The Art of Inheriting Secrets

by Barbara O'Neal

My first glimpse of Rosemere Priory came just before dusk, when the last of the day’s sunlight fingered the old stones a rosy gold. It was vast and rambling, bay upon bay of Elizabethan windows, with two crenellated towers pointing into an eggplant sky. Everything I knew about my mother shattered in that instant. I recognized it, of course, from her fantastical paintings. I recognized the woods, too, and the owl that flapped its wings and flew out of an upper window and probably even the fox that dashed across the rutted road, its fat tail sailing behind it. I simply believed that she’d made it all up.

My tidy, reserved English mother. She never spoke of her life before arriving in San Francisco in her twenties, where she met and married my father. Once I was born, she settled in to illustrate children’s books and create a series of exquisitely detailed paintings of a wild English wood, alternately seductive and threatening.

We both stared at the vast mansion. Vines covered her face, wantonly crawling through the broken windowpanes. “How long since anyone lived here?” He rubbed his chin. “Forty years or better, I’d say. When I was a boy, there were festivals and picnics on the grounds. All very grand.” “What happened?” “Now that’s the thing everybody’d like to know, miss. One day, it was all thriving and busy, and the next, the lot of them disappeared.”

Lord Shaw, the Earl of Rosemere, was my age, though we had no dealings to speak of. Lady Caroline was a great beauty, but she kept to herself.” Caroline. That would have been my mother. Lady Caroline.

Mother, I thought, heart aching. Why did you hide from me all these years?

In my capacity as editor of a highly respected food magazine, I was used to travel and curt manners, but her rudeness seemed over the top. Taking a breath, I said, “Look, I’ve been traveling for nearly twenty-four hours, and stairs are a challenge for me at the moment.” Follow conciliatory with steel: that was my motto. “Do you have a room I can reach more easily, or shall I call my driver back and have him take me somewhere else?” For a moment, she stared at me. Hostile. Furious, even. What the hell?

My mother’s sudden and crushing death had been the final blow in a series of disasters that plagued my thirty-eighth year. It had begun with a car accident that shattered my right tibia, which meant I could not manage the stairs in the San Francisco loft I’d shared with my fiancé, Grant, for six years, so I’d temporarily moved into my mother’s ranch house in Menlo Park to recover.

“Oh, my goodness, you have the lightning bolt!” “The lightning bolt?” Self-consciously, I touched my right eye. My blue iris was marked with a diagonal yellow zigzag I’d hated with a passion as a child. “It’s famous in your family. It’s not always a lightning bolt. Sometimes it’s a sun around the pupil, sometimes something else. A lot of the villagers have it too.” Her sideways smile gave her a knowing expression. “Lords will wander, don’t you know.” Blinking, I asked, “It’s a family trait?” “Yes! Didn’t your mother tell you?”

“This is all part of the estate,” she said, waving a hand. “Almost two thousand hectares, most of it forest and farmland.” I blinked. “Estate?” “Rosemere.” She gave me a quizzical look. “Your estate.”

“And listed means historical. A Grade I building means it’s valuable or significant to the history of the country. Or a few other designations, but mainly it just means you have to get approval for every step of renovation. Grade II is a step below that, but she put us through our paces.”

Oh. I touched my lips. Time halted. Every now and then, a mouthful of food tilted the world on its axis. This was one of them. The stew was dark and rich, meaty, herby. Thick broth and tender carrots and cubes of potato, hints of spice and aromatic vegetables. I moved my spoon through the opaque lake of gravy, imagining words that might describe it in an essay. I’d use the setting of the room, the AGA cooker in the corner, and the mullioned windows and the thatchers in their jeans. “This is venison?”

“It’s cursed, you know.” “Of course it is,” Rebecca said. “All old English houses are cursed.” “This is worse. Real. The Rosemere men die violent deaths,” Tony said, glowering from below heavy brows. “Murder, war, suicide. Hard to deny it.” I thought of my mother running to America. “What about the women?” “They’re fine. Just the men.” “Why the curse?” I asked. Samir said, “It was the curse of a village girl who fell in love with a monk when it was a priory. She’s said to haunt the ruins of the church. Or the well, depending on who tells it.”

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Rebecca said. “It gives me a thrill every time.” I nodded. “On the left are what remain of the gardens.” She pointed at a series of walls and terraces, tumbling down the hill. “They were created in the eighteenth century and were really quite famous. The old countess—I supposed that’s your grandmother—brought them back to life, but you see what time does.” I nodded. Everything was overgrown, the bare lines visible here and there.

“How many people are farming here?” Rebecca frowned. “I don’t actually know. That would be a question for Jonathan. Enough to at least keep the taxes paid on the place.” “What do they grow?” “Rape, mostly, some barley. Obviously sheep.” She gestured toward a field of white bodies grazing in the distance. “A few other things, but the canola oil is the main thing.” She braked and let me look out across the fields for a minute. “It’s beautiful when it’s in bloom—bright-yellow flowers across the whole countryside.”

Wooden panel doors hung at an angle, and the ceiling-high mullioned windows were almost entirely covered with growth. “Look at that.” He pointed, and I saw a blooming rose, white or pink, like a nightlight in the darkness. “It must be warmer in here than outside.” “It makes me think of Beauty and the Beast,” I said, and I couldn’t help picking my way over to the rose to touch it. “A house under a long curse.” “What did it take to break it? The curse?” “The beast has to learn to love and accept love in return.” I bent my head to the rose and was pleased to discover it smelled of lemons.

“Where’s the abbey?” “Just south. It’s only a ruin now, but it’s on an old pagan site, they say. There’s a spring, and some of the local witches tend the herb garden.” I laughed. “Really?” “Really. It’s been there since medieval times, and it’s supposed to be full of all sorts of blessed plants and healing herbs.” He pronounced the h in herbs. “It’s meant to be one of the best gardens of its kind.”

“This is one of the spots that is supposed to be haunted.” “It is really cold,” I commented, half-flippantly. “Who’s the ghost?” “A girl who jumped from the gallery.” He pointed to an opening three stories up. “These must be the towers then, right?” “Yeah.” “Why did she jump?” “It’s always love, isn’t it?”

I wished suddenly that my mother was here to tell these stories, share her history with me.

Rosemere Priory dates back to the eleventh century, when it was a monastery and famous medicinal garden. When the monasteries were dissolved by Henry VIII, the land was awarded to Thomas Shaw, and the title of Earl of Rosemere was created. The earl built a grand Elizabethan house on the site, which still stands. The holdings, with orchards, farmland, a lake, and a river, were extremely well positioned, and the family thrived for over a hundred years, when the estate was lost to Parliamentarians in the civil war. After the war, Lady Clarise Shaw, a great beauty who was rumored to be a mistress of Charles II, petitioned the king for the restoration of the estate. The king agreed, provided she married a man of his choosing, and she countered with the caveat that the estate could always pass to a woman if there was no immediate male issue. It has stayed in the family ever since, for four hundred years, until it was mysteriously abandoned in the 1970s.

The rest of the time, I lazed around reading novels I found in the hotel common room, forcing myself not to dig into more about the house or the family. After the previous hard months, my soul and body were tired. The weather was still horrible, either rainy, wet from the rain, threatening to rain, or foggy. That morning, it was the last, so I bundled up in a pink wool sweater that was one of my favorites, with fleece-lined leggings beneath my jeans and wellies, which were the only practical shoes for such conditions, then headed for the bakery I’d been meaning to visit since my arrival.

A scent of coffee and fresh cinnamon rolls hung heavily in that thick air, a nearly visible lure to the bakery.

“You have your mother’s grace.” A sharp sting of tears burned the back of my eyes. I swallowed. “Thank you. How did you know her?” “We took painting classes together.” “You’re a painter too?” “I dabble now and then. Never like Caroline. Did she end up doing anything with it?” “Yes.” Emotion made it hard to speak for a moment. I had not ever met anyone who’d known her as a young woman.

I didn’t trust Haver. Or Rebecca, for that matter. Even before Samir had warned me, there had been something a little too friendly about her. She might just be a social climber. Not exactly an attractive trait, but it wasn’t criminal. Now there was the earl and whoever I’d meet at his party. At this point, it would be wise to assume that almost everyone had an agenda and proceed with caution. I’d have to keep my wits, especially considering the challenge of interpreting English culture.

my mother had had very high standards. She’d always dressed exquisitely, simply, in very good fabrics—wool trousers and crisp blouses, nothing ever slightly stained or ill fitting. Even when she painted, she wore a long smock that kept her clothes tidy. She had, however, disliked wearing shoes. It was one of the quirks that made her so adorable, her taste for very soft, warm socks that she wore inside all the time. In the summertime, she puttered around her garden in bare feet, singing quietly as she snipped the heads of dead flowers, plucked weeds from the roots. Her skin was fair, so she wore a big straw hat to shade her face, but her hands—her hands were always tanned and stained and entirely unladylike.

again I glimpsed the forest of my mother’s paintings, mysterious and dangerous and intriguing. “My mother painted these woods endlessly.” I peered out. “Endlessly. Hundreds of times. Maybe thousands, in books and paintings and drawings.”

it seemed to me a prosperous place—why let the house go so desperately?

His grin flashed, and for a moment I forgot what we were doing. It was a wide, beautiful smile, with good strong white teeth, teeth that had been well tended, given braces and routine checkups, but it was the way it changed his face that made me nearly stumble, as if someone had flung open the curtains in a dark room, allowing sunlight to come flooding in. A generous, genuine expression. I couldn’t remember the last time someone had given me such an unguarded smile or looked at me so directly.

I imagined a ball, visitors coming in from all over England, or perhaps a house party. Most of my idea of old houses had come from Downton Abbey, and I imagined women in delicate Edwardian dresses headed for dinner, ropes of pearls and rubies looped around their thin necks. As if to accommodate my vision, I opened one of the doors to find a peacock-themed room, redolent with the fading colonial era.

There had obviously been a fire. Smoke stains ran up the walls, and shreds of fabric were all that remained from the draperies—which, ironically, exposed the view. These were the bay windows to the front of the house. On the floors below, they were covered with vines and roses, but here the vista was unobstructed, a clear picture of the roofs of Saint Ives Cross and the church on the hill. “The views are absolutely amazing.” “Yeah.” “Where was the fire? We are . . .” I turned my head, narrowed my eyes. “Two floors above the dining room and parlor, right?” “Right. Floor below is where the fire was. Not sure what happened. It’s always been like that. Pavi and I think someone lived in here, like a homeless person, because it’s like a campfire right in the center of the room. Maybe it got out of hand.” “Lucky it didn’t burn the entire house down.”

this was my grandmother’s room, right?” He nodded, looking up at the paintings. “She died wishing she was in India.” “How do you know that?” “My grandmother was her personal maid. What do you call it?” “You’re asking me? I’m American. Lady’s maid?”

“My grandmother talked about Lady Violet to my father her whole life. He knew her, I think, before she died, but there were all these things that happened right then—it’s sort of confusing.” “What things?” “Not sure of the order—he could tell you—but my aunt, his sister, disappeared. My grandmother was still alive then, but I don’t remember if your grandmother was or not. You’ll have to ask my dad.” I narrowed my eyes. “The sister never came back?” He lifted a shoulder. “No. They never found her. She was only fifteen.” “That’s very sad.”

“This is them, in India. Our grandmothers.” My heart lurched, hard, as I took the photo. It was of two young women, a black-and-white snapshot in an ornate frame. The Indian woman looked directly, unsmiling, at the camera, a long black braid draped over the shoulder of her sari. The white woman, my grandmother, sat in a chair, with her hand resting on the head of a large pale dog. She wore riding pants and boots and a crisp tailored shirt, and I knew her face instantly. Because it was my face. “Even our hair is exactly the same,” I said, touching my wavy hair. It fell below my shoulders, unruly and streaky, just like my grandmother Violet’s.

Peering down at us from the gallery was a cat, presumably the same one who’d dashed out from under my mother’s bed but a different cat than the one we’d seen the first time, this one nearly all black with white on his face and paws. “Hey, cat,” I said. He didn’t move. His long tail swished over the edge. I clutched the painting to my chest, thinking of all the cats peering out of my mother’s forests. Again, the tears welled in my eyes, and I had to turn away. “This is all making me kind of emotional.” “It’s all right to miss her, you know.” I nodded. “I just wish she was still here.”

I backspaced. Lady Olivia Shaw, the new Countess of Rosemere. I’ve only just learned of my inheritance, which includes a wreck of an Elizabethan mansion. I’m not at all sure the place can be saved, but Suddenly I realized part of what appealed to me. I feel I’d be letting down the women who’ve come before me if I don’t at least try.

I was skilled in pitching ideas. What would set this property apart? As you may know, the house has been vacant since the late seventies, when all the members of the family deserted it. My mother went to San Francisco, where she raised me without saying a word about her past. There seems to be no trace of her brother, and it is quite unclear when my grandmother died. The locals seem to think she cursed it because she never wanted to leave India to live in England, but she was forced when she inherited the house. I am a native Californian, a food writer with no experience in any of this, but Rosemere Priory has a long and storied history, woven with women’s lives, which I find compelling, and perhaps you will too. I’d love to meet with you if you think there might be potential for your show. My telephone number is (01632) 961796, or you may contact me at this email address. Sincerely, Olivia Shaw, Countess of Rosemere

I flipped my notebook to a new page and scribbled a few ideas—the cake-shop girl, the lamb industry (take care with the ick factor), and maybe craft beer. Thinking of my upcoming meal with Pavi, I added, “British Indian food?” I sent a quick email back offering a selection of times we could Skype and leaned back, setting pots of possible ideas to simmer on the back burners of my imagination.

People had lived and died in this little village for hundreds and hundreds of years. I felt them suddenly, long lines of them reaching back through time, and let my hand capture that emotion in an easy sketch, figures in all manner of dress moving through and around each other, their feet crisscrossing the same paths. The quiet square seemed busy with their ghosts, their stories, and it made me feel peaceful in some arcane way. Life had washed me here on this strange errand. Maybe the best thing to do was to just let it show me what it had in mind.

I’d never been able to get comfortable with sitting meditation, but cooking and sketching and walking gave me the same feeling I’d heard others describe. Wordlessness, focusing on the moment, letting go of the crazy voices all vying for attention.

I just need to get the order of things straight in my head. My grandmother died, right?” “Yes. That must have been 1973.” She paused, frowning. “Maybe ’74.” I was born in 1978, in San Francisco, which gave my mother enough time to emigrate, find a husband, and give birth to me. “So who was the earl when Violet died?” “Her son, of course. Roger Shaw was the fourteenth Earl of Rosemere.” “That’s my mother’s brother. My uncle.”

“Where did he go?” “To India, as far as I know—that’s where we’ve always sent the money, but he’s disappeared now too.” “Disappeared?” “No one has been retrieving the money for quite some time.” “India? Why would he go there?” “How should I know? He was born there, and some people . . . well, they don’t adjust, do they?” “What do you mean?”

I was not the most adroit banking person, but I was able to figure out most of what I needed for the moment—particularly the income and rents, which were, as the earl had predicted, quite substantial. I’d need advisors—multiple advisors, no doubt—but the estate was essentially a large business with several arms, and my task was to become CEO of the concern. Daunting. But not impossible. With a quiet sense of confidence, I opened my laptop and began making lists. Things I needed to understand. Advisors I’d have to consult. Where I was strong. Where I was weak. It was a start.

We stopped in Violet’s room, and she gasped aloud. “That painting is an Ingres.” I looked over her shoulder. “I thought it seemed familiar.” She stepped into the room, turning in a slow circle to look at the rest of it. “Incredible.” In the hallway, she cocked her head. “Where is the rest of the artwork?” “I have asked the same question. No one seems to know. The library is empty too.” She pursed her lips. “Why take all but the paintings in Violet’s room?”

“The countess was a very large personality. You’d love her or hate her. Of course, later in life, she grew more eccentric and extreme—I’ve always thought she must have had dementia.”

“These are the terraces,” she said, waving a hand. “They’re a Georgian invention, part of the craze for everything Italian. The young lords made their grand tours and came back enamored with Italy or the Moors or some new tree.” She pointed. “Those are tulip trees, I believe. Beautiful in the spring. And those are daffodils popping up. They’ll be blooming in a week or so, I’d say.” I imagined one of my ancestors as a dashing young lord, dazzled by the terraced gardens of Italy. “I’m not an experienced gardener,” I admitted. “I’ve always lived in the city. My mother has—had—a beautiful garden.” “Well, you’ll have a chance to learn here if you wish.” She gave me a half smile. “We expect our lords and ladies to know these things. And you must buy yourself a good hound.” I laughed but heard the kernel of truth in it. Point taken. I’d have to educate myself if I planned to stay.

The gardens meandered along banks of rhododendron—“This will be magnificent in a month”—and what must have once been a knot garden that meandered into a half-walled garden. We paused at the edge of an enormous field of rose bushes just leafing out on their leggy stalks. “How could they have survived so well?” I said in wonder. “Well, they’ve gone wild, haven’t they?” “My mother had a rose garden. I suppose I know why now.”

The walled garden gave way to another that made use of a ruin from the monastery days. Overgrown beds and pots and shrubs gone amok couldn’t hide what had once been a most romantic spot—private and designed for contemplation. A stream ran alongside it. “This comes from the spring at the center of the medicinal garden,” Jocasta said, consulting her map. “The building might have been a buttery or the like, since it would have been cooler here by the stream.” Fig vines covered the old stone, but everything else was overgrown beyond recognition. At a hedge, Jocasta stopped. “This is the pièce de résistance. The maze.”

The first two doors of the carriage house flats were locked, but the third opened into a neglected but very sunny space with a view toward the house. The brick had been exposed and the old beams left in the ceiling. A fireplace with a carved mantle took up the far wall, which would be a sitting area and dining room adjoining a kitchen that must have been built in the twenties, judging by the sink. “Quite charming,” Jocasta pronounced. “Agreed.” I poked my head around the corner and found a bedroom, small but again faced with that open brick and a row of windows that looked toward the hills. A bathroom that was the same era as the kitchen was far more charming, with a pedestal sink and a claw-footed tub. “No shower, but that would be easily added.” If I’d had any inkling that I’d be returning to my old life, the tide turned in that moment. I saw myself so clearly in this space, writing in that spot by the fire, cooking in that kitchen. Maybe I could get another dog, I thought, and saw her, too, sitting by the fire, a red-coated retriever. “This is perfect,” I said.

“The last thing, my dear, is to think about what you might want to do to support the house once it has been saved. You’ll have to do something. These prodigal houses take endless pots of money, and you will need another means of support. Just giving tours is not enough these days—you’ll have to think about what else you can do.” “Like what?” “You said you’re an editor—is that right? Is there something with writing or food that comes to mind? Maybe you can—” “Maybe a fair on Saturdays, to bring people in.” “Good start.” “A cooking school. Or—” “I suspect you’ll think of something.” I suspected I would have to.

“How do you find us so far, Lady Shaw?” “The town or you and your family?” I asked, a prawn between my fingers. “The town is bewildering. Somehow, your family is grounding me.” “Ah, very good. That is because our families have known each other for many, many years, a century, perhaps.”

“You must be proud of her.” “Yes. She always has her own ideas, but she has the intelligence to go with them.” “I can see that.”