“There may be a little bit of dust,” he said. “I have cleaners going in only once a month. I sent workers in a few months ago to deal with some damp in the pantry, but it was nothing serious. The garden is not as pretty as Miss Bevan always kept it. The flowers have been neglected, but I have made sure the grass is cut a few times each year. You may find the furniture a bit old-fashioned, but it is solid enough and of the best quality and it has been protected with covers. The inside probably needs a coat of paint, and the mats may be getting close to being threadbare. But I daresay I could get a decent price for it just as it is if you wish to sell it.”
“Oh, but I wish to live there,” she told him.
He beamed and rubbed his hands together. “I am delighted to hear it,” he said. “Houses were made to be lived in, I always say, preferably by their longtime owners. There is still some of the rent money left in the account here. I have taken from it only what has been needed to keep up the house. And the rest of the money is intact.”
“The rest of the money?” Samantha looked inquiringly at him.
“Miss Bevan was not in possession of a vast fortune,” Mr. Rhys explained in his lovely precise Welsh accent. “But she was left a very tidy sum when old Mr. Bevan, her father, passed on. She did not spend much of it—she lived frugally all her life and always said she was contented as she was. And Mrs. Saul, your mother, never withdrew any of it. It has been sitting in an account here for many years now, gathering a nice bit of interest.”
There wasmoneyas well as a habitable cottage? Why had she never known about this? Whohadknown? Papa? John?
She did not ask how much money there was. Neither did she ask any details about the cottage. She did not suppose either was of any significant size. But she did feel foolish for not knowing and wondered if the fault was her own. She had never asked—but her mother had talked so disparagingly about the property that she had made it seem like nothing at all.
Samantha was pleased, though, to know that there was a bit of money as well as the house. She had not been left penniless when Matthew died, but neither was she any more than comfortably situated. A few pounds more would be very welcome, especially if the cottage needed new rugs and a fresh coat of paint. She exchanged a look with Ben, and he smiled.
But all this meant, of course, that he would have no further reason to stay with her. For which fact he would surely be very thankful. She was really not his responsibility, after all.
The cottage was only a few miles along the coast, Mr. Rhys explained after the clerk had brought in the tea and a plate of sweet biscuits. It was close to the village of Fisherman’s Bridge though separated from it by sand dunes, which hid the cottage from view. The beach in front of it had always been considered part of the property and was never used by anyone except the inhabitants of the cottage. He would not advise Mrs. McKay to go there today or even tomorrow. He would like to have the cottage cleaned up for her first and the grass cut and some coal and basic necessities of food brought in.
Ben told him the mythical story of his friend, the late Captain McKay, and of Samantha’s maid leaving on the stage bound for England just that morning.
“A pity, that,” Mr. Rhys said. “And you will be staying in Tenby for the next couple of nights, will you? At a hotel? That puts Mrs. McKay in a bit of an awkward position, doesn’t it, even if she does have you for company and protection, Major. A lady needs her maid as well as a gentleman to lend her countenance. Let me see what I can do about finding a new maid. It should not be too difficult even at such short notice. The opportunities for good positions do not arise every day around here, especially for girls.”
“Thank you, Mr. Rhys,” Ben said. “That would set my mind at ease. I was deeply concerned, as you may imagine, when that wretched maid insisted that she would not stand for one more day of moving away from England rather than toward it.”
He made a convincing liar, Samantha thought. And what did he mean bythat would set my mind at ease?
“Wales is often seen as a wild, heathen outpost,” Mr. Rhys said with one of his broad smiles. “And sometimes we Welsh are content to keep it that way. Though the southwest here is often referred to as little England. You will not find many people hereabouts who speak and understand nothing but Welsh.”
“But it is a lovely, musical language,” Samantha protested, “and I intend to learn it.”
“Splendid.” Mr. Rhys beamed at each of them in turn and rubbed his hands together again.
They took their leave as soon as they had finished drinking their tea.
“Itishabitable, Ben,” Samantha said as they were being driven slowly up a steep hill on the way back to their hotel. “I feel quite dizzy with the knowledge. Though I expect it is very tiny. I wonder what atidy sumamounts to. Do you suppose I am vastly wealthy?”
“Probably not,” he said. “But maybe it will be enough to buy you plenty of coal for your fires during the winters. They are supposed to be milder here than in other parts of the country, but if my experience of Cornwall is anything to judge by, they can be mighty damp and cheerless. And windy.”
It was windy here today.
“I suppose that is the penalty of living close to the sea,” she said. “Oh, Ben, Mr. Rhys is so…respectable, is he not?”
“Of course,” he said. “What did you expect? A wild heathen? He is as old as the hills too.”
“He knew my great-aunt,” she said.
“You know nothing about her but her name?” he asked. “Are you curious about her, Samantha? And about the rest of your heritage?”
“My mother almost never talked about her life here,” she told him. “I think she was unhappy. Or perhaps just restless. She ran away to London when she was seventeen and never came back. Perhaps she intended to tell me more when I was older, but she died very suddenly when I was only twelve.”
She had not answered his question about whether she was curious or not, though. She was a bit afraid to be curious, actually. She was afraid of what she might discover. Her mother had been abandoned by her parents, Samantha’s grandparents. That at least she knew. She doubted she wanted to know the details.
Her great-aunt had owned her own cottage, though. That meant something at least. She had obviously not been penniless. Neither had her father, Samantha’s great-grandfather, if he had left hera tidy sum, whatever that might be. But where had her money come from before that to purchase a cottage? She had apparently never been married. She had had enough money to live upon without the sum her father left her. She had been able to leave most or all of that to her niece, Samantha’s mother, in addition to the cottage.
Samantha had always thought of her Welsh relatives as impoverished. Yet even a little bit of thought would have made her realize that her great-aunt could not have been penniless and that her money must have come from somewhere.
“Oh,” she said with a sigh, “perhaps I am just a little bit curious, after all.”
