The Invitation

When the Gallachers received an invitation from the Duke of Moorshire to attend an evening at Lea Hall, Maggie was overwhelmed. She could still scarcely believe her eyes, even if it was a long-overdue honour - after all her husband Rod had done for the town. She did not see the invitation as the rock on which she was to perish; nor was she prepared for the reaction of her family. Her son Paul, daughter Elizabeth and daughter-in-law Arlette were as delighted as she was but the effect on Sam, Arlette's husband, was to bring his smouldering hatred of his mother to flashpoint. But had Maggie, or any of the Gallachers, foreseen how it would turn out, how irrevocably it would change the lives of the family she loved so dearly, she would have torn that invitation into tiny pieces and thrown them all on the fire.