Farm Fatale (14 page)

    Samantha beamed at Sir Hadley and Lady St. Felix. "Catherine," she declared in ringing tones, "I think we have a deal."

***

Emerging from the hospital a fortnight later, Guy knew that he was incredibly lucky to have survived a serious heart attack almost unscathed. Except for overwhelming exhaustion (which the doctors claimed would lessen eventually), the only legacy of what had happened was the occasional struggle to find the right word. Yet words had often failed him when he had been perfectly fit, especially where Samantha was concerned. Rarely had they failed him so utterly as when he was taken from the hospital by Samantha and bundled into the Jaguar to find that life as he had known it had come to an abrupt end.

    Discovering that he was jobless was bad enough (although Hufflestein was apparently working on something). But the news that, thanks to Samantha's having sold the house in Roland Gardens to some film star, he was homeless in the bargain had added insult to injury. The final straw was discovering, halfway up the motorway, that she had moved them to some creepy old village in the middle of nowhere. Not just any creepy old village, either, but one called, risibly, Eight Mile Bottom.

    As for the house itself, The Bottoms, words failed Guy again. Apart, that was, from the single syllable
why?
Or, more to the point, why
not
some nice old Lutyens-designed pile, why
not
some comfortable twenties' bungalow? Somewhere the decorating had actually been
done.

    Samantha, he discovered, was obsessed with slapping Designers Guild wallpaper up everywhere—not personally, naturally, but through the offices of an entire army of decorators and designers. Was he to spend the rest of his life walking into stepladders, tripping over dust sheets, and encountering wild-eyed young men rushing about with fabric swatches?

    There were magazines everywhere he sat down. Copies of
Perfect
Gazebo
,
Estate Beautiful
, and the blasted
Insider
magazine that had caused all the trouble in the first place lay open at worrying advertisements displaying kitchens with chandeliers and Palladian friezes, stained glass–surrounded showers with candle brackets, and bathrooms featuring free-standing rolltop tubs festooned with fleurs-de-lis. Amid the swags, stuffing, gilding, and carving, one thing alone was plain. Samantha's refurbishment was designed to do to The Bottoms the absolute converse of everything Basia Briggs had inflicted on Roland Gardens. Where she had been minimal, Samantha would be maximal. No inch of wall, no centimeter of sofa would go undecorated, uncushioned, unstuffed, or, preferably, all three. All that the two projects had in common was the cost. Renovating The Bottoms would, Guy recognized, be eye-wateringly, ball-squeezingly,
agonizingly
expensive.

    After arriving at The Bottoms, Guy elected to spend most of each day in bed. His doctors had advised this, but it was also handy to avoid the battle zone downstairs. Even the soft drone of the radio, however, could not quite drown out the fact that Samantha had rowed over the refurbishment with three different designers during the last two days alone. One had actually been fired yesterday for refusing point-blank to install halogen downlighters in the vast and ancient central beam of the dining-room ceiling. Lying with both pillows pressed to his head, Guy had still been able to hear the finer points of the discussion.

    "But, Miss Villiers, you
can't
just slap modern conveniences up everywhere. Things have to be carefully restored and concealed. This is a historic house. It was in the St. Felix family for five or six hundred years, after all."

    "Yes, and it
looks
it," snapped Samantha, gesturing at the plain walls, stone fireplaces, and Jacobean plaster ceilings with contempt. "The place is hopelessly out of date. Look at the painting on that wall over there. It's practically peeling off. The sooner it gets a coat of Umbrian Sun, the better."

    The designer swayed backward on his heels before stalking off over the stone-flagged floor.

    Such dramas notwithstanding, the days dragged interminably. Today was his second Saturday entombed in the country. Sitting now in the oppressive silence of the garden, Guy felt heavy with boredom. Without the unending hum of London traffic, it was as if the plug connecting him to some vital life force had been yanked out. Samantha, sitting opposite, was loudly professing to be loving the peace. She'd even gotten twitchy a couple of times when a bird sang at too emphatic a volume.

    "Isn't it just fabulous?" Samantha exulted. "Sitting here on the lawn before lunch, reading the papers?" Noticing that she was flicking eagerly through the
Financial Times
magazine
How
to Spend It, Guy's convalescent
heart sank. Surely she needed no further tips on that.

    He took an unenthusiastic sip of Evian. Despite the perfect early-spring day, his sap was far from rising. The precautions he had taken to sit far enough away from Samantha to render her inaudible had been thwarted; she had merely decided to indulge in a virtuoso display of thespian voice-throwing.

    "Isn't The Bottoms just to
die for
?" she bellowed.

    Guy did not reply. He almost had, after all.

    "That sodding postman!" Samantha jerked her head up at a sudden screech of tires on The Bottoms' gravel drive.

    Guy glanced up wearily as the postman, eyes rolling, came grinning over the lawn toward them.

    "Not much this morning," he reported to Samantha. "A bank statement—my goodness, you've been spending, haven't you—and some telly producer saying he's returning your contract unsigned and that he's never worked with anyone so unprofessional—"

    "Give me that." Samantha snatched the letters out of his hands. "How dare you? This correspondence is private. I'll report you to the post office."

    Duffy shrugged. "Well, the letters were half open, Miss Villiers…"

    "Mrs. Grabster," corrected Samantha irritably. "I use my married name in the country. For reasons of privacy, you understand." She narrowed her eyes at the postman.

    "So I had to take them out to get them back in properly, if you see what I mean," Duffy continued, not batting an eyelid.

    Samantha examined the envelopes. They showed every sign of having been securely sealed previously.

    "Some people like me to read their letters for them anyway," the postman elaborated. "The old ladies especially. Easier than them scrabbling all morning to find their magnifying glasses and then spending all afternoon trying to understand somebody's handwriting."

    Talk of infirm old ladies sent Samantha's thoughts flying to the president of the Eight Mile Bottom Amateur Dramatic Society, the eccentric-sounding Dame Nancy, whom she planned to visit that very afternoon. As luck—and the phone book—had it, the leader she planned to oust lived in the very next house on the High Street, a residence with the decidedly bizarre name of Illyria. Samantha allowed a small smile to curve her lips. As coups went, it should be bloodless. Ancient, senile, and very possibly incontinent in the bargain, she was almost certainly one of the postman's old ladies.

    "Consuela's rushing across the lawn," Guy remarked in a bored drawl before Samantha could have her suspicion confirmed. "She looks very flustered."

    The postman immediately dropped his bag on the grass and began to rummage through it. "Just checking there's nothing else," he muttered.

    "I still can't
believe
you managed to persuade Consuela to come to The Bottoms," Guy said as the Filipina neared them. "You were absolutely ghastly to her in London. Paid her peanuts, made her slave all hours. Why on
earth
should she want to work for you again?"

    The postman's search became more frantic. He had tipped practically the entire contents of his bag on the lawn and was listening intently.

    "I don't know what you mean," Samantha gave Guy an innocent, blinking stare. "How was I ghastly to Consuela? I always let her put whatever she wanted on the CD player when she was cleaning."

    Yet Samantha was unable to suppress a smile. For the way she had lured Consuela had been a triumph, even though she said it herself. Samantha had known the cash-strapped maid would be unable to resist the bait of a free holiday at The Bottoms; known, too, that she would find it impossible to go back. Indeed, the Filipina had found staying was the only option once her former mistress had pointed out to her that, her illegal immigrant status being what it was, she would feel duty bound to report her to the authorities should Consuela return to London.

    "Madam. Madam."

    "What is it, Consuela? Burned the souffle again, have we?" It had, Guy recalled, been over a year since the incident occurred. But Samantha had never allowed her to forget it.

    "No, madam. Ees the Lady Avon. He is in the hall stairs. For seeing you, madam."

    Forgetting even to be irritated at Consuela's uncertain grasp of English, Samantha shot a triumphant glance at the gawking postman. Suddenly, she was gratified to have an audience. Her first visit from a local aristocrat was something she was proud—nay, needed—to have made public. "The Lady Avon?" she repeated, caressing the precious syllables with her tongue. "Her ladyship is in the hall stairs? In the hall, I mean?"

    Consuela nodded. "He says ees not a rush."

    "Why the hell didn't you tell me before?" But Samantha was ranting for form's sake, too jubilant to be really angry. "Surely she telephoned to make an appointment?"

    Consuela shook her head vigorously. "No, madam. Ees only just arrived, madam. Weeth suitcase."

    "With
suitcase
?" Samantha's head whirled. Was this what happened once you moved into a manor house? Did all manner of aristocracy suddenly descend on you without warning? After all, she thought with mounting excitement, the titled spent weekends in one another's country piles, didn't they? This was her chance to join the musical Chippendale chairs. "Her ladyship must have come to stay," she declared, thrilled.

    "Stay?" echoed Guy in dismay. "But where the hell will she sleep? The place is a building site."

    "In
our bedroom
, of course," snapped Samantha. Guy's face plummeted. "Get it ready, will you, Consuela? Make sure the wastepaper bin is empty and lined with a clear plastic bag. Oh, and polish the bath. There mustn't be a single drop of water in it." She recalled reading something to this effect about the state bedrooms at Blenheim. "Oh, and put some notepaper out on the dressing table.
Writing
paper, I mean."

    "What the hell for?" asked Guy.

    "Letters," muttered the postman, his eyes bulging with hope.

    Samantha rose to her feet and dusted down the front of her suit. Thank goodness she looked smart. In Dame Nancy's honor, she'd opted for the white waffle Dior this morning.

    "Coming, darling? To meet her ladyship?"

    Still pawing through his bag, the postman looked up expectantly. "
Coming?"she repeated,
directing the question forcefully at Guy.

    Guy shook his head and watched as Samantha trotted proudly across the lawn and through the French windows. Picking up his bag at last, the postman eagerly followed.

With the cottage now the property of Rosie and Mark, "Green-er Pastures" had finally been unleashed on the Sunday-paper reading public. Much to Rosie's annoyance, the first column had included the vetoed pig incident.

    "Come on, Rosie, the editor loved it," Mark assured her. "Said it was just the sort of color he was after. And you have to admit, you were a pretty amazing color after you fell over in all that shit."

    Shit was right, thought Rosie, glaring at him. "And another thing. Do you have to call me Significant Other? Couldn't I just be Rosie?"

    "There you are," said Mark triumphantly. "One minute you don't want to be in the column at all, and the next you're demanding a name check. Make your mind up, will you?"

    As he ruffled her hair and kissed her, Rosie, despite herself, melted. She was an idiot to do so, she knew, but life was too short for sulking and, anyway, Mark was irresistible when he was being charming. Besides, there was so much to be happy about at the moment. The owners of Number 2 Cinder Lane, a pair of hesitant teachers, had been positively eager to complete the sale as soon as possible, the reason being new jobs in another county and some relative willing to put them up indefinitely while they searched for a suitable property. Another enormous stroke of luck was both the building society and the estate agents moving with amazing speed to secure the deal. Rosie and Mark moved with even more amazing speed out of Craster Road.

    They had almost no furniture of their own. A beanbag chair, a couple of folding chairs, a portable TV, and some sleeping bags comprised the extent of their possessions. Even so, it was amazing how much room they took up. There was almost no space for clothes—much to her embarrassment, Rosie's underwear had been stuffed unceremoniously against the back window, her collection of graying bras and holey knickers providing entertainment for all passing traffic.

    As they arrived at Cinder Lane, Rosie glanced up at the clock tower. The dull gold hands were about to move into the two o'clock position; as she watched, the hammer hit the bell. "One. Two. Three," counted Rosie. "Four."