Marnie, unable to speak, gave a small sad smile.
‘And I know, Marnie, that she believed that she was your mother and that made her very happy.’
Marnie walked home to Little Raspberries across the green, aware of eyes on her through windows making her conscious of every step. As she turned the corner, she saw Hilary sitting on her low wall, still in her funereal garb and her mood rose.
‘I appear to be homeless,’ Hilary said with a smile. ‘Do you think the new lady of the manor might let me have a cup of tea?’
At the side of her doorstep was a posy of flowers and a bag of home grown onions, plus a bottle of David’s cherry wine, so the label read.
‘I can stretch to something stronger if you like,’ said Marnie, picking up the presents and opening the door. Company would be good today.
‘What a lovely house,’ said Hilary, walking in and looking around. ‘Though, I suppose you’ll be living in the manor soon.’
‘I haven’t even thought about it,’ replied Marnie. ‘I’m waiting to open my eyes and find out it’s all been a dream.’ So long as she didn’t wake up at her desk in Café Caramba with Suranna King about to land her a punch, she thought. All that debacle felt like a million lifetimes away.
Marnie took two glasses out of her cupboard and uncorked the wine.
‘Cheers,’ said Hilary, raising her glass to chink against Marnie’s as they sat at the kitchen table. ‘Here’s to new beginnings.’
‘And here’s to your . . . freedom?’ Marnie asked tentatively.
‘Oh yes,’ Hilary said with emphasis. ‘Julian is driving up for me as we speak. I shan’t be taking anything with me. I’ve moved everything I have of any value out of the house already.’ Hilary didn’t look the same dowdy woman as she’d appeared the first time Marnie had seen her. Her eyes were shining, her complexion dewy, even her grey hair was bouncier. ‘I’ll make sure that Titus leaves Wychwell, too. I have an offer he can’t refuse.’
‘I’ll miss you,’ said Marnie. ‘I mean, I hardly know you, but I’ve known other people for longer and yet less, if you know what I mean.’
Hilary smiled again, the smile of a truly content woman. ‘I do.’
They sipped the wine and it was sweet and punchy and tasted of summer.
‘Marnie, I have an apology to make to you,’ said Hilary. ‘I really didn’t know that Titus had been stealing from the estate funds until I started snooping around when I was trying to get my own finances in order to leave him. How much has he taken?’
‘I haven’t got a final figure, but, it’s a lot. At least a million.’
‘Oh hell.’ Hilary let out a long breath and raised her eyes to the ceiling. ‘I’ve been a fool too, trusting him. I really believed we were living from wise investments, but I hold true to the promise I made and I will make sure it is all paid back to the estate. And whatever he has taken from the people in the village, I’ll get it returned to them too. I have a plan.’
Poor Hilary, thought Marnie. She must feel terrible.
‘Mr Wemyss is on the case,’ she said, hoping that might relieve her of the obligation to fulfil such a ridiculously ambitious pledge.
Hilary picked up the copy of the fourth Country Manors book, which was sitting on the table next to a duo of salt and pepper pots.
‘Titus has forbidden me from reading these, says they’re pornographic tripe. Which is rich considering what I’ve recently found he views on the internet. But then again, he is the emperor of double standards.’
‘I can give you book two and three if you haven’t got them yet,’ Marnie offered, ‘but you’re not having that number four until I’ve finished it. I have to find out how it all ends.’
‘It doesn’t end at book four, surely?’ said Hilary, flicking to the last page. ‘She’d be an idiot if she killed the cash cow.’
‘You’ll laugh,’ said Marnie, ‘but I bet there won’t be another one. I think Emelie Tibbs was Penelope Black.’
Hilary looked at Marnie, realised she was serious and then burst into laughter. ‘That isn’t true.’
‘I’m sure it is,’ said Marnie. ‘Someone in Wychwell wrote that series. I’d put my life on it.’
‘I know they did. Me,’ said Hilary. ‘I’m Penelope Black.’
For the umpteenth time that day, Marnie was stunned into silence. Hilary topped Marnie’s glass up and handed it to her.
‘These are the sorts of days that enrich my writing,’ she said. ‘The days when fact out-fictions fiction.’
When Marnie eventually found her voice it was to say just one word: ‘You?’
‘Yes, me,’ said Hilary with a deep curve of a grin. ‘And I owe so much to Titus really. If he hadn’t kept telling me that I had no imagination whatsoever, I wouldn’t have tried to prove him wrong. I picked up a notepad one day and I started a story about a hideous dick’ – Hilary’s beautiful voice made a hideous dick sound something to aspire to – ‘with a giant chip on his shoulder. Married to a woman with passions surging under a very ordinary exterior. Then I added a masterful anti-hero who realises her true worth.’
‘Lara, and Manfred?’
‘My middle name is Clara,’ grinned Hilary. ‘My maiden name is Stamp.’
‘Oh my lord, Penelope . . . Penny Black.’
‘I never expected to be published. I certainly didn’t expect the tsunami of interest and the clamouring for more.’
‘And who is Manfred based on?’ Marnie couldn’t wait to find out.
‘He’s a collage of all my favourites: Julian of course, Michael Bublé, a little bit of Orson Welles and a lot of Liam Neeson.’
Marnie laughed, then stopped suddenly as the full implication of Hilary’s alter-ego hit her like a slap from a heavyweight boxer.
‘You’re super rich.’
‘I am,’ Hilary agreed. ‘And that means that Titus will be gunning for me financially soon. Julian Fosse is my publisher as well as my lover and he’s managed to delay some payments on my books so I look officially much poorer than I am, but I will still need to give Titus quite a sum to get out of my marriage. I shall repay everything, plus interest, that he has stolen directly back to Wychwell as part of the divorce settlement, so please forward me the final figures. A little insight: if he doesn’t agree to it, between us we will combine forces to sue him for embezzlement and also to drag the family name through the mud, which is of stupid importance to him. He wouldn’t want it tarnished, which is more than ironic. You hold a cocked shotgun to his head with that threat, trust me.’
Hilary’s phone rang and she excused herself whilst she answered it.
From the smile on her face, Marnie didn’t need to ask who was on the other end of it.
‘My chauffeur has arrived in the car park,’ she said, replacing the phone in her bag. ‘Thank you for your friendship, Marnie. I always had my sister to talk to and I’ve missed her so much. The day you pulled up beside me in the rain was one of those awful low times when I really needed her. I was so grateful for your company. You’re a good soul, I sensed that from the beginning.’ Hilary picked up her handbag. Even that small action showed off her innate elegance.