Free The Nothing Girl by Jodi Taylor Page B

place.’
    ‘Why do you keep calling her poor Jenny?’ he interrupted. ‘She appears perfectly normal to me. She’s not deficient in any way or missing anything vital. You’re not, are you?’ he added in a loud whisper to me. ‘Because if you are then this is the moment to tell me. I can take it, I promise you.’
    I shook my head. Once again, he’d defused the moment.
    ‘Now, anything else before we go?’
    He began to make all he preparations necessary for extricating oneself from one of Aunt Julia’s sofas.
    ‘Bloody hell, Jenny, we may be here for life. That remark I made about the cushions applies to the sofas as well.’
    ‘Really?’ said Aunt Julia nastily. ‘Do tell us, Mr Checkland, with whose money will you be buying these new sofas?’
    Russell grinned at her.
    Her face darkened alarmingly. Thomas snorted.
    ‘Language,’ I said, in my head.
    ‘Am I to understand, Russell, that you will be supporting your wife on her money alone?’ asked Uncle Richard, and I guessed this was the crunch. If he showed any weakness now, or tried to explain, or gloss over, or lie …
    ‘Well, mostly yes. Although there’s the money from renting out grazing, of course. 50p per sheep, you know,’ he explained to Aunt Julia and I think we all enjoyed her expression of baffled confusion. ‘And they improve the land no end. And it’s up to them to maintain the boundaries. Not the sheep, of course, the tenants. So as you can see, it’s a sweet deal.’
    Uncle Richard, in his own way, was a great deal more relentless than Aunt Julia.
    ‘So would it be fair to state then, that you bring nothing at all to this unequal marriage and you are marrying my niece solely for her money? Your father would turn in his grave at such behaviour from a Checkland.’
    That really was the wrong thing to say.
    Russell was on his feet in one fluid movement. I came up with him, ready to do what I could. His voice was far more icy than anything my aunt could never achieve. She was tall but he was taller. He looked down his nose at her, but spoke to Uncle Richard.
    ‘I think, sir, that in the drama of the moment you have become confused when you speak of inequality. Perhaps you have been so taken up listening to Mrs Kingdom’s unhelpful statements that you have not had time to consider the benefits to your niece of having a husband in possession of a twelve-roomed Victorian farmhouse with extensive outbuildings, stables, and thirty-three acres of prime grazing land, with a conservative estimate of, at the last count, fractionally over £750,000, fifty per cent of which is being transferred into my future wife’s name even as we speak. I know my fiancée was well provided for by her parents, but I shall be astonished (although very pleased, of course) if she brings anything like that sum to our marriage. Being in possession of these facts, sir, I would be grateful if you could indicate the areas of inequality that give you so much concern.’
    I stood beside him, staunch but shaking, oscillating wildly between fear, admiration, and now, hope.
    Uncle Richard sat back, looking thoughtful. Aunt Julia, however, was not done.
    ‘That’s as maybe,’ she said, dismissing twelve rooms and thirty-three acres with a flick of her wrist. ‘But I must inform you, Mr Checkland, that po – that Jenny’s precarious state of health precludes her from living anywhere except quietly in her own home, here with us.’
    This was crunch time for me. I would be locked away. Once again, he stepped in.
    ‘I knew it,’ he said to me. ‘You’re a vampire and you have to come home every night to your coffin in the cellar.’
    I inhaled the lovely smell of warm ginger biscuits and whispered, ‘I live in the attic.’
    ‘Then you’re an android and have to return to plug yourself in every night? Not a problem – we’ll get batteries. Or – how about a really long extension lead?’
    He was doing it on purpose. Aunt Julia was unused to being mocked. She