my calls. Nobody wanted to admit it, but there was a problem: it was not clear who actually owned the Charming House, and therefore who could sell it. "We're going to fix it, going to get signatures," promised Merlyn.

Deeds, it transpired, are tricky down here. There is Crown Property and Family Property. Most of the last has been deeded to the descendants of people who worked these islands as slaves. Even now the rule is that if you need to build a home, you ask for a lease and the land is deeded from Crown to 'belonger' when the house is built and lived in.

So I bought another air ticket, and we plunged into the records. It turned out that Felix had inherited the house along with his sister Mary Isabella, who used to practise the hymns for church on the piano still there in the living room. She had married a Simmons, and moved to

the Bahamas. She'd had two kids, Aubrey and Valerie. They, along with Merlyn and her sister Thelma, owned the Charming House.

Family arrangements and legal status needed squaring. So I flew to Freeport to find Aubrey and Valerie, promising not to forget to collect a death certificate for Mary Isabella. Aubrey was sad at losing the old family place. But Valerie refused to sign anything. "We done agreed nothing on selling Ma's home," she complained. The price of the Charming House went up a few thousand dollars.

There was a lot of laughter back at the bar at Porter's. But I knew it would be worth it, whatever happened next.
NEXT WEEK:
A fatal encounter with termites
Charles Laurence's Americans column will return after the summer