‘Fuck!’ she shivered, hopping from foot to foot and rubbing soap under her arms at lightning speed. Turning around, she let the icy jets pound down on her face before turning the water off and jumping into the nearest towel.
At least I’m awake
, she thought, rubbing herself dry and feeling a surge of physical energy as her tingling limbs began to defrost. She needed something to get the adrenaline flowing. As usual, there was a mountain of work to do today.
It was May now – she and Abel had been here six weeks already – and though the weather remained cold, spring had belatedly sprung, carpeting the valley in a cheerful burst of yellow primroses and daffodils. After the daily bleakness of Oradea, it was wonderful to be able to open her window every morning and smell crisp, clean, country air, and see greenery everywhere. The sadness over Michel never left her, but she tried to take comfort in the small pleasures of life at Loxley: decent tea, bacon, McVitie’s biscuits, apples that didn’t taste like they’d been made out of wool. It helped that Abel had taken to English country life like a duck to water, running around Loxley’s grounds building forts and camps, skipping off to school in the village every morning with a grin so wide you might have thought he was heading to Disneyland. Which, compared to the life he was used to back home, in a way he was.
Yesterday, he’d announced to Tish matter-of-factly, ‘Actually, I’m going to stay here forever.’
They were up at Loxley’s Home Farm, a handsome, L-shaped house with stables and outbuildings just over the top of the fell. Bill Connelly, the gruff old Loxley-lifer who had managed the farm for almost forty years, had agreed to let Abel help him feed some of the new lambs, in anticipation of which treat the little boy had worked himself up into such a frenzy of excitement he’d refused to eat either breakfast or lunch.
‘Mr Connelly says I’m a excellent farmer
and
a excellent helper.’
‘Well, Mr Connelly would know,’ said Tish.
‘He says I can stay as long as I like.’
Tish would have to have words with Bill. He meant well, of course, and hopefully Loxley would always be a part of Abel’s life. But they also had a life back in Romania. They’d have to go back eventually. There were other matters she needed to broach with Bill too. Like most small Derbyshire farms, Home Farm was losing money. But only in the last week had Tish discovered just how much it had been costing Loxley to keep the land going, and for how long. They were a mixed farm, which meant they had both arable and livestock, but because of their position and exposure to the elements, as well as the fragmented nature of the land (the entire estate was punctuated with pockets of ancient woodland, so none of the fields was of a decent commercial size), they had suffered more than other local concerns.
The Connelly family had been tenants at Home Farm since before Tish was born. There could be no question of abandoning the farm, or of asking them to move on. But with the maintenance and running costs of Loxley Hall itself easily topping eight hundred thousand a year, not including big-ticket items like roof repairs or fixing the internal damage wreaked by Jago’s friends, it was hard to see just
how
they were going to support a failing farm as well. Tish’s father, Henry, had already remortgaged all of the smaller properties on the estate during his lifetime, including Home Farm. Short of the not-to-be-considered sale, this left Tish precious little wiggle room. At the very least she needed to sit down with Bill Connelly and go through the numbers.
Three weeks ago, Tish had asked George Arkell, a financial advisor and family friend, to come up to Loxley and to help her devise a plan for getting the estate back on an even keel. George’s prognosis was less than heartening.
‘Do you want the good news or the bad news?’ he asked her.
‘Good news,’ said Tish.
‘The good news is, the National Trust will probably contribute to repairs in the public wings of the house. That could end up reducing your projected deficit for the year by as much as thirty-five per cent.’
Tish brightened. ‘That is good news! So how much money is that, then?’
‘Around half a million pounds.’
‘George! That’s wonderful!’
‘Yeeess,’ said George. ‘Except that it leads us on to the bad news.’
‘Which is?’
‘You still need to find approximately nine hundred and sixty thousand pounds just to cover your current costs, interest payments on the loans, that sort of thing.’
‘Oh.’
‘Yes. Oh. And your projected income for the year, from visitors, farming and other revenue combined is …’ He paused, flipping through the notes on his lap ‘… ah, here we are. Eighty-five thousand, one hundred and twenty-eight pounds and sixty-two pence. Before tax.’
Tish looked suitably crestfallen.
‘You have to raise some capital,’ George told her firmly. ‘That means you must sell some land, property, paintings, or most likely a combination of all three. Once you’ve done that, we can work on consolidating your various debts. Then, with any luck, we find some reliable tenants to pay
market rates
for all of the remaining properties.’
‘I can’t evict the Connellys,’ Tish protested.
George ploughed on. ‘And finally, we come up with some sort of long-term strategy for the future. Something that will turn Loxley into a going concern that pays for itself.’
‘Such as?’
‘It could be tourism-based, holiday lets or what have you; it could be organic farming, conferences, shooting parties. Dirt bikes. I don’t know.’
‘
Dirt bikes?
’ said Tish. ‘Are you mad? In our peaceful little valley? The village would be up in arms, and quite rightly too.’
‘I understand,’ said George, who did. His own family had lost their ancestral pile fifteen years ago, casualties of the collapse of Lloyd’s of London. He knew how heartbreaking it was to be the generation who broke the chain of trust, who lost it all after hundreds of years of careful estate management. Times were changing, though. All over England, estates far grander and wealthier than Loxley were going under. ‘But I’m afraid if you don’t find large amounts of ready cash in the coming months, and come up with a radical rethink about the estate’s future, you’re going to have to sell up. You know, the National Trust are cash-rich at the moment. They’d take excellent care of the place.’
‘No,’ Tish shuddered. ‘Never. Loxley stays in private hands. In Crewe family hands, if I have anything to do with it. My God, if Daddy could hear this conversation he’d be spinning.’
‘Actually,’ said George, ‘I suspect none of this would have surprised your father in the least. Henry knew which way the cookie was crumbling. That’s why he mortgaged everything to the hilt and changed his will to cut out Jago. But he should have warned you how tough it would be.’
Tish couldn’t bring herself to blame her father. He’d done his best. Day after day she sat slumped over his papers, praying for inspiration to strike, for some solution to present itself that did not involve turfing out her tenants or – horror of horrors – selling her soul to the National bloody Trust.
There must be a way to make Loxley profitable. There just must be.
Once she was dry, she pulled on the same jeans and holey red sweater she’d been wearing for the past three days, and made her way down to the kitchen. With its constantly lit log-burning stove, it was by far the warmest room in the house. As such it had become the nerve centre of Operation Find A Miracle, as Tish now called her efforts to revive Loxley’s finances, taking over from Henry’s cold, draughty office, at least until the weather warmed up.
‘You look terrible,’ said Mrs Drummond with motherly concern when Tish walked in. ‘You’re no good to anyone if you don’t sleep, you know. Or eat. Let me cook you a proper breakfast.’
Tish sighed, but did not protest. Mrs D’s idea of a ‘proper’ breakfast was a fried calorie bomb so fat-drenched it could probably fatally block one’s arteries just by looking at it. But feeding people up was Mrs D’s vocation, and it applied as much to Tish as to Abel, who must have gained half his bodyweight since he came to Loxley, but whom Mrs Drummond still invariably referred to as ‘that poor little mite’ or, sometimes, ‘skin and bone’.
‘Not still pining over that Michael, are you?’ Mrs Drummond asked, cracking three eggs into a sizzling pan full of butter.
‘No,’ lied Tish.
‘Good. Because you know what I always say about the Frogs.’
‘Yes, Mrs D. I know.’
How Tish wished she had never confided in Mrs Drummond about Michel. After a few too many glasses of red one night, it had seemed like a good idea to open her heart. But ever since then she’d been subjected to daily lectures on how one could ‘never trust a Frenchman’ because they were ‘all cowards’. The xenophobia was entirely well meant, but Tish found it draining.
‘Oh, no fried bread for me please,’ she protested. ‘It gives me dreadful indigestion.’
‘Nonsense, lovie. You’re just eating it too quickly,’ said Mrs D, cheerfully dropping two battered slices of Hovis into the heart-attack pan. ‘I’m going into Castleton later. Do you need anything?’
‘No thanks,’ said Tish. This was good news, though. She had a string of begging phone calls to make this morning to Loxley’s various creditors, and was relieved Mrs D had errands to run. These things were even harder with an audience.
Just as Mrs D plopped Tish’s mountainous breakfast down in front of her, the doorbell rang. Both women looked surprised.
‘Are we expecting anyone?’ Mrs Drummond sounded faintly accusing, as if Tish were still a teenager and had invited friends over without asking.
‘Not that I know of,’ said Tish, getting up. ‘It’s probably just a delivery.’
‘Ah ah ah!’ Mrs D held up an admonishing finger. ‘You sit right there and eat, madam. I’ll get the door. Running yourself ragged,’ she muttered, shuffling out into the hallway. ‘It’s no wonder you look like you’re half dead.’
Tish had taken only two bites of fried egg before she heard the raised voices. One was unmistakably Mrs D’s, shrill and strident, the way she always sounded when she was rattled. The other was also a woman’s voice, but younger, and conciliatory despite the volume. From her nasal tone, it sounded to Tish as if she might be American.
Tish moved to the door so she could hear what they were saying.
‘If I could just speak to the owner,’ the American girl pleaded. ‘I’d only need a few minutes of his time.’
‘I’ve told you.’ Mrs Drummond was practically shouting. ‘The owner is busy. And even if she weren’t she would
not
be interested.’
‘She? Oh, I’m sorry. I understood the house belonged to a Mr Jago Crewe.’
‘Good day,’ said Mrs Drummond briskly. Tish heard the front door slam. A moment later, Mrs D reappeared in the kitchen looking flustered.
‘What on earth was all that about?’ asked Tish.
‘Oh, nothing. Some dreadful American woman.’ Mrs Drummond shook her head in disgust. ‘Very pushy. She’s gone now.’
‘Well, what did she want?’
‘Want? I’ll tell you what she wanted. She wanted to buy the manor! Can you imagine the cheek of it? She kept saying Loxley was “perfect” and she had to have it. As if it were a scarf she’d seen in a shop window! I told her the house wasn’t for sale, and that she was trespassing, but she wouldn’t take no for an answer, cheeky little thing. Kept asking to talk to … oh my good gracious!’
Tish followed Mrs Drummond’s gaze to the kitchen window. A dark-haired girl had her face pressed to the glass. She was smiling and waving, apparently trying to get Tish’s attention.
‘There she is again.’ Picking up a broom, Mrs Drummond waved it at the window as if she were trying to scare away a bat. ‘Shoo! Get out!’
Tish giggled. She’d had precious few laughs recently, but this was like a scene from a
Carry On
film. ‘I think I should go and talk to her.’
‘Talk to her? Don’t be silly, Letitia. The woman’s plainly a lunatic.’
Watching Mrs Drummond jabbing her broom at the window, Tish thought it debatable who was the lunatic. Unbolting the scullery door, she walked out into the kitchen garden.
‘Can I help you?’
The girl stepped away from the window. She was extremely pretty, Tish noticed, with a mane of glossy, dark hair that shone like a Herbal Essences advertisement. She was also woefully underdressed for the Derbyshire spring weather, in a thin white cotton blouse, fringed suede miniskirt and bare legs. She looked like an extremely lost Pocahontas.
‘Are you the owner?’ she asked, extending an elegant, French-manicured hand.
‘Sort of,’ said Tish. ‘Not exactly. It’s a bit complicated. I’m Letitia Crewe.’
‘Rainbow,’ said the girl, shaking hands warmly.
‘That’s your
name
?’ said Tish, realizing too late how rude it sounded. Luckily, the girl didn’t seem to mind.
‘I know,’ she grinned. ‘What can I say? My parents were Californian hippies. Still are. I actually have a sister called Sunshine, believe it or not.’
Not sure how she was supposed to react to this piece of information, Tish said nothing.
‘Look, do you mind if I come in?’ said Rainbow, breaking the silence. ‘I’ve got a business proposal I’d like to make you and it is
super
-cold out here.’
Five minutes later, having convinced a deeply suspicious Mrs Drummond to go into Castleton and leave the two of them alone, Tish made a pot of Lapsang tea and sat down with Rainbow at the kitchen table.
‘So, what’s this all about?’
‘Simple,’ said Rainbow. ‘I want your house.’
‘Oh.’ Tish looked disappointed. ‘I’m sorry but, as I think my housekeeper explained, Loxley isn’t for sale. It’s been in my family for centuries.’
‘Oh, I know
that
,’ said Rainbow, taking a sip of her tea and almost gagging. It tasted like burned rubber. ‘I don’t want to buy it. I want to borrow it.’
Tish brightened. ‘Lease it, you mean?’ Though she hadn’t intended on doing it so soon, it was certainly part of her plan to find a reliable, paying tenant for Loxley eventually. Admittedly, she hadn’t pictured this person as a squaw-like twenty-something American hippy named Rainbow, but that was no reason to look a gift horse in the mouth.