The list of wishes is not a letter, or an explanation.
James has obviously been through the ebbs and flows of this process a hundred times. I take considerable comfort in being part of such a vast and timeless congregation in James’s mind.
It takes me a moment to regroup.
“So, the property was definitely my father’s. Can I ask when or how he acquired it, James?”
“I’d be very happy to go through everything with you in person, if you’re available later in the week?”
Thoughts scrambled, I ask, “Oh, do you have a London office then?”
James chuckles. “Unfortunately, not. No, we would fly you out here to the British Virgin Islands to take receivership. Whenever fits in with your schedule—provisions were made within the will itself to cover all fees and expenses involved in the transition of ownership. First-class airfare and transfers have been covered, so I can action your travel arrangements whenever works for you?”
I believe, at this point in the conversation and for the first time in my adult life, my mouth falls open. By the sounds of it my father had another life. A life that included first-class air travel and second homes. His UK assets were already sizable, as reflected in the inheritance I received a few days ago, but this sounds like another matter entirely.
“Nina?” James asks after a moment of silence.
“Yes, sorry, it’s just quite a lot of new information to take in.” Slowly a new question forms, a crude, blunt one that I do not know how to phrase well. “Sorry, James, but this property, this estate, is it substantial? I mean, how much—” I trail off, hoping not to need to add more. And thankfully James saves my blushes.
“It is a generous property, yes, in one of the most exclusive areas of the BVI. But we can get into numbers and the rest as and when we meet.”
A generous property. My father was rich. Very, very rich. And I had no idea. The thought snags—because, how did he get that rich?
“But do you know when my father might have bought or used the house, James? It’s just, I can’t quite square away when he would have gone out there,” I ask.
“Well, we can certainly look into these things for you and get into the weeds when you’re over. When would you be available to fly?” he asks, his tone pragmatic.
I look around my father’s empty sitting room once more. There is no more to be done here and the university has already granted me a sabbatical, my lectures covered, my students aware. Time off “for grief.” It seems everyone in my life, except me, obviously, has foreseen that once the music finally stopped, I would need time to scrape myself off the floor.
Mistaking my pause for reticence, which it may well have been, James pushes on.
“Of course, if you would rather not come out in person we can supply e-contracts and assist in placing the property directly on the market for you? If that would be something—”
“Are his things still there?” I interject, the question flying from me before I can couch it in politeness.
“His things?” James asks, seeking clarification.
“Yes, does he have possessions out there. Personal items? Is the house left as it was?”
I hear understanding drop into James’s voice. “Yes. The house is vacant but lived in. There are the standard personal effects present, I believe. Yes. Pictures, books, personal items.” He sounds sad now. I have made James sad; I’ve managed to depress a will executor.
But that doesn’t matter, because the prospect of what I might find out there, in that house, still undiscovered, lifts me out of my void. The idea that I might find more of my father out there, the possibility that our story might not yet be over, is a salve.
A fizzle of excitement crackles to life inside me. I thought I knew everything about my father, but this house has shown me that, clearly, there is more to know. More of him out there, halfway across the world, and wasn’t it just like him to leave something behind for me to ponder, to provide me with a series of questions that demand answers? A puzzle, clues to follow, more to solve. Hope glows afresh inside me, but with it a sharp splinter of fear, because a truth has been kept from me and I cannot imagine why. Good things are rarely kept secret, which means I might find something I don’t like in all this. It is always dangerous to look too hard into the lives of those you love and respect more than anything.
It occurs to me that I could just instruct James to begin the process of putting this bizarre property on the market without my involvement. I could request they ship his personal items back to me. Though out of context would any of it make sense? Perhaps it doesn’t need to? I could just let my father lie, rest…in peace. I could plop the enormous sale value from this generous property into my bank, then go back to work at the university and never think about money, or this mystery house, ever again.
But would I never think of it again; or would I always think of it? Of what it meant…I would never know. And that would drive me mad, not knowing.
I have never been the kind of person to turn away from an unanswered question. The cat cannot be shooed back into the bag and Pandora’s box cannot be repacked. My father would have known that, and knowing that, he deliberately left me the house.
By doing so he is trying to tell me one last thing, about him; he has left me one last challenge, a puzzle to solve. And if anyone could set something in motion from beyond the grave it would be him.
“When is the soonest I can fly out?” I ask.
—
IN THE DAYS BEFORE I depart, I do what research I can. I scour online for any reference to my father’s work abroad but I find nothing. No mention of a holiday home, no clues to be followed.
