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Moonshine
Victoria Clayton
A witty, charming romantic comedy from the author of Clouds Among the Stars.Roberta is appalled to have to abandon her perfect life in London to return to the family home and look after her mother, who has taken breaking her hip as a sign to stay in bed all day reading romance novels. Her involvement with a married polititian may have been a direct consequence of this.When the inevitable scandal breaks, Roberta flees – and accepts a job as housekeeper to an eccentric family, and is summoned to their family home – an enormous castle in the Irish countryside.Arriving in Ireland, Roberta takes a hair-raising pony and trap ride in the driving rain to reach her destination: Curraghcourt. It is a grand and imposing castle, although it has fallen into a state of bad disrepair. And when she meets the family, Roberta begins to understand why.The owner’s wife, Violet, is lying in her room in a coma. His charming but vague sister is addicted to poetry; and his mistress Sissy has a private line to the fairies. Completing the family unit are three dysfunctional children.The novel follows Roberta's efforts to restore Curraghcourt and reform the wayward family. She quickly finds redeeming qualities in even the most infuriating characters and falls in love with the melancholy madness of the household. The wonderful cast of characters includes eccentric friends, the fiery yet sentimental neighbours, assorted hangers-on and admirers.Victoria Clayton has written an enchanting novel, a wonderful social comedy.
VICTORIA CLAYTON
Moonshine
DEDICATION (#ulink_09bfd19a-a410-508d-9828-3cf28fc3d01e)
Remembering Constance Boyle, my Irish grandmother.
CONTENTS
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Dedication (#ulink_307ecf56-e9bf-5149-b5c0-b6054f316513)
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ONE (#ulink_5d796533-3115-5279-a201-f96e9c8789a9)
The waves scattered the lights from the Swansea to Cork ferry as though tossing silver coins to the marine life of the Bristol Channel. The wind flung the contents of my stomach after them. I bitterly regretted the Battenberg cake.
‘You don’t look well, dear,’ the motherly stewardess had said. ‘Take my advice and have a little something to settle your insides. The crossing’s going to be rough.’
Discouraging though this sounded, they were the first kind words that had been addressed to me all day. She had put down the plate before me and urged me to eat. It would have been impolite to refuse. Now my imagination was haunted by those lurid pink and yellow squares of cake, clad in wrinkled marzipan. As I pressed the cold iron of the ship’s rail against my burning face a sense of monstrous ill-usage overwhelmed me and I groaned aloud.
‘You poor thing! I’ve suffered from mal de mer myself and it’s no fun. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where thy victory?’
The voice was male, self-assured, amused. I suppose there is something comical about sea-sickness if you don’t happen to be feeling it. I wanted neither the sympathy nor the teasing but nausea and faintness made flight impossible. I would have fallen if the stranger had not taken my arm.
‘Steady! Come on, let’s sit down.’
He half carried me to a row of benches. Naturally, at this hour of howling purgatorial darkness, they were empty.
‘I feel awful!’ I moaned. I would have added, ‘The human race is despicable and life is a hideous pantomime,’ if I had not, even in this moment of crisis, a disinclination to make myself utterly ridiculous.
‘It’s bad, I know. You just want to die.’ He pushed me on to a seat and sat down beside me.
‘I do!’ I sobbed, the kindness in his voice encouraging me to give way to melodrama. ‘You’d better let me throw myself in. It’ll be the solution to every problem.’
‘Not for me, it won’t. People might think I pushed you overboard.’
‘How like a man! It’s got nothing to do with you. They’ll think, quite rightly, that I couldn’t stand another minute of this beastly boat going up and down, up and down. Oh, how I hate the sea!’
The man laughed. ‘We haven’t left the bay yet. Mumbles Head is over there, to the right. There’s only a slight breeze and the water’s as smooth as the proverbial mill-pond.’
I lifted my head. The lights of Swansea rose and fell most unpleasantly but the moon sent an unbroken path of beams across the water to meet them. The howling was all in my mind.
‘I hate mill-ponds.’ I continued to cry.
‘That’s right. Let it all out.’ My self-appointed nurse patted my arm from time to time. ‘Now.’ He handed me his handkerchief. ‘Have a good blow. Feeling better?’
I blew. ‘I feel worse if anything.’
‘The trick is not to register the motion of the ship. Don’t, whatever you do, look at the rail. Keep your eyes fastened on something on board. A lifebelt, a noticeboard or a ventilation funnel. Or, even better, look at me.’
The light from the saloon window fell on the right side of his face. I saw someone reassuringly ordinary, fairish, with prominent ears. I could just make out a cheek creased in a smile.
‘I suppose you’re a journalist.’ I was too tired to put as much venom into the accusation as I would have liked.
‘My goodness, you know how to hit where it hurts! Do I look like a sot and a liar? Have I the appeal of a tramp with rotting gums and a leaky urinary tract?’
‘You are, aren’t you?’ I persisted.
‘I’m a literary agent. A pretty innocent game, on the whole. Are you a film star who wants to be alone?’
‘Well … no and yes.’
I stared at him, trying to pierce the darkness and the bone, cortex and synapses that housed the impulses operational in lying. The last ten days had destroyed my trust in anyone I had not known from the baptismal font.
‘What can I say to convince you?’ He felt inside his coat. ‘Wait a minute.’ He stood up and searched his trouser pockets. ‘Here we are. Car keys and useful torch attached. Present from a desperate godmother. At the time I thought it was a bit mean but now I’m grateful.’
He directed a pencil beam on to an open passport. I saw the photograph of a young man with a high forehead and bat-wing ears. Below this it said, Literary Agent.
‘See?’ He directed the light on to the white slot on the passport cover. The name was Christopher Random. ‘That’s me. I can show you my driving licence, if you’d like.’
‘I believe you. I’m sorry I doubted. You’ve been extremely kind, Mr Random.’
‘You can call me Kit.’
