He was a man calculated to impress. As he stood in the doorway, leaning lazily against the frame, I got a strong impression that he enjoyed theatrics, and that he knew and relished that he had startled me.

Doing some quick calculations of my own, I chose to appear unperturbed. I had met and dealt with these men before and knew what might derail a flair for the dramatic.

Lifting an eyebrow, I said calmly and flatly, "I beg your pardon?"

A slight frown crinkled the brow above his sharp blue eyes. Clearly this wasn't the answer he'd been expecting. He recovered quickly, dragging a hand through his windswept hair in a charming and practiced manner, his mouth twisting in a cheeky half smile.

"I'm sorry, miss, but you look just like a photograph that if I've seen once, I've seen a thousand times. You flat startled me, I'll admit, standing there in the door like a ghost of the past."

I wondered if that was the only reason I had startled him. He seemed a little put off to have met someone here, and his manner was just a little too breezy for the shrewdness of his expression. Suspicion prickled in my mind, and so although I was rather curious about the photograph, I chose to press on a different question first.

"I'm sorry to have disturbed you. I would, though, like to know what, in fact, you were doing here with my shovel? I assume that that is the shovel that belongs to this shed?" I nodded towards the tool dangling from his hand.

The smallest of shadows flickered across his face. He glanced down at the shovel and back up to me in a rather intent manner, which, all of a sudden, made the hairs on my neck ripple irrationally.

It occurred to me that I may have pushed him too quickly and I felt a tiny rush of fear, before he smiled once more and the shadow was gone, and I felt silly for that fear.

"Yes, you are clever. The agents asked me to do a bit of last-minute tidying 'round the garden and I was just finishing up now. They didn't tell me you'd be here already, which is why I wasn't expecting to see you, especially looking like do you."

It seemed a reasonable enough explanation, so I let it go and moved on to my other question.

"You called me the spitting image of Clara Young. Where have you seen a photograph of my grandmother? Unless of course there was another Clara Young from Mousehole?"

He broke into a genuine, charming grin.

"Ah-ha! Well, that explains things. So you've come to see the house that your gran grew up in, have you? How pleasantly full circle, miss ... er?" He looked at me enquiringly.

"Grantham. Rose Grantham. Did you say that this was my grandmother's house? This very house is where she grew up?"

He looked surprised, then amused.

"But surely ... you didn't know? Are you telling me, Miss Grantham, that you simply happened to rent this house and that you didn't it was your family's? And as for your name, that wouldn't be 'Grantham,' as in Edward Grantham, Viscount Beresford, perchance?"

I nodded somewhat hesitantly. I supposed it wasn't worth hiding. "My grandfather. And I am as surprised as you, honestly. I knew that Gran grew up here, which is what made me decide to take the house, but she never told us more than that. She's rather reticent about her childhood, other than that she left for London when she was eighteen. I saw this house and loved it, and that is the truth."

He gave me an appraising look before putting the shovel back and stepping out of the doorway to let me pass.

"I think I can help you out there, if you'd care to come with me, Miss Grantham? I'm Mick Donnelly, by the way."

I thought about his offer for a moment. I did not know this man, who he was, or what he did besides garden work with 'borrowed' tools. I had always been wary of the company I kept, yet I knew that I had come this far on my instincts and own boldness, and it had felt very right so far. Besides, I was in fact rather curious about my grandmother's hidden past, and if I was being offered answers I may as well follow where they might lead. This was, after all, my journey of discovery.

I shook his proffered hand and smiled. "Thank you, Mr. Donnelly, I would be glad to."

"Call me Mick," he said with a small wink and a cheeky grin. "Now follow close, these rocky shores can be dangerous for a newcomer."

There was a moment's quiet as I turned and closed the shed door. I noticed that there was no padlock for the latch, and so I made a mental note to ask the agents for one on the next morning. I wasn't sure I entirely liked the idea of anyone being able to walk in.

Dangerous, indeed, a little voice said in my head, recalling the wink. The suggestive hint of a threat in his tone caused a flutter of anger to ripple through me. I wouldn't be frightened or moved so easily.

I turned back to Mick with a bright smile. "Don't worry, Mr. Donnelly. I'll be very careful."

A look of consternation flashed briefly across his face, and I noted it with a touch of smug satisfaction as we headed through the house and back up to the lane.

****

The walk to Mick's cottage was short, but I enjoyed it with gusto nonetheless. After all the years in London's grey tones, I felt that I might never get enough of the sun's gleam or the sparkle of the sapphire sea. The breeze continued to play with the wisps in my hair, and I became so entranced in the musical rustling of the tall seaside grasses and watching the fluttering, dipping flight of the storm petrels that I hardly noticed when Mick stopped in front of a slightly weather-beaten wooden fence and swung open the creaking gate.

He turned back to me with a grin.

"She needs a new coat of paint, and she's seen a few better years, but these have been meager days, Da's getting on, and I'd been fighting at the Front for too long. You know how it is. Or maybe not, the Hon Miss Grantham?" He gave me a teasing look, which I didn't entirely appreciate, and then carried on. "Regardless, here she is, home, 'umble home."

The cottage perched small, low and windswept along the seashore. It was a little ramshackle, as he said, but with its diminutive, yet practical garden, thick coat of whitewash and smoke curling from its stout chimney, the effect was still rather homely.

Inside was crowded, cluttered and yet fastidious in that particularly English way. An abundance of doilies perched fussily atop most surfaces and, despite the warmth of the day, a fire roared merrily in the hearth.

A woman's voice from a narrow hallway startled me out of my study. As she bustled squarely into view, her sharp, clear blue eyes, rosy complexion and black hair peppered with iron grey strands suggested that this was Mick's mother. She was a stout, capable looking woman with a somewhat calculating gaze. Her smile, however, was friendly.

"Hello dear, what a lovely young woman my Mick has brought home! You must be the girl who's taken the big house for a stay? I'm Dolores Donnelly, pleased to meet you."

"Thank you very much for having me by, Mrs. Donnelly. I'm Rose Grantham, and you've certainly guessed me correctly."

"She's Clara Young's granddaughter," piped in Mick from behind me, "and she'd like to know more about the Youngs and her gran's time here."

Intent interest sparked in Mrs. Donnelly's stare as she appraised me closely.

"So she is indeed. Well, come sit my dear. Tea's on and we'll have a little chat. Mick, fetch my box of photographs, would you?" She turned back to me. "Any relation of the Youngs is very welcome here, I'm sure."

I wasn't sure, but I thought her smile did not quite touch the glint in her eyes. In a moment, though, Mick was back with the box and the glint was gone.

"Thank you, dear. Now, Miss Grantham, would you like to see your grandmother as a girl?"

"Very much so," I smiled.

We leafed through many old photographs of Mousehole. I saw fishing fleets, the village pub, festivities, Dolores and her husband on their wedding day and Mick as a baby. Finally, we came to a picture of a small group standing in a lush garden alongside the walls of a house. There were two older couples, one set dressed expensively and the other more plainly, yet it was clear that this was an important day to all. To the side, a younger couple stood holding a frilly baby, while a good-looking young man who looked about twenty stood beside them. What caught my eye, though, was the girl in the center.

She was striking; she stood, holding a small dog in her arms and laughing, sunlit and sparkling. She looked merry and beautiful, and it seemed as though she was somehow the center of attention without noticing it. She was dressed in a light coloured Victorian dress which gathered at her neck in lace and flowed in a fluttery material down to half-sleeves. It clung along her waist and fell to skim the tops of the grass lightly. To me, it seemed as though it would be pink and white and enchanting. Her hair looked as though it might be blonde, like mine, shining and piled loosely on top of her head, with a little flat boating hat perched jauntily on top.

Mrs. Donnelly followed my gaze and affirmed what I was thinking.

"That, is Clara Young, in front of the big house."

"She's lovely."

"Just like you, my dear," she smiled at me. "You see why you might be recognizable around here, at least to the older folks, or those who've seen the pictures."

I laughed, "yes, I suppose I'll be notorious without having ever stepped foot here before. Who are the others in the picture?"

She peered down. "Well, the finely dressed folks there are your great-grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Young. The others are my grandparents, Jack and Mary Blythe. They did the gardening and some housework for the Youngs, and on the right there is my aunt Elsie and her husband, Bill, holding my cousin Anna. This was her christening day, you see, 1894. That's why everyone was in their finery together. Your gran would've been about eighteen here, and folks just adored her."

"And who is the young man beside your aunt and uncle?"

She smiled fondly. "That's my father, Freddie Blythe. He helped Granddad around the garden, and he took over as gardener once Granddad retired. The Youngs kindly held a garden reception after the christening that day, and by all accounts it was a lovely party. It was just close before your gran left."

"Why did she leave?"

"Well I wasn't born for another good two years, you see, but from what I've been told, your gran was the darling of the village, and was especially beautiful and charming, but rather like a bird in a cage. Your great-grandparents owned a very prosperous shipping company, so she was accustomed to a good life, but it was too small for her and not nearly as exciting as she needed. So, one day, she run off to London and I can't say as many folks were entirely surprised, although there was a general sadness about her leaving, and her parents were right worried and more than a little cross, as you can imagine.

Then, though, word was that she had met and was engaged to the young heir to the Grantham title and fortune, and was soon to be Lady Beresford, and so the feeling was that she had found the fate she was seeking, and her parents were much more pleased. So from then on, they blessed and attended the wedding, and visited the Grantham estate now and then, but Clara and her new family never came to Mousehole. Once Mr. Young retired, he sold the business and the big house and they moved a little closer to Clara, and Mousehole no longer had a Young in it after generations. Of course, I heard they both passed on before you were very big, and so you wouldn't have known them. The big house was sold again some years ago, to some wealthy businessman, and so he doesn't ever come here but lets it instead. It's been empty for some time now, until you showed up. It'll certainly be happy to have a Young in it again, I'd say."

Here, she stopped, and gave me another appraising look. It was as if she was determining how much to tell me, and deciding whether to hold something back. She smiled a little, seeming to choose, and went on. "Perhaps even," she paused again to look at me confidingly, a little like a furtive hen, "happy enough to keep the spirits away from you. For everyone knows now that that's why tenants never stay very long at the big house, my dear. They are simply too afraid of the haunting."

******