“I want to buy Tremarth. I’ll give you any price you care to ask for it. You may or may not know that I’m not a poor man, and money as such means little to me. Just name your price, and you can have it. Of course I’d like to have the furniture, too – or most of it!
– and your price must cover that. It might be better if you get someone to value it for you, although my firm, which deals in priceless antiques and distributes them all over the world, can undertake that job for you. I give you my word they will be completely fair and there is no possible danger that your interests will be disregarded. They will, in fact, have instructions beforehand to be meticulously fair, and after that I can assure you I shall be over- generous rather than under. So how soon would it be convenient for me to send someone down?”
Charlotte was more fascinated by his flood of eloquence than by what he was saying. He had conducted his tour of the house in almost oppressive silence – apart from the one or two observations he had made and the remarks he had flung at Waterloo; but now, it seemed, he could not repeat himself too often, and it was his repetitions that finally secured Charlotte’s full and amazed attention.
She took Waterloo by the collar and shut him out on the terrace; then she said to Tremarth that he had better- return with her to the drawing-room. A little impatiently, for one who admired the place so much, he accompanied her.
Once inside the room Charlotte assembled her brightest wits and delivered what she personally considered a particularly final type of speech.
“I don’t know what gave you the idea that I might be willing to sell this house, Mr. Tremarth, but I do assure you I have no such intention of parting with it. At any rate not for the moment. A few months from now I may have come to some decision about the house, but for the present I’m well content to try living in it – despite the fact that they may be a little difficult.”
“It will certainly be extremely difficult.” His brows were bent and he was gazing at her as if he simply could not credit the evidence of his ears. “For one thing, it badly needs modernisation… and I don’t suppose you have any domestic staff available?”
“I believe there’s a daily woman who comes up from the village to open the windows and remove the surplus dust – that sort of thing.” She smiled at him as if she fully realised how inadequate that kind of assistance might turn out to be. “And a friend is coming to stay with me for a few weeks, so between us we shall manage. In fact, I’m looking forward to giving the place a magnificent spring-clean.”
She walked across to the piano and ran her finger across the ebony top of it. She held it up for his inspection.
“See? The daily woman isn’t all that good.” “Good?” His voice sounded explosive. “You could hardly expect a village woman to keep this place as it should be kept – ”
“I don’t.” She continued to smile at him, almost sweetly. “That’s why I’m looking forward to the arrival of Hannah Cootes. As a matter of fact, she’s on her way down from London at this very minute… I’m picking her up at the station this afternoon.”
“And you won’t sell?”’ His voice was hard and icy.
“I’ve told you, not at the moment. If you like to contact the local estate agent in, say, three months’ time, you might possibly discover that I’m open to offers.”
“I can make you my offer here and now. You’ll never get anyone else to be so generous!”
“Why not?” She leaned against the piano and. regarded him with a bright and curious gleam in her eyes. “After all, you may be rich
– and presumably because you’re rich you don’t want to do anything with the house, such as turn it into a hotel – but there are all sorts of people motivated solely by the eagerness to make money who might see in Tremarth a very valuable property. You must admit it would make a wonderful hotel or country club – ”
She was quite alarmed by the bleak ferocity of his expression.
“If you turn Tremarth into something of that sort, I – ” He drew a long breath. “I simply won’t allow it! ”
“You can’t prevent me, Mr. Tremarth,” she reminded him sweetly.
He took a few obviously agitated turns up and down the room, and then returned to her with his pocketbook in his hand. From it he removed an impeccable slip of pasteboard and placed it in front of her on the piano. She saw that it was beautifully engraved with his name and address in Grosvenor Square, London.
“I don’t think either you or your friend will find it very much fun housekeeping in a house with twenty bedrooms,” he observed in such a tight voice that she realised he was having difficulty controlling his temper. “At any rate, not after the first couple of weeks. So I’m leaving you my card in order that you can get in touch with me. I shall not get in touch with you again myself… but I feel fairly confident you will have a change of heart in a very short time from now – possibly within the next forty-eight hours! – and I have no doubt at all that I shall be hearing from you! It’s fortunate for you that I am a fairly patient man!”
It was not what Charlotte herself would have described him as, seeing the taut look about his mouth and the frustrated gleam in his eyes, but it was his impudent assumption at that moment that impressed her most, and because of the unmistakable red in her hair her temper rose.
“I think it is quite unlikely that you will be hearing from me, Mr. Tremarth,” she emphasised, “either within the next forty-eight hours or the next six months.”
He shrugged his shapely shoulders.
“I have warned you that I’m a patient man.” As if he had suddenly realised that his time was valuable and he was actually wasting some of it he turned away and headed for the drawing-room door. But before he reached it he remembered that he owed her something, and turned and delivered himself of some slightly acid thanks.
“It was good of you to show me over the house,” he pronounced stiffly. “I was not surprised to discover that it’s exactly as I remembered it – even to that coating of dust on the piano. I don’t think your Great-Aunt Jane was exactly well served by her domestics, but at least they were hardly a problem in her way.”
He strode out into the hall, and she followed him more slowly. Just before he disappeared into the blaze of sunshine on the terrace he cast his glance in her direction and wished her a formal good-bye.
She answered mechanically:
“Goodbye…” And then, with a dimple appearing at one comer of her mouth, she added, “Richard!”
Tremarth paused for a moment as if in surprise, and then continued on his way out to his car.
Charlotte drove into Truro that afternoon and met the London train, and the slight gloom that had held her since the morning evaporated when she caught her first glimpse of Hannah’s cheerful countenance.
Hannah Cootes had been her friend since her schooldays, and there was virtually no difference between them in age. But Hannah looked several years older, and she was one of those people who always struck everyone else as ‘sensible’. She had an outdoor complexion, short dark hair, and because of the closeness of her work she invariably wore glasses. She painted miniatures, and was already acclaimed as quite a competent artist. Charlotte, who always itched to take her in hand and dress her just a little bit more smartly, as well as set her hair for her and get her to experiment with one of the more reliable brands of cosmetics, felt her lips curving in amusement when she realised that Hannah had left London in the same old paint-stained corduroy slacks she used when she was working, and for luggage she had only a single suitcase.
Charlotte took it from her and assured her that she was delighted to see her.
Hannah apologised for the working clothes.
“But it was as much as I could do to catch the train, let alone furbish myself up a bit,” she admitted. Then, admiring, her eyes flickered over Charlotte. “But you look wonderful, as always! Why you ever bothered to start a typewriting bureau when you might have been modelling clothes I can’t think.”
Charlotte smiled at her.
“There are any number of girls who look good in clothes,” she assured her admiring friend, “but typing other people’s letters is one sure method of earning a living. However, my future plans are somewhat different now, and I may not return to typing letters. I shall probably sell out my share of the partnership and invest it in something else.”
“Oh!” Hannah’s eyes were bright and questioning as they walked towards Charlotte’s small parked car. “Such as what?” she enquired.
Charlotte glanced round at her almost impishly over her blue clad shoulder.
“Tremarth?” she suggested. “I had an idea this morning, and I may yet make it work!”
On the way back to Tremarth there was so much to talk about that Charlotte did not pursue for the time being whatever plan it was she had formed for the house that had once belonged to her great-aunt. And when they finally
