Avalon Read Online Free PDF Page B

He dumped the case on the kitchen table, and stood for a moment, glaring at it, strongly tempted to forget the whole thing and call it a day.
    He could call the solicitor in the morning, he thought, and plead for another day to sort through the files. In light of the National Tragedy and all, Hobbs would probably understand. Then again, since James had begged Hobbs to get him the files in the first place and everyone was doing him a huge favor just to let him have them overnight, he decided he’d better give them a quick glance, at least.
    Slipping off his jacket, he made himself a big mug of strong instant coffee, dragged out a chair, and sat down. Drawing the box across the table, he untied the string and lifted off the lid. Inside were assorted files, legal envelopes, official-looking documents bound in black ribbon, a faded green accounts book, and various paper-clipped bundles of papers — all of which he had to examine in the hope of turning up a scrap of evidence which would help establish his claim to the lodge and land.
    The problem, as James had come to understand it, was that the Duke of Morven — not the one who had recently died in Australia but the one his father had served: the one who had given the property to James’ parents in recognition of his father’s service as gamekeeper and factotum — had made application for a transfer of property but had somehow neglected to deed it properly. The old Duke died intestate, and the estate passed to an ailing Aussie cousin who had no interest in it and in fact had never once bothered to come and see the place.
    Unfortunately, this elderly cousin had passed away in Sydney, and before clear lines of ownership of the lodge property could be established, James’ parents had also died — within a fortnight of each other. To complicate matters further, the Australian cousin’s holdings had fallen to a consortium of property speculators who had hired a development firm to press forward their plan for transforming Blair Morven into a retirement spa and golf condominium resort for well-heeled oldsters.
    This was a gross oversimplification of the problem, to be sure. Indeed, the whole thing had become so tangled in legal obscurities involving the two countries that even the Aberdeen firm of solicitors which had handled the old Duke’s affairs for five generations confessed bafflement. On the off chance that some small but highly significant fact was being overlooked, James had implored them for a last trawl through their archives — the results of which had produced the assortment of documents before him.
    He picked up a paper-clipped bundle, slipped off the clip, and unfolded the first page; it was an old grant of fishing rights pertaining to the River Dee which ran through part of the estate. Glancing at the signatures, he recognized his father’s tight scrawl. As gillie — that peculiarly Scottish blend of manservant, guide, and gamekeeper which had evolved over time into the position of estate foreman — his father had signed many of these sorts of things: bills, applications, letters, and such, dealing with the day-to-day affairs of Blair Morven.
    Tossing the first bundle aside, he picked up another and opened it. After a cursory glance, he took up three or four others and flipped through them. They were a collection of affidavits and warrants, written in obscure legalese, regarding a series of surveys of the property which had been carried out long ago when the old Duke had applied for a permit to grow and export timber.
    Next was a brown cardboard file folder full of letters — all of them from various tenants discussing changes in the rent, requesting new machinery or fencing, and similar concerns. Other than the cost of rental property three and four decades ago, James learned nothing to his advantage and quickly added the folder to the stack.
    He picked up the accounts book and discovered that it was not, as the printed cover professed, a record of rents