Free The Ivy Tree by Mary Stewart Page A

to sell it, or pay Con to manage it. You needn’t have Julie on your conscience.’
    â€˜But surely—’ it was absurd, I thought, to feel as if one was being backed against a wall by this steady pressure of will – ‘But surely, if the old man realised that he was ill, and still Annabel hadn’t come back, he would leave things to Con? Or if he left them to Julie, and she was content to let Con go on as manager, wouldn’t that be all right?’
    Her lips folded in that soft obstinate line. ‘That wouldn’t answer. Can’t you see how impossible – ah, well, take it from me that it wouldn’t work out like that. No, my dear, this is the best way, and you’re the gift straight from the gods. Con believes he’ll never get control of Whitescar and the capital except this way. When you’ve said you’ll help, I’ll explain more fully, and you’ll see what a chance it is for all of us, and no harm done, least of all to that stubborn old man sitting at Whitescar waiting for her to come home . . .’
    Somehow, without wanting it, I had taken the cigarette, my hands fidgeting with carton and lighter in spite of myself. I stood silently while she talked, looking about me through the first, blue, sharp-scented cloud of smoke . . . the sagging bed, the purplish wallpaper, the wardrobe and dressing-chest of yellow deal, the tablecloth with the geometric flowers of Prussian blue and carmine, and the stain on the ceiling that was the shape of the map of Ireland. I thought of the high moors and the curlews calling and the beeches coming into leaf in the windbreaks. And of the collie-dog waving his tail, and the straight blue stare of Connor Winslow . . .
    It was disconcerting to feel the faint prickle of nervous excitement along the skin, the ever-so-slightly quickened heartbeat, the catch in the breath. Because of course the thing was crazy. Dangerous and crazy and impossible. This silly, stolid pudding of a woman couldn’t possibly have realised how crazy it was . . .
    No, I thought. No. Go while the going’s good. Don’t touch it .
    â€˜Well?’ said Lisa Dermott.
    I went to the window and dragged the curtains shut across it. I turned abruptly back to her. The action was somehow symbolic; it shut us in together, storybook conspirators in the solitary, sleazy upstairs room that smelt of too much cigarette smoke.
    â€˜Well?’ I echoed her, sharply. ‘All right. I am interested. And I’ll come, if you can persuade me that it can possibly work . . . Go on. I’ll really listen now.’

4
    Or take me by the body so meek ,
    Follow, my love, come over the strand—
    And throw me in the water so deep ,
    For I darena go back to Northumberland .
    Ballad:
    The Fair Flower of Northumberland .
    It took three weeks. At the end of that time Lisa Dermott vowed that I would do. There was nothing, she said, that she or Con knew about Whitescar and Annabel that I, too, didn’t now know.
    My handwriting, even, passed muster. The problem of the signature had been one of Lisa’s worst worries, but she had brought me some old letters, written before Annabel’s disappearance, and when I showed her the sheets that I had covered with carefully practised writing, she eventually admitted that they would pass.
    â€˜After all, Lisa —’ I used Christian names for her and Con, and made a habit of referring to Matthew Winslow as ‘Grandfather’ – ‘I shan’t be doing much writing. The person who matters is Grandfather, and I shan’t have to write to him. As far as the bank’s concerned, the signature is all that’s needed, and I’ve got that off pretty well, you must admit. In any case, even a signature might change a bit in eight years; it’ll be easy enough to account for any slight differences, one would think.’
    We were in another