The only time of the year there was ever any real activity at the grand house was in the summer when he arrived with his wife and children for a quiet break, or in October when he organised a shooting party for a handful of his intimates.
Pheasant shooting and fly fishing in Ireland had become part of Tarasov’s gentlemanly life style, which he had been introduced to by Michael Fitzwilliams in happier times; assiduously emulating the aristocratic banker.
The house, which sat on a low lying hill overlooked fine lawns and the rolling landscape of County Limerick, had been restored and transformed into Tarasov’s personnel shooting and fishing estate. It lay a good distance from the main road and was separated from the surrounding countryside by tall trees and hedges in a region where the locals were noted for their discretion.
The centre-piece of the house was a large hall which in bygone days had seen many celebrations when the gentry were invited to fête birthdays, family marriages and for New Year balls. Meals were served in a traditional country home dinning room from which guests could retire to a smoking room complete with a huge period fire place.
Tarasov enjoyed the master suite whilst his staying guests were accommodated in finely appointed bedrooms complete with en-suite bathrooms.
To the back of the house, shielded from view by high hedges, were the stables and outlying houses which were accessed by a service driveway from the Limerick-Tralee road.
In normally times Tarasov had flown into Kerry Airport on his private jet, a small airport where he could discretely come and go without attracting unwanted attention. It lay approximately halfway between Bleak House and Dingle, a small and picturesque harbour town, where his yacht Cleopatra was anchored in summer for family cruises around the south coast of Ireland. Dingle was far from the haunts frequented by the jetset, a couple of hours by road, or a thirty minute helicopter hop from Bleak House.
The Cleopatra had the added advantage of being a moveable hideaway if ever things got to hot, as the life of a Russian oligarch could be fraught with dangers.
Tarasov selected his guests carefully, few were the Russians who had visited his Irish home. Apart from the summer breaks and October shoot were the Listowel Races, when Fitzwilliams’ wife Alice, a well-known racehorse owner, and friend of Kseniya and her family, came down for the event. Other than that the vast house lay empty for most of the year.