The Wilt Inheritance Read Online Free PDF Page A

eyed his pitiful state and finally relented. ‘If you go and have a shower, and put those disgusting pants in the washing machine, I’ll make you some sandwiches.’
    Wilt sighed and went upstairs.
    ‘Some bloody shitty holiday,’ he muttered halfway up.
    ‘I heard that,’ Eva called out. ‘Swearing again! You’ve got to learn not to use that filthy language. We’re going to be in very select company after all.’
    Wilt kept his thoughts about that to himself and went into the bathroom
    When he came downstairs half an hour later, dressed in a pair of grey trousers and a shirt, he found Eva on the phone spreading the ghastly news to Mavis Mottram, to make her jealous. He took his brown bread and sardine sandwiches through to the front room and stared at a cricket match on telly without taking any real interest in it.
    Instead he was mulling over the change that had come over his wife ever since she had returned fromAmerica last year. Wilt didn’t know why, and Eva refused to tell him. In fact, she wasn’t prepared to say anything at all about what had happened to her in Wilma, Tennessee the previous summer. Occasionally she murmured ‘Bitch’ when she didn’t know he was listening. It was either that or ‘Stupid cow’. All in all, it was as clear as daylight that the trip to visit her Uncle Wally and Auntie Joan, with the quads in tow, had been as disastrous as his own quest in search of Old England which had been made at the same time.
    He had ended up in a mental hospital after landing on his head in the back of a pick-up truck, and then been falsely implicated in the disappearance of a Shadow Minister. Eva’s stated reason for returning early had been that Uncle Wally had suffered two heart attacks. Secretly, Wilt suspected the hand, or rather hands, of his daughters in Wally Immelmann’s misfortune, but given that he loathed the ghastly man he didn’t much care. The only thing he did find disturbing was Eva’s new-found determination to dominate him, a trait she’d evidently picked up in Imperial America. ‘Dominate’ was too mild a word, in fact. So was control. Ever since last summer she’d been insisting he do whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted.
    Well, Wilt most certainly didn’t want to spend the summer kowtowing to some damned snobs who would undoubtedly patronise him. And what sort of moron was this son he would have to tutor? He was just considering where on earth he could find therelevant A-level history syllabus when Eva came marching in.
    ‘Oh, there you are,’ she said. ‘For your information, I told Lady Clarissa you’d been at Porterhouse and it turns out that you have that in common with her husband, Sir George. He was a student there, too, so you’ll have something to talk about together.’
    Wilt gaped at her.
    ‘For Christ’s sake, I never went anywhere near the place! I went to Fitzherbert. And you expect me to chat the bastard up about the good old days at bloody Porterhouse and who the present Master is? He probably comes down every year for the Annual Feast and regularly uses his Dining Rights. He’ll spot me as an imposter straightaway.’
    ‘Well, surely you can find out that sort of thing and just let him do the talking?’
    ‘Bugger!’ groaned Wilt.
    ‘And that’s another word you can cut out,’ snapped Eva, leaving the room again. With another groan, Wilt followed her out and headed for the front door. Having made sure that he had the right keys, he stepped out into the afternoon sunshine. He needed to get out of this house and to talk to someone sane.
    Wilt headed for the allotments and his old friend Robert Coverdale. For some years now Robert had lived in a shack there in preference to his own house which was, as he put it, ‘Infested with shrews. Namely my wife and her two maiden – that’s a joke too – sisters.’
    Wilt found him on all fours, weeding his asparagus bed. The old man prised himself to his feet.
    ‘You look like something the cat