The grandly named Perilly House was really just a large farmhouse. It was a very pleasant farmhouse built of Cotswold stone, with a big central gable and two large wings. Roses grew about the front door which had been tricked out with a white Georgian portico and an antique brass bell-pull.
A nervous cleaning woman answered the bell and told me her ladyship was not at home. Her ladyship had gone to a hospital charity committee meeting in Cirencester, which answer, despite my attempts to convince myself that Elizabeth was behaving well, triggered a rush of uncharitable thoughts. I imagined Elizabeth earning every brownie point she could so long as she saw Georgina’s trust fund in her sights. I imagined she would suddenly be active on the hospital charity, and the mental health fund-raising committee and even the flower rota at the parish church. “But his lordship’s at home,” the cleaning lady volunteered.
“Would you tell him John Rossendale’s here?”
“Is it business, sir?” She had clearly been trained to be wary of all strange visitors.
“No.” I was about to say I was a friend, but decided that would stretch the truth too far. “It’s a private matter.”
The woman looked dubious, but seemed reassured that I was not in a suit, which meant I was probably not serving a writ or otherwise adding to Peter Tredgarth’s troubles. “He’s at the camp, sir.”
I knew where that was. In the early days of my sister’s marriage, when Peter and I had still been friends, I had been a frequent visitor to Perilly, and I remembered the old camp which had been hastily built in the war to house Italian prisoners doing farm work on the surrounding estates. By the time I, first saw the camp it was already derelict. At one time Peter had thought to turn the old wooden huts into a chicken farm, but in the end he had done nothing and the timber had rotted away and the undergrowth had all but hidden the concrete foundations.
I walked down a tractor-rutted path, past a spinney of alders, then turned alongside the stream which would lead me to the low hill where the camp had been built. I saw Peter Tredgarth standing beside the stream, staring gloomily at the water. He had a shotgun under his arm, making him look uncommonly like a man contemplating the benefits of suicide. He jerked guiltily when I called his name, then stared with surprise as he recognised me. “What the hell are you doing here?” he asked. I could hardly expect him to be glad to see me after our last meeting in the Channel Islands.
“I’ve come to see you. And Elizabeth, of course, but I gather she’s not at home?”
“She never is, these days. I sometimes forget what she looks like.” He peered at me, evidently trying to decide whether to be grudgingly polite or dismissiyely nasty. He didn’t have the guts to be nasty, so offered me a grunt of welcome instead. “D’you see any heron?”
I looked up and down the stream. “No heron, Peter.”
“One of the labourers told me he saw a nesting couple up by the weir. Thought I’d shoot them.”
“Aren’t they a protected species?” I teased him.
“Bad for the fishing, you see. Bloody bad. Best thing to do is shoot them.” He broke the gun and took out the cartridges.
“Why don’t you have a water-bailiff to look after the fishing?” I asked.
“I did. Retired sergeant from my regiment. Nice chap, but I couldn’t afford to pay him.” He looked unhappily at his water, which was choking with weeds. “Needs a bit of work, eh?”
“A bit.”
“Must get down to it one day. You can get a lot for the fishing rights these days. And it’s good water, you know! No damn fish farms filling it up with trout-shit.”
“Why don’t you build your own fish farm,” I asked him, “and pollute it yourself?”
“I tried that, John, but they wouldn’t give me planning permission. Bastards. They’ll let some upstart grocer build a brick bungalow on a beauty spot, but they won’t let a landowner make a decent living. I should have bribed them, of course, but I couldn’t afford their fees.” He frowned at me, seemingly puzzled by my unexpected visit. “If I were you I wouldn’t be here when Elizabeth gets back. She had a telephone call from her lawyer chappie yesterday. The one in London? You must know who I mean. He lunched here last week and scoffed the best part of a brisket. Anyway, Elizabeth’s not exactly happy with you. Livid, in fact. Shouldn’t be talking to you myself, but…” He could not think quite why he was talking to me, so his voice tailed away.
“You don’t have Elizabeth’s capacity to hate?” I suggested.
“Yours is a ghastly family,” he said. “Always squabbling.”
“And yours isn’t?”
“They’re pretty ghastly too,” he admitted. Peter Tredgarth is big and heavy, with a permanently worried expression. He had not always been like that. When I first introduced him to Elizabeth he had been a trim Guards officer, lively and quick, who used to sail the Channel with me. He had long since given up sailing and was now weighed down with the world’s griefs. “I thought you’d gone back to sea?” he said irritably.
“I did. I came back.”
“Bloody silly of you. If I was you, I’d stay out there. That’s what I should have done. Gone off and stayed away.” He fell silent and, for a moment, neither of us could find anything to say.
“I hear you were up at the camp?” I said to fill the silence.
He gave me a fierce look. “Did you drive here?”
“I caught a bus from the station, then walked.”
“I don’t think I’ve been on a bus since I was at prep school.” He grimaced, either at the memory, or as he tried to decide what to do with my unwelcome presence. “Tell you what I’ll do,” he said at last, “I’ll drive you to the station. That way she won’t find you on the premises, and I won’t tell her you’ve visited. We can stop for a bite of lunch on the way. I know a decent little pub which does a good midday meal. Wait here!”
He didn’t let me respond, but just turned away and began walking towards the tree-fringed hill where the camp lay. I started after him. “I’ll come with you.”
“Wait!” He turned on me angrily, then, as if to explain his rudeness, tossed me the gun and its two cartridges. “Keep an eye out for the heron, there’s a good chap.”
I waited. The two heron flew past me. I ignored them. Instead I watched Peter plod up the hill and disappear into the undergrowth beyond the trees. There was a pause, then his mud-stained Land Rover appeared and bounced down the slope towards me.
“See the heron?” he asked as he braked beside me.
“Not a sign, Peter.” I climbed into the passenger seat and pushed the gun into the back.
“Steak and kidney pie and a decent pint, eh?” Peter was suddenly very jocular.
I put my hand over the gear lever to stop him driving away. “I don’t want to go to the pub yet, Peter. I’ve come here to see what preparations you’re making for Georgina. If I approve of them, then I won’t oppose Elizabeth and she can get her claws on Georgina’s money. So why don’t I just go up to the house and wait for Elizabeth?”
He stared at me, biting a strand of his moustache. “Georgina?” he finally said.
“Georgina,” I confirmed.
“You’re worried about her?” He seemed astonished at the thought.
“Of course I’m worried about her.”
“And you think Elizabeth’s going to cheat on the trust fund?”
“It occurred to me, yes,” I said bluntly.
For a few seconds I thought he was going to throw me out of the vehicle for insulting his wife, but instead he just pushed my hand away from the gear lever and crashed it into first. “Right!” He spoke angrily and decisively. “You’ve asked for it, so you’ll damn well get it. Operation Georgina.” We lurched forward, turned on to the rutted track, and accelerated up towards the farm. “Elizabeth won’t take kindly to you poking about the place, but Georgina’s your sister, so why the hell shouldn’t you see where she’s going to live?” He laughed, but at what I could not tell. He drove furiously. We went past the house, past the farmyard, and up a track edged with blackberry bushes. At the end of the track, and facing on to a quiet country lane, was a pretty stone cottage. Building work was evident from the scaffolding which reached up to the chimney and from the pile of plumber’s junk that lay outside the door, but no builders were actually visible.