It was only a week later that Martin and Stephen were back at Croome.  Christmas was upon them and Lord Alfred had insisted that he wanted to spend it at Croome.

“Let him go if he wants to, your lordship,” said Sir Thomas Barlow, his physician.  “To speak frankly, it will probably be his last one with us.  I probably shouldn’t say that, but I don’t think you go in for humbug, Martin, is that right?”  He rested his hand upon his shoulder.  Martin was surprised by Sir Thomas’ informal tone and behaviour, but was immensely grateful at the same time.  He was always being shielded from unpleasant truths, which was a bad thing in the long run, and in this case he had already worked it out for himself.  Yet, there was still a little electric jolt of to hear it so plainly articulated and once the words had been uttered by the grandfatherly old doctor whom Martin, along with their Majesties themselves, so greatly respected, they could never be retracted and the last straw at which one may have clutched in self-delusion had now gone.

It was decided to bring Lord Alfred down in Martin’s motorcar, despite the cold, wet weather.  Mrs Polk-Stewart had been invited as she cheered him so greatly.  This meant that Constance and her fiancé, his third cousin (one removed) Lord Philip Rous-Poole, must also be invited.

Jack Thayer and Charles Fortune, Stephen’s friends from the University of London, were also to be in the party, as would be the Vane-Gillinghams and, as was customary, Viscount and Viscountess Delvees of Crewkerne who would come across from Somerset.  The Plunger, who was spending Christmas with his parents at Fayette, near Dorking, would be down for the New Year Hunt.

With such a pleasantly full house, there was less chance for gloom, but this also meant less chance for privacy.  For the umpteenth time Uncle Alfred, Martin and Stephen sat together discussing the events of a century ago.  This time they were closeted in the room decorated with a wide selection of Martin’s late brother’s paintings, which he had mostly executed in the hospital in Bournemouth before he succumbed, after a long battle, to the effects of syphilis.  It was an ever-present tragedy that he contracted the terrible disease as the result of his father’s instigation that he go with a women in the effort to produce an heir.  The irony of the situation was not lost on the three men gathered in the room today.

“I think we’ve been looking at it all wrong,” said Stephen.  “Clearly Mrs Polk-Stewart is responsible for the missing page.  It risked her daughter’s advantageous marriage if there was any doubt about Philip’s being the heir and, of course, any sons.”

“She was friendly with Sir Gregory,” said Uncle Alfred.  “She could easily have asked to see the ledger again or even taken it down herself when we were dining there.”

“But the thing we may have got arse about (if you’ll forgive my crudeness, Lord Alfred) is that the ‘three’ may not have been erased from the original, but added later and maybe erased at the same time.”

“Why would anyone want to do that, Derbs?” asked Martin looking perplexed.

“It may have been someone who wanted to discredit the title, not to legitimise it.”

“But who would want to do that?”

“I’m clever, Mala, but not that clever.  I don’t know.”  He turned to Uncle Alfred. “What do you think, sir?”

The old man did not know either, but speculated: “Could it be something to do with the first marriage?  Could it be Desideria-Luiza or some member of the Molsomo family who wanted revenge for the shame the divorce brought upon them?”

“It is a motive,” said Martin, whose brain was beginning to run quickly, “but they were probably in Brazil and, in any case, the erasure or the alteration— whatever it was—must have taken place after 1880 when mother and father saw it.”

This seemed undeniably logical and the three of them sat for a little while longer and then fell to discussing the paintings and engravings of Desideria-Luiza, which the boys had seen at first hand before they quit Portugal to return to England. 

***** 

On Christmas Eve, after the tree had been lit and the carol singers had left full of rum punch and spicy cake, two groups gathered at opposite ends of the house. In the red drawing room, the ‘quality’ in their evening clothes formed a huddle.  In the servants’ hall, surrounding Chilvers, the servants were also grouped.

“Turn it to left slightly,” said Carlo. 

“No, that h’aint the right knob, Mr Chilvers,” said Higgins.  “That’s the one wot makes it louder. You want the ‘tuner’.

“I think I know what I’m doing, Higgins.  I have read a book on listening-in.”  This reading had apparently been in vain.

“Oh you men!  Let me have a go!” cried Mrs Capstick in frustration. “Oh look, the wire’s come out.  Mathew, go and join it to the aerial wire.  That’s it coming in through the window frame.”

“Won’t I get a shock?” asked the young footman with caution.

“There’s no electricity in the aerial.  It just collects the waves from the ether.”

Not utterly convinced the footman put on his cotton gloves and, keeping matters well clear of his brass buttons touched the two filaments together.  Suddenly there was the booming sound of dance music.

“Turn n’it down,” cried Higgins.  “I told you that were the volume.”

There was a crackle and the music stopped altogether.

Upstairs there was a similar to-do.  Suddenly there was music when they realised they had not given the listening-in apparatus time enough to ‘warm-up’.

“That’s the Savoy Orpheans,” said Martin.  The group listened intently through the ‘static’ and could just hear the dance band.  In moments when it cleared they could hear the actual clink of glasses and the chatter of the crowd.

It was marvellous, they constantly remarked to one another that they could actually hear down in Dorset what was going on in a London hotel.  Stephen put on the earphones while the others gathered around the ‘speaker’, which they had positioned on an eighteenth century ormolu consol, and it crackled and spat at them in between whines and whoops and snatches of music. Suddenly a voice boomed out: “This is 2LO, the London Station of the British Broadcasting Company calling! 2LO calling!”  There was some more music and then a duet was sung.  Then there was nothing but static, no matter how much they fiddled with the aerial of the ‘superheterodyne’ model that sat like one of those wooden things for winding wool on top of the receiver.

Tiring, they eventually gave up and resumed their chatter until Jean was persuaded to go to the piano and play.  She selected ‘Three o’clock in the Morning’ and Stephen and Lady Delvees, who was all the better for the wine she had drunk at dinner, performed a neat little waltz to the sweet tune.

Down in the servants’ hall the ‘straight’ wireless with its outdoor aerial was having more success and they were able to listen to a story for ‘tots’ being read by ‘Uncle Albert.’

“Oh turn it off, Mr Chilvers, for Pete’s sake,’ said Mrs Capstick at last and the experiment in listening-in came to an end.”   

***** 

There was no snow that Christmas and on Boxing Day Martin was busy with the tradition of giving small gifts to the servants and to people on the estate.  Stephen went out for a walk with Charles and Jack.  They were well rugged up for it was cold.  They took their sticks and Stephen’s dogs, which ran about and pushed their way into the bare hedgerows on the scent of sleeping hedgehogs and badgers.  They came to the top of a rise and Stephen pointed with his stick down into the valley.  There strode spidery steel pylons that were bringing the electric current from Bournemouth through the estate and on to Wimbourne Manor and other towns in the county. “We should have it here by the middle of next year.  Martin has lobbied hard but insisted that the wires must be underground in the three villages. “Electricity will make a big difference to people’s lives,” said Stephen.

The dogs chased unsuccessfully after rabbits.

“It’s funny that the modern world should intrude so brutally on this old place,” said Charles.

“I don’t know if it is all that brutal.  What about the railway?  That must have caused more of a ‘shock’ than the electricity,” said Stephen, half-making a terrible pun.  “The people here want the good things of modern life too.  It would be unfair to keep the villages as museums just for painters and trippers from London.”

“I’m sorry Stephen,” said Charles.

“Oh I didn’t mean you and Jack.”

“Yes you did,” he laughed.  “We’re visitors and we want to look at pretty things without being concerned about how miserable people’s lives are, so long as they’re picturesque from a charabanc window.”

“It’s you who has made a big difference to the lives of people in these parts,” said Jack, seriously.  “There’s the gymnasium and the Higher Elementary School and the motor bus.”

“Those last two are all Martin’s doing, said Stephen.  “He’s the true lord of the manor in every way but he’s really the last of a dying breed.  It is the government and the local authorities who make all the running now.  Martin would still like to control matters on the estate as his father and grandfather did, but he can’t.  The people now look to the government for electricity, new roads and unemployment insurance and not to their lord.

“The War has changed everything.  It intruded on life down here and the people have had to come to terms with an utterly alien way of looking at the outside world and at new scale too, like we all have: big factories, the mass movement of people, big, new intrusive laws that rationed their food, told them what to plant, taxed them, censored what they read, closed their pubs early and forced their sons to fight; millions of men, millions of pounds, millions of dead!”

“There’s no turning the clock back now.  Croome is joined to the outside world just as surely as it is by the iron rails and those electric wires.  All we can do is to try to make it work for the people we see around us in our community.  But it is hard to relate to things on such a vast scale. We still think and love in terms of villages.”

Jack and Charles nodded in agreement at Stephen’s passionate outburst.

“Martin is thinking that we should have something called a ‘nursery school’ in Branksome; he has been influenced by his socialist friend, Miss Foxton.  If you can believe it, he still thinks he’s a Tory like his father.”  Stephen laughed.  “If he donates the land and agitates hard enough Westminster and the County Council will provide a nurse and a ‘kindergarten’ teacher.  No doubt he will contribute, but it is the government who will provide it- if it ever happens.  Come and have a look at the gymnasium.”

They obtained the key from Mrs McGrath at the village shop and went inside.  There were chairs set out and Stephen said: “The British Legion has been holding its meetings here. They want me to be their president.  I said to ask his lordship first.  I don’t want him to feel slighted.  What should I do?”

“I would just accept the nomination, Stephen.  With your War record you deserve to be president.  I think I know his lordship well enough to say that he would feel that this thing in particular is more appropriately yours—it’s not like it’s the tennis club or anything,” he laughed.

“Oh they’ve asked me to be president of that too—but I turned it down and they asked Martin.  I think they also want to use his courts.”

“Just don’t tell him he’s second choice, Stephen,” advised Charles.

They took off their overcoats and jackets and soon Stephen was hammering the punching bag in his shirtsleeves.  Charles and Jack took turns in holding it steady.  The two visitors made half-hearted attempts to lift the weights, but Stephen took it seriously and was going at it steadily.  Charles licked his lips at the sight and Jack playfully punched him.

“You won’t think it’s so nice when you have to walk home with me,” grunted Stephen. “I didn’t intend to, but I’ve worked up quite a sweat.  I’ll have a bath before afternoon tea.”

“Can I watch?” asked Charles cheekily.

“Can we both watch?” corrected Jack.

“Why not?  It will save Carlo if you operate the soap.”

Thus Martin came into their bathroom to find Jack and Charles washing Stephen and making playful grabs at his privates, which Stephen raised teasingly above the water.  For a moment Jack and Charles hesitated, and then they saw Marin grin. “Don’t mind me chaps.  He loves an audience and I’m surprised that he hasn’t got you into the water with him.”

“Come on, the three of you!” commanded Stephen. “What do I have to do to get pleasured around here—swim the English Channel?  Grab it Charles and stop mucking about.  Martin, show Jack how to do my balls properly.  I’m feeling particularly randy this afternoon.” 

***** 

Spring came and Stephen was hard at work on his thesis.  He made frequent trips up to London to use the University library and was pleased with his treatise, which was on efficient methods of setting out building sites where reinforced concrete construction was to be employed.  It was a dull topic, but Martin manfully read what Stephen assured him were the ‘best bits’.

Uncle Alfred began to fail and could no longer make visits to the doctor nor come down to Croome.  His last outing was to attend the wedding of Constance to Lord Philip Rous-Poole at St Margaret’s, Westminster.  The occasion was somewhat over-shadowed by the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of York on the same day.  Still, the prospect of their honeymoon was an exciting one—they were to sail for Kenya for a safari with the chance of ‘bagging’ some big game, Philip told his cousin with great relish.

The weeks that followed saw Mrs Polk-Stewart almost permanently back at Branksome House where she sat with Lord Alfred practically every day, reading to him and supervising his medicines.  Apart from fighting with Higgins, she was actually a great help and Martin found himself thawing towards her a little.

At the beginning of June Uncle Alfred received a letter that stirred him from his sick bed. The first thing he did was to get Higgins to send for his lordship the moment he returned from Croome where he had been judging at the Agricultural Show as was the long-held tradition.

“Martin,” he said, holding the letter out in his hand, which was now at the end of a distressingly wasted and bony arm.  I have just received a letter from De Souza, our paid researcher. Apparently he has been in North and South America and he is on his way to London with his findings.  He didn’t say what they are, but he is coming here and I want you and Stephen to be with me.  I’m likely to get confused and it would be a help to have you with me.”

“Stephen and I are interested in the family story too, Uncle. Of course we’ll be here.  When is he coming?”

“He thought next Tuesday, and Martin, I propose asking Mrs Polk-Stewart to be here as well.  We embarked on this adventure together and I think it is only right that she be in at the kill too—whatever De Souza might have to say.  I hope that is alright with you.”

Martin was not particularly pleased and regarded his cousin (if indeed she actually was) and her daughter (whom he was sure she was) as little more than fortune hunters, but it was undeniable that Uncle Alfred was very fond of Mrs Polk-Stewart— even a little spoony over her—and the woman could not be faulted in her care and attention to his uncle during this, his final illness.

“Yes, of course, Uncle.  She shall be here on Tuesday too.” 

***** 

De Souza came in the afternoon.  He was a handsome man in his early forties and had the look of a scholar about him with his brief case and pince-nez glasses on a ribbon.  His English was perfect.

They assembled in the pink drawing room, Uncle Alfred on a settee with a mohair rug over his legs because he felt the cold in his bones even worse than usual now he was so thin and even on this June day he longed for the heat of India.  There was tea and coffee for De Souza.  The servants were dismissed and De Souza began.

“You sent me, Lord Alfred, to find out what happened to the first wife of Lord Thomas Poole, your ancestor.”

“Yes, that is so, Señor De Souza, I hope your search has been fruitful.”

“Fruitful yes, your lordship and also costly, I have taken many months and have crossed the Atlantic four times.” Lord Alfred waived that away and was anxious that he proceed.

“Lord Thomas petitioned Parliament for a divorce from Desideria-Luiza Poole (nee Molsomo) at the end of 1806.  At that time he had two daughters by her, Djanira and Olivinha, born in 1804 and 1806, after being married to the lady since 1803.”  From his bag he produced transcriptions of the marriage certificates and baptismal records.  These were circulated around the room and they peered at the dates and the names of witnesses for clues.

“I see the marriage and the Christenings were all in the Roman Catholic Church,” said Lord Alfred.

“That is so,” said De Souza. “Lord Alfred was himself a protestant I presume and converted at the time of the marriage—although I have no evidence other than what you see before you.”

“I wonder how long he had been in Portugal?” asked Stephen.

“We have records of him being there twice: In 1801 and the again in 1803 when he was with General Cavendish-Bentnick and the British ambassador.  What he was doing in Portugal was not clear.

His divorce came through on the 12^th of September 1808.  I’m sorry to report— but you must already know—that another lady, the niece of Cavendish-Bentnick, had already become his mistress.  She was not his first I am sorry to have to tell you.  I hope you are not distressed by the sexual immorality of that era—so different to our own times,” he said a trifle primly. Martin went red and dared not look at Stephen and hoped that De Souza would swiftly pass on.

“By that time, Desideria-Luiza Poole and her two daughters were in Rio de Janeiro with Queen Maria.  Desideria was a lady-in-waiting to Her Majesty.  Lord Thomas was not with them and I don’t believe ever saw her or her three children again.”

“Two children,” corrected Uncle Alfred. “The two girls.”

“No three,” said Desouza emphatically. “She gave birth to a baby boy in Rio.”

There was a collective gasp in the room. “What was the date of that birth?” cried Lord Alfred, in an agonized voice, half rising from his couch.

De Souza had the paper before him. “August the 25^th 1808.”

“Why she must have been pregnant when she left Portugal on November the 29^th,” said Mrs Polk-Stewart.

“And the baby was born after the decree absolute and before the second marriage,” said Stephen, excitedly.

“And he would be Thomas’ legitimate heir!” cried Martin.

“What happened to the baby?” asked Lord Alfred. “Did he live?”

“He did your lordship, but his mother died not long after childbirth.  He was christened Javier Mateus Xesus and took his mother’s surname, Molsomo, as news of the divorce had reached her by then.

“This is only my speculation, Lord Alfred, but Desideria-Luiza may have died from the shock that her husband had abandoned her— divorced her in fact.  I don’t know when she learnt of this, but as a devout women—well, it can’t be even imagined.  Her death certificate records the more prosaic, ‘childbed fever’ but I am a romantic, I confess.

“The three children were brought up in the court, but it was a rather impoverished and ramshackle affair out there in Brazil.  The older sister helped raise him and her other sister too. The girls were deeply religious like their mother.  The younger one went into a convent.  You will be pleased to hear she lived to a ripe age.  The older one made a good marriage to a Canadian merchant and moved to Quebec, taking her young brother with her.

“That was my husband’s mother,” interjected Mrs Polk-Stewart, who had grown quite excited.

“The sister’s married name became…”

“Mrs Jenny McKenzie,” completed Mrs Polk-Stewart in triumph.  Lord Alfred patted her hand to calm her.

“And Javier anglicised his name too,” continued De Souza.  “He became James…”

There was a noise.  Stephen had had some sort of fit.  He had risen and just vomited M. Lefaux’s excellent lunch into a large china pot that held a Kentia palm.  Martin rushed over to him and held him by the shoulders until he recovered.  He was not a pretty sight when he turned around to the others who were all staring at him.

“It was Molsom, wasn’t it? James Molsom?”

“Yes, it was,” said De Souza, surprised.

“How did you know that, Stephen?” asked Uncle Alfred.

“That was my name, my real father’s name, don’t you remember, Mala?”

“H. Markland Molsom. ‘My mother used to call him Mark’,” Martin murmured as if in a trance. “I do remember you telling me, Derby.” 

“What does this mean?” cried Mrs Polk-Stewart.

It was a good question.  They looked at each other and then Stephen said, as he wiped his mouth and returned to where they were sitting:  “It may be a coincidence of names.  My mother said my father was born in the United States, not Canada.  There may be no connection at all.”

The researcher continued: “Molsom went into the lumber business.  He married a Miss Campbell in a place called Medicine Hat and they had a number of children.  There were five girls born and then two boys.  The oldest boy was named Mathew Henry and he went to the United States.  His brother stayed in Alberta and carried on his father’s business, but passed it on to his son in-law as he had no surviving sons of his own.”

Stephen was as white as a sheet.

“Albert Henry was some sort of mining engineer and moved around a good deal— San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Birmingham and so on.  He married in 1865 to a woman called Upton—Sarah Upton.  That was in a tiny place called Markland, near Kokomo in Indiana.

“And their children?” asked Martin.

“Just a boy.  His name was Henry Markland Molsom”

“What happened to my father, do you know, Senor De Souza?” said Stephen, now deadly calm.

“Yes. ‘Molsom and Son’ were prominent mining engineers for a time.  They worked in the United States and in Central America and in Europe, but the business failed when the father died.  The depression of 1891 caused the company to become insolvent.  There were many debts, but I didn’t go into those records, I’m afraid.”

“I think I know the rest, said Stephen.  My father came to England and was in Cornwall in the tin mines—he was an engineer—supervisor, I think.  He met my mother, a young girl from St Just.  He died of lung disease in 1895, the year I was born.  For some unknown reason my mother went to Branksome-le-Bourne and she died when I was three.”

There was stunned silence.

“Why did she choose to come to Croome, Derby?” asked Martin.

“Perhaps my father told her to.  She never said.  Perhaps Titus Knight knows—he’s my stepfather,” explained Stephen to Mrs Polk-Stewart and Senor De Souza.

“It can’t be a coincidence,” persisted Martin.  “He must have known of the connection.”

“I might be able to shed some light on that for you sir, said De Souza.  The daughter of Desideria-Luiza—the one who became a nun—only died in 1892.  We know she wrote letters, but we don’t have any.  It is possible she told your father or grandfather the story.”

“I think that is a good bet, Señor De Souza,” said Mrs Polk-Stewart.  “It was a letter my late mother-in-law received that told me we were connected to the Pooles.  That is why I came to England.  I don’t know who it was that told her—but it was by mail; it wasn’t in person, I can tell you that.  My husband’s mother never spoke to me much after my husband became  shot.”

The awful conclusion had to be drawn: “So, Derby, are you the rightful Earl of Holdenhurst and Marquess of Croome?” asked Marin in a flat voice.

Stephen came over to him and put his arm around him. “No Mala, that is you.  It has been in your blood for much longer than it has mine.  I don’t want to be the lord of the manor under any circumstances.  Besides, think about how difficult it would be to prove something so long ago and so complicated.  Was the baby Javier Molsomo really Javier Poole?  She was divorced when she had him and living in another land. It is problematic that he was even legitimate.  It might have been anybody’s baby.  Please don’t give it another thought.  It is an interesting fairy story that is all.”

Martin wasn’t going to argue.  He loved Stephen, but the thought of giving up his own birthright was suddenly a terrible prospect; he never realised how much it meant to him until that moment.  “You can wear my coronet and robes on your birthday, Stephen,” said Martin.

Then Stephen spoke: “Tell me, Mr De Souza, did my father or grandfather ever go to Portugal?”

“I have no evidence, sir.  It’s possible I suppose, they were in Europe on occasion.”

“I think we have to consider the possibility that my father’s intention may have been blackmail, Mala.  Perhaps he died before he could ‘put the squeeze’ on your father.”

There was silence for a minute while this new thought was digested.

“You know, I just now remember William trying to tell me something about our great grandfather before he died.  I couldn’t really understand what it was.  Do you remember me telling you, Derby?”

Stephen couldn’t remember that as he cast his mind back to that dreadful day before the War. It remained a mystery.

There were more questions and the papers were poured through again.  De Souza announced that he would be in London for a few more days if there were anything further they required and he then departed.

“Boys, will you excuse me?  I want to have a word with Mildred, said Uncle Alfred.  They left for their room to talk some more and Uncle Alfred had Mrs Polk-Stewart close the door.

“Now Mildred, this has come as a great surprise to us all.  The succession in a family like ours is of major importance.  The welfare and even happiness of many lives depends on it.  I know you tore that page out of the ledger in Sintra…” She went to protest.  “Don’t bother denying it.  You probably went back in there when you excused yourself from dinner.  Am I right?”

Mrs Polk-Stewart lowered her head like a naughty schoolgirl.

“And I will bet you a shilling that you kept it, didn’t you?”

She nodded with a twinkle in her eye.

“You’re a very bad girl.  Bring it here and we will burn it.  You don’t want to upset Constance’s marriage or cause pain to my nephew.  I’m quite sure Constance would have preferred to marry Stephen, but who was to know?”

Like a lamb she left the room and retuned a few minutes later with the page.  Uncle Alfred glanced at it and rang the bell.  Glass appeared and was asked for matches.  He produced a box from his pocket and wondered if Lord Alfred was taking up his smelly pipe again.

“That will be all Glass.”

Mrs Polk-Stewart took the page to the unlit fireplace and struck a match.  The past was now purified.

“Mildred,” said Lord Alfred. “I’m altering my will tomorrow and making a small allowance to you for the rest of your life or until you decide to remarry—you are still a young and attractive and very naughty woman.  You might like to use the money to return to America.

“I have no one in America, Alfred.  I’m getting used to this country.  I might take a flat— with steam heat.  And of course there’s Constance…and Philip,” she added with a slight shudder.

“As you wish,” said Lord Alfred, and patted her hand.

To be continued… 

Thanks for reading.  If you have any comments or questions, Henry and I would love to hear from you.  Just send them to pbruno@tickiestories.us and please put the site name in the subject line.