Until there isn’t.
The house vibrates with noise. Everyone at the funeral has been corralled inside, and more cars are arriving by the moment, emptying old moneyed couples onto the gravel drive with rather alarming precision. We enter the house with one of them, me wishfully expecting to hear a stern, sombre Thank you for your condolences, but the wake has been postponed. Except we don’t hear it. Instead, the fire’s roaring, and a table has been placed in the centre, tyrannised by flowers and condolence cards. Servants are carting the Fortnum & Mason towers back to the sitting rooms, closed to visitors but today open for guests.
As we walk through the hall past the growing crowd, my grandmother walks among them, talking loudly about the weather, the tea, anything of absolutely no consequence she can grasp at, anything to avoid the unpleasantness of a suicide spoiling her son’s funeral.
Because she must know of it by now—Grandmother is omniscient when it comes to the family, and this is her domain. She could have postponed this display, but instead she’s probably called in favours to either postpone the arrival of the police or keep them out of view. If there’s one thing she will never tolerate, it’s scandal.
And whatever ears she’s whispered in, whatever words she whispered—they’re causing the desired effect. There’s a surge of sounds hammering inside my head—quickening heartbeats, forced laughs—but I can’t discern anyone talking about the boy, what happened to him, who he was, anything. People know something’s wrong, but they don’t know what it is yet—and likely won’t, until they’re able to whisper and gossip about it from the comfort and anonymity of their homes. How very English.
As soon as I think it, my grandmother appears. “Noah Elliot,” she says with a clenched smile. “Darling,” she adds for good measure, “we’ve been looking for you.”
“I apologise,” I say, matching her forced politeness with insincere regret.
My grandmother pauses, obviously debating whether to accept it or demand an explanation for missing the funeral. But that would mean causing a scene in front of Mara. My grandmother turns her steel blue eyes on her. “I must steal my grandson from you now. But please”—she gestures ever so graciously—“have some tea, a bite to eat—rest for a bit. I can have Allegra make up a bed for you in one of the downstairs rooms.”
Mara opens her mouth to respond—to refuse, surely, if for no other reason than it being the middle of the bloody day—but I intervene. “I agree, sweetheart.” Mara’s expression is filled with such obvious incredulity at my use of that expression, it’s nearly impossible to bite back my laugh. “Have a lie-down. It’s been a trying day. I’ll find you in a bit, just . . . make yourself at home.”
A tiny smile at my extremely awkward code for “Go forth and find out what in fresh hell is going on.” She nods and manages to feign a yawn. “You’ll have to excuse me. I’m . . . overwhelmed?” She looks at me for approval, and gets it.
“Of course,” my grandmother says, a lift in her voice whilst she takes my arm. And then I’m steered away, flicking a winner’s grin over my shoulder at my girl. It takes a moment to register that I’ve been shuttled into a side corridor cordoned off from the public, filled with some of the many marble busts of past generations of Shaws, casting long shadows that slice the marble floor.
The staccato rhythm of my grandmother’s heels halts once we’re alone. “Noah,” she says, casually brushing something from the shoulder of my suit. “It’s time to discuss your inheritance.”
6
SILVER FETTERS
THAT SENTENCE ECHOES UNDER THE arched ceiling as though the statues themselves were repeating it.
Your inheritance. An inheritance. The inheritance.
The sun shines dimly from the mullioned, arched windows, transforming the wrinkles that fold my grandmother’s face into a mask of light and shadow. She’d be almost cartoonishly frightening if she weren’t standing beside a Greek statue of a smiling naked boy astride a ram.
“Is it really? The time?” I ask.
Chin lifted, she begins walking again. “Today has not gone as planned, I’m quite aware. But there are things that must be discussed, things that cannot wait.”
There isn’t any point in arguing. I want nothing to do with my father or what he’s left behind. What he’s done to me, Mara—it’s more than enough. I needn’t even say it—I can thin my smile and listen as my grandmother speaks and ignore whatever she says.
She walks ahead beneath the high, lonely ceilings, turns sharply to the left, where a bank of what must surely be unused rooms lie in wait for occupants who will never arrive. One of them gets lucky—my grandmother turns a gleaming glass knob, opening the door to a time capsule from the eighteenth century. The ceiling mouldings are tipped with gold, highlighting every carefully carved curve and corner, helped along by a drapey crystal chandelier fitted with actual tallow candles (unlit). Instead, the light comes from the lit, gilt-framed portraits in every size and shape. Everything in the room is perfectly preserved, arranged, to accommodate guests in waistcoats and corsets—not the Asian woman in business casual sitting in front of the fireplace. She seems so out of place that I blink, and she seems to disappear, then reappear the next instant.
“Noah, dear, allow me to introduce you to Ms. Victoria Gao, your father’s attorney.” Ms. Gao crosses the room to shake my hand, looking far too young for the grey bob that frames her face.
“She’s here to inform you of the”—my grandmother, for the first time, appears to scrabble around for the right words—“responsibilities that you now possess as heir to your father’s estate.”
I’d thought I was prepared for this, but the word “heir” brings me up short. “Why isn’t Katie here?”
“Your father named you as the executor of his will, once you turn eighteen.”
In just a few months, then. The air seems to flare with heat, blazing. “I’m not sure I understand. Katie—”
“Your father expected you to provide for your sister as you see fit, but he expressly prohibits the transfer of executorship to your sister until she’s reached twenty-five years of age.”
“I’m not even eighteen—this makes no sense.”
“Mr. Shaw, it isn’t my job to question my clients’ final wishes.”
“Then what is your job?”
“To make sure they’re granted,” she says, and holds out a thick envelope. I put it on a side table inlaid with what was probably ivory. Fuck this shit.
“Fine.” I turn to my grandmother. “Am I free to go?” She glances quickly at the envelope on the table and then at Ms. Gao, whose expression remains placid.
“Not quite, I’m afraid,” my grandmother says. “Your father was our only child, which means that he was our sole heir. He refused to use his title when he married your mother, but never formally disclaimed it,” she says with an ugly curl to her mouth. “But that’s all over and done now. You can reclaim the title of lord.” She hits the big smile button. “And you may inherit our entire estate in addition to your father’s.”
“What about my sister?” My voice is new and rough-edged. “She loved our father, he loved her, she loves you, you love her—why is she being excluded?”
“She’s only fifteen, dear.”
“So? She’s far more dedicated to preserving my father’s legacy than I am.”
That earns a sharp-edged smile. “Your grandfather and I are less concerned with your father’s legacy than we are with the Shaw legacy. Your sister will marry, take her husband’s name, no doubt, as will her children. Whereas, yours—”
“Grandmother,” I say with a frozen little grin. “This is a difficult day for everyone. Why don’t we leave this for another time? We’re all exhausted, and there’s the incident to think about.”
Her eyebrows twitch at the word, but that’s all the acknowledgment I need to know that I’ve struck a nerve. Which I consider to be an invitation to continue. “We should be thinking about practicalities now, not an unknowable f
uture.”
An expression of surprise, and dare I say, approval? “Yes. Well. That is a very mature suggestion, dear. Very well, then.” She stands and smooths out her dress, pats her hair—nervous tics. I’ve thrown her, which makes me wonder how much she thinks she knows of me, what she may have heard in the few years since I left home. And who might’ve told her.
“I’ll join your grandfather—I expect you’ll be along soon?” She turns to Ms. Gao, who offers a bit of a nod. Then, to me, “I’d like to introduce you to the manor’s curator. She’ll be the one to tell you everything you need to know about the estate. If you happen to run into her before we meet again, do come and find me so I can make a proper introduction. She’s wearing a red suit.” Grandmother punctuates her sentence with a sniff, playing painfully to type.
“Of course,” I say.
“Splendid. I’ll leave you to it.” She drifts slowly out of the room, as if waiting to be called back at the last second.
Ms. Gao does not approach the side table where the envelope lies, but indicates that I should open it. “In that envelope you’ll find your father’s personal financials—his liquid and real property assets, his wishes relating to Euphrates International Corporation, and—”
With my grandmother out of the room, I’m free to interrupt her. “Ms. Gao, I’d like to be very, very clear—I want nothing to do with my father. Including his money.” Her expression is glass. “Give it away, burn it, I don’t care. Give my sister what she needs and take the rest for yourself if you like.” Still nothing. “Do you understand me?”
“Perfectly.” She stands straight and still. “But what you’re asking is impossible, legally. The funds have been automatically transferred into an account in your name. The account numbers, everything you’ll need, is in that envelope. Ignore it if you like, but what belonged to your father is now yours to do with it what you will. You, and no one else.” She stands and leaves the room, leaving me alone with the poisoned fruit of my father’s poisoned labour.
The idea of touching the envelope repulses me. I intend to leave it there, to leave the room, the manor, the estate, everything behind.
But I don’t. I take it and open it, skimming my father’s last will and testament before something else catches my eye at the very end. The ghost of my father smiles as I read it.
Dear Mr. Shaw,
My sincerest condolences on your great and terrible loss. Naomi was a treasure; it was one of the great honours of my life to know her, and an even greater honour to teach her.
Your wife had a brilliant mind, of course, but it was her ferocious heart that struck me upon our first meeting. I thought I was prepared for it, but the extent of her gifts took even me by surprise, and mixed with the passion of her convictions, anyone in her orbit would find him or herself helpless to resist.
If she had been a lesser person, she could have used her gifts to indulge impulses and man’s inherently selfish nature. Instead, she gave her life to give life, and not just to your children.
My position prevented me from getting to know you—we met only once, for the very briefest of moments, and you had quite a lot else on your mind then, rightly so, as your son was being born.
As I know you’ve begun to suspect, Noah is indeed special, in ways I’m afraid I can’t begin to explain. It is the unfortunate nature of my own gifts that I am so limited in what I can say, but please know this: Your wife did not die in vain.
By the time you read this, I’ll have left Cambridge, and we are not fated to meet again. I urge you to spend what time you would otherwise waste on searching for me with your son instead—he needs you, and the world needs him.
Your wife has bequeathed to you the greatest gift. Don’t let her death be in vain.
Most Sincerely,
A. L.
7
A BLUNDERING ORACLE
WHEN I FIRST MET THE professor, I was with Mara at a botanica in Miami, and he was masquerading as a Santeria priest (which I would’ve preferred). Abel Lukumi a.k.a. Armin Lenaurd a.k.a. whoever the fuck he is, in reality, is nothing more than a Gifted con man. He used my father, my mother, and will use me if I allow it. Before he vanished, my father explained, quite insanely, that he believed I would have to kill Mara because of Fate and Destiny, or else she’ll inevitably kill me in some unspecified way. After that horror show, I received my own letter, as did Mara. Mine was from my mother, written to me before she died. Mara’s was from the professor, but the message to both of us was the same: The die has been cast. Your role has been written. Be the hero and play it, or there will be no happy ending for either of you.
I made a decision that day, and it seemed I’d have to make another. I tear the professor’s letter in half.
Fate is bullshit. Destiny doesn’t exist. If I want a happy ending, I’ll have to write it myself.
I find Mara poised in the middle of a balcony that rings the great hall. People in black swarm inside the house and then march out of it like ants. Mara has been pacing, tigerlike, between the two groups—I stuff the will and letter back in the envelope before I call out to her.
She rushes over. “Noah, I know who he is.” She notices the envelope in my hand. “What is that?”
“Shit my dad said, essentially.” The professor is rather a sore subject with us. “I’ll explain later. What happened?”
“So, after you and your grandmother left, I tried to find my way out of the house so I could go outside and see what was happening with the body, but this place is Labyrinth, and I never made it.” A look of clenched frustration, then a deep breath. “I was trying to get out of the house, and I ended up hitting a dead end—a staircase roped off with a little sign that said ‘private’ or whatever. Obviously, I stepped over it.”
“Obviously.”
“I ended up in this older part of the house—the rooms looked completely different,” she says, glancing behind her shoulder at the great hall. “I ended up under the stairs? Beneath the stairs?”
“Below Stairs, do you mean?”
Her eyes light up. “Yes! Below Stairs. I ran into this complete caricature of an old English person who said his name was Bernard—he pronounced it Bernerd, by the way—”
“Naturally.”
“He works for some charity, I think—preservation, maybe?”
“The National Trust?”
“Maybe? I think he said something else. Anyway, he told me I wasn’t supposed to be down there, of course, and I played the dumb American.”
“Not very well, I imagine.”
Her mouth lifts into a half smile. “I start apologising, saying I got turned around, and that I was with you, and his eyes twinkled with this old-man-who-doesn’t-get-to-talk-to-anyone-but-today’s-his-lucky-day twinkle, and he pompously starts giving me a tour of ‘Below Stairs.’ Muttered something about rumours and ‘that boy.’ Right,” she says, nodding as she registers my expression. “He’s the first—maybe the only person I’ve met—to even mention him. So of course I ask, ‘What boy?’ And then he acts like he didn’t hear me, telling me hundred-year-old stories about maids catching your ancestors having affairs, whispering about whose children belonged to whom, instead.”
“But you kept on.”
“No one has ever been more interested in the shit Bernard has to say. As far as Bernard knows.”
“You looked up at him through your dark lashes, face full of wonder.”
She grins. “Which makes him more enthusiastic and less willing to let me go. He starts showing me things that old valets and lady’s maids and other indentured servants squirrelled away—two-hundred-year-old kids’ toys and these small trunks inlaid with silver and probably, horribly, ivory, so I start having a panic attack.”
“Wait, are you joking?”
“No, I mean, sort of. It was a thing—the dumb-American game didn’t seem to be working, so I worked up to the scared-little-girl game.” She lifts her shoulders into a shrug. “I wanted to find out if he knew anything that actu
ally mattered, but he sits me down and tells me to breathe.”
She hates being told to breathe.
“I fucking hate it when people tell me to breathe—it’s like telling me to smile. Like, you breathe.”
“Dare I ask whether Bernard survived your encounter?”
“Fair question. I took pity on him because he’s eight thousand years old.”
“Generous.”
“Indeed,” Mara says, mimicking my accent. “Anyway, I started going on about how upset I am about your father, and what happened at the funeral, and then I go shivery and whisper, Sixth Sense style, that I saw the whole thing. He licked up everything I offered him, and then begins telling me, ‘in strictest confidence’ how ‘The boy is the great-great-grandchild of a house maid that served your great-great-grandfather.’ There are pictures of him somewhere, a portrait in the house. There’s all of this stuff that goes back centuries, he said. Your family kept everything.”
“Did he happen to add anything helpful, like, for example, where?”
“Yeah, no. He talked about servant records and family trees and shit being here, in the house, but where here, he didn’t know. But he did give me a name.”
“Need I ask?”
“Sam Milnes. Familiar?”
I shake my head.
“He’s apparently also the great-great-grandson of the old groundskeeper, but his G3 was fired as soon as they discovered the lady’s maid was pregnant, and moved south to do something else, I don’t remember, and Sam’s dad is a chef at a pub about an hour away from here. Not at the funeral.”
“His father wasn’t? Mother?”
“Nope. No one in his family. I asked specifically.”
“Bad blood?”
“Bernard mentioned something about a rumour that he wasn’t the groundskeeper’s kid, that someone in the family knocked her up, then sent both of them packing to hide it.” She shrugs one shoulder. “Or some other shit happened so long ago that no one cares about it anymore.”