Angry

 

 

 

The church was crowded for the funeral.  Some came under obligation.  Michael was from a prominent line.  However, most came with affection and love.  Michael was loved.

 

His family had presided over the estate, and the estate workers, for a couple of centuries.  Times had changed.  The workers were now employees on a more formal basis.  In the past their cottages were part of the package of their employment, their livelihoods.  It didn’t matter that they lived from hand to mouth.  This was their existence.  Their necessity was their existence.

 

In future years, the properties were rented to the staff, giving them more freedom to develop their homesteads, to put a stamp on proceedings. 

 

In recent years the Baron – the current Baron – had developed a passion.  It was not a passion that hurt anyone. 

 

The Baron always believed, as was his upbringing, that it was always honourable if what you pursued did not harm anyone.  If this was the case it was not harmful.  Ogbourne Maizey was the Baron of Worthy Down.  He was the ninth Baron as far as the historical records showed.  Ogbourne’s passion was for art.  It couldn’t harm anyone.  It just harmed his finances.  It just harmed the finances of his ancestral home.  It just harmed his family, as obsessions often do.  

 

The cottages on the estate now belonged to the workers, the staff, the employees – whatever they were called nowadays.  They were effectively partners.  They had bought into the business.  The manor was used as a visitor centre to raise funds.  The workers were invited to buy into the venture.  In past times the workers were never even invited into the house.

 

So, the coffers were filled and Ogbourne Maizey could enjoy his habit like the addiction that it was.  Like the addiction of nicotine, alcohol or drugs. 

 

Ogbourne Maizey’s addiction was art and art did not harm anyone.  Or so he told himself.

 

But it was an addiction and addictions harm people.

 

 

It certainly did not affect Michael, because Michael was the second son, and second sons don’t count in the scheme of things, in the line of peerage.

 

*

**

 

Today was the funeral of Ogbourne Maizey’s younger brother Michael, the second born.  He had not inherited the unusual moniker of the first name or the title it bestowed, because he was not the first born.  For once in his life, Michael Maizey was the centre of attention.

 

Except it wasn’t in his life.

 

It was in his death.

 

Today was Michael Maizey’s funeral.

 

And they all gathered round.

 

*

**

 

Today was Michael Maizey’s funeral and he would be buried in the family plot but not in the ancestral tomb.  That privilege was reserved for the Barons of the family and Michael was not the Baron because he was the second son.

 

*

**

​

He was always Uncle Michael, even to people who were not related to him.

 

*

**

​

There was a large crowd, as expected, because everyone respected Michael.  His kindness was the cornerstone of his life.  It was his legacy.  He did not have children of his own but lived the paternal life vicariously through his nieces and nephews, his brother’s children – Ogbourne’s children.  If truth be known he witnessed their upbringing more than Ogbourne.  Ogbourne worshipped the artistry of paintings of families, of their devotion.  He could look at them for hours; they made him weep. 

 

Reality was not as good as art, not as good as his imagination.

 

*

**

 

It fell to Michael then naturally that he needed to take the reins of the family.  It was to his house that Arthur, Harold, Matilda and Jessica chose to take their breaks from boarding school.  Ogbourne was always too busy devouring and purchasing.  His mind was too full to fulfil his parental duties.  Arthur and Harold and Matilda and Jessica did not mind.  The time spent with Uncle Michael was time well spent.  They did not have to ask for anything.  

 

Those school holidays were the only time that the siblings spent together.  Uncle Michael provided them with the location and more importantly a home.  Of course, it was not their real home.  Their real home was the manor house on the estate.  Uncle Michael’s house was somewhere to play, to eat, to sleep. The brothers and sisters simply wanted to be together and just accepted the things offered to themselves by Uncle Michael.

 

Uncle Michael was always so kind.

 

Those school holidays were the only time that the siblings spent together.  These school holidays were time when their parents were notoriously absent.  A father embroiled in art and a mother embroiled in society, mainly the society of herself.  Millicent did not need to worry about money; she had a title.  Millicent did not concern herself about money, it wasn’t her role in life; it was not what she had married for.  Millicent did not concern herself about money until the funds ran out.

 

*

**

​

Ogbourne and Millicent turned to Michael, of course they did, and Michael did the honourable thing and took over their debts and loans as he had taken over the raising of their children.

 

*

**

 

Michael Maizey was buried in the family plot but not in the ancestral tomb.  That was reserved for the first born, for Ogbourne.  Michael Maizey was buried on the grounds of the estate that he had owned for twenty years, having purchased it from his brother and his brother’s wife.  Michael had bailed them out so that they could afford the lifestyles they could not afford.  On the surface it was a pretence.  Ogbourne and Millicent still held their titles and still presided in the manor house.  They still presided over the workers.

 

They were sitting tenants.

 

Sitting ducks.

 

Michael was a bystander.

 

It was a pretence.  Gratitude was not the order of the day.  Even today, on Michael’s day; the one day that he was centre of attention.

 

*

**

 

Two weeks later they read his will.  Two weeks later they found his diaries.

 

*

**

 

It was discovered that Michael had invested wisely.  The income from the visitors, the investments from the staff and all the other work that Michael had done to the property had made the estate accumulate in profit – a healthy profit.  A more than healthy profit.

 

Everyone was amazed.  Michael had led an ordinary life, comfortable in his little cottage on the edge of the estate. 

 

It was the estate he owned.

 

Nobody apart from Ogbourne and Millicent knew this fact, not even their children. They had played and ate and slept at Michael’s cottage when it suited them and had then returned home to the manor, the manor which they assumed was their home.  The manor which belonged to Uncle Michael.

 

*

**

 

Michael Maizey was worth £3.2million on his death.

 

*

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​

For the family it was not just the revelation of the fortune that astounded them.  That was difficult enough to accept.

 

It was the diaries that were more difficult to swallow.

 

Diaries record intimate thoughts.  They are a window to the soul of their writers.  Lovely Uncle Michael kept diaries all his life.  Nobody knew. 

 

Nobody took the time to know.

 

His diaries revealed his soul.

 

His diaries revealed his hatred, his anger.

 

Lovely Uncle Michael.

 

*

**

 

Lovely Uncle Michael despised his weak brother, the brother who inherited everything and deserved nothing.  The brother who blew it all away on dreams and fantasies.  The brother who had never worked a day in his life.

 

Lovely Uncle Michael despised his sister-in-law who only married into the family for title and riches; who was more attached to the injections into her skin and her arms than she was to her own children.

 

Lovely Uncle Michael despised Arthur and Harold and Matilda and Jessica who used his house as their playground – who never showed gratitude, and in their adult years, never offered to pay for a meal, for accommodation, who never offered a smile except between themselves.  Always between themselves but never directed towards him.

 

*

**

​

Lovely Uncle Michael, in his Will, disowned all his relatives and left them penniless.  The estate had been sold.  Ogbourne and Millicent were homeless.  The title, to be passed to Arthur, was nominal, worthless.  There was no fortune attached.

 

Like Lovely Uncle Michael it had gone.

 

For the first time in his life Ogbourne would have to fend for himself.  For the first time -  a first time for the first born.

 

*

**

 

Lovely Uncle Michael left in entirety, his fortune of £3.2 million and the Baizey estate to the local donkey sanctuary with specific instructions to demolish the manor house and in its stead, build stables to house aforementioned donkeys.  The gardens were to be dug up and used entirely for grazing.  It was, Uncle Michael said, the only food that he would provide that would be appreciated, the only food he gave where he did not expect thanks, the only homes he provided where he did not expect thanks.

 

*

**

 

Lovely Uncle Michael hated donkeys.

​

 

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