The Lauderhill Legacy

Chapter 5 - REECE LINE - PRESENT DAY

Lucinda Wolverleigh fussed about the tea wagon, pouring steaming tea into scalloped edged, frail looking china cups. She looked every bit the lady's guild poster girl with her flowered dress and stubby heels, permed hair, its lead colour reflecting dully in the sun-streaked sitting room.

She set the pot down and slid a crocheted cover over it for warmth then carefully carried the two cups to the chintz-covered sofa beside the window.

"Those are biscuits from my mother's recipe. You'll like them." The other woman sipped her tea and selected one of the recommended biscuits, placing it on her saucer beside the cup. "Well, what did you think?" The voice was firm and commanding and the question was delivered with an expectation of an immediate and informative response.

"Very nice."

"What do you mean?"

"Your mother's recipe, it's very nice."

Lucinda squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath. "Not the biscuits."

Margaret gave a self-deprecating smile. "Garfield said there was a lot of boxes and trunks unopened in the basement."

"I asked what you thought, Margaret."

"Lucinda, you are such a bully sometimes." She sipped her tea noisily drawing a frown from her cousin. "I think we'll just have to wait and see what Marcee or Walter decides to do with the things in the house."

Margaret Reece was a steamboat of a woman with a wide girth, heavily made up features and exuding a strong scent of powder.

"I understood it was all hers." Lucinda remarked, ignoring the rebuke from her younger cousin.

"The contents are, but she and Walter will likely decide together about their distribution."

Lucinda Wolverleigh, nee Reece, was the granddaughter of Harvey Highcourt, David Highcourt's brother. Married and widowed by a Leonard Wolverleigh, one time conductor aboard the Trans Canada Railway passenger line. When her great uncle died in the snowstorm, her great grandfather fell into a deep depression, slipping gradually into a terminal decline.

He called her to his bedside and gave her a letter that he said contained information about a family legacy that was to be kept safe and secret from their other relatives. With no other explanation, and too worried to question his motive, Lucinda hid the letter, reluctantly revealing it only after she was contacted years later by her cousin, Margaret Reece.

Margaret, it turned out, also had a piece of information corresponding to the Highcourt family legacy, entrusted to her by her father and handed down with the same pledge of secrecy. How these separate and secret missives came to reside in two different branches of the family was never ascertained nor discussed; both women accepted the reality that they could be either allies or competitors, with the option of allies carrying the day.

Choosing a biscuit from the plate, Lucinda studied her cousin. The letter from her grandfather was actually a torn, partial letter that contained several lines of meaningless prose until matched to the segment Margaret had been given. Together, they at least made sense in reading although not entirely in meaning.

The key, they both felt, lay with a book rumoured to have been kept by Angus Lauder and handed on to his sister Charlotte and now most probably resided among the stored belongings in the basement of Belinda's home.

"How do we influence that decision?"

"I'm not certain we can. Garfield has suggested speaking to Walter about leaving mementos with family members. Maybe, if they agree, we can get to sort through the things ourselves."

"And if they don't?"

"Lucinda, I don't have a master plan. This is all very upsetting to me as you might imagine."

"What, you mean great grandmother having a fling with Angus Lauder? Move on, Margaret, that was generations ago."

"Perhaps, but it was still news to me when I read your part of the letter."

"Speaking of which, have you had any thoughts on its meaning?" Margaret shook her head slowly and chewed daintily on her biscuit.

She opened her huge needlepoint purse and withdrew a copy of the combined letter parts, opening it and adjusting her glasses on her nose.

"Logic tells me that solving the riddle doesn't mean having to read the book."

"What logic?"

"The fact that Angus Lauder's personal effects weren't sent to Belinda but to David Highcourt. What would be the point in leaving her the few lines of prose and not the book if she needed it for reference?"

"But it mentions the book." She handed Lucinda the paper.

"No. All it says is, Alec cautions one to read all between the covers."

"Well there you are. You have to read the book."

"I thought you said you didn't have any ideas about this."

"I don't. If we can't find or get hold of this book, and by the way it is just a rumour, there's nothing more to do."

Lucinda looked thoughtfully at her cousin and made a mental note that Margaret wouldn't present much of a problem in her quest for the Lauder legacy.

"It's all very stressful to me, Lucinda. Secret clues and special books; mysterious messages. It's so very... Agatha Christie." Margaret fanned her face with her fingers.

"And just as with Agatha Christie, there is a solution." Her cousin snapped and went back to reading the copy.

PRESENT DAY

Marcie woke with a start. She stared at the strange room trying to get her bearings then realized where she was with a long, blowing breath of relief. The temperature felt cool and she kept the blanket wrapped about her as she waddled to the bathroom. Everything felt cold and she remembered that the utilities were all ending before the weekend; the new owner would have to pay his own startup costs to reinstate them all.

Luckily, the hydro was still on. She rinsed her face with cold water, shivered and clumped down to the kitchen to see if there was any tea or coffee left and foraged in the fridge and cupboards for something to eat. Staying over was not the great idea it had seemed the night before.

The telephone rang and she gave a small cheer for another utility still functioning.

"Hello?"

"Marcee? Good morning. How'd you sleep in that empty house?"

"Walter, bring me my clothes, it's freezing in here. The gas company has shut off service already."

"Boy, they don't give an inch do they. I am on my way. I just called to see if you wanted anything for breakfast."

"Oh God, yes. A toasted bagel and a huge coffee would be marvelous."

"Be there in half an hour." He rang off and she hung up the phone, gathering the blanket around her shoulders.

A fairly strong sun was making its way through the living room blinds and she opened them wide, shoving a chair into the middle of the room and curling up in the tepid warmth. On the bookstand near her was Walter's handwritten copy of the text from the letter they'd found and Marcee reached over and held it up for examination.

'Alec cautions one to read all between the covers.