Martin Edwards - The Hanging Wood

‘I read about that when I looked up the Hall’s history this afternoon,’ Louise said. ‘Arson, wasn’t it?’

Fleur moved her head to one side, allowing a pretty waitress to refill her glass with a fine red Bordeaux plucked from the newly refurbished climate-controlled wine cellars that lay beneath their feet. There were ten for dinner, sitting around a mahogany Chippendale table large enough to have accommodated twenty; Fleur sat beneath a portrait of her great-grandmother’s great-grandmother. The woman in the painting wore a green velvet-and-satin evening gown, whereas Fleur contented herself with a simple black dress and necklace of pearls, but like her long-dead predecessor, she radiated the self-assurance that came with being chatelaine of Mockbeggar Hall.

‘One of my ancestors dismissed a servant on a whim, and the man set fire to the place in revenge.’

Her wry smile gave no clue to her thoughts. Daniel felt a sudden urge to step inside her mind. How must it feel to belong to a house like this, where your family had lived for so long? Hard to understand for someone who had grown up in a nondescript semi on the outskirts of Manchester. When he was a boy, to live here would have seemed a dream come true. But real life was no dream. The Hall’s makeover had been planned and executed with respect for the past, and many of its original features had been restored and retained, but the historian in him could not help cringing at the metamorphosis of a grand family home into an offshoot of a caravan empire.

Beggars couldn’t be choosers, but was Fleur as happy about the Hall’s fate as she claimed? For whatever reason, discontent lurked beneath her surface calm, he was sure of it.

Kit Payne smiled. ‘Thank goodness there are employment tribunals nowadays where disgruntled staff can ventilate their grievances without resorting to acts of vengeance.’

‘Not that we like to think we have any disgruntled staff,’ Bryan Madsen announced, sneaking a not very surreptitious glance down the waitress’s top. ‘Kit does a first-rate job of keeping everyone motivated. Ably assisted by Glenys, I might add.’

Kit beamed, a spaniel relishing a pat from his master. Further down the table, his wife Glenys simpered, prompting Sham and Purdey Madsen to exchange glances that implied shared scorn of long standing. Twenty years her husband’s junior, with a Geordie accent and a generous bosom, Glenys had met Kit while working in the office as a trainee personnel officer, and now she was in charge of Human Resources. Her principal topic of conversation was their son Nathan, who was currently in Tanzania on an educational holiday organised by his very expensive private school. Just as well in the circumstances , she’d said. Orla’s name didn’t pass her lips; her main concern about the suicide at Lane End Farm was clearly that it should not disrupt the equilibrium of the Payne household.

‘What happened to the arsonist?’ Louise asked.

Fleur shrugged. ‘I believe he was executed.’

Purdey Madsen made a face. ‘Gross.’

‘Darling,’ her aunt said, ‘they knew how to deal with criminals in those days.’

‘But he didn’t even kill anybody!’

‘He made the greatest mistake of all.’ Fleur allowed herself a faint smile. ‘He was careless, and so he got caught. Why risk doing wrong if you don’t make sure you get away with it?’

Bryan coughed. ‘When we started renovating the place, Daniel, it was hardly in a better state than it was back in 1837.’

Daniel made admiring small talk as the waitress served him with venison accompanied by a generous helping of cranberry Cumberland sauce, wild mushrooms, and a head of sweet caramelised roast garlic. The catering was handled by a firm run by a celebrity chef; nothing but the best for the Madsens. An honoured guest, Daniel sat in pride of place, between Bryan and his wife. Before the meal, his host had taken him and Louise on a tour of the Hall, a chance to show off the lovingly restored silk hangings in the drawing room, the intricate carvings and fine plasterwork in the pastiche Elizabethan gallery.

This huge dining room had been reimagined as one more facet of the Madsen money-making machine, available for hire by elite dining clubs, business magnates, and politicians in search of an awayday with a touch of class. Bryan had hinted that a committee of cabinet ministers was booked in for late August for a private meeting over dinner to discuss the next round of spending cuts. The focal point of the room was a magnificent fireplace bordered by twisted columns carved from wych elms cut down, Bryan said, from the Hanging Wood. There was a Japanese lacquered chest, a small table on which huntsmen once breakfasted, and a long case clock with a moon dial and an engraved motto, Time flies, pursue it, Man, for why the days are but a span . A couple of dozen Victorian portraits depicted three generations of the Hopes family: stern fathers, demure wives and assorted children, cats and horses. The Hopes undeniably thought of themselves as animal lovers, even if hunting foxes to death was their favourite sport.

Daniel tasted the meat. Tender and lean, with a tangy aroma. He tried not to think of the deer from which it came.

‘What happened to the pooches, Aunt Fleur?’ Sham asked, waving her knife at a pair of landscapes, each of misty heather-clad fells, which were interspersed between pictures of Fleur’s forbears and their domestic menagerie.

Before his sister-in-law could answer, Gareth said, ‘We’re trying out different ideas for exhibiting some of the contents of the Hall, darling. The insurers might kick up a fuss if we keep all Millais’ work in areas accessible to the public. Or at least increase their already extortionate premiums. Thank God so much stuff survived — we’re spoilt for choice as to what to display. The Hopes may have fallen on hard times, but at least they didn’t flog every last piece of the family silver.’

Sham was about to ask another question, but was interrupted by Fleur exclaiming in admiration about her niece’s bracelet. Talk of the family silver had Daniel glancing at the cutlery. Old, heavy, and no doubt absurdly valuable, it bore the same Hopes monogram as the napkin rings and the tiles of the fireplace, an elaborately curling letter H. Fleur might have become a Madsen, but the Hopes hadn’t quite been airbrushed out of Mockbeggar Hall. Their monogram spoke of power and possession, a reminder to visitors of how the other half once lived. Mind you, the other half continued to live very well, to judge by this meal served with such swift and silent efficiency, albeit no longer by flunkeys born into service, but by freelancers on agency contracts. Impossible not to be impressed. And yet, like the sumptuous furniture and fittings, the food was too rich for Daniel’s taste.

Hannah stayed at The Forge Brow longer than she’d intended. When Mario left for home, Greg suggested another drink and she found herself saying OK. By the time the Friday crowd thinned and the evening grew chilly, she was ready to leave, but she’d enjoyed his company far more than she’d expected. As a drinking companion, he was funny without being crude — at least, not very — and knowledgeable without being tedious. He’d arrived in the Cold Case Review Team with a very dodgy reputation, but she was glad she’d given him the benefit of the doubt. He even claimed to share her enthusiasm for the music of Diana Krall.

‘Back to Ambleside, then?’ he asked as they reached the car park.

‘With any luck I’ll be home before it gets dark.’ She was seized by a sudden dread that he might invite her back to his place. Not what she wanted at all. ‘Anyway, I’ll see you on Monday.’

‘Take care, Hannah.’

He hesitated, as if for once in his life he was unable to make up his mind about something, but then he gave a brisk nod of farewell, and strode off to where he’d left his car.