldn’t a been more than a few month old, from what they all said.’

Esme had a sudden thought. Was Polly the member of staff who had been sacked? Was that why she was trying so desperatly to avoid talking about the past? Maybe she had been ignominiously sent away without references. It wouldn’t support the theory of a legacy for long service, but they already had their doubts on that one.

‘The girl who was sacked,’ she said, ‘was she called Polly Roberts?’

Albert shook his head.

‘But you do remember Polly Roberts?’

Another shake. Esme frowned. So much for Albert throwing light on Polly’s background. Had her journey been a waste of time?

She tried another direction. ‘Do you remember the name of the girl who was sacked?’

Albert laughed. ‘Are you joking? It was over fifty years ago!’

Esme smiled. ‘Sorry, that was asking a bit much.’

‘Hang on a minute, though. Now you come to say…’ He began tapping his forehead with a grubby finger. Suddenly he pointed at her. ‘Griffin. That’s it.’ He seemed quite excited. ‘Mary, I think. That’s right. Mary Griffin.’

Esme was sceptical. ‘Are you sure? As you said, it was a long time ago.’

‘She had the same name as my cousins. I remember having the horrible thought that she was a relative or something, though I’d never seen her before.’

‘I don’t suppose you know what happened to her?’

He shrugged. ‘No idea. Went back to where she came from, I s’pose. Probably back up here. There’s lots that went down there as ‘ad worked up here, you know, over time.’

Esme noted the name Mary Griffin in her book and dropped it back in her bag. Wasn’t that so-called friend who’d recently visited Mrs Roberts called Mary? She’d have to check. It might just be a coincidence. Mary wasn’t an unusual name. ‘Well, thank you, Albert. You’ve been very helpful.’

Albert acknowledged her gratitude with a nod and turned his attention back to his plants. ‘You with the other bloke?’ he asked nonchalantly, facing away from Esme now.

‘Do you mean the journalist who did the piece in the paper?’ asked Esme to his back.

‘Nah, not him. He only wanted to know what the old place was like before it burned down. No, him as was trying to find the little ’un.’

Esme frowned. ‘You mean Catherine? When was this?’

Albert stood up and stared out into the garden. ‘Now let me see. Got to be a fair few months back now.’ He shook his head. ‘Can’t remember now. Never mind.’ He went back to the bench and began scooping compost into the next pot. ‘Well, now, if you don’t mind, I’d better be getting on.’

‘Yes, of course,’ said Esme, her thoughts galloping. She turned to go, then paused. ‘This person? Did he say who he was?’

‘Some sort of investigator. Private. Like on the tele.’

‘And he was definitely trying to find the daughter, Catherine?’

‘That’s what he said.’

For some reason the idea that someone else was asking questions made Esme nervous. Should she read anything into it? Did it have any bearing on Polly’s anxious state of mind? And who was it who was looking? And why?

Esme decided she needed to find out more about Catherine Monkleigh.

Albert cleared his throat and Esme realised where she was.

‘Sorry, Albert. I was thinking through what you said. I’ll leave you in peace.’

‘You’ll make sure you close the door when you go, won’t you?’ he called after her.

14

Esme found Catherine M. Monkleigh’s birth listed in the first quarter of the year 1939. That would mean her birth was registered between January and March of that year, which matched Albert’s assumption that she was only a few months old when she left. She noted the reference so that she could make the necessary arrangements to receive a copy of her birth certificate by post. The certificate itself would give her the exact birth date, where Catherine was born and her parents’ details. Whether that would give her another lead, though, remained to be seen. She lived in hope.

The records office was humming this morning. If the rain had kept them away last time it was having the opposite effect today. There was a musty scent of damp clothes in the reception area as people arrived and shook themselves to dispel the rain from their coats.

Esme went to find Lucy at the desk. She was giving a brief explanation of the layout of the office to a middle-aged woman with a fraught expression, clutching a notebook and copy of
Practical Family History
. She declared her bewilderment as to where to start. Esme sympathised. There had seemed to be so much to grasp when she set out on her own family history trail. The terminology was like a foreign language and it had taken her some while to wrap her head round everything, before feeling able to make the first step. It was a slow, if enthralling, learning curve and what you did learn was invariably dependent on which direction your research took you. If you discovered that your great-great-grandfather was convicted for assault, then you became an expert in scouring sources on criminality and the justice system. If one of your ancestors left a will, probate records became familiar territory. And the more you grasped, the more you realised how much more there was to learn. No wonder that for some it became a lifetime’s work.

Lucy directed the newcomer to her colleague across the room and the woman set off with a look of excited anticipation.

‘Did you find it?’ asked Lucy, seeing Esme waiting.

‘Yes.’ She tapped her notebook. ‘I’ve got all the details. I’ll order it priority service so I should get it the day after tomorrow. I didn’t find a record of her death, so with luck she’s still with us.’

‘I’ve got the maps out again for you,’ said Lucy. ‘What do you have in mind?’

Esme shrugged. ‘I don’t know till I see it. I hope looking a second time will stir something which I can’t quite grasp at the moment.’

‘I tracked down a copy of the sales particulars as well, from when the botanical trust bought the estate. I thought you might like a look.’

Esme went through to the search room. There was something about this cottage which she’d missed, though she couldn’t think what. After all, it was a cottage on the estate of an employer, which had been bequeathed to an employee. There was nothing inherently wrong in that. Unusual maybe, but dubious?

The date when it had been legally removed from the estate might give a clue as to why Polly had been left the cottage. If it happened around the time that Daisy was born it might indicate a link with Sir Charles but as she didn’t yet have a specific date for Daisy’s birth, she couldn’t yet confirm that as a possibility.

Lucy appeared with the maps and the other documents and laid them down on the table.

‘Good luck,’ she said with a wink. ‘Let me know how you get on.’

Esme stared at the yellowing map roll and wondered whether any other properties had been sold off in the past. Or perhaps Keeper’s Cottage hadn’t been left to Polly at all? Maybe that was only rumour and speculation. Maybe Polly had simply bought the cottage at some point. She picked up the sales particulars. Perhaps they would clarify matters.

She sat down on a nearby chair and read them through, glancing now and again at the estate map in front of her. As far as she could make out with a quick calculation of the number of properties across the immediate area surrounding the house site, the estate was sold intact, apart from that one item, Keeper’s Cottage.

She checked the date on the sales document advertising the auction. It was more than a year since the sale and the estate had been sold off after Sir Charles’s death. Had anyone wondered about the estate being complete except for one cottage? Probably not. It had been broken up into several lots, though the Trust had eventually bought all of them.

She wondered how long the estate had been in the family, and whether there was anyone left who had cared that it had been sold off. If the main house hadn’t been occupied since 1942 when it burnt down, maybe there was no emotional link with it any more. Esme thought of Albert who had been at Markham Hall at the start of his career and moved down south later. He implied that many staff members came from what he might have termed ‘the old place’. Many might have returned to Shropshire on retirement, just as he had. Strong emotional ties with the house and estate might have continued for various reasons, such as the same family being on the staff for several generations.

Esme’s mind drifted on to Catherine and the fact that someone was looking for her. Was that because she was a beneficiary to Sir Charles’s estate and was being sought by his solicitor? It was a bit late in the day, though. Unless they had been looking all this time since his death and so far had drawn a blank.

Esme considered. Was there someone who would have been directly affected by the reappearance of Catherine, after a considerable period of time? Someone who hadn’t even been aware of her existence? A new wife, perhaps? Esme discounted that. Surely Albert would have mentioned it if Sir Charles had remarried. But then again, why should he? Esme had been intrigued by the story of his absconding wife and daughter. She hadn’t asked about Sir Charles and what happened to him after his wife and daughter had left. If there was a divorce, or Catherine’s mother had died, he would have been free to marry. Perhaps the new lady of the house was unaware that he’d had a daughter, though that seemed unlikely. There it was in
Who’s Who
for one thing, so it would be public knowledge.

Though it might be that she had been aware of Catherine’s existence but then was suddenly confronted with her in the flesh. Or perhaps Sir Charles was. His long-lost daughter arrives home but he decides to keep it from his new wife. Albert had said that to his knowledge Catherine had never again made contact with the family but that may not have been the case. The fact that Albert didn’t know didn’t mean it hadn’t happened.

Esme sighed. This wasn’t getting her anywhere because she as yet had no facts to back anything up. She stood up and went over to the desk. Lucy’s colleague said she was busy elsewhere sorting through documents. Esme hoped they were of the Monkleigh estate. She needed something else to go on in order to make progress.

She left a note for Lucy asking if she knew when exactly Sir Charles had died and whether there had been an obituary in the local press. Something there might give them a lead. She left it at the desk and went to her locker to find her coat.

She’d already spent far too much time in the records office that morning and she had other pressing obligations to attend to, though one less than she might have had. The Shropton Canal client had dispensed with her services when she was only half-way through the brief. He hadn’t given any reason.

As she dragged her bag out of the locker she heard the jangle of the keys to Keeper’s Cottage. She’d promised to drop them off at Polly’s solicitors now that she’d completed the packing. She’d been walking round with them for days. She’d better hand them in before they came chasing her.

She pulled up her hood and hurried out of the building and up the street, aware that something was brewing in her head about Catherine and whether or not she’d ever re-established contact with her father before he died. It would come to her eventually. She just needed to give it the time.

*

Esme hurried along the street debating whether to brave the queue in the post office first or call at the solicitor’s to drop off the keys. The rain hadn’t eased and the pavements were doubly hazardous as people struggled along with reduced vision from hoods and umbrellas.

At one point Esme thought she spied Gemma through the window of Waterstones but when she pushed open the door she realised it wasn’t Gemma after all. She was disappointed not to have the opportunity to sort things out between them. Gemma had left a message on Esme’s answering machine to ask whether Esme had sent some flowers to Elizabeth. The question seemed contrived and Esme wondered whether it was Gemma’s attempt to make amends between them. But when Esme returned the call Gemma had not been at home and Esme could only leave her own message, confirming that she hadn’t sent flowers. Why would she, when Elizabeth wasn’t in a state to appreciate them? She asked Gemma to ring again sometime soon.

A quick glance at the snake of people in the post office indicated a long wait, so Esme headed for Smith, Evans & Dart, Solicitors, instead.

There was a young mother with two noisy children in reception. The mother was trying to conduct a conversation with the receptionist above the din of the older child, a boy of about three, entertaining his younger sister by pretending to be a particularly loud vehicle driving round and round her pushchair. She was giggling with uncontained delight. The receptionist was battling away bravely with the conversation, throwing the occasional agitated glance in the direction of the children. At least they weren’t whingeing, thought Esme, even if it wasn’t the right place and time for such a boisterous game. The mother was evidently oblivious to the noise, having perfected the ability to blot it out. By the time the exchange was complete the receptionist looked exhausted.

The party left and calm descended. Esme approached the desk and held out the keys, explaining what they were.

‘Ah, yes. It’s Mrs Quentin, isn’t it?’ Esme confirmed that it was and moved to leave.

‘Could you hang on one moment? I’ll just let Mr Evans know.’ The receptionist picked up the telephone.

Esme turned and gazed out into the street. The rain was coming down more heavily, now. People on the pavement were moving more quickly, flashing past the glazed door, heads down, shoulders hunched.

The receptionist coughed and Esme turned back to her.

‘Mr Evans would like a quick word, if you have a moment?’ she said, smiling.

‘Yes, I suppose so.’ Esme couldn’t imagine why he would want to see her but she was happy to keep out of the wet for a while longer.

The receptionist gestured over to a waiting area to her left. ‘If you’d like to take a seat.’

Esme sat down and appraised the décor. The room was long and narrow with the receptionist’s desk tucked into one corner, immediately opposite the entrance. The seating area for waiting clients ran along one wall, facing away from the entrance. It felt like a railway station platform which had been recently carpeted, and the track filled in. Esme imagined the 10.54 to Crewe bursting through the wall, sweeping away everything in its path.

After a few minutes a young woman in a smart black suit emerged from a door at the end of the room and led Esme out of the reception area, through a side door and up a staircase to the first floor. She showed her into a large room with a huge bay window looking on to the street below.

A tall, grey-haired man behind a large desk stood up and held out his hand.

‘Mrs Quentin, thank you for waiting. My name is Evans.’

‘Hello, pleased to meet you.’ She shook his hand and returned his smile.

He indicated a chair and they both sat down. He was an elderly man, clearly near retirement age, if he hadn’t already passed it. But he seemed bright and cheerful and evidently not one to lay down his pen just because the calendar signified a particular birth-date.

‘I am greatly indebted to you for acting in place of your sister while she’s in hospital.’

Esme shook her head. ‘Not at all. Elizabeth had all but finished, so there wasn’t much left to do.’

He leant his elbows on the desk and brought his fingertips together. He looked at Esme over the top of them. ‘I was very perturbed to hear about your sister’s unfortunate predicament.’

‘Thank you. Hopefully things will improve soon.’

He nodded slowly. ‘Indeed. Indeed.’

He seemed to be mulling something over in his mind.

‘I’ve left the keys with your receptionist,’ said Esme, hoping it would prompt him to explain his wishing to see her.

‘Ah, yes. I was going to ask you about that.’ He sat back in his chair.

Esme was puzzled. ‘I understood you needed them to arrange for the house clearance.’

‘Yes, you are quite right. That was the original plan.’

‘Has something changed?’

‘I’m in a difficult position here, Mrs Quentin, and as you are Mrs Roberts’s representative, so to speak, I feel I ought to ask your advice.’

Esme was taken aback. Wasn’t it usually the other way around?

‘Of course, if I can –’

‘I really don’t know what to make of it,’ began Mr Evans, palms pressed together as if in prayer. For a moment he looked almost distressed.

He searched through a pile of papers on his desk. ‘A letter arrived this morning from Mrs Roberts. Ah, here it is.’ He studied it carefully and then looked at Esme over the top of his glasses. ‘She wishes to dispense with my services, she says.’ He laid down the letter and sat back in his chair. ‘Well, of course she has that right. I was engaged by her daughter. She may wish to make her own arrangements.’

Esme struggled to grasp the implications of what he was saying. ‘Yes, I suppose…’

Mr Evans laid his hands on the desk. ‘Perhaps I should explain. Miss Roberts was most concerned that the necessary procedures were in place to ensure that Mrs Roberts was adequately provided for after Miss Roberts’s death. The cottage would be sold and the proceeds secured to ensure her long-term care. I was led to understand that all this had been agreed between them. Your sister certainly never gave me the impression that Mrs Roberts would have any reason to dispute the arrangements.’

‘And the letter clearly suggests otherwise.’