“Paid and displayed what?” Dixie muttered to herself, a vaguely obscene image coming to mind.
“You’re American,” a cheery voice announced.
Dixie turned. A young woman pushing a stroller loaded with two toddlers and groceries stood at her elbow. “You were thinking aloud. Pay and Display. It’s for parking.” She slowed her voice as if talking to a child. “You did park in the car park didn’t you?” Dixie nodded. “You have to pay.” She led Dixie to a yellow machine. It needed £1 and 50p coins.
“I don’t have change. I’ll have to skip it and take my chances with the fine.”
“You can’t do that! The fine’s fifty pounds.”
Fifty pounds? She had to be kidding. Seventy or eighty dollars for a parking fine? What did you pay for speeding? The smallest thing Dixie had was a ten-pound note. Minutes later, Dixie had a five pound note, five heavy coins, and had learned the intricacies of the parking system. A small round coin paid for an hour’s parking. She received a large seven-sided coin for change and a ticket with small print giving precise directions for placing it on the inside of the driver’s window.
Dixie squeezed between her car and the BMW, unlocked her door and set off the alarm. Silencing it took a good three minutes of searching for the manual and finding the right page. Why hadn’t Stanley explained this instead of all the stuff about dipped headlights and windshield wipers?
To Dixie’s surprise, the passersby ignored the siren. She wished she could and finally emerged, red-faced, after slapping the ticket on the window.
Mayburn House wasn’t the gracious Georgian structure she’d expected, but a yellow-brick building housing a baker and an “off-licence.” The latter looked like a liquor store. A brass plate by the front door announced “Woodrow, Hartscomb and Caughleigh. Solicitors and Commissioners for Oaths.” Oaths fit Dixie’s mood right now. At the top of the uncarpeted stairs, a glass paneled door stood ajar.
“I’d like to see Mr. Caughleigh,” Dixie said as she pushed open the door.
A secretary glanced up from her typewriter, flicked her purple nails and asked, “Do you have an appointment?”
“Mr. Caughleigh’s expecting me.”
“You need an appointment,” she repeated, tapping her artificial nails.
The click of her long nails snapped Dixie’s nerves. Planting both hands on the desktop, she leaned over until they were nose to nose. “My name is Dixie LePage. I flew in this morning from the States. Mr. Caughleigh is expecting me. I wrote to him and left a message this morning. Tell him I’m here.”
Secretary blinked her impossibly long eyelashes, pulled her shoulders back and pursed her mouth. “I’ll see if he’s in,” she said and teetered across to the inner office.
Muffled voices sounded through the closed door. Dixie regretted her temper but gave Caughleigh five minutes before she pushed open the door herself. She took a deep breath and looked around the room. Battleship gray filing cabinets looked old enough to house secrets from World War I. Stacks of old deed boxes with faded names covered two walls and both chairs by the window appeared to have been quietly fading since the sixties.
“Miss LePage, I’m delighted to meet you at last.” Dixie’s images of a Dickensian lawyer were way off base. Manicured hand extended, Sebastian Caughleigh looked down at her, all six foot one of him, with bedroom eyes and a smile that could melt butter.
“You had a good flight, I trust,” he said in a too-smooth voice.
“The flight was fine. Everything went downhill after I landed.”
“Yes, yes, I got your message. These strikes!” He raised his eyes upward as if that would get the rails rolling. “Terrible. If you’d only left a number, I could have sent a car for you.”
“It’s hard to take return calls at a pay phone.”
He showed pristine white teeth when he smiled. “Never mind. You’re here now. That’s what matters and we have a lot of business to discuss.” He closed the door behind him. “You’ve met my secretary, Valerie Fortune.” Valerie smiled graciously and Dixie decided anyone called Miss Fortune could be forgiven purple fingernails. “It’s a bit late to ask Valerie to make coffee. Perhaps you’d rather a spot of lunch?”
She could use more than a “spot.” The clock said two. Her body was still at breakfast time with scant sleep. “Lunch would be very nice.”
“We’ll be at the Barley Mow,” he told Valerie as he took Dixie’s elbow.
“Uncle?” The inner door opened. Sebastian Caughleigh drew in his breath. Dixie felt her jaw drop. The Adonis from the airport stood in the doorway. “Hello,” he said and smiled. Sebastian Caughleigh didn’t.
“We’re just going out, James. I’ll talk to you when I get back.” Then, as if remembering Dixie, he added, “My nephew, James Chadwick.” Reluctance shadowed Sebastian’s voice.
“We’ve met,” Dixie replied. “James helped me out with a pay phone at the airport.”
James’s eyebrows rose, slowly. “I wish I could join you for lunch,” he said with a sly smile.
“So do we, James, but I know you’ve got things to do. See you later.” Caughleigh opened the outer door wide. Dixie stepped out and he slammed the door behind them.
“The Barley Mow is our local down on the village green. I thought, being American, you’d like lunch in a genuine old-English pub.” She would, but she wasn’t picky—anywhere that served food would be fine right now. “Just a short walk, not worth taking the car,” he said as he went to cross the road.
“We might as well drive. I have to move my car. I only paid for an hour.” A seventy-dollar fine would make an expensive lunch.
Sebastian Caughleigh stopped mid-stride. “You have a car?”
“A rental.”
He jackknifed his long legs into the Metro’s passenger seat. It took a good fifteen minutes to exit the car park, negotiate the traffic in High Street, turn right at a Norman church that invited exploration, and find a space in the Barley Mow’s graveled car park. They could have walked it in ten.
The Barley Mow stood on the edge of the village green, just yards from a wide pond that edged onto the lane. Inside, it was an antique hunter’s dream. Horse brasses hung on oak beams. A hammered copper hood decorated the chimney of an inglenook fireplace. Willow pattern plates, copper kettles, hunting prints and old maps decorated every niche and wall.
Sebastian led her through the pub. “Alf,” he said to the dumpy man behind the polished bar, “this is Miss Dixie LePage, the Misses Underwood’s great-niece. She’s over from America to see about settling the estate.”
“Hi, Alf.”
“Afternoon.” Alf looked up from counting money and smiled—at Dixie. “What can I get you?”
“Two ploughman’s please, Alf.” Sebastian turned to Dixie. “You’ll like this. It’s a pub specialty.”
She would, would she? Irritation pricked down her spine. He hadn’t bothered to ask before ordering. Were Englishmen still living in the Victorian age? And what the heck was he expecting her to eat? Meat, if the plates on the table she’d passed were anything to go by. “What’s a ploughman’s?” Dixie asked, pointedly looking at Alf.
His mouth twitched as he looked straight at her and gave her a little nod. “American, aren’t you?” Alf paused, acknowledging her agreement with another smile. “It’s a pub standard: bit of salad, pickle, a chunk of baguette, and Cheddar, Stilton, or ham depending on your choice.”
That was something; she could have a good lunch without explaining or justifying her reluctance to eat meat.
“Two