IT SEEMED BRYN knew exactly how to clean a filthy cow, which was just as well because Charlie had no clue. She’d have fussed about hot water—which wasn’t exactly possible in a tumbledown barn, and Cordelia wasn’t exactly small enough to take into the house and pop into the bath.
But Bryn simply hosed the worst of the mud from her—‘Left on it’ll cake and leave her cold.’ And then found a bunch of rags. He handed some to Charlie and took more himself.
‘We rub,’ he told her. ‘It’ll warm us up as well as Cordelia. She is cold. We dry her, we feed her well and then we keep her in the shed with her calf until we’re sure she’s recovered. If we leave her like this she may well go down, and if she drops it’ll be hard to get her up again. We’ve dodged one vet visit with Flossie. Let’s not risk another.’
So despite her wanting to head into the house and a warm bath herself, she stood on the opposite side of a cow to Bryn and she rubbed and rubbed, and Bryn rubbed and rubbed…and it was more of the same, she thought. He…this whole situation…this man…made something happen to her body…to her mind?
Bryn’s words kept playing in her head. We. We dry her. We feed her well.
We was a magical word. It made her feel shivery but not from cold.
How long since she’d been part of we?
The calf was nudging around them, heading for Cordelia’s teats, backing out and checking them out and then darting under again. She was a strange-looking calf, still a bit bony from a malnourished start, but nosey and pushy and…fun? She had one huge white eye in an otherwise black face, which made her look like some sort of bovine pirate. She kept trying to shove Bryn out of the way as she tried to access her mother’s teats and Bryn did his best to accommodate—but Violet was still pushy. She kept popping up from the teats to check on Charlie, and the sight of her pirate eye under Bryn’s arm made Charlie want to chuckle.
Bryn was so good. His affection for the calf seemed immediate. He obviously loved animals.
The sight of him was doing something to Charlie that she didn’t understand. Right now she didn’t want to understand. She just wanted it not to end. She was still wet but the rubbing not only warmed her, but was somehow…mesmeric?
Bryn was talking in soothing tones to Cordelia. Cow talk? In Welsh?
‘You’re thinking she understands?’ she asked.
‘All cows know Welsh. It’s international cow language.’
It was a very silly answer but she liked it. She went back to rubbing, insensibly happy at the ridiculousness of it.
‘So why the trouble?’ Bryn asked, gently, and it was like being pulled back into the real world but this was Bryn asking. He was leaving soon and somehow it didn’t seem wrong that he should ask. But still, she didn’t want to emerge from her happy place.
‘Trouble?’
‘I can see it on your face,’ he said. The laughter had gone, but the gentleness remained. ‘Trouble apart from your grandma’s death.’
‘I…’
‘You don’t need to tell me if you don’t want.’
‘I guess.’ She shrugged and rubbed for a bit more and then thought, Why not?
‘It’s just… This is Grandma’s farmlet, but it’s mortgaged. Heavily mortgaged, for more than it’s worth. There’s no money. The bank’s repossessing. They’ve given me another month, which considering the size of the debt is good of them, but after that, I need to be gone.’
‘And you live in Melbourne.’
‘I’m supposed to live in Melbourne, but if you can tell me what I should do with seven decrepit dogs, a dumb cow and calf, and chooks that are way past point of lay…’
‘There are animal refuges.’
‘There are,’ she told him. ‘And I’ve talked to them and they’ve told me frankly what chances my dogs, Grandma’s dogs, have. The people running them are fantastic but they run on the smell of an oily rag and right now they’re in trouble. The government’s just made puppy farming illegal, with huge penalties. All the dodgy backyard operators are dumping their breeding stock before the new penalties come in, and there are so many dogs needing rehoming they can’t cope. They’ve said they’ll keep Grandma’s dogs for a month and do their best to find them homes but they’re not hopeful. None of my…none of Grandma’s dogs are what you’d call cute. So after a month…’
She paused and rubbed Cordelia a bit more and struggled to continue. Forcing herself to think of the other animals. ‘And a cow and calf like this? Scrawny, mixed breed, neither dairy nor beef? I might be able to find a place for the chooks, but the cows and the dogs…’ She shook her head. ‘Somewhere up there Grandma’s breaking her heart and so am I.’
‘Hey,’ he said and her hand, which had been rubbing with a fierceness that was almost desperate, was suddenly grasped and held. ‘There are solutions. There must be.’
‘You tell me what they are, then,’ she said and tugged her hand away because a woman could only indulge in fantasy for so long and the time for fantasy was over. ‘Are we done here? Let’s go find your gear from the car, get cleaned up and get ourselves ready to face the day.’ And then she shook her head. ‘Or not. There’s no need for you to face anything. I’ll cut a hole in the fencing along the dry part of the boundary and you’ll be right to go.’
‘I won’t be,’ he said, almost apologetically.
‘What?’
‘The tree that came down last night,’ he told her. ‘It came down on my car.’
She stared at him in horror. ‘On your car?’
‘Right across the top. I haven’t checked closely but from where I was standing when the tree came down…well, she won’t be driveable.’
‘But I thought…’ Her heart almost seemed to stop as she thought of the implications. ‘Your car… That tree… You could have been in it!’
‘So I could,’ he said, equitably. ‘But I wasn’t, which is why I’m doing the Pollyanna thing this morning. The sun’s out, I’m not squashed, and there has to be a solution for all things.’
‘I need to see,’ she said, appalled, and he took her rags from her and gave Cordelia a farewell pat.
‘Okay,’ he warned. ‘But it won’t be pretty.’
* * *
It wasn’t pretty.
So much had happened this morning that she hadn’t even checked out the front of the house. She’d taken Bryn’s word that the driveway was blocked and then been…distracted. They left the sheds, rounded the house and she stopped dead.
Dead. That pretty much described the massive gum that had crashed right across the driveway. In fact it had been dead for the last couple of years, killed by drought, or simply by old age. It had been the biggest tree on the property, a giant that even alive had been far too close to the house for comfort.
But there was no way Grandma would have cut down such a thing, and seeing it now, split, shattered, still smouldering at the stump, Charlie felt her eyes fill. She remembered it as a magic, living thing.
When she was eight years old her grandfather had fitted a rope ladder to the lowest branch. It had been a messy year. Her parents had been going through a vitriolic divorce and Charlie had been sent to Grandma and Pa’s, ‘to get her out of the way’.
Blessedly Grandma had decided that was exactly what Charlie needed. A place of her own. She’d been provided with armloads of comics, the kind her mother would never let her near. The first fork of the tree formed almost an armchair. Charlie had lugged cushions up there, hauled the rope ladder after her and pretended for a blessed while that the world didn’t exist.
And now…
‘A friend, was it?’ Bryn asked and she looked at him in astonishment. What sort of guy guessed a tree could be a friend?
She shook her head, too emotional to speak, then gave her face an angry swipe. So much emotion. She needed to move on, letting the bank have what was left of this tree as well as what was left of this place. And the dogs and cows…
Did banks take dogs and cows?
And somewhere under this mess were the remains of Bryn’s car. It had been squashed on her land while he’d been returning her dog who’d been wandering untended.
Could he sue? Of course he could.
How could you sue someone who’d been sucked dry?
Trying to fight off the wash of something dangerously close to hysterics, she edged towards the vast mound of splintered tree. The deluge of rain that had followed had stopped the whole thing being burned. There was still ancient foliage on the dead wood, the remains of vast branches with millions of leaves.
The car was on the other side of the trunk. She could just see. It was yellow. A branch had smashed down over the front but the body was still in…
In shape?
In the shape of a bright yellow, once stunning, Italian supercar.
Here.
She stepped back as if she, too, had been burned.
She’d seen this car, before her grandmother died. She’d driven from Melbourne for the weekend, and arrived as the guy had been leaving, a man in his sixties, smooth, urbane, wearing a suit that had screamed money. He’d given her a smile that had made her edgy—or maybe she’d already been edgy, what with a supercar parked in Grandma’s yard.
‘Good morning, Miss Foster. I’m Thomas Carlisle. You’re earlier than we expected. Your grandmother told me you were coming today. Sadly I can’t stay and talk, but do let me tell you what a wonderful woman your grandmother is. Clever, intuitive, forward thinking. It’s been a pleasure doing business with her.’
And he’d gripped her hand, warmly, strongly, as if he’d had a right to hold her—and then he’d slid into his horrid yellow car and slimed out of her life. Out of her grandmother’s life.
Leaving catastrophe.
‘I’ve just invested a little money,’ her grandmother had told her, defensive already. ‘It’s a solid investment and he’s such an intelligent man. And he’s a baron, Charlie—a proper baron. You’re supposed to address him as Lord Carlisle, but he says “call me Thomas”. He has a stately home and everything.
‘He doesn’t boast about it, though. I wish he could have stayed to talk to you but of course he’s so busy. He has a brochure up in the general store and everyone’s talking about it. Look.’ She’d handed Charlie a glossy, gold-embossed pamphlet. ‘See what I’m now part of.’
‘Straws,’ she said now, faintly, the sour taste of that conversation rushing back.
And Bryn, standing beside her, got it.
‘You met my uncle, then?’
So she was right.
‘Your uncle…’ She whirled on him, fury threatening to choke her. ‘That scumbag is your uncle? You’re in that scheme that robbed half this neighbourhood of their savings, that made Grandma…that caused her…that…’
She could no longer get words out. She turned back and stared at the remains of one ridiculous supercar and all she felt was fury that the stump hadn’t burned far enough to reach it. ‘Get off my property,’ she managed. ‘I don’t care that your car is wrecked. I don’t care how you manage it. Get off this land now or I’ll ring the police and have you carted away. Come to think of it I should ring them anyway. Your uncle…’
‘Charlie, he’s nothing to do with me.’
‘No? Family business, isn’t that what you said? Your family. So where is he now? He was supposed to have committed suicide, only the police say it was faked. They said he’s probably in Brazil or somewhere, but wherever he is he’ll be poncing round being Lord Whatever He Calls Himself This Week, selling these useless straws and talking old people into investing in his phony, cruel schemes.’
And then she paused. ‘Or maybe he’s still here. Is that why you’re here? To help him get away? Whatever it is, I want nothing to do with it. Nothing to do with you. I don’t care if you’re covered in mud, Bryn Morgan or whoever you are. I’ve done with lying and cheating and I’m not as trusting as Grandma. I’m not even going to thank you for saving Cordelia. Or Flossie. Get off my land—or the bank’s land—and get off now.’
And she turned and headed for the house at a run.
* * *
As Lord Carlisle of Ballystone Hall, Bryn led a privileged life. From the moment his grandfather had crumpled, had turned to him in shattered dependence, he’d decided the only thing he could do was to care for the vast estate, to pass it on—to whoever—with pride. He’d worked hard, hands on, doing what he loved. The lands had improved. The lot of the tenant farmers had improved, and the Ballystone stud cattle were starting to be known the world over.
Regardless, one thing Bryn didn’t have to worry about was his creature comforts. There had always been a hot bath at the end of the day, excellent food, staff to see to details.
Staff was what he needed now. Help to get out of this mess.
He was filthy. His jacket was somewhere inside the house, blood-stained, abandoned after carrying Flossie in last night. He’d been wearing a light shirt, trousers and shoes, which had been enough while working hard with Cordelia but now… The sun wasn’t strong enough to stop the cold. He was wet, muddy…no, make that filthy, and he was cold.
The farmhouse behind him looked firmly locked. He could still feel the echoes of the slam of the front door.
He raked his hair and a thick wedge of mud came away on his hand. Digging cows out of bogs was a filthy business.
He needed his phone. It had been in his jacket pocket but he’d taken it out when he’d used the jacket to carry Flossie. It’d be lying on the passenger seat of the car.
He had a change of clothes in the car.
If he could reach the car he could get his clothes, get his phone, wash down in the shed and ring for assistance. He could even ring the police, and get the stolid local sergeant to explain to Charlie that he wasn’t the scumbag she thought he was.
If she’d listen.
He wanted her to listen.
Why?
And strangely, tangentially, he was suddenly thinking…
No! The last thing he needed right now was emotional entanglement. Actually, the last thing he needed ever was emotional entanglement. The thought of loving someone else…
Just no.
But why was he thinking of that now? It didn’t make sense, but he was.
When he was nineteen years old he’d lost his father, his uncle, his cousin and his twin sister, in the one appalling tragedy. The grief he’d felt that day was enough to last him a lifetime. During the ensuing years he’d tried dating—of course he had—but the moment he felt himself getting close that fear closed in. He held himself to himself.
But he hadn’t held himself to himself last night or this morning. He’d held Charlie as if he cared.
He did care.
Why?
Because it was time out of frame, he told himself. These last few weeks, dragged into his uncle’s sordid mess, away from home, away from anything that seemed solid, his normal defences weren’t working. They’d be working soon enough. He knew that. But while they weren’t…
‘Pull back,’ he told himself. ‘Let yourself help, let yourself be a friend, but no more than that.’
‘She doesn’t want to be a friend. She thinks you’re as bad as your uncle.’ He was talking out loud.
‘That makes it easier. She has no need of emotional connection and neither do you. What’s happened last night and this morning was an aberration. Move on.’
So finally he shoved the thought of Charlie’s anger away as best he could—and the emotions that went with it—and tackled what lay in front of him.
The tangle of smashed branches prevented any access to the car. A vast branch was blocking the passenger side. A smaller one lay across the driver’s door, and one had slammed right across the engine.
He glanced back at the house. As he did, the curtains of the front window were hauled shut.
No help there. Not that he blamed her. What his uncle had done was horrific.
He’d thought Thomas only victimised farmers with Hereford herds. If he’d guessed her grandmother was a victim he would have explained earlier, but it was too late now.
But knowing what she was thinking…
Don’t go there.
He needed to stop thinking of Charlie and focus.
Clothes. Phone. Car.
He thought back to the shed, where Cordelia and Violet were presumably still recovering. While he’d been rubbing, he’d noticed an ancient scythe; like the ones tenant farmers had used to harvest crops a hundred years ago. He liked old tools.
He’d also noticed old saws. He didn’t like them so much.
He looked again at the tree and he thought longingly of the well-maintained chainsaws in the vast outbuildings at Ballystone.
Beggars can’t be choosers. When in Rome do as the Romans do. A bad workman always blames his tools.
Yeah, how many other platitudes could he think of? he wondered as he trudged back towards the shed. He’d obviously have plenty of time to think of them.
* * *
He was sawing his way into his car.
She shouldn’t look. She was showered and warm and the doors were firmly locked and she should be over it, but she was still shaking with anger and she was still furiously aware that That Man was still on her property.
The bank’s property.
She should call the police. They’d want to know he was here. She’d almost done her own citizen’s arrest. He was stuck.
She was upstairs in Grandma’s big front bedroom, edging the drapes aside just slightly so she could look.
He’d stripped off his shirt, or maybe it had ripped while he’d fought his way through the tangle of smashed wood. He was bare to the waist. He was sawing methodically, back and forth, long, even strokes.
The tools hadn’t been used since Pa had died, almost ten years ago. She knew the saw would be rusty.
Excellent, she thought savagely. He’d have his work cut out for him. Even if it took him the whole day, that was a token recompense for all the pain his relation had inflicted on this community. On Grandma.
On her.
She headed back downstairs and fished in the bureau for the glossy brochure Grandma had shown her. It was a magnificent production, with a picture of a stunning Hereford bull on the front, a beast even Charlie could recognise as something special. In the background was what looked like a little like a castle, ringed by mountains.
Once in a lifetime opportunity to gain access to sperm straws from the herd of Lord Carlisle of Ballystone Hall.
The brochure followed with a string of stunning comments from the UK’s most respected farming magazines.
‘What Lord Carlisle has done has produced an advance in breed quality never before seen in this country…’
There were links to articles astounded at what this breed was achieving.
And then the offer…
Straws of semen for sale under strict conditions. These straws are sold with conditions that each progeny will make a return to the company. If you don’t wish to purchase semen, you have this once in a lifetime chance to invest in this amazing breed.
Apparently Lord Carlisle had no desire to make more money himself but having set up his breeding herd at home he wished to see it expand into ‘the colonies’.
There was sworn proof of testing, of stunning results from careful breeding. There were photographs of semen straws with the coat of arms of the Carlisles discreetly embossed on the outer wrapping. The straws had numbered certification of authenticity.
Included was a description of genetic markers to identify progeny and protect ‘copyright’, and enough science to make her eyes water.
There was enough promise of profit to make Grandma hand over what money she had and then head to the bank to borrow more. To a greedy bank manager in a small community who’d been dazzled himself.
It was all so stupid. So farcical. A decent Internet search could have exposed the scam before it began. But this was a depressed farming community, where drought and failing profits had eaten away its foundations. The young had mostly left, for the city and for secure jobs. What was left was a core of elderly farmers, struggling to make ends meet, struggling to keep their land. They’d been clinging to hope, and hope was vulnerable. This man had targeted them well.
By the time Charlie had realised what was going on, the whole thing had been exposed. There’d been no need for Charlie to do any sleuthing—the police had done it for her. The real Lord Carlisle was said to keep himself to himself, an old man, almost a hermit, and in ill health.
The man calling himself Thomas Carlisle had obviously taken advantage, creating his own fraudulent online presence. Certification, paperwork, sperm containers, had all been stolen. Signatures had been forged. With no authority, he’d sold empty promises. Lies. Heartbreak.
The real Lord Carlisle had been contacted and was said to be appalled.
She headed to the Internet now and skimmed the recent media reports of the scam. Thomas Carlisle, real name Thomas Morgan… She hadn’t even registered the name.
He was Bryn’s uncle. Bryn was driving his uncle’s car. He’d come to help a man who’d ruined lives.
Charlie sat at the kitchen table, her fingers seemingly paralysed on the keyboard. She was weeping.
These last months…the desperate call from Grandma… ‘They’re taking my land, love. The house… They’re saying by the end of the week…’
She’d come down straight away, into a mess. She’d transferred what had been left of her own funds as a stop gap because she hadn’t been able to see any other way of halting the bailiffs. She’d headed back to Melbourne to see lawyers…
And then the heart attack, the loss, the grief…
This man’s uncle.
She’d kissed him.
Yeah, she’d been as naïve as Grandma.
She thought of him now, sawing with a rusty blade, trying to get into a car that must have cost far more than the value of this farm.
‘I should ring every farmer in the neighbourhood and let them come to watch,’ she said out loud, but she knew she wouldn’t. Because the damage had been done, and maybe she understood now the way her grandmother had been conned.
‘Because he smiles,’ she muttered. ‘And that smile… If his uncle was like him…’
She sniffed and sniffed again and then headed to the kitchen to cuddle Flossie, who was looking much perkier than last night. The bandage around her leg was still in place, looking almost professional. She thought of Bryn, of his tenderness as he’d cared.
‘It’s all a deceit,’ she muttered as the rest of the dogs mustered in for a cuddle as well. ‘How stupid am I? As stupid as Grandma, or stupider. He can saw out there for a month, I’m not going near.’
* * *
He’d been sawing for an hour when a truck pulled in from the road outside. There’d been a few cars pass, but the thought of flagging anyone down for help was daunting. But the rickety truck slowed as it passed, then did a U-turn and came into the yard.
An elderly farmer climbed out and stared at the mess in bemusement.
‘What the…? You okay, mate? Charlie? She’s okay?’
‘She’s in the house,’ Bryn told him. ‘She’s fine. My car got squashed last night with all my gear in it.’ He straightened and wiped away sweat. ‘I don’t suppose you have a chainsaw I could borrow?’
And then the guy saw the car and Bryn saw his face change.
How many people in this district had been conned?
‘You’re…’
‘I’m nothing to do with him,’ Bryn said wearily. ‘I’m just returning the car to the…’
‘He’s his nephew! He came to help him!’
She must have been watching. Charlie’s head appeared at the top-floor window. She yelled and the guy backed away as if Bryn smelled. Which, considering the mud and the sweat, wasn’t surprising.
‘What the…? You okay?’ the farmer yelled up to Charlie. ‘What’s this low life doing here?’
‘I’m fine,’ Charlie yelled back. ‘He’s getting a taste of summary justice. Leave him to it.’
‘He might be here for a few days,’ the farmer yelled back and then he grinned. ‘Couldn’t happen to a better piece of… Yeah, I won’t say it. Got a mess on my own place, love, but if you’re sure you’re okay…’
‘Thanks,’ Charlie yelled back. ‘But I’m okay. Let’s all mind our own business. This guy’s nothing to do with us.’
She slammed the window shut, the truck did a fast reverse and Bryn was left alone again.
* * *
He sawed on.
In a way, the hard work helped. For the last week he’d been stuck in a dingy motel room or in the interrogation room at the police station, fielding questions from police, from accountants, from lawyers, trying to sort his way through a financial nightmare. His own lawyers had flown out in the end, and the mess was sorted as much as it could be, but the week had left its mark. He’d felt dirty even before he’d arrived here, and Charlie’s contempt was making it worse.
What else could he do?
Years ago his family had abandoned the idea of compensating for Thomas’s crimes. What Thomas had stolen, gambled, conned in his lifetime was enough to destroy everything they’d worked for and more. This scam had been a small one in the scheme of things, and it spoke of desperation. Thomas loved all things European. For him to spend months holed up in such an out of the way place, conning little people… He’d have hated it. And now he’d be in some even more distant country, conning more?
What could Bryn do about it?
Nothing, he conceded. The Ballystone Hall website, used only as a tool for marketing his cattle, was now plastered with warnings of this scam. It was hurting his own finances. People were now questioning the integrity of the Ballystone herd—with good reason. The last weeks had cost him a fortune. The idea of compensating every victim…
‘You can’t do it,’ his lawyers had advised and they’d advised strongly. ‘Your grandfather accepted it and you need to accept it, too. If you do it once you’ll be admitting familial obligation, and you’ll have every one of your uncle’s victims from the last thirty years suing you.’
So he had to wear it, and it made him feel ill. Yesterday all he’d wanted was to get home and put this behind him. He couldn’t bear to face the victims of Thomas’s deceit.
He was facing Charlie.
Or not facing her. She was locked inside the house, hating him, hurting because of what his toe-rag uncle had done.
If Thomas were here now…
He wasn’t. There wasn’t a thing Bryn could do about his uncle. He had to put all his faith in international policing and hope that one day justice would catch up with him.
Meanwhile, could he help Charlie? Pay her out? He could do that without getting emotionally involved.
But the lawyers’ warnings rang in his ears. ‘One pay-out and you’re liable for millions. Don’t even think about it. Most countries have victims of crime compensation. We’re sorry, my lord, but you’ll just have to wear it.’
He was wearing it now.
All he could do was saw, and heave away dead timber, and feel…as if it wasn’t even close to being near enough.
* * *
He was still on her land.
Three hours later he was still sawing, and Charlie needed to take the dogs for a walk, check the chooks and make sure Cordelia was doing okay. And get out of the house.
She couldn’t sit in the kitchen and rage for the rest of the day. Or for the rest of the week. Or until the bailiffs came and repossessed Grandma’s farm.
He’d sawed for a full morning. Maybe that was enough. What she most wanted was to get rid of him and the way he was going…her neighbour had said a few days. She wanted him gone now.
She looked out again at the mass of timber. He didn’t seem to be making inroads. There was still a mess around the car.
Needs must, she thought, sighing. She had to let the guy off the hook.
How?
His phone must be in the car. Otherwise he’d have rung for help by now. If she lent him her phone he could ring for a tow truck, for a woodcutter who was handy with a chainsaw—for a hire car? He’d have to pay—she had nothing to pay with—but that was his call. But she bleakly, finally accepted that she needed to approach him, maybe find the numbers, offer her phone, wait until he’d made the calls.
‘Okay, Charlie, suck it up,’ she told herself. ‘Go lend the toe-rag your phone and give him the right numbers. Anything to get rid of him.’
But it took courage to walk out of the front door.
After her post cow-digging shower, instead of putting on another pair of ancient jeans she’d gone a bit formal. As a defence? Who knew? But for some reason it made her feel a smidge more in control. She’d pulled on black trousers and a crisp white shirt and she’d twisted her hair into a neat knot. Now that decision seemed sensible. She was a career woman, and she knew how to handle conmen.
Or maybe not, but she surely knew not to do anything like kiss them. Idiots kissed conmen and she wasn’t playing the idiot one moment longer.
Go and get rid of him. Fast.