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‘SO WHAT DO you actually know about this man who wants to come and help us, Dad?’ Victoria asked.
‘He’s my stockbroker’s son,’ Patrick said.
‘So is he taking a gap year? Is his degree going to be in history?’
‘I don’t know,’ Patrick said, ‘but Alan said he’s very keen.’
He must be, Victoria thought, to arrange an interview for nine o’clock on a Sunday morning. ‘Did you want to interview him, then, as you know his father?’
Patrick smiled and patted her shoulder. ‘Absolutely not, darling. You’re the one he’s going to be working with. It needs to be your decision.’
‘If you change your mind, we’ll be in the office,’ Victoria said.
It was a shame her father had been so vague about the details; he hadn’t even asked for a rudimentary CV. Then again, her father came from the era of the gentleman’s agreement and he didn’t like paperwork. Hopefully the lad would bring his exam certificates with him and she’d be able to get an idea of his education so far and his interests, and whether he’d be the right one to help her.
Part of her thought there was something rude and arrogant about interviewing a volunteer for a job you weren’t actually paying them to do; on the other hand, if he was hopeless, he’d be more of a hindrance than a help because she’d have to double-check everything he did. Plus, even though he wasn’t being paid, he was getting valuable experience that might help him with applications for further study or a job in the heritage sector.
‘Come on, Humphrey,’ she said to her fox-red Labrador, who was curled up on the chair where he knew he wasn’t supposed to be. ‘Let’s go for a walk.’ It was more to clear her head before the interview than anything else. It felt as if she’d spent weeks wrestling with forms.
At the W-word, the Labrador sprang off the chair, wagged his tail and followed her into the garden.
Growing up at Chiverton had been such a privilege. Victoria loved everything about the place, from the mellow golden stone it was built from, through to the big sash windows that surrounded the huge Venetian window at the back of the house, through to the pedimented portico at the front. She loved the gardens that sprawled around the house and were full of daffodils and bluebells in the spring, the way the sunrise was reflected in the lake, and the formal knot garden at the side full of box and lavender. And most of all she loved the ballroom.
Her plans were going to require a lot of organisational skills. But hopefully Samuel Weatherby would fall in love with the place, too, and support her fundraising effort.
Humphrey headed straight for the lake as soon as they were outside and was already swimming after the ducks before she had a chance to call him back.
‘I’m banishing you to the kitchen,’ she said when he finally came out of the lake and shook the water from his coat. ‘I don’t want you scaring off our volunteer.’ Unless he was unsuitable—and then perhaps she could offer him a coffee in the kitchen, and Humphrey would leap all over their volunteer and make him withdraw his offer of help.
She could imagine Lizzie’s soft giggle and, ‘But, Tori, that’s so naughty!’ Lizzie was one of the two people Victoria had ever allowed to shorten her name.
She shook herself. She didn’t have time for sentiment right now. She needed to be businesslike and sort out her questions for her impending visitor to make sure he had the qualities she needed. Someone efficient and calm, who could use his initiative, drive a hard bargain, and not mind mucking in and getting his hands dirty. And definitely not someone clumsy.
In return, he’d get experience on his CV. She tried not to feel guilty about the lack of a salary. So many internships nowadays were unpaid. Besides, as her mother had suggested, they could offer him accommodation and meals; and Victoria could always buy him some books for his course. Textbooks cost an arm and a leg.
She changed into her business suit and had just finished dealing with an email when the landline in her office shrilled. She picked up the phone. ‘Victoria Hamilton.’
‘May I speak to Mr Hamilton, please? It’s Samuel Weatherby. I believe he’s expecting me.’
He sounded confident, which was probably a good thing. ‘Actually,’ she said, ‘you’re seeing me. I’m his daughter and I run the house.’ She wasn’t going to give him a hard time about asking for the wrong person. The message had probably become garbled between their fathers.
‘My apologies, Ms Hamilton,’ he said.
He was quick to recover, at any rate, she thought. ‘I assume, as you’re ringing me, you’re at the gate?’
‘Yes. I parked in the visitor car park. Is that OK, or do I need to move my car?’
‘It’s fine. I’ll come and let you in,’ she said.
Humphrey whined at the door as she walked past.
‘You are not coming with me and jumping all over our poor student,’ Victoria told him, but her tone was soft. ‘I’ll take you for another run later.’
The house was gorgeous, Samuel thought as he walked down the gravelled drive. The equal of any London townhouse, with those huge windows and perfect proportions. The house was clearly well cared for; there was no evidence of it being some mouldering pile with broken windows and damaged stonework, and what he could see of the gardens was neat and tidy.
He paused to read the visitor information board. So the Hamilton family had lived here for two hundred and fifty years. From the woodcut on the board, the place had barely changed in that time—at least, on the outside. Obviously running water, electricity and some form of heating had been installed.
Despite the fact that the house was in the middle of nowhere and he was used to living and working in the centre of London, a few minutes away from everything, there was something about the place that drew him. He could definitely work here for three months, if it would help keep his father happy and healthy.
All he had to do was to convince Patrick Hamilton that he was the man for the job. It would’ve been helpful if his father had given him a bit more information about what the job actually entailed, so he could’ve crafted a CV to suit. As it was, he’d have to make do with his current CV—and hope that Patrick didn’t look too closely at it or panic about the hedge fund management stuff.
He glanced at his watch. Five minutes early. He could either kick his heels out here, on the wrong side of a locked gate, or he could get this thing started.
He took his phone from his pocket. Despite this place being in the middle of nowhere, it had a decent signal, to his relief. He called the number his father had given him.
‘Victoria Hamilton,’ a crisp voice said.
Patrick’s wife or daughter, Sam presumed. He couldn’t quite gauge her age from her voice. ‘May I speak to Mr Hamilton, please? It’s Samuel Weatherby. I believe he’s expecting me.’
‘Actually,’ she corrected, ‘you’re seeing me. I’m his daughter and I run the house.’
Something his father had definitely neglected to tell him. Alarm bells rang in Sam’s head. Please don’t let this be some elaborate ruse on his father’s part to fix him up with someone he considered a suitable partner. Sam didn’t want a partner. He was quite happy with his life just the way it was, thank you.
Then again, brooding over your own mortality probably meant you didn’t pay as much attention to detail as usual. And Sam wanted this job. He’d give his father the benefit of the doubt. ‘My apologies, Ms Hamilton.’
‘I assume, as you’re ringing me, you’re at the gate?’
‘Yes. I parked in the visitor car park. Is that OK, or do I need to move my car?’
‘It’s fine. I’ll come and let you in,’ she said.
He ended the call, and a couple of minutes later a woman came walking round the corner.
She was wearing a well-cut dark business suit and low-heeled shoes. Her dark hair was woven into a severe French pleat, and she wore the bare minimum of make-up. Sam couldn’t quite sum her up: she dressed like a woman in her forties, but her skin was unlined enough for her to be around his own age.
‘Sorry to keep you waiting, Mr Weatherby.’ She tapped a code into the keypad, opened the gate and held out her hand to shake his.
Formal, too. OK. He’d let himself be guided by her.
Her handshake was completely businesslike, firm enough to warn him that she wasn’t a pushover and yet she wasn’t trying to prove that she was physically as strong as a man.
‘Welcome to Chiverton Hall, Mr Weatherby.’
‘Sam,’ he said. Though he noticed that she didn’t ask him to call her by her own first name.
‘I’m afraid my father hasn’t told me much about you, other than that you’re interested in a voluntary job here for the next three months—so I assume that either you’re a mature student, or you’re changing career and you’re looking for some experience to help with that.’
She thought he was a student? Then again, he’d been expecting to deal with her father. There had definitely been some crossed wires. ‘I’m changing career,’ he said. Which was true: just not the whole truth.
‘Did you bring your CV with you?’
‘No.’ Which had been stupid of him. ‘But I can access it on my phone and email it over to you.’
‘Thank you. That would be useful.’ Her smile was kind, and made it clear she thought he wasn’t up to the job.
This was ridiculous. Why should he have to prove himself to a woman he’d never met before, for a temporary and voluntary post?
Though, according to his father, they needed help. Having someone clueless who’d need to take up lots of her time for training was the last thing she needed. In her shoes, he’d be the same—wanting someone capable.
‘Let me show you round the house,’ she said, ‘and you can tell me what you want to get out of a three-month placement.’
Proof for his father that he could take direction and deal with ordinary people. If he told her that, she’d run a mile. And he needed to get this job, so he could stay here to keep an eye on his parents. ‘Experience,’ he said instead.
‘Of conservation work or management?’
‘Possibly both.’ He felt ridiculously underprepared. He’d expected a casual chat with a friend of his father’s, and an immediate offer to start work there the next week. What an arrogant idiot he was. Maybe his father had a point. To give himself thinking time, he asked, ‘What does the job actually entail?’
She blew out a breath. ‘Background: we do an annual survey to check on the condition of our textiles and see what work we need to do over the winter.’
He assumed this was standard practice in the heritage sector.
‘My surveyor found mould in the silk hangings in the ballroom. It’s going to cost a lot to fix, so we’re applying for heritage grants and we’re also running some fundraising events.’
‘So where do I come in?’ he asked.
‘That depends on your skill set.’
Good answer. Victoria Hamilton was definitely one of the sharper tools in the box.
‘If you’re good at website design, I need to update our website with information about the ballroom restoration and its progress. If you’re good at figures, then budgeting and cost control would be a help. If you’ve managed events, then I’d want you to help to set up the programme and run them.’
Help to, he noticed. She clearly had no intention of giving up control. ‘Who fills the gaps?’ he asked.
‘Me.’
‘That’s quite a wide range of skills.’
She shrugged. ‘I started helping with the house as soon as I was old enough. And Dad’s gradually been passing his responsibilities to me. I’ve been in charge of running the house for two years. You have to be adaptable so you can meet any challenge life throws up. In the heritage sector, every day is different.’
Her father believed in her, whereas his didn’t trust him. Part of him envied her. But that wasn’t why he was here.
‘I’ll give you the short version of the house tour,’ she said.
Stately homes had never really been Sam’s thing. He remembered being taken to them when he was young, but he’d been bored and restless until it was time to run around in the parkland or, even better, a children’s play area. But he needed to look enthusiastic right now, if he was to stand any chance of getting this job. ‘I’d love to see around,’ he fibbed.
She led him round to the front. ‘The entrance hall is the first room people would see when they visited, so it needed to look impressive.’
Hence the chandelier, the stunning black and white marble floor, the artwork and the huge curving double staircase. He could imagine women walking down the staircase, with the trains of their dresses sweeping down behind them; and he made a mental note to ask Victoria whether any of her events involved people in period dress—because that was something he could help with, through Jude.
There were plenty of portraits on the walls; he assumed most of them were of Hamilton ancestors.
‘Once they’d been impressed by the entrance hall—and obviously they’d focus on the plasterwork on the ceiling, not the chandelier—visitors would go up the staircase and into the salon,’ she said.
Again, the room was lavishly decorated, with rich carpets and gilt-framed paintings.
‘If you were close to the family, you’d go into the withdrawing room,’ she said.
Another sumptuous room.
‘Closer still, and you’d be invited to the bedroom.’
He couldn’t help raising his eyebrows at her.
She didn’t even crack a smile, just earnestly explained to him, ‘They didn’t just dress and sleep here. A lot of business was conducted in the private rooms.’
‘Uh-huh.’ It was all about money, not sex, then.
‘And if you were really, really close, you’d be invited into the closet. This one was remodelled as a dressing room in the mid-eighteen-hundreds, but originally it was the closet.’ She indicated a small, plain room.
He managed to stop himself making a witty remark about closets. Mainly because he didn’t think she’d find it funny. Victoria Hamilton was the most serious and earnest woman he’d ever met. ‘Surely the more important your guest, the posher the room you’d use?’
‘No. The public rooms meant everyone could hear what you were talking about. Nowadays it’d be the equivalent of, say, video-calling your bank manager about your overdraft on speakerphone in the middle of a crowded coffee shop. The more privacy you wanted, the smaller the room and the smaller the number of people who could overhear you and gossip. Even the servants couldn’t overhear things in the closet.’
‘Got you. So that’s where you’d plot your business deals?’
‘Or revolutions, or marriage-brokering.’
He followed her back to the salon.
‘Then we have the Long Gallery—it runs the whole length of the house. When it was too cold and wet to walk in the gardens, they’d walk here. Mainly just promenading up and down, looking at the pictures or through the windows at the garden. It’s a good place to think.’
She flushed slightly then, and Sam realised she’d accidentally told him something personal. When Victoria Hamilton needed to think, she paced. Here.
‘Next door, in the ballroom, they’d hold musical soirées. Sometimes it was a piano recital, sometimes there would be singing, and sometimes they’d have a string quartet for a ball.’
‘The room where you have the mould problem,’ he remembered. Was she blinking away tears? Crying over a room?
‘We’ve tested the air and it’s safe for visitors—you don’t need a mask or anything,’ she said.
He wasn’t going to pretend he knew much about mould, other than the black stuff that had crept across the ceiling of his friends’ houses during his student days. So he simply followed her through.
‘Oh.’ It wasn’t quite what he’d expected. The walls, curtains and upholstery were all cream and duck-egg-blue; there was a thick rug in the centre of the room, a grand piano, and chairs and chaises-longue laid out along the walls. There were mirrors on all the walls, reflecting the light from the windows and the chandelier.
‘It’s not a huge ballroom,’ she said. ‘Big enough for about fifty, and they’d have supper downstairs in the dining room or they’d lay out a standing supper in the Long Gallery.’
‘Is it ever used as a ballroom now?’ he asked, intrigued.
‘Not for years, but I’m planning to use it as part of the fundraising. It’ll be a Christmas ball, with everyone wearing Regency dress, and dinner will be a proper Regency ball supper.’
