Sarah Bennett - Bluebell Castle

Looking from the small, brown pile in front of her to the unusually quiet array of pups and hounds sprawled before the fireplace, Iggy did her best not to laugh at the collection of innocent expressions staring back at her. ‘This better be a one-off,’ she admonished, as though they could understand what she was saying. ‘Because I haven’t got time for you lot to get sick.’ The problem with having so many dogs was it was almost impossible to avoid them all getting ill if one of them caught a bug.

Keeping them under her watchful gaze in the hopes the guilty dog would give themselves away, she walked to the large wooden box next to the fireplace where they kept old newspapers and bits and pieces of dried kindling to help in lighting the fire. When she spotted the paper on the top of the pile, she couldn’t help a self-satisfied grin from tweaking her mouth. It was the tabloid paper she’d dropped in there earlier-the one with Will Talbot scowling out from the front page which had put the stupid idea to call him in her head in the first place.

‘Might as well be useful for something.’ Snatching up the cover and the next few pages behind it, she returned to the offending spot in the middle of the hall and pressed Will’s face into the still-soft poo as she scooped it up. She deposited the ball of paper in the empty bin in the small washroom near the door before washing her hands thoroughly. Collecting the bin when she’d finished, she headed back across the hall towards the servant’s area to dispose of the parcel and to give Mrs W a head’s up that the floor would need disinfecting.

*

Petty satisfaction proved a highly motivating tool, and Iggy pictured various soft parts of Will Talbot’s anatomy as she hacked and slashed at the brambles crawling over the statue of Venus which stood in the basin of a long dead fountain opposite the entrance to the maze. By the time Tristan wandered out with a flask of tea and a couple of Betsy’s homemade rock cakes tucked in his pocket, she was scratched to bits, but the worst of her anger had been exorcised and she’d uncovered most of the moss-stained marble figure.

‘Blimey, you’ve made some progress this morning,’ he observed, gaze sweeping over the piles of shorn brambles she’d raked off to one side.

‘Not enough.’ Pausing to shove her sweat-matted fringe back, Iggy did a couple of rotations and stretches to ease the ache in her back. Maybe Will had a point. It didn’t matter how much effort she put in, there was no way things could be ready in time for the end of August. But she had to try. Blessed with what she called perseverance-and Arthur called bloody-minded pig-headedness-Iggy was never one to give up on a situation, often to her own detriment. Even when everyone else around her could read the writing on the wall, her instinct was to plough on, to stick to the plotted course and tough it out to the end.

Shaking off the wave of self-doubt, she squatted down beside her brother and accepted the plastic mug of tea he held out. The long-term future of her family was still at stake, and she was determined to do whatever she could to secure it. The estate farms were finally running well enough for her to be able to turn her attention to other projects. It had taken the best part of nine months of hard work since their father had passed on for her to convince their tenants she was up to the task of managing the estate, but she’d succeeded.

They were tough men and women-the land and necessity had bred them that way-and she didn’t resent them for expecting her to prove her worth. Through the deprivations of a particularly harsh winter she’d worked side-by-side with them, rescuing stranded sheep high in the dales beyond the borders of the estate, fixing broken tractors and thawing frozen pipes.

Selling one painting, no matter how much it was worth, wasn’t going to keep the castle running for the rest of her lifetime; it wasn’t going to keep those farmers protected by a landlord who understood and respected their connection to the lands. Like Arthur and Tristan both, she wanted to ensure future generations didn’t face the same heartache and insecurity they were currently coping with. Putting Bluebell Castle on the tourist map was an essential part of that, and they needed to open with a bang.

Tristan snagged the mug from her to wash down a mouthful of cake. ‘Arthur told me about your plan to get Will Talbot involved with the garden renovations. I think it’s a stroke of genius. His name’s everywhere at the moment. If you could persuade him, or that gorgeous girlfriend of his to open the fete as well, it’d really draw the punters in.’

Stealing back the mug, Iggy drained the contents then held it out to him for a refill. ‘It might’ve been a genius idea if he hadn’t accused me of taking the piss.’

‘Oh, Iggy, that’s pants.’ Tristan slung an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in for a quick hug. ‘Wait? Did he actually say that?’

She nodded. ‘That and a lot of other rude things. Ridiculous, effing impossible; can’t be done; planning would take longer than I’ve got left to finish it.’ She shrugged. ‘There might have been more, but I hung up on him. Rude bastard.’

Her brother snorted. ‘Bet he loved that.’

She brushed the crumbs from her rock cake off her jeans-a futile exercise given the dirt streaking them-and rose. ‘What Will Talbot may or may not love is nothing to do with me.’ When their eyes met, she read nothing but encouragement in her brother’s gaze. Other people might have scolded her for being hot-headed and overreacting, but not Tris. He’d walk through fire for her, both he and Arthur would, and she’d do the same for them. ‘Do you have time to look at the drawings with me this evening? I’m struggling a bit over what to do for the best.’

‘Can’t see the wood for the trees?’

She groaned at his terrible pun. ‘Something like that.’

Having screwed the mug back onto the top of the flask, Tristan stood up beside her. ‘’Course I’ve got time. Bring them into the family room after dinner, and I’ll take a look.’ He tugged the end of a loose strand of hair that had escaped from her plait. ‘Don’t fret, Iggle-Piggle, we’ll get it sorted out.’

‘I hate it when you call me that,’ she grumbled.

‘I know, why else do you think I do it?’ Flashing her an unrepentant grin, Tristan left her to it.

Iggy entered the family room with the various drawings Lucie had managed to dig up from the family archives secured in a roll under her arm. As usual, several of the dogs had commandeered the floor in front of the fireplace, even though it was too warm for the hearth to be lit. With a few gentle toe nudges, she managed to stir them, eliciting a chorus of grumbles and whines as they begrudgingly yielded the space to her.

She’d barely unrolled the first drawing before Arthur’s greyhound, Nimrod, tried to walk over it. ‘No!’ Iggy grabbed the dog and pulled him into her lap before his claws could damage the delicate paper. With a hug to show him he wasn’t in trouble, she shooed the dog away and rolled the drawing back up. ‘This isn’t going to work, is it?’ she said to the milling dogs as she stood.

‘Talking to yourself again?’ It was Arthur, with Lucie on his heels.

‘It’s the only way I get any sense,’ she retorted with a quick grin. ‘I need to evict these hooligans.’ She gestured towards the dogs. ‘Give us hand, will you?’

Between the three of them, they managed to remove the dogs in short order. ‘You’d think we were locking them out in the stables or something,’ Lucie said, as she watched the dogs skulk across to the far end of the great hall where their enormous pile of cushions and blankets stretched out in front of the fireplace. Taking up most of one end of the hall, it dated back to the origins of the castle.