Martha nudged Frankie and the three sisters began to go downstairs. Juliet said nothing. She had a lurking feeling in the pit of her stomach that it could be very bad indeed.
‘Ah, there you all are, my dear girls, come in and sit down.’
Rousseau beamed at them and ushered them into his study. Sylvia was already there, perched on the edge of a chair that had been brought in from the dining room, looking worried. Will, the estate manager, was also present, standing awkwardly beside her father’s revolving leather desk chair. Juliet took a seat in her favourite elderly bucket chair, which had collapsed springs and cocooned you gently in its worn velvet arms. It facedboth the studio section of the room and the windows, so she could see straight down the sweeping lawns to the wood at the bottom that gave the house its name. Frankie and Martha took each end of the faded Chesterfield, both tucking their feet up underneath them. The study was a wonderful room which ran along half of the back of the large house and, despite its name, was actually part-office and part-library, with a full half of it used as Rousseau’s studio. A renowned sculptor, it was here that he created his pieces which ended up in museums, galleries and private collections around the world. Juliet saw now that he was working on a female figure, rising fluidly from a block of marble and miraculously taking on soft curves from the hard material.
‘Ah, Léo, there you are, good, now we can get started.’
Juliet reluctantly drew her eyes from the sculpture towards the door. What washedoing here? If it were possible, she thought, he looked even more pleased with himself than he had done earlier. He glanced over at her and gave her a smile and a small wave, but she slid her eyes away and over to her father, who was ready to speak.
‘Right, I’m sorry to bring everyone together in this Agatha Christie-like gathering, but this is an important matter which involves us all. Luckily, there is no murderer to unmask.’ He beamed round in what Juliet thought was an unusually unsure way, receiving some watery smiles in return. He continued hastily, ‘Although you have all already met him, I would like to formally introduce you to Léo Brodeur, who has come to run the cookery school with Sylvia. I hope you will make him welcome, especially as he has rooms here in the house, in the new wing.’
There was a murmur of greeting and Léo nodded around vaguely at everybody. Juliet averted her eyes and thought, not for the first time, how very British it was to name that part of the house ‘new’ when it was a good two hundred years old. Newat some point, she supposed, and the name had stuck. Rousseau went on:
‘Well, it seems that, unfortunately, Feywood finds herself in some financial difficulty.’
Juliet heard Martha’s sharp intake of breath and realised that her sister had been right. Were things really so bad? Her eyes travelled up to the flaking, yellowing paint above the window, which had been used to cover the effects of a water leak about ten years ago, then to the crumbling wooden window frames. Maybe they were.
‘I am very thankful for Will here, who has been doing some clever number crunching. It has revealed that although the situation is not yet desperate, it may well be soon.’
Frankie interrupted.
‘But Dad, how can there be money problems? I mean, Feywood isn’t mortgaged, you’re still working, Martha and I both give you rent, and the cookery school will help, once it gets going, surely?’
There was a silence as their father stared miserably at the edge of his desk. Juliet wished he would just get on and tell them what was happening, but knew he loathed this kind of conversation. He would much prefer everything always just to be…pleasant. Will spoke up.
‘Rousseau, would it help if I explained?’
Their father nodded gratefully and relaxed fractionally into his chair.
‘Right. Well, Frankie, you’re correct that Feywood isn’t mortgaged, but I’m afraid that your mother took out rather a large loan – to the tune of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds – when she was very unwell, partly for medical bills and partly for…’
He paused, uncomfortable. Juliet could feel the distress rising inside her. She knew she was about to say something she’d regret, but she couldn’t stop herself.
‘Partly to buy a load of expensive stuff to make herself feel better about dying, and to hell with us having to deal with the fallout once she had gone?’
There was a shocked silence, and Léo’s hand flew to his chest.
‘Don’t look at me as if I’m some kind of monster,youdidn’t know her,’ said Juliet, glaring darkly at him. ‘Shopping was always her favourite medicine, even for a slight sniffle.’
He held his hands up in surrender.
‘I beg your pardon, Juliet, I did not mean to offend you.’
She put her face in her hands and groaned.
‘So, is that it then, the loan, or is there more?’
‘More, I’m afraid, and it gets more serious. The roof, as you may already know, has been patched up repeatedly over the past thirty years, and it has now reached the stage where it desperately needs to be replaced. On a house of this size and age, with its listed status and the requirement for specialist materials, we are looking at costs of around one hundred thousand pounds. Many of the window frames also need to be replaced and most of the electrics haven’t been updated since the 1930s.’
Juliet’s older sister was the first to speak.
‘How are you going to find that sort of money? Can we help?’
‘Bless you, Martha.’ Their father was ready to take the reins again, noticed Juliet, now that the really bad news had been delivered. ‘Yes, you girls will all have to help, we will all need to. The cookery school is very close to opening, and that should bring in good revenue, especially now that Léo is on board. We have already arranged that with Sylvia, thank you.’
‘Of course, Rousseau. I grew up here too; I couldn’t bear to see it sold.’
She reached over to squeeze her brother’s hand, and he continued.
