Good Manors Page 2

  I felt sleazy doing it but my reason for doing it was pure, or so I thought. I was just establishing my name, making some money so that eventually I could drop the tabloid stuff and concentrate on serious news stories and taking photos of great merit. My dream was to take an iconic photo that would be used down the years to show future generations an act or an event that changed history.

  Chapter Two

  2003

  Xander Patrick

  “Mr. Patrick, Mr. Patrick!” someone with a high-pitched and wearingly familiar voice called my name.

  I tried my best to ignore it but when a hand tapped me on my back I had to stop.

  “Oh, sir. I’ve been calling you.” Mary panted, hand on her chest. “I’ve chased after you from the shop.”

  “Sorry, Mary, I was thinking about Harriet.”

  “She’s fine, sir, no signs yet, but I need to let you know something.”

  My eyeballs really wanted to roll but I fought hard to look interested. Mary always had to let me know something. Sometimes it was her lumbago, other times it was how terribly I was looking after my mother’s business, and if I was really lucky she’d be trying to set me up on blind dates with her friend’s daughters or granddaughters.

  “What is it, Mary?” It wasn’t difficult not to sound too interested.

  “You know Gerald wrote in to that magazine—”

  “Readers’ Wives?”

  “No.” She shook her head, and I held in a smirk. “The one with the woman and the hair and the—”

  “Nuts?”

  “No, no, no. Not a food magazine. She writes the articles on the old houses and does the pictures. She’s dead good.”

  “You mean Good Manors.” I could have teased Mary further for my own entertainment but I really did have a busy day ahead.

  “Yeah, that’s the one. Well, she’s coming.”

  “Oh, fabulous. Write the dates in the big diary.” Stepping forward to pull away from the well-meaning but vastly annoying old woman, I was stopped by a hand on my arm.

  “But, Xander, that’s the thing.” Her eyes were big and bright under the cloud of fluffy gray hair. “She’s coming today!”

  “Today?” I couldn’t have a nosy journalist at Mallard’s—the finances needed going over, there was a new arrival expected at any minute, and with a whole load of renovation in the offing the timing couldn’t be worse.

  “Yes, today.”

  “How in God’s name can that be? No one told me. I wasn’t informed.”

  “No, well, Gerald answered the phone yesterday and it was someone at the magazine asking if we could take India early, and he said yes and now she’s coming today, expected about lunchtime, and I don’t know what to do.”

  “Why the hell wasn’t I asked about this?”

  “You know Gerald, he’s easily excitable and he thought it was a good thing. Her articles bring in the tourists.”

  “I know, but now? Why now? I haven’t got time to be mollycoddling a bloody journalist!”

  “You don’t have to, that’s the point. She joins in with the day-to-day running of the place. Where shall we put her?”

  “Can’t we just put her off? Get her to come back another time?”

  Mary sucked air through the gap in the front of her teeth and shook her head.

  “Gerald said we can’t. The woman on the phone told him this was our only chance.”

  I ran my fingers through my hair in frustration. Whoever the woman on the phone was, she knew she’d been talking to an imbecile. A well-meaning imbecile with great knowledge of Mallard Hall and its history, but common sense were not well-used words in his dictionary.

  “Right, fine then. I’ll put her with bloody Gerald. He can deal with her. Let me know when she arrives, I need to meet with her.”

  “Okay, are you sure Gerald—?”

  “He was so excited to have her here so he can deal with her,” I snapped.

  “Right, well, she can come in the shop with me tomorrow then, you know, so she gets a feel for the variety of the place.”

  “Sure, that’s fine. Now let me get on, I need to see Harriet.”

  Sometimes I was convinced that only Harriet really listened to me, that only she understood me. Mallard’s was my ultimate passion. To keep the hall open, to make it a success was all I dreamed about. It was difficult holding together that dream on my own but I battled on.

  “Hello, sweetheart, how are you doing today?”

  Harriet bleated and shuffled herself up onto her four legs and wobbled over to the gate as I let myself in.

  “You’re looking good, any sign of the little one?”

  She bleated again, and I was sure I heard a weary note to the mother-to-be’s voice.

  “Oh, the little bundle of wool will be here soon enough, darling. Don’t fret.” I petted her. She was so soft and bouncy. That was why Castlemilk Moorit wool was so expensive and hence why I’d spent a small fortune on Harriet. She’d make her money back and more within a year from wool and maybe meat from her offspring. I was hoping to have a sizeable flock one day, but Harriet was my first and I was very protective of her.

  “Well, my pet, I’ve got to get back to work. The books just don’t seem to balance. God, Harriet. This place will be the death of me.”

  It had certainly killed my father. People said it was his bad boy ways, the drinking and the women and the gambling, but I knew the truth. Mallard Hall had consumed him. It wasn’t easy to maintain a huge property and staff, especially when the family money had all but gone and you had no discernible business skill.

  My dad had been brought up as aristocracy and had never learned a thing about business or a trade of his own. They had burned up money like it was fuel back through the fifties and sixties. It had only slowed down a little when my dad had married Mum and he’d inherited the hall. I’d looked at the books and it seemed he had been sensible for a while, trying to build up what little capital there had been.

  It had all gone to pot in the eighties. I didn’t really know all that had happened, Mum had never said, but everyone knew of Dad’s reputation. He had been caught on camera once and that had become his complete demise. He had spiraled into debt and constant alcoholism. By the time I was twelve he was dead.

  It had been a weird thing, almost a relief to know he was gone. I remembered in the back of my memory a cheerful man with a sparkling smile. He’d read me a bedtime story every night and had gone out of his way to be with me. Those memories were few and far between. I couldn’t have been much older than five or six when he’d become distant, almost non-existent in fact. And when we had crossed paths he had simply yelled and hollered at me. He’d hit me, or when he’d been incredibly drunk he’d tried to hit me and had missed.

  He hadn’t been my dad, he had been the shell of him. So to have that shell gone was a relief, it meant I was able to cherish the good memories and attempt to forget the bad.

  Mum had then taken over the reins at the Manor and she had started to whip it into shape, with a little help from me. We had been incredibly poor back then, personally speaking. Mum had pushed every last penny back in to the hall to keep it ticking over. I had been sixteen when I’d joined her more officially while doing a part-time course at college in accounting and business management. At eighteen I had become a full partner in the running of the hall, at twenty-one Mum had given me the hall as my birthday present, and that had been when I’d introduced the farm shop. She had supported me every step of the way, and even when she had been ravaged by the chemo that they’d tried to keep her alive with she had helped me out with whatever she’d been able to manage from her sickbed.

  Every day I missed her. She had been my everything. Her life work had been Mallard Hall so I was determined to make it a success for her. It was the way I would keep her memory alive forever.

  It was tough to make money in a country filled with stately homes. There had to be something different, something that pulled in the punters. The farm shop was
working well for us, people from miles around came for our produce. Lamb, beef, chicken and not to mention the fruit and veg. We had connections with local farmers and cottage industries that brought in jams and preserves, cakes and biscuits and cheeses that bulked out our own produce. We were a hub for locally sourced food.

  Several restaurants in the area used us to supply them, the rich ‘holiday home in the country’ set used us and the few distant tourists we attracted in came mostly for the farm shop and its award-winning produce. It was what dragged our revenue up and over the threshold. Or at least it had been. There’d been a worrying dip in the profits, and although stock seemed to be selling, the figures just weren’t adding up.

  My first thought had been petty thieving but Mary was a fantastic manager and her staff were by and large long-time, trusted employees. I’d put it down to the temps we brought in at busy times of the year but when I looked at the figures the money was draining at all times, not just in the school holidays and at Christmas.

  It wasn’t a paltry sum that had gone missing either. I might have been able to cast a blind eye if it had been. Times were tough and people had families to support. No, thousands of pounds a month had gone missing and it was seriously impacting the running of the whole manor.

  I wandered into the shop.

  “Mary, can I have a word?”

  It was quiet—people came in on Thursdays, which was new stock day. Wednesday was quiet except for the odd bargain hunter or clueless tourist.

  “Sure, sure, but you know we’re expecting that India woman any moment. I’m going to go meet her because, well, I know you said to leave her with Gerald but we know what he’s like. He’ll bore the poor girl to tears in thirty seconds flat.”

  “Fine, fine, whatever. I’ve been going over the figures and it’s not adding up, Mary. Are you sure that you’re recording everything correctly?”

  “Yes, Mr. Patrick. We take down all the stock here and check sales against it regularly. I’ve been checking the tills to make sure they aren’t broken. I’ve been writing down every sale when I’ve been at ’em and then checking the takings. Always adds up perfectly.” Mary looked worried. She knew what I was going to say next.

  “Then we’ve got a thief, Mary. It’s the only explanation.”

  She sighed and shook her fuzzy head. “But who, Xander? Who? I mean, most of the staff have all been here years. We’ve never had this problem before. They’re all trustworthy sorts. I can’t believe it of any of ’em.”

  “I know, Mary, but who else could it be? Are you checking up on people?”

  “Yes, sir, I am. I’m doing random till checks and everything. I’ve not caught anyone stealing even a quid. There was the one time when Jenny was a fifty pence piece off but we found that on the floor, she must have dropped it. Spent ages looking for it. She was mortified, sir, didn’t speak to me for a week after that.”

  “We need to do more, Mary. We’re losing over ten percent of our takings. Who else has access to the tills?”

  “No one really.” Mary shrugged.

  “Well, tell everyone to be extra vigilant. Watch customers, especially regulars, carefully.”

  “Oh, but, Mr. Patrick, we don’t want to scare ’em off!”

  Mary never quite knew what to call me. She’d known me since I’d been a kid but I was also her boss. I got a mix of titles when we talked.

  “I know, Mary. But someone is on the take and if it’s not staff it must be a customer. Make sure the tills are manned at all times. Make sure any unusual behavior is reported back to me.”

  “Right, okay, I will.” Mary worried her hands together.

  I hated doing that to her, she was a fantastic manager. When I had been little she’d been the housekeeper. She had kept all kinds of things in order, had kept me and my father apart when he had been particularly bad, where she’d been able to. When I had opened the shop I’d known she’d be perfect for it. She had been a bit reluctant at first, but when I had explained I was losing the role of housekeeper as the manor became more and more a tourist attraction she had agreed to give it a go. She had settled in well, apart from a few teething problems in the early days. She hadn’t been keen on the tills at first but once she had gotten used to them she had been in her element. I was glad I’d managed to keep her on. She was ditzy and quite often terribly annoying but she could organize a bunch of prisoners into fine dining wait staff if she had to. The woman didn’t know how to fail.

  “I’m going back to the books. We’ve got several big bills to pay and I’ve got to work out how we can do it.”

  “I’ll call you when India gets here then, shall I?”

  “What? Who? Oh, her. Yes, yes, I suppose you should. Can you make sure she doesn’t hear about our little problem then, please, Mary?”

  “I will make sure of it, Xander. Mum’s the word and all that.” She placed a plump digit over her lips and winked at me. “I won’t let another reporter ruin our lives. No way, I won’t.” Her face tightened into hard lines.

  “Thanks, Mary.”

  All the old staff were of the same feeling. They knew of the article that had been printed at the height of my dad’s alcoholism that seemed to be the catalyst of his demise. When I looked at the books for back then, there had been many gaps in the finances. Payments for prostitutes and single malt whisky, which he had never written down. He just took, took, took.

  My mum had never let me see the article, wouldn’t even talk about it with me.

  “Your dad was a good man, Xander.” Mum had sighed. “I want you to remember that. I don’t want you to look at that tat.”

  “If he was so good, why did you change your name?” I had raged at her once, in a haze of teenage hormones and angst.

  “Because I needed to step up and take over. Mallard’s name is associated with dodgy deals, underhanded and sleazy goings-on. I needed to distance us from that to make this place work.”

  I hadn’t got it at the time and I had kept the second name Mallard. It had only been when Mum had died that I had taken on her maiden name, a constant reminder of the woman who had loved me and had struggled on her own to rebuild a broken empire.

  Mallard Hall was my pride and joy but Patrick was my family name. My dad was just a shadow but my mother lived on through me.

  Chapter Three

  India Grace

  Packing for a Good Manors trip was always difficult. Overpacking was essential because sometimes I’d spend my days up to my boot tops in mud and other times I’d be attending balls and fundraisers and need my best dress and makeup. I had no clue what to expect at Mallard Hall and that was made worse by the sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that I could get there to be chased away with pitchforks or a gun.

  What if someone there remembered me and the photographs I’d taken? The guy who ran the show wasn’t a Mallard, but what if his staff were old faithfuls from back in the day? I’d be screwed.

  What did one wear when being pursued by angry, weapon-wielding folk anyway? I decided to pack nothing but sensible flat shoes just in case. Not that I was particularly known for sensible. I had extra-long hair that I frequently colored. At the time it was mostly my natural bronzed brown but the tips were dipped in pink, just the bottom couple of inches. I liked to be different, to dare and stand out. Funnily enough it was the easiest way to hide. Generally people were too afraid to approach someone with wacky hair and bright clothes, so I managed to slip through life quietly without much fuss and fluster.

  Until I turned up to do a Good Manors shoot. I could tell how desperate the hall or manor I visited was by how enthusiastically I was greeted. If all was well, business booming, I’d be greeted quietly and efficiently. I loved those jobs because they were the easy ones. I got to take millions of photos and pick and choose what to use. The deeper the financial difficulty, the bigger the welcoming party.

  When I pulled in at Mallard’s, I knew they were in trouble and my stomach churned with the age-old guilt. Outside the grand G
eorgian frontage stood an old, gray-haired woman with glasses and a huge smile, a middle-aged guy with thinning hair, thick glasses and the body of a well-used broom and a young man with a confused look beneath his long fringe. It seemed to be a style he was comfortable with. As my car pulled up, the youngest of the three amigos ran off.

  “India? India Grace?” The old woman’s voice squeezed in through my partially open car window and attacked my ears.

  I nodded.

  “Fabulous!” She got even louder when I opened the door of the car and walked round toward the motley crew.

  “Welcome to Mallard Hall, my dear. I’m Mary.” She took my hand and viciously pumped it up and down in her own.

  I was relatively sure she wasn’t trying to wrench my arm out of my socket to bludgeon me with the wet end because she smiled at me the whole time. But maybe she was just crazy.

  “Let me introduce you to Gerald. You already spoke on the phone.”

  “Hello, Gerald.” I smiled, and he smiled back, revealing around five intact teeth and halitosis.

  “Hello, love,” he cried. “It’s so good to see you here, to show Mallard’s off to the world. It’s a grand place, you know. Was built in 1764 by the original Lord Mallard. Look at the cornicing, it’s a wonder it is.”

  “Yes, it’s very lovely.” I nodded. Clearly he was the historian of the group. There was always one, a mind filled with all the little facts, rumors and tales from the olden days. They had their uses—if I could stop them waffling on long enough to get them to answer my specific questions.

  “See how symmetrical the place is? It goes all the way through the manor, you know.”

  I looked at the building with its tall, thin windows and its aching squareness. It was as symmetrical as could be, in comparison to the lush trees in the background growing willy-nilly like nature intended.

  “Ah, here’s Harry now with the master.”