Page 44 of Road Trip
“As one does,” Esme said. She’d pulled her dog onto her lap and was absent-mindedly stroking his ears as she gazed past Therese, at the television over the bar.
“It was fabulous,” Therese said. “The house itself, and the grounds, and the antiques, and of course, the art collection.”
“You should have seen it back in the day,” Esme said with a sigh.
“You grew up around here?” Therese asked, deliberately playing dumb.
“You could say that. My family owned Tarrymore for many generations. I grew up in that house, got married in the ballroom. Both my father and his parents and great-greats and beyond are buried in the family cemetery. Now, of course, the great house is owned and managed by the Trust. And Sinead and I live in the gardener’s cottage ’round back.”
“Oh. That’s so sad,” Therese said. “All of it, I mean.”
Esme’s mouth twisted in a wry smile. “Had it been up to me, I would never have given the estate up to the Trust. But my darling little brother had other ideas, and he was able to talk myninety-two-year-old father into believing nobody in the family could ever make a go of operating it as a profit-making concern.”
“Family drama,” Therese said, shaking her head.
“It’s the way of our people,” Esme said. “Technically, I suppose I’m Anglo-Irish, although my father became an Irish citizen when he turned eighty. And do you know how we know Jesus was Irish?”
Therese actually did know, but she wanted her new friend to share her little joke.
“Because he lived alone with Mary ’til he was thirty, had twelve close drinking chums, and his mother was convinced he was God.”
“Hah!” Therese said with an appreciative chuckle. “Good one!”
“Do you have siblings?” Esme asked.
“Just my little sister Maeve. She’s actually traveling with me.”
“Get along?”
“Rarely. Er, sometimes. We love each other, but we’re… very different.”
“Geoffrey and I were nothing alike, and we weren’t keen on each other as friends either.” She nuzzled her chin against the top of the dog’s head. “Sinead is all the family I need.”
“Geoffrey, your brother? Where is he now?”
“In hell, if there’s any justice on this earth.”
“And yet, he talked your father into just giving up your family home?”
“Afterhe talked my father into bankrolling half a dozen of Geoffrey’s other rubbish schemes. The ostrich farm in Cumbria, the solar-powered golf carts—in Ireland, a country where we don’t see the sun for seemingly months on end…”
Therese giggled despite herself.
“He told Father the estate was a drag on the family fortune, would never ever turn a profit, even though I had financials all in order to turn it into something along the scale of Powerscourt Gardens,” Esme said.
“What about your mother? She couldn’t make your father believe in your vision?”
“They divorced when I was nine,” Esme said. “She remarried and moved to New Zealand. And my stepmother was never a fan of mine, so no help there.”
Esme sighed and wrapped her arms around the small dog’s frame. “The real nail in the coffin was that IRA robbery, back in the ’70s. Papa never really felt safe living at Tarrymore after that. It didn’t help matters that the villains pistol-whipped Marguerite and shot up her Aston Martin as they made their getaway.”
“An IRA robbery? Wow! What happened?”
The older woman polished off her drink and raised her empty glass in the air. A moment later, their server arrived with another gin and tonic. He nodded at Therese. “Anything for you?”
“Why not,” Therese said, shrugging.
Esme took a long sip of her own drink, nearly emptying the glass. She pointed at Therese’s half basket of chips. “Are you going to eat those?”
