The Kilternan Legacy (13 page)

Snow was having some sort of spasm beside me. I think Simon had kicked her.

“And once those … those … persons are turfed out of the cottages, I don’t doubt but what you’d get a decent return from the properties instead of the pittance that satisfied Irene. Certainly you could realize enough to pay the rates until you can sell up.”

“Sell up?”

“Well, you’ll have to sell up to pay the death duties.” Then my dear great-aunt stopped and stared hard at me. “I suppose that
you
could pay that out-of-pocket and never miss it.”

“No, I couldn’t pay those death duties out-of-pocket and not miss it. I don’t know why you should think all Americans have gold mines.”

“Michael did very well in America. Everyone knows that.”

“My grandfather’s business is none of mine.”

She sniffed and crossed her hands—oh dear, they were paws—at her waist, as if girding her loins for another attack.

“You’d be well advised to listen to what the men have to say to you on Sunday. Property values being what they are, you’d do well to take the first decent offer you get.”

“I have to wait until probate …”

“So you do, but if, for instance, Jimmy made you an offer on the place, it being in the family and all, the details could be worked out to everyone’s satisfaction.”

The last person I’d sell my house to was vacant-eyed mousy Maeve.

“So far, my solicitor has been quite capable of advising me, though you’re very kind.”

“That young man is too bold by half,” said my great-aunt, “so firmly that I suspected she’d run up against Michael Noonan’s unrufflable intelligence already. “These are
your
children?” she continued.

No one else’s.”

She snorted at my flippancy as I performed the introductions. She gave another snort but made no attempt to introduce Maeve properly.

“And you’ll need someone very keen to break that ridiculous Brandel trust! Well, you’re to be collected Sunday afternoon. Be sure you’re ready at half four sharp.”

She wheeled, made a peremptory gesture to the shadow Maeve, and was gone before I could get breath enough to say that I found I had other arrangements for Sunday. And what was the Brandel trust anyway, that I should break it? I’d forgotten to ask Michael. Oh, well, I was seeing that bold young man tomorrow.

“Wow!” was Simon’s heartfelt response. “With relatives like that, who needs enemies?”

“That poor Maeve,” said Snow.

“Poor Maeve nothing!” replied Simon. “She’s panting to get into our house.”

“Well, she won’t!” I said definitively.

A car had impeded our progress by the time we got as far as the turn into the … my lane. And the car was an Austin, which was hurriedly braked, as much to avoid ramming us as because the driver was in a flap to stop us.

“Oh, wait, please wait!” the woman cried, and raced around her car to me. “Please, I know my sister-in-law was just here. I saw her car in the lane and pulled out of sight till she’d gone. I’m Winnie Teasey, your uncle Richard’s widow. And please, please, do say you’ll come Sunday? I’d be glad to collect you. No, Bob is to do that. I’ve wanted so to meet you. You
are
Irene Stanford, aren’t you?” And suddenly the flustered woman was blushing with additional confusion. There was something very appealing and sweet about her disorganization. One had the urge to reassure her at all costs.

“Yes, I’m Irene, and I’m very pleased to meet you.”

“Oh, Alice has been
that
way.” Her face contorted with distress. “I knew it. You see, she’d been certain that it would all come to her, being the oldest surviving sister like, and she’d already decided that Maeve and Jimmy must have the Lodge, and Tom and Michael would have the row cottages, and Betty the big end one. Oh dear, I probably shouldn’t have said that, but you’d find out soon enough
anyhow
. But I mean, Alice has very
good
qualities … she’s a pillar of the church, it’s just that
tact
was never her long suit, and she gives such a different impression than she should.” She paused long enough to take a breath, and seemed to notice Snow beside me for the first time. Then Simon.

“Are you Sara? And that must be Simon. How clever of you to have twins. And how charming you are! And only fourteen? My, whatever do you feed your children to make them so big? Now please don’t let Alice put you off coming this Sunday. There are so many of us who
want
to make your acquaintance that you can simply ignore her and talk to us. And Tom—that’s Alice’s husband—doesn’t let her run on so when he’s about. But we all want to meet Michael’s children. Not that I knew Michael, you understand …”

In a way, Winnie was as overwhelming as her sister-in-law.

“Michael’d left before Beebee—that’s what Richard was called—married me.”

“I’ll be truthful, Aunt Winnie, I never heard anything about my Irish relatives, except that I had some, until Aunt Irene left me her queendom.”

Winnie’s still pretty face illuminated in a rather astonishing way, showing us that she must have been a lovely young woman.

“Irene’s queendom!” Tears filled her eyes. “She was such a good person. So understanding of people’s problems. And I
told
them that Irene was quite right in the head when she made you her heiress, for I can just
imagine
what would have happened had she chosen any one of us. I mean to say, it would have been just desperate. If only Beebee had been alive!” She sighed. “Oh dear, there I go on, but I did
try
to get out early before Alice was likely to come.”

“Auntie Imelda beat Auntie Alice,” said Snow in a sweet voice that dripped acid.

Winnie’s mouth opened in an “oh” of surprise. “Imelda’s been here?”

“Between you and me, Aunt Winnie,” my daughter went on before I could answer, “there’s not much to choose between ‘em.”

“Oh, there is, there is!” Winnie was plainly upset that both sisters-in-law had had the jump on her. “Oh dear, oh dear, and really they’re not
like
that.”

“Money’s involved,” remarked Snow in a knowing tone.

“Oh, and you couldn’t be more right. How clever you are. Oh, but please do come. I’ve a granddaughter, just your age, not nearly as pretty, and a grandson,
my
Betty’s oldest, who’s Simon’s age. I suppose you’re wild about motorbikes too?”

She couldn’t have uttered wiser words to change Simon’s mind about going to the tea.

“And don’t ever tell Alice’s Betty, but her second boy has a motorbike. He hides it in a friend’s shed.” Aunt Winnie said this as if she were certain Alice’s ears were still tuned to the happenings on Swann’s Lane. “So please
do
come.”

“We’ll come, Aunt Winnie. I promise.”

Her relief was so intense that tears started in her eyes again. “Oh, you are good. Just like dear Irene. I miss her so much. Now I must run. I’ve these things to give Ann for the children. Such darlings!”

She dragged clothing out of the back of the Austin, and, with her arms full, she paused once more by the window. “Ann’s related, too, you know.”

Before I could ask how, why, when, where, because I was quite delighted to claim a relationship with Ann Purdee, Winnie was off down the lane at a shamble-run.

“Well, will surprises never cease!” said Snow, grinning with delight.

“Mom, get the hell outa here before someone else descends on us,” said Simon in a long-suffering tone of voice.

We did.

“YOUR POSITION is somewhat difficult in this, Mrs. Teasey,” Michael Noonan said as he began riffling through a bulky file of papers. “In September of last year, the elder Mr. Fancy informed your aunt that he was relinquishing the cottage, but he did not hand over the key. Your aunt telephoned him at his new address, and he said he’d mail it to her, only he never did so. By then George Boardman had offered her three thousand pounds.

“After your aunt suffered the first stroke, she asked me to press Fahey for the key. He again refused, saying …” Mr. Noonan cleared his throat and gave us an expurgated edition of the saying. “… He’d changed his mind and would keep the cottage as a summer residence. Legally he is not entitled to do so, since he is a veteran, living now in veterans’ housing, and he can’t hold two properties at once.”

“Can’t you evict people here in Ireland for non-payment of rent?” asked Snow.

“But of course you can. However, Fahey has paid the rent on the cottage until September. The amount is twelve pounds per annum.”

“Twelve pounds? And Great-great was offered three thousand?” Snow’s practical mind rebelled.

“In addition, he is claiming the amount that he had paid out for a new roof.”

“To be blunt about it, is he by any chance blackmailing us for a lump sum, after which he’d quit?” I asked.

“That’s about the size of it.”

“Don’t let him get away with it, Mom. The way they’ve left the place, they ought to pay us to get out of the lease.”

“Slaney’s is worse,” said Snow.

“But Slaney is not the leaseholder,” Michael Noonan explained. “His mother is. And the rent has been overdue since Tom Slaney returned.”

“Since he returned?”

“He’s a thoroughly bad lot, drinks heavily, is out of work more often than he’s in, but his mother was Miss Teasey’s cook until she became too feeble. Then she stayed on in the cottage.”

“Aunt Irene said nothing about keeping on the tenant in that cottage,” I said.

“Not surprising. Old Mrs. Slaney was very ill last winter, and not expected to last. Of course, you can do as you wish. Actually, it might be a blessing to put the old lady in an old-people’s home, out of the reach of her son.”

“I’d have to think about that,” I said, feeling Ugly American.

“The Cuniffs in Lark are no problem. The rent is paid monthly by banker’s order into your aunt’s account, and there’s never been a lapse.”

“How much do they pay?” asked Snow.

“Seven pounds a month.”

“That’s still not much against a purchase price of three thousand pounds. You’d get more interest with your money in a savings account. Or would you?”

“Good heavens, Snow. What will Mr. Noonan think?”

“That Americans raise their children to be practical, Mrs. Teasey,” he replied, with a twinkle in his eyes. “She’s right, you know. The rents are absurd, due partly to the Rent Control Act and partly to your aunt, who had her own reasons.”

“Which she didn’t vouchsafe to us, and no one else will tell us.”

“As soon as the will has been probated, you can sell any of those cottages and let the new owner worry about eviction. And as for Brian Kelley, that may be all wind and stuff. He even badgered your great-aunt when she was in hospital—until T’ornton”—he dropped h’s too—“turfed him out.”

“Mr. Noonan, in my situation, about which none of the relatives are happy, could probate be contested? Aside from Brian Kelley’s threats, I mean.”

Reluctantly he conceded that it could.

“Because I’ve been getting clues.”

“We’ve been inundated by elderly disapproving auntie relatives,” explained Snow, with complete disgust.

Michael Noonan’s expressive lips twitched, suggesting that he knew exactly whom she meant.

“We’ve been commanded to a family tea on Sunday, at half past four,” my daughter continued. “It seems we’ve cousins our ages.” She sounded so thoroughly bored that Michael Noonan did chuckle.

“Well, Mr. Noonan? I’ve already had broad hints that, when I go back to the States, Jimmy and Maeve might be willing to caretake the house for me, or buy it, and that once ‘those’ tenants have been chucked out of the cottages, decent rents might be earned. And they know tenants who are desirable, respectable, and solvent.”

“We do things a little differently in Ireland, Mrs. Teasey,”

“I’ve been apprised of that fact too.”

“Please. I can appreciate how uncomfortable it could be for you but, as my client, you should be aware that there is a very good chance that one or another of your great-aunt’s relatives may decide to contest the will formally—unless you’d be willing to seem to give them what they want until probate has been secured.”

“I gather they think I have to sell it to pay the death duties, so they’re counting on my accepting a very low offer.”

Michael Noonan chuckled again as he leaned forward across his desk in a decisive manner. “Fair enough. Give them no indication to the contrary. The trust fund is not public information. And if they become too insistent, refer them to me.”

I sighed. Snow, however, gave one of her giggles, and then composed her face into a mask oddly resembling her Great-great-auntie Alice.

“That young man is too bold by half!” she said, in such an excellent imitation that Mr. Noonan roared with laughter. “You’ve met her!”

I’m just no good at dissembling, Mr. Noonan,” I said, worried.

“Ah, Mom, it’ll be fun stringing them along. You let me and Simon handle it.”

Our solicitor cleared his throat.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Snow went on, “children are seen and not heard in Ireland, but
that’s
an advantage.”

“
Mom?
” said Simon in that “she’s off again” tone.

“Oh, Sim, we’ll
help
Mother. I mean, you don’t want Auntie Alice’s Maeve in our house, do you?”

“Actually, Mrs. Teasey, simply say that you can do nothing until the will is probated.”

However, I saw Michael Noonan and my conniving daughter exchange understanding glances.

“Naw, Mom, just slide away from the question,” said Simon, making the proper gesture with his hand. ‘You do
that
very well.”

I knew what he meant, and I
could
evade very well. Teddie taught me how, but I didn’t want to discuss that any more.

“Mr. Noonan, there was mention in the will of the Brandel trust.”

“That’s the one Great-great-auntie Alice wants you to break,” said Snow to me.

“She couldn’t an’ she wanted to, Miss Stanford,” said Michael Noonan, the sharpness in his tone directed against Aunt Alice. “The Ladies Brandel are sisters, very old friends of your great-aunt’s,” and it was patent that he thought them charming. “They’re well into their nineties, and as spry as sparrows. Both have their eyesight and hearing, and although they walk slowly, they still get about under their own steam.”