Silas and the Winterbottoms Read online

  ‘All right,’ said Milo, as a deep unease swelled within him, ‘I will do what Uncle Silas wanted. I am the new heir of Sommerset.’

  A scream tore across the room. It was Mrs Hammer. She jumped to her feet and ran to the large windows.

  ‘Moses!’ she cried, pointing towards the large oak tree just beyond the rose gardens. ‘He just fell from that tree! The branch snapped and he fell!’

  They rushed from the drawing room, through the entrance hall and out into the rose garden.

  ‘Over here!’ Isabella shouted as she ran between the stone columns at the edge of the rose gardens. ‘Quick! Somebody call the doctor – Moses is badly hurt!’

  The old gardener was flat on his stomach, his calloused fingers clawing at the dirt as he dragged his body away from the oak tree.

  ‘Moses, stop!’ cried Milo. ‘You mustn’t move!’

  Ignoring the warnings, Moses clawed at the ground, pulling himself onto the soft green grass of the rose gardens. His shattered legs dragged behind him like two bags of coal.

  ‘Where are you going, Moses?’ said Rosemary desperately. ‘Please, don’t move until help arrives!’

  Groaning, Moses pulled himself along the trellised archway and stopped beside a bed of red roses. Then he plunged his fingers into the dirt.

  ‘What’s he doing?’ said Isabella.

  ‘Moses, what is it?’ Milo asked, throwing his crutches to the ground and dropping down beside the gardener. He put his hand on the old man’s back. ‘Moses?’

  ‘I do hope the ambulance hurries up!’ said Mrs Hammer fearfully.

  It was Adele who solved the mystery. She peered over Rosemary’s shoulder and looked down at the garden bed.

  ‘They’re letters,’ she said. ‘I think he’s writing something!’

  When Moses was done his eyes closed, his body deflating into the soft grass like a punctured tyre.

  Milo looked down at the rose bed and saw what was written in the soil.

  Without actually making a decision to do it, Milo plunged his hands into the dirt.

  SOMMERSET

  Arusted copper box buried under a bed of red roses and caked in decades of mud and dirt was retrieved from the gardens of Sommerset. Once again the Winterbottoms gathered in the conservatory to wait for Whitlam, trying to come to terms with the blackest day in Sommerset’s history. Moses was dead. He had drawn his last breath in the very gardens he had tended for so many years.

  The police examined the branch which had caused him to plunge from the tree – they were certain it had been tampered with; sawn so that it would break when Moses stood upon it. One of the gardeners had overheard young Knox telling Moses that the master wanted him to trim the evergreen oak that very day. Then Mrs Hammer recalled Silas having a meeting with Knox in his office right after he intercepted the note Moses wrote to Milo promising to tell him the truth about his uncle. When the police questioned Knox in his quarters the boy quickly fell apart and confessed everything. Silas had offered him the head gardener’s job in exchange for doing away with Moses. The young gardener was arrested and taken away.

  In the conservatory, at the foot of Silas’s empty chair, Thorn kept a vigil as if he were awaiting his master’s return. Isabella sat on the floor near the beast, stroking his long back, while Adele picked nervously at her fingernails and tried as hard as she could not to think about Moses. But of course that was all she could think about.

  The maestro, who had been talking with the police, returned to the conservatory and sat down next to his grandson just as Whitlam made his entrance.

  ‘This has been a day of great tragedy,’ said Whitlam, scratching at his curly white hair, ‘and great revelation. My colleagues and I have thoroughly examined the contents of the buried box. I have in my hand two documents. One is a letter from Moses; the other is the final will of Lady Cornelia Bloom.’

  Puzzled looks were exchanged around the room.

  ‘Well go on then!’ snapped Isabella impatiently. ‘What does it say?’

  ‘Yes, well,’ said Whitlam. ‘I should first make it clear that we have conducted extensive handwriting analysis of Lady Bloom’s letters and documents – the will is authentic. As such, Silas’s will is no longer valid.’

  Everybody in the room seemed to gasp at the same time.

  ‘Lady Bloom wrote a new will just a few days before her death,’ continued Whitlam. ‘The letter Moses left makes it very clear that Lady Bloom had grown concerned about Silas’s behaviour – he had become controlling and obsessed with Sommerset. He refused to allow Lady Bloom’s family and friends to visit the island and kept Lady Bloom a virtual prisoner. According to Moses, she feared for her life, which is why she left a copy of the new will in his possession – in case anything should happen to her. It was for this reason that Moses sent his son Ezra with her on the day she was to deliver this new will to her lawyers in town. She did not tell Silas what she was doing, however Moses saw him walking into the forest with an axe in the early hours of that morning. Lady Bloom’s car hit a tree that had mysteriously fallen across a sharp bend in the road – the police believed the branch had been deliberately felled, but they couldn’t prove it. As we know, Lady Bloom was killed instantly and the boy suffered severe brain injuries requiring lifelong medical care. Being a cunning fox, Silas agreed to take care of all the boy’s medical expenses on the condition that Moses kept his mouth shut about everything. Moses never let on that he had a copy of Lady Bloom’s will . . . until today.’

  ‘Heavens above!’ said Rosemary, shaking her head. ‘What a tale! But then, nothing my brother has done would surprise me now. So, Whitlam, here is the million-dollar question – who did Lady Bloom leave Sommerset to?’

  ‘Yes, who?’ said Isabella anxiously. Murder, secret wills, blackmail – she found the whole thing utterly, tragically romantic!

  ‘Well,’ said Whitlam, ‘that’s a very good question. It was Lady Bloom’s wish that once both she and your uncle were gone, the estate and all of its assets should go to the youngest generation of Blooms and Winterbottoms.’ The old lawyer grinned. ‘And as Lady Bloom has no living relatives that means Sommerset now belongs to Adele, Isabella and Milo Winterbottom!’

  The three Winterbottom children looked at each other wide-eyed and slack-jawed. Could it really be true? Sommerset was to be shared by all three of them? The answer was yes! Naturally Adele and Isabella were elated, hugging each other and jumping about the place, but Milo did not react.

  ‘Did you hear, my boy?’ said the maestro, putting an arm around him. ‘Just a few hours ago you tried to give Sommerset away and now it has come back to you again. Fate is trying to tell you something, yes? Maybe now you will listen to it.’

  ‘So, Milo,’ said Adele nervously, ‘Sommerset is ours to share... What do you think?’

  ‘I think . . . I think Uncle Silas would hate the idea of Sommerset being shared by three Winterbottoms. It would drive him crazy. Well, crazier.’ Milo smiled shyly and stood up, joining his cousins in front of the fireplace. ‘I think it’s perfect!’

  That night the island had its first real celebration in years. Every member of the household gathered in the ballroom to hear the maestro play his violin as Rosemary and Mrs Hammer read a poem in honour of Moses. Then the children gathered outside in the garden and lit a candle for the old gardener, wishing him well on his final journey home. They laughed and talked through the night, making plans for the bright future which seemed to stretch out before them, and as the sun began to rise over the island the whole family raised their glasses to Lady Cornelia Bloom, thanking her for the gift of Sommerset.

  EPILOGUE

  From behind a cover of thick vines and cypress trees he watched them at play in the gardens of Sommerset. His eyes, small and bright, studied the Winterbottom children with jealous fascination. They had everything he required – health . . . youth . . . fortune.

  He looked up at the full moon. It was late. Clutching the cylinder containing the powdery remain
s of his benefactor, Silas Winterbottom, the ancient doctor turned away and headed back into the depths of the darkened forest.

  He had work to do.