Country Plot by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

If there was one big thing like a Titian I could sell, I wouldn’t hesitate or repine. It would be worth it to put everything right. But none of the bits and pieces, lovely though they are, is valuable enough to make any difference.’
    â€˜What about taking out a loan?’ Jenna said, thinking hard.
    â€˜Loans have to be serviced. I’d just be adding to the costs, and my income wouldn’t stand it.’ Kitty pulled herself together briskly. ‘Well, let’s not talk about it now. How about my giving you a quick tour of the house after breakfast, so that you have some idea of the task ahead?’
    She obviously didn’t want to dwell on it, so Jenna followed her lead and changed the subject brightly. But the thought of the shadow hanging over this pleasant woman almost spoiled the delicious Full English that Mrs Phillips served up.
    â€˜You’re spoiling me,’ Jenna told her. ‘If this keeps up I’ll be as fat as a pig in no time.’
    â€˜We believe in breakfasts in this house,’ Mrs Phillips said comfortably. ‘Best time of day to eat. Fill the tank
before
you drive the car.’
    â€˜We don’t go in for large lunches,’ Kitty explained, ‘so you’ll find you’ll burn it off by supper time.’
    Kitty seemed really to have intended a ‘quick tour of the house’ but Jenna was so interested in everything that it took some time. On the ground floor were the drawing room and dining room, furnished and decorated like something from the National Trust, except they were stuffed with a great many more of what Kitty called ‘the things’ – china, glass, silver, clocks, curios and so on. There were lots of paintings, too: family portraits, which Kitty was very amusing about, landscapes and quite a lot of sailing boats. ‘Peter’s father was a keen sailor and he loved nautical pictures, so most of them were collected by him. Oh, look, here’s Sir George Everest. I told you I’d show him to you. We keep him tucked away in this alcove because it really isn’t a very good painting. It wasn’t done from life, but from a photograph, some time after his death, which is probably why it looks so wooden.’
    Sir George appeared to be a vigorous old gentleman with a huge beard and wild hair. Even Jenna, who had no expertise, could see that it wasn’t a very good painting.
    â€˜Lovely frame, though,’ Kitty said, touching it. ‘Probably worth more than the picture. They were so terribly proud of him, you see, that they framed him with no expense spared. He used to hang in the hall in Peter’s grandfather’s time, but his father moved him in here so as not to frighten the visitors.’
    Famous names popped up quite frequently. ‘That’s a sketch of Disraeli – he was a frequent house-guest. That pair of vases – ghastly aren’t they? – were a gift from Prince Albert after the Great Exhibition. Sir Edward Everest was quite chummy with Albert and helped with the organization. Peter Scott did that painting of pheasants while he was staying here once. That cigarette box was a birthday present from Princess Margaret.’
    Kitty’s throwaway comments showed how used she was to living with history; yet Jenna felt that dispersing the collection would diminish it, and believed Kitty thought the same, though she would never make a fuss. She wasn’t brought up that way.
    In the dining room there was a long mahogany table round which Jenna counted twenty matching chairs, and there were more against the walls. ‘It’s George the Third,’ Kitty said. ‘Lovely piece, but impossibly large. The only people who buy these big tables now are corporations who want them for their boardrooms. And even then, most of them want new. It’s been well used in its time. The Everests were always tremendous entertainers. Peter’s father, between the wars and