Marrying Money: Lady Diana's Story Read Free Page A

he doesn’t smirk much when he asks after Kay’s health.
    My cheeks were burning at the memory . I was still saying a little prayer to St Jude not to make this hopeless case suffer more than she had to, when suddenly everything went quiet.
    W hen Auntie Kay is having one of her turns, quiet, is worse than bad. I flew the rest of the way along the corridor, threw myself at the door and was launched into the room with a screeching sound of breaking wood and door and the brass lock gave way.
    Auntie Kay lay on the floor, her face blue, and she wasn’t breathing.
     

     
    What happened after that is a blur. I remember screeching for Millie to phone for an ambulance, and I remember kneeling down in the dust beside Auntie Kay and somehow those CPR moves all came back to me. They must have worked, because the EMT’s told me, when they arrived and took over, that Auntie Kay was breathing again.
    The ride to the hospital, holding Kay’s hand, seemed never ending. Her bones were so fragile. Somehow, I’d always seen her as the big, loud, whimsical woman she was when I was a child. When had she become so frail? Do we ever notice the years passing until it’s too late?
    I paced around the hospital waiting room, flicking occasionally through ancient magazines that told me how to make my home look like a stately house. Maybe I could raise a few bob writing an article about how to make your stately home look like a place you'd want to live in.
    Sally rushed into the waiting room and wrapped her arms around me in a reassuring hug. Her mother came with a big thermos of tea. All sorts of people stuck their heads in the door to see about Auntie Kay, claiming they were just passing by. I cried, because I never knew we had so many people who actually gave a damn.
    “Lady Ashburnham?”
    I looked up to see a tall, handsome man who looked like he could take the lead in a TV soap set in a hospital. Who would mind receiving bad news from a hunk like this?
    I would, I thought grimly. I stood to shake his hand. “Miss McKinley-Jones needs a lot of rest. She’s suffered a cardiac infarction - a heart attack. She must be kept from over exciting or exerting herself. She will be just fine as long as she lives by a few simple health rules.”
    Obviously, this man had no idea of that a normal life for Auntie Kay consisted of fighting with the vicar over evil spirits and climbing up oak trees to get answers from the universe. These were normal for Auntie Kay but she’d never be up for them again. I sniffed, and Sally’s mum handed me a huge snowy white handkerchief.
    “I believe she was, um, in an attic room four floors up?”
    His raised eyebrows made me feel very small.
    “She wasn’t living up there. She has a nice room on the second floor with a lovely view of the river and the meadows…” I was babbling, but I didn’t want him to think Auntie Kay was neglected and locked in the attic by an unfeeling family.
    “Unfortunately , she had a few sips of vodka, and it didn’t agree with her. I didn’t know she had it. Uncle Billy must have left it behind. Aunt Kay decided she had to be in the highest point of the house to avoid the evil spirits, you see.”
    He nodded thoughtfully, as if what I was saying was perfectly logical.
    “Lady Ashburnham, I think it would be a good idea if your aunt spent some time recuperating in a nursing home. She will need regular nursing care for a little while, and it would be easier if she was in there rather than relying on occasional nursing visits to her home.”
    Auntie Kay ’s stay at a private nursing home was arranged. I went home and worried about how to find enough money to pay for her stay there.
     

     
    “At least you won’t have to worry about her being looked after while she recuperates,” Sally said as we sat in our usual seats in the Scraggy Duck that evening. We had stopped in for a reviving pint on the way home from the hospital. “A nice, quiet nursing home with a staff to keep an