Disclaimer: I own Jack Squat.
Affairs of Entailment
CHAPTER ONE
IT WAS WELL KNOWN by Eleanor Barnett's thirty-fourth birthday that she intended to spend the rest of her life unmarried and living in her father's house off her father's fortune, no doubt whiling away her youth in some armchair off in a study somewhere, reading some ridiculous book (also her father's) about philosophy or something equally as absurd like that.
But unfortunately, for Eleanor, at least, it was also well known that following her parents' death (a most unfortunate stroke of luck with an apple and a rather quite obstinate mule), if she indeed never married, her father's estate at Lancaster was to be entailed back to the Barnett family itself, leaving poor Eleanor with no inheritance other than the small but comfortable sum her father had actually left her, plus an added amount from her mother.
Well, that's how rumor had it at any rate. But whether or not it was actually true really didn't matter, since whatever rumor said, went in the small East Farthing town of Dwaling. Truth be told, no one had actually seen Dodoric Barnett's will since he'd written it thirty-odd years ago, but everyone was perfectly willing to believe the Barnetts' claims to the fortune, mostly because they knew that money in the Barnetts' hands was money in theirs.
But oh, how her mother must have been rolling in her grave when she realized this! For she knew the chances of her daughter marrying were just as likely as… well… something rather unlikely, like her daughter actually falling in love. And she thought it a most dreadful waste to have given her daughter such fine, exquisite looks only to have Eleanor hide them behind some damned book! (For it was also well known that the only thing Mrs. Barnett could waste was her husband's money, if you don't count the time spent on all those numerous but fruitless attempts to find the perfect future son-in-law.)
And, however much he would have hated to admit it, Mr. Barnett was probably just as restless at the idea of his five sisters taking over the place. The least they could do was to leave his daughter the family estate at Knocturn Abbey, but whatever would she do with all that farmland? They'd probably leave it to his only nephew, anyway, once they'd all moved out.
"I can't believe you're going to sit back and let them take over the place!" Ruby Hollow, her cousin on her mother's side, cried to her one day. She scarcely took her eyes off of her book as she sat on the banks of the pond. "You've only a year left before they force you to move out! What ever will you do with yourself? Certainly not stay here! It is so dreadfully boring."
"No more boring than staying in an empty house." Eleanor rocked herself back and forth on the wood swing hanging from the branch of a gnarled willow and sighed.
"Only because you insist on not populating it!" Ruby cried. "Honestly, you've brought this all upon yourself, you know. I can't believe you're not going to do anything about it!" she repeated.
"Ruby Hollow, if you're insinuating that I use my predicament as an excuse to find a husband of nothing more than convenience, you're as bad as Lidu."
Ruby placed her book in the grass turned to her cousin. "Lydia Barnett may be a cheap romantic, but rest assured, dear cousin, I am not. We Hollows are hobbits of substance." And she promptly turned her back to Eleanor with a humph.
"Which is precisely why you accompany her to Frogmorton in your best bodice and bonnet, with your hair fixed and your face all dolled up, when the Eastfarthing Troop has come to town."
"That is most certainly not what I was getting at, dear cousin," Ruby assured with a scoff. "But while we're on the subject—and at this point Eleanor rolled her eyes, for she knew where this conversation was going, as she and her cousin had discussed the dreaded 'subject' many a time—I still hold my opinion that you're wasting a wonderful opportunity.
"I mean, look at you: you're pretty, rich, old enough to marry, probably the most eligible lass in Dwaling—not that that's saying much, but you get my drift—and yet all you do is sit at home reading and waiting for your greedy, no-good relatives to scrounge up everything your mother and father worked so hard to give you!"
"If they worked so hard to give it to me, they should have had more sense than to entail it to the most undeserving bunch of idiots ever to be bred in the Shire."
"Eleanor!" Ruby hissed in a low voice, looking about to make sure no one had heard her cousin's less than acceptable words. "Besides, they did entail it you, unless you've forgotten."
"Well they might as well not have. Now pray tell what exactly you were getting at a moment ago," Eleanor said dismissively, waving her hand as if it were no big deal, twirling herself around on the swing.
Ruby was silent for a moment, quietly contemplative as she regarded a dandelion with a frown. "I was only insinuating, in the first place, dear Eleanor, that you should do something about getting the entailment changed to change your circumstances," she admitted at length, "not change your circumstances to get the entailment!"
Eleanor laughed and leaned back, closing her eyes and allowing the wind to whip across her face. "You could change my father's will no sooner than you could find it, and you can change any will, for that matter, no sooner than you can find me a husband, my dear cousin!"
Ruby sighed and rolled her eyes, picked her book back up and turned to the pond, casting a small stone in for good measure. Then she plucked the dandelion from the ground and held it to her face. "Then I shall just have to find you a husband," she said, blowing the duffy seeds to the wind and tossing the stem into the pond once they were out of sight.
DOWN AT KNOCTURN ABBEY not two hours later, the Barnetts were just set down for luncheon at the long table in the dining room.
All twenty-four of them, that was, save the three who'd carried their plates to the back porch, eager to escape their family's constant chatter and incessant gossiping, for such things are quite inevitable in situations in which the women outnumber the men one to three.
Eleanor strove to avoid them if at all possible, sparing herself the uncomfortable silence her presence would bring, for they were no doubt talking of what they would do with Lancaster once the one-year they'd so graciously granted her was indeed up.
Oh, Dear Aunt Katrina and her poor husband Polo could entail the whole of Knocturn Abbey to their son Cole, the only male descendant in the family, once everyone else had moved out, they being the only ones intending to stay. What a fine wife they might find him with such a fortune!
And Dear Aunt Melissa and her two daughters Marigold and Mentha would have ever so much more room to store their numerous dresses and petticoats in all the free space that would be provided by her dear sister's absence.
Dear Aunts Penelope and Esmerelda would probably barter off some unneeded furniture and her mother's collection of silver spoons, no doubt to invest in smials of their own, assuming they wouldn't invest in jewelry and clothing first.
And Dear Aunt Sophia, Lidu's mother, the sister-in-law, Brian Barnett being her third husband, would have a room for each of her four children. It was, after all, Brian who would actually inherit the estate from his brother, being the patriarch of the family, or as much of a patriarch as he could be with five sisters, a nagging wife, and eleven other unmarried young women, all no older than thirty-five.
But Dear unmarried Aunt May simply didn't know what she'd do. She'd already, quite simply, endured enough of her family's nonsense for one morning. Her predicament was most discouraging, for out of all her many sisters and in-laws and nieces and nephew, not a one of them had yet come to the realization that Lancaster was, having been built, in fact, for three instead of twenty-four, after all, a good deal smaller than Knocturn Abbey. And more discouraging was the fact that she would be the one to deal with it once they all found out, for they'd probably be in too great a shock and inundated in such despair as to render them incapable of handling the situation themselves.
Such domestic talk both bored and confused cousin Lidu, who only really wanted to talk of clothes, jewelry, and most of all hobbit lads, all of which she could do, amazingly, at one time.
Not that any of the younger girls didn't, but their mothers kept much better tabs on their daughters than Sophia Barnett did on Lydia. Lidu actually had an exceptional talent for it, being somewhat more intelligent than her other Barnett cousins (save Eleanor) though never really applying her intelligence to anything really intelligent, and was in the process of demonstrating said talent when Eleanor herself was brought into the subject.
"You know, Lee," as the Barnetts called her, "I was just now thinking of how grand a trip to Frogmorton this time of year would be," she began, giving no room for protests. "You know how much you simply adore your favourite," she teased, fully aware that Eleanor knew good and well what she was doing, "cousin in the whole wide world, and it would mean ever so much to me if—what on earth does that woman want now?"
Eleanor breathed a sigh of relief when Lidu stomped huffily back into the smial at the request of her mother, who was probably going to ask her which room she would want once they moved to Lancaster, what color she would like it painted, and whether she would like a new bedroom set with all the money Sophia would get from mooching off Aunt Penelope and Aunt Esmerelda's idea with the spoons.
May shook her head, smiling but too disappointed in the follies of her own flesh and blood to laugh.
"You'd better get going before she invites you to the ball, Lee," May warned with a smirk.
Eleanor frowned and put down her fork. "What ball?"
May put on an expression of mock surprise and her hand fluttered over her chest. "Your cousin wants you to take her shopping in Frogmorton with your money, and you ask what ball!" she laughed, throwing off the act. "Honestly, Lee, I thought you much cleverer than that."
"Are the Barnetts throwing a ball?" Eleanor asked incredulously, mouth agape at the horror that might ensue if such a thing was ever to pass.
"No," her Aunt gasped, much to her niece's relief. "Heavens no. But rumor has it that a fine young man is planning on building his mother's summer home in Dwaling, and one does not come to live in Dwaling without first hosting a housewarming ball, especially seeing as we're a bit low on social events now that your mother, bless her soul, is gone. And as we all know—"
"What rumor says goes," they chorused dejectedly.
"Oh, I hadn't heard," said Eleanor, now wishing she hadn't.
"Yes, well, now you have," May confirmed dismally. "But no one has to know, so run along before Lidu ends up taking you husband-shopping."
"Oh she wouldn't do that with Lancaster at stake," Eleanor argued confidently, waving her fork.
"I never said for whom," May pointed out with a raised eyebrow.
Eleanor nodded in sudden understanding before grabbing her plate and handing it to her aunt. "Send me word when it is safe to come back," she told her. "I'll probably be staying down at The Hollow, though I have more than a slight suspicion that Ruby has heard the news and will no doubt be just as eager to talk me into going for the same reason I originally assumed to Lidu."
She descended the wooden steps of the now deteriorating Barnett back porch and walked on until she had just reached the equally rickety gate. She undid the latch and called back to her aunt in afterthought, "But of course you don't have to tell Lidu that!"
THE COUNTDOWN to the Lancaster inheritance began the next morning, a month exactly after the Barnetts' passing.
At The Hollow, the Hollows spent the evening in an uncomfortable silence, the women busing themselves with knitting and crocheting and cross-stitching and embroidery, and the men busying themselves with a good book, as the sounds of rejoicing and celebration from Knocturn Abbey, however muffled by the walls of the smial, rang on with a good deal of fervor throughout the night.
Off in Frogmorton, the Jackleys had just arrived from Hobbiton and Mr. Underhill and his elderly mother from Stock. They booked a few rooms in a well-known inn, ordered a few rounds of ale, and toasted to an elegant summer smial that had not yet been built.
As predicted, Eleanor Barnett spent her last night whiling away the hours in an armchair in the late Mr. Barnett's study, sipping on tea and munching on crumpets, and reading some book about philosophy or something absurd like that, all into the wee hours of the morning. She looked up only as the clock struck midnight.
So began the affairs of her father's entailment.