Bellingford Days

7

Bellingford Days

    “She’s an artist,” explained old Jim Parker. “Got ’er living-room all cluttered up with huge great sheets of board and pots of paint.”

    Jack Powell returned dubiously: “That nice Mrs Cross, she’s an artist, ’er front room’s not full of boards and stuff.”

    “Dare say. It ain’t the same. Go and look for yourself: you’ll see what I mean. See, Anna, she’s a real artist.”

    Jack shrugged. “I might.” And this had better not be one of old Jim’s ruddy leg-pulls! “I gotta go, Ma Mason’s asked me to look at her sink.”

    “Lucky you. Well, you can look in on Anna on yer way home.”

    Jack mooched off, not saying whether he would or he wouldn’t.

    Old Jim sniffed slightly, but got on with dead-heading his roses.

    Jack duly looked at Ma Mason’s sink. That was a sink, all right. Didn’t drain properly? What was she on about? The water gurgled out like nobody’s busi— Left a pool of… Well, a few drops, yeah: she could wipe that up with her— All right, she couldn’t. Or, put it like this, the sink had no right to do that. Resignedly he fetched his level. Right: if you had micrometer eyes—like hers, yeah—the whole sinkbench was just slightly—very, very, very slightly—out of plumb. No pun intended. If it was really bad, an object such as a rolling pin or a glass tumbler when placed on the inner side of the bench would roll towards you. He demonstrated. It didn’t. Ma Mason tried it for herself. It did. All right, she was a witch, as well as the word that rhymed with it.

    “Look, Mrs Mason, the only way to fix it it’d be to try jacking the whole thing up—put some packing under it, see?”

    Show? Of course it would show, woman, to those that had micrometer eyes and deliberately bent down and peered under the slight overhang of the expensive industrial-steel, all-in-one sink and bench! He explained about a lick of paint but that didn’t satisfy her. This unit had been custom-made, had it? Fancy that. And put in by? Right: one of the ponciest do-yer-whole-kitchen-out-in-21st-century-taste Portsmouth joints. There was an alternative, yeah. Rip the sinkbench right out, and try shaving a micro-millimetre off the support at the back. A quote for that? The woman was barmy!

    “Look, Mrs Mason, I could do that, but it’d entail days of inconvenience for you. It’s a big job, the sink’d need to be unplumbed. It isn’t worth it, for a tiny puddle of water like that. And as a matter of fact”—he tried the poncy marble rolling-pin again, same lack of result—“I’m not a hundred percent sure it is the sinkbench at fault. Think it’s possible the level of the sink itself is very slightly out of whack, in which case that’s how they manufacture them, and that’s all she wrote.”

    Measure it? What good would—Oh. A level that size? Few jobbing builders had those, but as a matter of fact, somewhere in his truck— Jack mooched out to it. It was here somewhere, it had belonged to his dad… Did levels go off? He went back in with it. Gee. Fancy that, it showed that the sink bottom was very, very slightly— Yeah. He had had time to reflect that if the whole bench was, it would be, but apparently she hadn't.

    This was most unsatisfactory, the firm had no right to—Blah, blah. Jack agreed with her every word and finally escaped without being forced to quote on ripping the whole thing out and refitting it. Sure he could’ve done with the dough, but ya know what? That was the sort of dame that’d let him spend a week sweating over the job and then swear blind the thing was still out of kilter and refuse to pay him!

    He headed the trusty truck down Moulder’s Way, whistling. That was the place. He drew over to that side, not bothering about anything fancy like hand signals or a proper turn, parked facing the way he intended to proceed, and got out.

    She answered the door in person. Taller than Rosie, that was a disappointment. Not as pretty, either. He’d known she was older, but somehow he’d expected her to be just as— Yeah.

    “Jack Powell,” he said easily. “You’d be Rosie’s cousin Anna, that right? Good to meet you. Thought you might need some odd-jobs doing. Bit of gardening? Carpentry? Anything, really. Plumbing, if you need it.”

    “No,” she said, going rather red. “I’m sorry. And in any case I can’t afford to pay you.”

    Jack scratched his head. “Well, if there’s something that can be done on the spot, could do it for you, anyway? Got nothing else to do.”

    Anna looked in despair at the thin, wiry man with the rumpled dark curls and the rather red cheeks above the shadow of a heavy beard. She knew that sort of little, energetic man: they were terribly bossy and determined, and would never listen to a word a woman said to them. She’d known two in her teaching life: one had been head of the maths department and the other had been the school’s janitor, but that hadn't made any difference, they’d been just the same. The sort of person that did things that were for your own good that you didn’t want or need done. “We really haven’t got anything that needs doing!”

    Suddenly another voice said from behind her: “What’s the matter, Anna? Is someone pestering you?”

    Anna stood back in relief. “Yes. I mean, he wants something to do, and I’ve said we can't afford to pay him—”

    “It’s all right, I’ll deal with him; you go back to your painting.”

    Looking terribly relieved, Anna escaped, and Jack was faced with the younger version. At first he thought it was young Georgia, that had been staying over at Miller’s Bay with that dark bloke and the little kids, but then he realised it wasn’t. Cripes, that made three lookalikes! He grinned. This one was very like Rosie, too, but a bit wider in the face; and the eyes weren’t blue-grey like Rosie’s but a soft grey-green—same shape, though: big, and well opened but not bulgy. Call him prejudiced, or merely cracked, but he could not stand bulgy eyes—in either sex, really, but they were worse on a woman.

    “It’s very good of you, but we really don’t need any jobs done, thanks,” she said firmly.

    “I’m not asking for money,” said Jack mildly. “Jack Powell.” He stuck out his hand. “Think you must be one of Rosie’s cousins?”

    “Yes. I’m Molly Leach. How are you, Jack?” she said nicely, shaking. “I think you must be Gareth’s grandfather, is that right?”

    What was that, damned with faint praise, or something? Well, yeah, he was a granddad, but he wasn’t over the hill yet, ta very much! “Yeah. Rosie mention him, did she?”

    “Yes; she said that he and his mother are staying with your friends in France this summer,” she said, smiling Rosie’s very smile.

    “Yeah. Not my friends,” he said with a wince. “The French lady—her name’s Laurence, that’s a female name in France—she stayed with me daughter Sylvia as a PG one summer, and they got pally, so now she keeps inviting them over.”

    “That’s nice.”

    “It would be if the woman wasn’t trying to get her hooks into yours truly,” admitted Jack, grimacing. “Sure I can’t give you a hand with anything? I’m at a bit of a loose end today. Could tidy up your back garden for you?”

    “No, thanks,” she said placidly. “We like it untidy.”

    “But you got a jungle out there!”

    “Yes,” said Molly Leach calmly. “That’s how we like it. Not everybody in the entire world wants their garden tidied up within an inch of its life.”

    “Uh—well, no,” said Jack, thinking of his own apology for a back garden. “It’s a phenomenon that’s getting rarer and rarer in these parts, though.”

    “Yes. Would you like a cup of tea?” she offered calmly. “I’m just making one. But we mustn’t disturb Anna, she’s working.”

    Jack accepted this munificent offer. He wasn’t too sure why she’d made it, but he wasn’t chancing his luck by asking. He came in. “How’s the fridge?”

    Molly looked at him a trifle drily. She was as familiar with his type as Anna was—even more so, in fact, she’d had a lot more experience of men. However, she replied nicely: “Was it you who brought it? It’s good, thanks.”

    “Right,” he said feebly. “Um, Anna painting in the front room, is she?”

    “Yes.” She poured water onto the teabags. “She’s doing some cottage studies. Do you take milk?”

    “Milk and one sugar—ta, Molly. Heard she was an artist, didn’t know she was doing cottages. Um, dunno ’ow much you’ve heard about Bellingford,” he said cautiously, “but she might be pestered by some of the in-comers to paint theirs, if it gets out.”

    “I see,” she said calmly. “It’ll be interesting to see how soon they start asking, won’t it?”

    “Yeah,” said Jack with a feeble grin. “–Not another sociologist, like Rosie, are you?”

    Molly eyed him a trifle drily. He was clearly a nice man, but—just like all the Aussie men—the sort that assumed that normal conversation consisted of a relentless series of questions about your personal life. “No. I did my degree in marine biology, but it was a mistake, really,” she said placidly. “I was mixed up with a marine biologist, you see. I used to do that—get all involved with whatever my boyfriends were into. I’ve stopped that, now. I suppose I took a look at myself and realised how silly I was.”

    “Right. So you gonna stay with Anna for a bit? Scrounge up custom from the retirees while ya bring ’er relays of tea and stop callers from pestering ’er while she’s working? ’Cos I’d say that’s what she needs!”

    “I think you mean she needs a wife,” said Molly, giving him a dry look. “It certainly explains why all the great artists have been men, doesn’t it?”

    Jack winced. “Uh—yeah,” he muttered.

    “Actually I’m just here for a holiday,” she said with a kind smile. “I’ve got a job in a solicitor’s office in London, for the time being. I wish I did have a vocation to be an artist’s wife, frankly! Or for anything, as a matter of fact.”

    “Um, well, we can’t all have vocations,” he said awkwardly. “Most of us just get by.”

    “Mm. Well, that’s certainly me,” said Molly ruefully. “I don’t want to be a genius—I think that’d be very uncomfortable. But Anna seems to know what she wants to do, and my sister Georgia’s all set for a career in acting, and Rosie’s doing really solid work in sociology. But I’m not specially good at anything, and what’s worse, I can’t think of anything I really want to do.”

    Jack wouldn’t’ve said that she’d need to want to do anything, because with those looks and that lovely smile there must be hundreds of blokes just lining up with offers! “Uh—well, it may be the ruddy 21st century, but not all women have to have a career, ya know. Or haven’t the Australian blokes got any enterprise?”

    “Not much, no,” she said, sounding really, really dry. Shit! Put his foot in it, there.

    “No, well, stick around, we got blokes in Britain, too.”

    “Mm. I suppose I shouldn’t judge them all by one, but the one I tried was a disaster. No, I tell a lie: there were two!” she said with a sudden laugh. “But the other one was just a holiday fling!”

    He should be so lucky. And what was wrong with the bloke? If he could make her look like that, why hadn’t he come back for more? “Uh-huh.” He drank tea and replied nicely to some questions about Gareth. After a while it dawned: she was the cousin that had a little kid, of course! So he asked her about him.

    They were finishing their second mugs—no biscuits, unfortunately, and certainly no sultana cake of the sort Rosie produced at the drop of a hat—when Anna came in. She blenched at the sight of Jack: that was flattering.

    “It’s all right: he isn’t doing anything highly technical and requiring cash money, he’s just having a cup of tea,” said Molly placidly. “Want one?”

    “Yes. Thanks, Molly.”

    “How’s it going?” said Molly, boiling up the jug again as Anna sat down.

    “Pretty good, but I really need to go and do some sketches of it. The Polaroids don’t give you the feel.”

    “Yes. Well, if your courage fails you, you could make quite a nice income doing portrait sketches,” she said cheerfully. “Another one asked me about portraits when I was at the Garden Centre.”

    “What on earth were you doing there?” croaked Anna, staring.

    “Just smelling it, really!” she said cheerfully. “It was first thing this morning: the plants were all fresh and green and they smelled all nice and planty: I think they’d been watering them.”

    Anna grinned suddenly. “That’s a relief! I thought you were turning into a Mrs Mason!”

    “Hah, hah!” returned Molly, pouring her tea.—Why couldn’t the woman get it for herself? thought Jack, frowning.—“Anyway,” she said, “as I say, one of the retirees asked me about portraits. So I sort of struck a balance between crass commercialism and your artistic sensibilities, and said you didn’t do portraits in oils, but you did do pencil sketches.”

    “Shit, they’ll be beating a path to your door!” choked Jack, suddenly collapsing in hysterics. After that he felt fortified enough to ask if he could look at the painting. But Anna went red and said it wasn’t ready to be looked at, yet. Okay, if that was how she felt about it. But shit, would it of hurt just to let him see it? He did manage to look in the front room as he left and old Jim was right: it was full of big boards and pots of paint. No carpet. Um, maybe it had never had one. Well, just as well.

    He was halfway to Bottom Street before the brain got into gear again—more or less. Hard to say which of them was more of a disappointment, really. Well, a mad lady artist? Imagine living with something as dreamy and unfocused as that! Or focused on only one thing: one-track minded—worse. And as for Molly… With the prettiness and the lovely smile and that mild manner of hers, at first you just thought she was a paler copy of Rosie. But that wasn’t the half of it, was it? He had a fair idea that underneath she was pretty much of a hard case. A harder case than Rosie? He’d say so, yeah. He thought of the way she’d said “I think you mean she needs a wife,” and winced. And—well, maybe everyone didn’t want their garden tidied up, but shit! Most people did! It had been a—a perfectly normal enquiry!

    He drove down Bottom Street without noticing little Keanu Driver experimenting with the hose, and ground his way up the steep Top Lane. Slamming the door as he got out. That fucking back garden hadn't cleared itself up in his absence. Right! That could go—and that—and that— And what the fuck had be been keeping this for, did he imagine he was gonna build a boat some day or what? And that! On second thoughts, that was a decent bit of timber, it could go in the shed—but these bits of old bike could definitely go! And soon as he’d tidied this lot up he’d dig the place over, and then manure it really good, start a proper veggie garden! Because shit, Sylvia and Steve could ruddy well stand on their own two feet, and he wasn’t responsible for Gareth, the kid was theirs, not his! And maybe if he didn’t spend so much time over there Steve would get off his bum and decide to pack in the flaming Navy and get a decent shore job. He had the qualifications—electrician’s mate. The only thing stopping him, if you asked him, Jack Powell, was he liked having the Navy make all his decisions for him! Well, it was time he stood on his own two feet, for a change! Grimly Jack got on with it.

    Back in Moulder’s Way the artist had wandered back into her studio and was standing looking at the work in progress. Molly came up to her shoulder and looked at it too, grinning. After a moment she said: “She quite often goes shopping in Portsmouth. You could nip out and sketch it then.”

    “Yes, but how will we know if she’s gone?”

    “She drives a little purple car like Yvonne’s. I’ll keep a lookout for it while I’m sunbathing.”

    Anna brightened. “That’d work!”

    The cousins went on looking at the picture of Mrs Mason and her cottage, Anna critically and Molly still frankly grinning. It was highly unlikely that any retirees would be queuing for this sort of cottage picture!

    In Miller’s Bay Jamaica was in full swing. Rosie had been very keen to have Colin down for it. True, the ruddy ’orspital had recently let him out, having more or less trained him to hop with a crutch, but he wasn’t what you could call mobile, yet. Uncle Matthew had firmly got him into a nursing-home. Colin hadn't had the strength to argue, really. The more so as the alternative seemed to be to stay with the old boy: he had to be in London because of the physio and the bloody neurosurgeon’s endless tests. The leg was still in plaster, though the medicos had assured him—several times—that the femur hadn’t been broken, wasn’t he lucky? It was late August; he still had months of physio in front of him, but at least they’d given up hacking the ankle about. Rosie had reiterated her warm invitation in front of Uncle Matthew and he had decreed he could go down in an ambulance. Oh, well. Small mercies. At least it was fresh air—and the view was luverly! Possibly it wasn’t all for him—Rosie and Rupy usually had a Jamaica over summer—but it certainly felt like it!

    Jamaica of course demanded the appropriate gear—or Rupy did—but Colin’s invalid status had spared him that. However, he didn’t stick out like a sore thumb, because the other gentlemen present had not received Rupy’s august approval, either. Luke’s orange caftan, which Colin would have ’umbly said was just the thing, wasn’t: not Jamaican or even Caribbean! Rosie’s claim that it only needed the afro and he’d pass for Bob Marley’s brother had been dismissed. Luke was wearing it regardless. Max Lattimore, according to John’s grinning report, had been tending towards the dreary until he’d appeared in his bathers, at which point Rupy’s jaw had sagged and he’d been incapable of saying anything for a bit. Though subsequently rallying to assure him he was the younger Connery to the life—Goldfinger era. And Pierce him no Brosnans, there was no comparison!

    The distaff side, however, was faultless. Colin hadn't bothered to solicit Rupy’s opinion: he didn't feel he needed to. Georgia’s turquoise bikini was completely Jamaica, and actually Colin would have thought so even without the giant puce artificial flower Rupy had donated for her to wear behind the ear. Rosie was glamorous in a bright pink bikini of the very soft, unlined sort, with the nether limbs lightly swathed in a bright sarong. Ooh-er. Molly was pretty Jamaica, too. The bikini was multicoloured floral on a white background, the exact botanical detail not being discernible, there wasn’t that much fabric. Good—yes. Just to gild the lily, Yvonne, the Haworths’ nanny, was not the comfortable grandmotherly person Colin had been envisaging, but a tall, well-curved, yellow-haired woman in her mid-thirties. In her mid-thirties and a scarlet bikini, bought in Queensland the previous year. It came complete with a giant skirt printed in gold and black on the scarlet and a matching blouse of the sort which one knots casually at the waist below the very visible bikini top. Plus very black sunglasses, also Queensland, and a giant white straw sunhat jazzed up with one huge blue hibiscus and one huge yellow one. The gigantic platform-soled sandals were, according to Rupy—he was, after all, gay, poor fellow—the final Jamaican touch! Delish!

    The little Lattimore girls had Jamaican hats: wide-brimmed children’s straw sunhats, Julie’s bright yellow and Sally’s bright pink, liberally trimmed by Rupy in person with huge artificial flowers.

    Rupy’s new hat was the identical style in bright lime. It certainly matched his new bright lime thong, yes. And the bright pink rubber flip-flops and matching flower—the latter to be worn either on the wrist or pinned to the hat—certainly looked good with the lime. Added to which, when he wore his lemon slacks and bright lime tee-shirt with the hat—with or without a gauzy white shirt open over the tee—the effect was dreamy. Or, as Molly’s Micky had put it not long after Colin got down here, which was the final proof that there was a God: “Nah, ya look like a ning-nong. That’s a girl’s hat.”

    The Haworth household had long since acquired the appropriate furniture for Jamaica and it was now all out on the front lawn. In fact it now completely covered the front lawn.

    John sat back in a white cane armchair, grinning. “This sufficiently R&R?”

    “It is, just about, since you’re asking,” replied Colin from his position stretched out at full-length on a padded sunlounger. At least they’d already had the things, they hadn't had to buy one for his invalid self. And one was meant to stretch out on them, so— Yeah. And less than two yards away Molly was face-down on its twin. This could not be bad—no. “A glass of Planters’ Punch might just complete it, though.”

    Rosie was lying back in the big awninged swing with her eyes closed. She opened one eye. “You think that’s a joke, don’t you?”

    “Er—yes,” he admitted limply. Fairly limply, given the preponderance of Australian lovelies in the immediate vicinity.

    “Just wait,” she predicted, shutting the eye and relaxing.

    Colin looked at John.

    “Sun’s not over the yardarm yet, old man.”

    “I make it eleven forty-seven. Where are these ruddy naval yardarms, anyway?”

    “Supporting the yards,” said Rosie with her eyes shut.

    “She’s not far wrong. Patience,” he murmured.

    Luke was in one of the two hammocks, heavy white canvas with elaborate white fringes. The old brick of John’s cottage hadn’t been defaced by huge bolts, the hammocks came complete with their own supports, recently painted bright blue to match the front door and windowsills. Colin would have expected considerable competition for these hammocks, but they’d been through all that and the gilt had worn off the gingerbread, Julie, Sally and then Micky having all discovered that there was very little one could do in a hammock except lie rather still.

    “You’re not telling us Rupy’s gonna rise before noon and prepare iced pitchers of Planters’ Punch, are you?”

    John opened a Financial Times and glanced at it in a desultory manner. “Not rise before noon, Luke—no.”

    “Yvonne, then?” suggested Colin.

    Rosie yawned. “Ooh, ’scuse me! No, she’s just gone back to her place to get the sausage rolls out of the freezer.”

    “Yum!” said Molly, looking up with a smile. “Sausage rolls in Jamaica: Paradise! No tomato sauce, though, Rosie: it’s full of food dye.”

    “Sure,” drawled Luke, glancing down at the beach where Max, Georgia and all three kids were shrieking and splashing in the shallows: “Julie’s and Sally’s mummy would throw ten thousand fits.”

    “More to the point, so would the kids, have you ever seen a kid that’s having a food-colouring high, Luke?” returned Rosie.

    “Well, no,” he admitted feebly.

    “You’re not saying it actually acts like a drug, surely?” croaked Colin.

    “Think it is a drug. –Yes. Though the Heinz sort’s supposed to be okay,” she allowed.

    “Darling, don’t risk it!” said John quickly.

    “Don’t be mad: Baby Bunting went barmy on a quarter of an inch of Cora Potter’s cordial at the club, do you think I want him laughing his head off like a maniac and then throwing a screeching fit?”

    “No. But I meant Max’s kids.”

    “Nah, don’t worry.”

    “Micky could have it, but he’d better not,” said Molly into her folded arms. “Pour encourager les autres.”

    Colin glanced at her and smiled. “Very wise.”

    “The French stopped putting colouring in food years back. Yoghurts—stuff like that,” noted Luke idly.

    “Yeah, but unlike the Anglo-Saxons, the French are famed for their common sense,” returned Rosie grimly. “Added to which, dare say they don’t have vested interests in the companies that make the stuff.”

    “Mostly multinationals these days, I think,” murmured John from inside the Financial Times. “Talking of which, it says here there’s a takeover bid in the offing for AlPharm—isn’t that one of Henry’s companies, Luke?”

    “Don’t ask me,” he replied in a bored voice, letting his magazine drop.

    “Does it produce food dyes?” Rosie asked John.

    “Mm, amongst other chemicals. And other foods. Frozen peas,” he murmured on a sly note.

    “Hah, hah. –Aim that Vogue over here, Luke, if you’ve finished with it.”

    “Finished defacing it, more like,” noted Colin. “Why the Hell were you reading it, anyway?”

    Solemnly Luke presented the Vogue cocked hat to Baby Bunting, who was playing placidly on a straw mat, ignoring his elders’ chatter. “There we go, Baby Bunting! Like a paper hat? Just like a party, huh? Want to put it on your head? That’s right: good boy! –Huh? Oh—well, it was there, Colin. The Everest principle. Haven’t you read it already, Rosie?”

    “No, it’s Rupy’s. Chuck it over.”

    “No, I might hit the baby.” He extracted himself from the hammock, not without difficulty, and handed it to her politely.

    “Thanks. Which bits did ya rip out?”

    “Not the clothes,” he said kindly. “The gossip. You didn’t want it, did you?”

    “Heck, no: it’s tripe. Mind you, the French one’s gossip’s worse: they always call the ladies by their husband’s names. ‘Madame Philippe de Rothschild’, for instance: it’s never just ‘Madame de Rothschild’ or ‘Mathilde de Rothschild.’”

    “Mathilde?” replied Luke, looking startled.

    “Supposing that her name is. Or did ya meet her in France along with the yoghurts?”

    “No,” he said, grinning sheepishly. “The yoghurts were more my level.”

    John lowered the Financial Times. “I thought that was a French Vogue, Rosie.”

    “No, it’s an American one—usually miles better pics.”

    “Didn’t Rupy buy a French one, though?”

    “Captain Exactitude rides again,” she groaned. “That was the French one, goddit? This isn’t it. Think it’s one he nicked from somewhere, actually. His dentist’s waiting-room, very possibly. Henny Penny’s reception room? His agent’s reception room? Sloane Square Salon? –In which case it won’t’ve come from Mrs Arvidson up Albert Street, I’ll give you odds of five thousand to one.”

    “No bet. –One of the worst of the in-comers,” John explained to Colin’s and Luke’s blank faces. “Never shops in the village and has her hair done in London twice a week, taking the Lamborghini up a-purpose, and Rosie has the stats to prove it.”

    “Yuh—uh—I get it,” conceded Luke on weak note.

    “Sloane Square Salon?” ventured Colin.

    “Sloane Square Salon is the local hairdresser’s, in the High Street,” said John mildly. “Here’s Yvonne: this looks like action!” he smiled, as she approached carrying a pile of… How disappointing. Packets straight out of the freezer. Colin looked at them sadly. Luke, who wasn’t too sure what English sausage rolls were but had experienced the quality of English sausages during his walking tour of Britain, looked at them with considerable gratitude for the reprieve.

    “Where’s Greg?” she greeted them.

    “In his kitchen, I hope,” said John, grinning. “Want me to fire up the Aga for you?”

    “Hah, hah,” Yvonne replied to her employer, trying not to laugh. “I’m not as hopeless as her, you know!” She glanced scornfully at her employer’s wife.

    “Few people could be,” agreed Rosie calmly, holding up the Vogue. “Like this?”

    “Mm, smart!” she beamed. “It might be nicer in blue, though.”

    “You always say that. –Go on, then, light the ruddy thing.”

    Yvonne looked superior. “I’m not going to do them in the Aga, I’m going to pop them in Greg’s oven. He’s going to show me his dad’s trick of getting rice nice and fluffy.”

    “Good luck!” she returned feelingly.

    Yvonne just looked superior and, promising them the packet said the sausage rolls took half an hour to thirty-five minutes, walked off.

    After a moment Luke said thoughtfully: “Now, these English sausage rolls—”

    “You don’t want to know,” Colin assured him kindly. “Though I can tell you the pastry will not be dripping with butter and lard!”

    “Mm, I can just remember those days, too!” said John with a laugh.

    “Pastry and sausage?” said Luke in a voice of doom.

    “You don’t have to eat them. All the more for us!” replied Rosie cheerfully. “Look, John, like this?” She held the magazine out to him.

    “Very pretty. It’d suit you, darling.”

    “I’m not thinking of buying it, you nana! Just looking,” she said happily.

    John looked at Colin’s stunned face. “Oh, yes,” he said, very, very mildly.

    Colin just smiled feebly, and lay back feebly.

    Silence reigned in Jamaica—apart from the sufficiently distant shrieking and splashing in the water. Molly was still face-down on her sunlounger. John read his Financial Times slowly. Rosie pored over the Vogue. Luke appeared to have gone to sleep. Down on the straw mat, Baby Bunting abandoned the game of trying to mate Jumbo to Panda—or possibly trying to give one a ride on the other—and embarked on the game of trying to cram Jumbo and Gladly Teddy into the plastic crate that was meant to hold his mixture of plastic blocks and traditional wooden blocks which Colin had a fair idea might have come from the Haworth nursery he remembered from his enforced holidays in it—looking back, must have been when Pa and Ma had been off on their earlier rounds of anti-nuclear protests: Pa was the proud possessor of a large framed newspaper clipping of his blurred face next to Bertrand Russell’s blurred face. Tim surfaced from nowhere, found his humans were doing nothing, and went off to play with the splashers. A fusillade of yapping from Roger greeted him. The sounds of over-excited barks joined those of the splashing and shrieking… Colin lay back and closed his eyes.

    “Drinkie-poos!” said a pleasant tenor voice with a laugh in it.

    Colin came to with a start. “God, was I—”

    “So was Luke, dear!” Rupy assured him merrily. “Have a lovely glass of Planters’ Punch!”

    Colin gaped at his tray. Tall tumblers, already bedecked with coloured straws, little umbrellas, and slices of orange, lemon and strawberry on the rim. Wot, no pineapple? Empty: also on the tray were three tall glass pitchers. Different styles: one extremely elaborate cut glass effort, one elegant, straight-sided and modern, and one just an ordinary heavy glass jug that you—with luck—would see filled with beer in a very ordinary pub. The tall, elegant one held something darkish and ’orrible. “What’s the brownish one?” he croaked.

    “Genuine Planters’ Punch, Colin, dear! Greg’s got a book!” Rupy assured him. “Dark rum, dash of grenadine”—Colin tried not to wince—“um, sweet and sour mix, did you know it’s supposed to have egg-white in it? I didn’t,” he admitted cheerfully. “Um, something else?”

    “Bitters!” said Greg loudly. “Fill it up with soda water! It’s great!”

    Colin looked at him hopefully, but he was holding a tray of the exact same stuff! His jugs were, at a guess, a plastic one, the ’orrible orange flahs on it certainly indicated as much, cut crystal, though, true, if it was his he’d let the kid drop it on the crazy-paving, too, and plastic again, judging by its red stripes that clashed ’orribly with its yellow contents. “Um, what are the yellow ones?” he said feebly.

    “An Australian Planters’ Punch,” explained Rupy. “Greg’s one is for the kids. This is the alcoholic version: it’s a recipe from Rosie’s dad, and Greg’s worked it out, you see! The yellow is pineapple juice.”

    “Planters plant pineapples,” Rosie pointed out mildly.

    “I thought it was cotton?” groped Colin.

    “You’re thinking of mint juleps,” she said definitely.

    As a matter of fact a nice plain mint julep would hit the spot round about now, and he had the feeling Luke shared this sentiment. “Uh-huh. So what’s in it beside pineapple?”

    “Pineapple’s enough, isn’t it?” said Molly, beaming at him over a tall tumbler of it. –The front view was, if anything, even more entrancing than the back, so Colin found he was beaming back.

    “Rum,” Greg was explaining. “In Australia they use a dark rum, but it looks much nicer with Bacardi, so I’ve used that. Dash of Cointreau—that was Rosie’s dad’s inspiration—twists of orange peel, freshly-squeezed orange, lots of ice.”

    “Delish!” Rupy assured him.

    “Mm.” Colin broke down and asked: “What’s in the green one?”

    The green one had been favoured with Rupy’s over-elaborate cut-glass jug and in Colin’s opinion they deserved each other. It was very green. A brisk, fresh, ’orrible green.

    “Midori, of course!” chorused Molly and Rosie.

    “Eh?”

    “A melon liqueur. Japanese,” said Luke on a dry note. “Those airline magazines you get in the seat pockets on the airplanes tend to be full of advertisements for it.”

    “We call this ‘Midori in Jamaica,’ don’t we, Rupy?” revealed Greg, grinning. “Midori, shot of vodka, slices of lemon, fresh lemon juice, sugar syrup, soda water to make it sparkle!”

    It was doing that, all right. Greenly. “It’s lovely!” Yvonne assured him over her glass of it.

    He’d have expected that, but— He looked wildly from her to John. “Chin-chin,” his cousin said, holding up his tall tumbler of it. Blandly he removed the slice of strawberry from the tumbler’s rim and ate it. “Get into the spirit of it, Colin.”

    Possibly the bitters in the Planters’ Punch would counteract the grenadine. Feebly he chose that. It didn’t. And how much sugar had the boy put in his bloody sweet and sour mix, for God’s sake? Luke appeared to be making the same discovery. Hurriedly Colin avoided his eye.

    Greg had taken his non-alcoholic Australian Planters’ Punch down to the kids. Rosie set her glass of the alcoholic version down carefully on the cane table—its top was woven cane painted white, matching the chairs, and extremely uneven. “Is it too sweet for you, Colin? Most Indians have a sweet tooth,” she said mildly. “You should try Mr Singh’s coffee!”

    “It’s wonderful,” explained John, smiling, “but it takes a bit of getting used to. Gaspingly strong, but also gaspingly sweet. Comes with the milk and sugar in it, you see. I’ve had a version out in those parts where they used tinned, sweetened condensed milk, too.”

    “Oh, yes?” said Colin feebly.

    “There are several versions of Planters’ Punch, I guess,” said Luke neutrally. “This version can be real good. The bitters and the lemon or lime—I prefer it with lime—go well with the rum. I’ve had worse. Had a so-called mint julep in New Zealand once that had Cointreau and a local apricot brandy in it as well as the bourbon, now that was a disaster.”

    “The definition of one, I should think,” croaked Colin, goggling at him.

    “Should’ve come and helped us make them, Luke, dear!” Rupy advised him. “But I thought you’d never been to New Zealand?”

    “No, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick there, Rupy,” he said feebly.

    “But—Oh, no! It wasn’t you that Derry met out there, that’s what I’m thinking of!”

    “No: me and a few million other guys, I guess. I have been there, and my advice if you’re thinking of going would be to avoid the lounge bar of the Auckland Airport Travelodge like the plague. Or certainly its cocktails: I had a thing—“ He closed his eyes and shuddered. “The gin and the Cointreau together I could have taken—just. With a twist of orange. But Frangelico as well? Ye gods!”

    “What is Frangelico?” asked Molly.

    “I’ve never heard of it,” agreed Yvonne.

    “A hazelnut liqueur,” said John, his shoulders shaking slightly. “Italian, I think.”

    “Uh-huh,” Luke agreed. “Back home we might call them filberts—but, yeah. My guess would be, one measure each of that and the Cointreau to two of gin. Strong—yeah. But drinkable? No way.”

    “Why in Hell did you order it?” croaked Colin.

    “I was drinking with a guy whose flight had also been delayed, Colin, and he bet me I wouldn’t have the guts. Clear?”

    “Very clear!” he choked, suddenly giving way entirely and laughing until he cried. Somehow after that horror story Greg’s version of a Planters’ Punch didn’t seem too bad at all, so he drank it off thirstily. And allowed Yvonne to urge a hot sausage roll on him, why not? And allowed Molly to persuade him into trying the Australian Planters’ Punch, why not? If you liked rum and pineapple it was extremely palatable.

    … Max, Georgia and the little girls had retired to the Thwaiteses’ former cottage to change out of their wet bathing-suits before lunch. Micky had consented to use Rupy’s room to change—reminding the company that at home he never had to change, but possibly unaware that it was normally the baby’s room. Luke had gone off to see what culinary delights Greg was preparing for Jamaica. Colin appeared to be asleep. The Jamaica natives looked at one another in silence for a few moments and Molly looked uncertainly at them looking.

    “Oh, well,” said Rosie with a sigh.

    “I suppose Luke’s just one of those Americans with no real sense of humour,” said Rupy sadly.

    “You’d think it would’ve sunk in by now that Jamaica drinks are supposed to be fun,” she said heavily.

    “And that Jamaica’s sup-posed to be fun, Rosie!” added Yvonne.

    “John, dear, does everybody in your entire family except you think drinks are supposed to be taken seriously?” asked Rupy on a sour note.

    “Terence isn’t too bad,” he replied in tolerant tones.

    “John, the man tried to teach us how to make a proper Martini!” cried Rosie. “Didn’t he, Yvonne?”

    “Yes, that’s right,” she agreed.

    “Oops!” said John, grinning all over his face. “Never mind, we’re gradually training him up, Rosie. He’s improving, he lapped up old Michael’s drinks at the Mountjoy Midsummer Festival like nobody’s business, didn’t he? Actually seemed to be having fun—well, discounting the lapsing in the direction of the odd lady Friend. Give Luke time, darling. He’s barely even learned to relax, yet!”

    Yvonne looked at Colin cautiously, but he was definitely asleep. “You wouldn’t expect Colin to,” she admitted in a lowered voice. “It must be an awful shock to his system. Not just being wounded, that was obviously traumatic enough; but giving up his job.”

    “Mm,” agreed Rosie. “But I dunno what Luke’s excuse is supposed to be!”

    “Is Massachusetts in New England?” returned Yvonne cautiously.

    “Think so. Why?” she replied cheerfully.

    “Well, don’t they say that New England people are the coldest and most formal of the Americans? I mean, if he grew up there—”

    “See what ya mean. But you would think that twenty years of bumming around the world might of taught him to relax.”

    “It manifestly hasn’t. At least, not taught him that things can be fun,” said Rupy. “Well, perhaps… Leading a rather precarious existence, darlings? Hand-to-mouth, all that?”

    The company agreed that that must be it, and further agreed that the caftan showed he was trying. Rosie then took Baby Bunting inside to change his nappy before lunch, Yvonne and Molly both happily accompanying her.

    “Girl talk,” said Rupy with a twinkle, stretching out in his hammock.

    “Mm-hm.” John got up and picked up Baby Bunting’s discarded Vogue hat.

    “Tidy it all up later, John,” he murmured.

    “Mm. Not that. This came from that American Vogue of yours.”

    “Oh, yes?” he said, smothering a yawn.

    “Mm.” The hat was composed of several layers—several sheets from the magazine. John unfolded them carefully. He scrutinised the innermost sheet in silence for a while. Then he said: “Rupy, did you actually read the bloody thing?”

    “Er—well, you know me, John!”

    “I’m not criticising your taste, you ass!” he said with his charming smile. “Did you read the gossip column?”

    “No—well, it’s out of date.” Rupy sat up slowly and carefully in his hammock, staring at him. “Don’t tell me there’s a stupid piece about Rosie!”

    “Not this time.” Silently he brought it over to him and pointed.

    Rupy gasped. “That’s Luke!”

    “That’s what I thought at first glance, too. ’Tisn’t. Read it.”

    He read. “Henry Beaumont,” he said limply. “I see. But— Are they twins, John? I mean, it’s a bit blurred, but I’d have taken my dying oath this was Luke!”

    “Mm. No, they’re not twins, Rupy. Several years between them.”

    “Well, uh, Rosie’s cousins are very like her: I suppose genes can do that sort of thing…”

    “Mm.” He folded the sheet up carefully and put it in the hip pocket of his shorts.

    “Could he be the brother?” hissed Rupy.

    John rubbed his chin. “Dunno. The indications seem to be pointing that way, don’t they? And I have to say it, I do not think it was a coincidence that he chose this particular page to make a hat for Baby Bunting.”

    Rupy’s jaw dropped. “Did he make it?” he croaked.

    “Yes,” said John succinctly.

    “But—but then— My God!”

    “Uh-huh.” The sound of children’s voices was heard from the direction of the Thwaiteses’ cottage, followed by the yapping of an over-excited corgi. John gave him a warning glance and sat down again.

    “But why?” hissed Rupy in bewilderment..

    John just shook his head slowly.

    “Don’ tell Rosie,” said Colin in slurred tones.

    They jumped.

    He opened his eyes. “Norra sleep. Jus’ resting.”

    “How much did you hear, Colin, dear?” said Rupy faintly.

    “Stuff about Jamaica. Yvonne being symp’thetic.” He yawned. “Frightening.”

    Rupy clapped his hand over his mouth with a startled snigger but Colin’s cousin just agreed calmly: “I’ll say. She means well, though. Don’t worry, neither of us will breathe a word to Rosie.”

    “They’re planning another baby!” Rupy informed him, beaming.

    John looked somewhat drily at his cousin but rather to his astonishment Colin gave what appeared to be a perfectly genuine smile and replied simply: “That is good news!” Possibly there was hope for him, yet.

    “Here’s Georgia,” said Jim Potter on a snide note, peering through what was left of their shop window for the display of hardware that the locals didn’t need and the retirees were too up-themselves to condescend to buy—they got a man in from Portsmouth to do all that. Taking more local custom away from the village—right. “Maybe she can wise up Harry about ’is bloody career choice.”

    Isabel was just about to wither him—young Georgia Carter only knew about hairdressing, and not all that much about that—when Georgia Leach came in with Roger on his lead. She awarded her life-partner a filthy look before saying extra-nicely: “Hullo, Georgia, dear! What can we do for you, today?”

    “We’re out of tin trays with pictures of corgis on them,” noted Jim.

    “Hah, hah,” said Georgia with a grin. “Actually I was wondering if you had a really, really easy electric tin-opener, ’cos—”

    “Of course, dear!” cried Isabel. “Those manual ones are awful, aren’t they, no matter what the ads tell you! Little fingers can’t work those at all!”

    “Eh? Oh—nah. Max has taken his kids up to his parents’ place,” said Georgia in completely indifferent tones. This was news to the village: Isabel’s eyes bulged. “Nah, this is for us. Anna can’t work those manual ones.”

    “I see,” she croaked. “So you’re back in Moulder’s Way, are you? –Jim!” she said sharply.

    Jim jumped, and dragged his eyes from what Georgia had seen fit to grace the village with on a warm August morning. “Eh? Oh—yeah. The German ones are best. Rosie’s got one.”

    “That was ages ago!” said his helpmate scornfully.

    “She’s got one, though. And come to think of it, she made Luke buy one just a few weeks back.” Jim produced one. Unlike Rosie, who had trustingly accepted his recommendation, Georgia examined it narrowly before agreeing to take it. Pretty much par for the course, from what he’d seen of her.

    “So how’s the career?” he said in chatty tones, as Isabel came round to the customer side of the counter and started petting Roger, telling him what a pretty boy he was. She could pretty boy him all she liked, they were not getting a corgi! Because Guess Who’d end up having to walk the ruddy thing? Jim (Muggins) Potter, that was who! The kids’d all claim the pooch wasn’t their idea—however much they’d twisted his arm to get it in the first place—and she’d be too busy getting the breakfast or the supper or too exhausted after getting the supper, or— Yeah.

    Georgia didn’t reply to his kind enquiry in the spirit in which it was ostensibly meant, she replied blankly: “Eh? Same like it has been for the last month, I s’pose. I’ve signed contracts with Henny Penny Productions, but we don’t start rehearsals until next month.”

    “Right. Well, you’re getting a nice break.”

    “I don’t need a nice break, I’m fed up doing nothing. And it isn’t holidays at home, I had my break at Christmas,” said Georgia grimly.

    “Eh? Oh—yeah, ya would of,” said Jim feebly. “Um, Rupy in it this time, is he?”

    “’Course, he’s Commander! They’ve cast him in the new series, too.”

    “Right. Rupy’s been doing the acting stuff all his life, that right?”

    “Yes. He went professional at seventeen.”

    “That right? You know any other male actors, Georgia?”

    Instead of responding in kind to this chatty enquiry, as Rosie would have done, she fixed him with a hard grey-green gaze and replied: “Why?”

    “He’s trying to get you to admit that acting’s a hard life and very few people succeed in it, Georgia, especially those that suddenly decide they want to go into it at turned eighteen,” said Isabel sourly, giving up on Roger. –Possibly temporarily: she remained on the customer side of the counter.

    “Is this your Harry?” said Georgia, not sounding very interested. “Has he got talent?”

    “No,” replied his adoring mother grimly.

    “No,” agreed his doting father. “He hasn’t got the looks, either.”

    “He’s not bad-looking,” replied Georgia temperately. “He’d look a lot better if he lost a lot of weight.”

    “Damned with faint praise! I’ll tell ’im that!” choked Jim, going into a sniggering fit.

    Isabel eyed him sourly. “You’ve told him everything else, I dare say that’ll go down just as well. Um, well, what about Euan Keel, Georgia?” she asked feebly, as her useless life-partner obviously wasn’t about to.

    “Dunno. Don’t really know him.”

    “Oh. I thought you did?”

    “I’ve seen him, do ya count that?” replied Georgia indifferently.

    “Well, no, we’ve all seen him, in fact he bought some tools here, didn’t he, Jim? When him and his little girlfriend were doing up their cottage in Medlars Lane.”

    “Ya could say that,” allowed Jim, winking at Georgia. “Stood about where Roger is,”—he paused, perforce, as Roger broke into an excited series of yelps—“Good boy. Quiet! Um, yeah, there, looking as sulky as all get out, while she told ’im what he needed.”

    “He mended that cupboard of Velda Cross’s all right, Jim!” objected his life-partner swiftly.

    “Eh?” he croaked.

    “The summer when Rosie was pregnant—when him and Katie stayed with Velda, before they bought Quince Tree Cottage!”

    “The elephant never forgets,” he said faintly. “Thought that was a rattly window? –No, all right,” he said as she frowned, “whatever it was, he fixed it: proves he can hold a hammer when ’e wants to. –Think my point was, he didn’t want to,” he said to Georgia. “See, that’s pretty much why him and Katie broke up. Well, besides the fact she bossed the pants off him and didn’t care if it showed.”

    “Yeah,” said Georgia indifferently. “I know, Molly told me.”

    “Molly?” said Isabel—very weakly indeed, her husband noted with some pleasure. “Does she know him, dear?”

    “Ya could call it knowing, yeah. If you were thinking of him as a rôle model for Harry,” said Georgia, dragging them ruthlessly back to the subject they’d started out with, “he’s got talent. Plus and he went to drama classes when he was a kid, and did loads of amateur stuff. He got a really good part in professional theatre in Edinburgh when he was about eighteen, and landed a ditto in London not long after that.”

    “Did Rosie tell you all that?” croaked Isabel.

    “Nah, Molly did. –I don’t want a plastic bag, thanks, I’m not up for choking a dolphin.” She handed over the exact change, said cheerfully, “See ya!” and removed herself and her corgi.

    Silence reigned in Potter, Ironmonger.

    Jim recovered first. “Hard little object, isn’t she?”

    Isabel twitched. “Well, yes.”

    He eyed her sideways. “Choking a dolphin?”

    “Never mind that! What was all that?”

    “Don’t ask me!” replied Jim with a certain relish, since she’d given him his opening. “Apparently the village is really behind on the Euan Keel-Molly Leach connection.”

    “She’s never been out of Australia in her life, before this!” she said dazedly.

    Jim eyed her thoughtfully.

    “It must have happened when he was making the film out there!”

    “That’d be the logical conclusion—yeah,” he agreed.

    “Hang on! Didn’t Rosie say she’d gone to Queensland with them?”

    “Uh… Well, thought that was the other cousin, the one that never made it down huh—”

    “Dot,” she said instantly.

    “—here,” finished Jim feebly. “Right. Did double for her—yeah.”

    “Yes, but I think Molly went there too, on holiday!”

    Jim had a hazy idea they all went there for their holidays: wasn’t it a bit like their, um—well, scratch anything this side of the Channel. Like their Marbella? “Um… Might of, yeah.”

    “I’ll ask Yvonne!” she determined, her eyes shining.

    “She’ll be able to tell you,” he agreed, extremely relieved they were off the subject of H—

    “And you can get upstairs right now and tell Harry what she said!”

    “Look, Georgia hasn’t even done any acting yet, do ya think he’ll take any notice of—”

    Apparently, yes. He went.

    Isabel went round to the serving side of the counter and leaned on it, her brain buzzing. Euan Keel and Molly? Well! The topic was so exciting that it was some time before it came back to her that Max Lattimore and his little girls had vanished from Bellingford leaving Georgia apparently unmoved. After living in his pocket for—well, nearly a solid month? Help.

    Jack Powell had had one of those mornings. A plumbing job at crack of dawn for one of the most demanding of the retirees: blocked toilet, they only called him in if it was urgent, of course, anything that was a really big job they’d get a firm in from fucking Portsmouth. He headed for Medlars Lane in the faint hope that if, as rumour had it, people had been looking at Quince Tree Cottage, they might be actual buyers that might want a bit of fixing up done—given that it was him that had done the renovation for that tit Euan Keel in the first place. It was a good job, if he did say so himself, but of course it was pretty basic, because him and his little girlfriend had split up before they’d hardly had the place for five min— He drew in hurriedly. There were people actually looking at the place! A huge fat bloke and a slim younger bloke with fair hair in the weird spiky look they seemed to be going in for these days—God knew why, made ’em look like they’d just tumbled out of bed and shot off to school before their mums had managed to catch ’em. He’d even seen Harrison Ford, who must be older than he was, done up in the aforesaid—might of been at the Oscars or something. And he, Jack Powell, was here to tell you it had made him look ruddy daft!

    He got out of the truck and ambled over to them. “Nice little place,” he offered.

    The younger bloke turned. “Hullo, Jack,” he said with a silly grin.

    Jack’s jaw dropped. Euan Keel in person! He used to look quite normal, what in blazes had he done that to his hair for? “Hullo, Euan,” he croaked. Well, at least the bloke wasn’t up-himself to the extent of making you call him Mr, bow, scrape, like some of them. True, it would’ve been ludicrous if he had of, because he, Jack, had eaten Rosie’s and Rupy’s idea of a Jamaica lunch with him, but there were those that would have tried. And he wasn’t all bad: he had given him and Greg a hand to dig over the Haworths’ veggie garden that summer—John had been at sea.

    “It’s for a part,” said Euan, making a face and touching the not only spiky but streaked blond hair—looked like one of young Georgia Carter’s worst efforts. “Shakespeare.”

    Jack had heard a fair bit about that while Euan had been around the place so he nodded and agreed: “I get it. Do what they say or die the death, eh?”

    “Aye, that’s it!” he said with a laugh. See, at first you thought he was putting on the Scotch, but after a while you realised he wasn’t, he only lapsed into it when he was relaxed. Which given he was a bloody nervy type, wasn’t that often. Though it was hard to relax when your girlfriend was giving you a hard time over not pulling your weight over doing up the cottage, true.

    “So, brought a friend to have a look at the place?” he said easily. –The huge fat bloke looked like one of those opera singers, he had a neatly trimmed black beard. The three tenors, that was it. Could it be one of them? It wasn’t impossible, Euan was in show business, after all. Unfortunately that sort of type expected you to recognise him. Jack eyed him warily.

    “Absolutely!” he said: blimey, talk about your fruity voice! Only he sounded more like a bass than a tenor. “Isn’t it adorable?”

    Adorable? Funny word for a man to use. Maybe he was gay, there were enough of them in show business, too. “Um, yeah. Nice little place. Solid stone. The yuppy that bought it off Euan decided he couldn’t hack the drive from Portsmouth after all, that’s why it’s on the market again. It’s sound, you wouldn’t have any trouble with it.”

    “It’s sound thanks to you!” said Euan with a grin. “This is Jack Powell, Derry, the genius who turned the dump into a human habitation!”

    “Good to meet you, Jack,” he said, sticking out a meaty paw. “Derry Dawlish.”

    Strewth! Rosie’s bloody film director! “How are you, Mr Dawlish?” he said feebly, shaking. “Rosie’s mentioned you.”

    “One’s flattered, Jack!” he said with a fruity laugh. “But call me Derry, no need to stand on ceremony!”

    “Derry, then,” said Jack feebly. Five’d get ya ten it was a made-up name. “Ma Granville Thinnes down the road’s got the keys, if you want to have a look inside.”

    “We’re over that hurdle, thanks,” he said drily, holding up the keys.

    “The bitch actually offered us a cuppa,” said Euan heavily.

    Jack grinned. “Thought you’d been favoured before?”

    “Quite,” he said wryly. “Over an hour’s torture while she forced me to recall every celeb I’d so much as glimpsed.”

    “Hasn’t set foot inside a theatre in the last forty years!” said Dawlish briskly.

    “Uh—I’d say you’re not far wrong, there, Derry,” conceded Jack feebly. “They been here since—heck. 1969, I think. When was the flood down Bottom Street? Uh—yeah. 1969. They were inhuman even way back then. Never go anywhere, except sometimes into Portsmouth when he’s got a few dressed pheasants to sell. –And don’t get your hopes up,” he said as the famous film director brightened visibly, “’cos nobody round these parts has ever been favoured with so much as a sniff of one! Some years he sells them in London, too, but they don’t go up, he uses a bloody courier.”

    “See?” said Euan with a laugh.

    “Perfectly!” he agreed, laughing this booming laugh and shaking all over the enormous frame. “Well, shall we go in?”

    They went in. Dawlish could only just squeeze up the staircase. The attic bedrooms with their sloping ceilings and the view right into the big old quince out the front rated another “adorable”. Jack didn’t point out that the fucking tree’d creak and groan all night, ’cos this looked like a bloke that was incapable of lifting a nail, let alone a hammer, and he also looked the sort of a bloke that’d want a lot of stuff done to anything he bought. To prove it he spotted the lack of lead-lighting in the windows up here and asked if there was a lead-lighter in the village.

    “Do it for you easy—no sweat,” Jack replied smoothly. Well, shit, Rosie said the libraries were full of books that told you about that sort of thing, and if they couldn’t find a book she could find something on the Internet for him, and he really ought to advertise himself as available for that sort of work—deliver a few leaflets to the ruddy retirees. He was thinking of it. Well, shit, did he want to go broke? Not actually, no. Greg had mentioned the words “career path,” but Rosie had squashed him flat just as he, Jack, was about to. Silly young tit. But it was true that if they were all going elsewhere for the services you’d thought you could provide, you had to figure out the services they did want and provide them instead—no matter how bloody daft they were.

    Dawlish rubbed his hands. “Good, good, good! Now, Rosie once mentioned a cottagey look with rose-patterned wallpaper on the sloping ceilings: what do you think?”

    “She likes roses,” admitted Jack with a sheepish grin.

    “Derry, it’d clash with the wonderful tree—you should see it in winter,” said Euan on a wistful note, staring out into leafy green. “Grey and gnarled—fantastic heavy shapes.”

    “One would go for something with the same shade of green in it,” he said firmly.

    Jack and Derry then went back downstairs while Euan used the bathroom. It was a nice little bathroom—blue shower cabinet, Jack knew the very truck it had fallen off the back of. It and the matching ones in Greg’s loft and John’s two new cottages.

    “Entre nous, it’s too small for me,” admitted the great director sadly. “But one is hoping that Euan might reconsider it. Well, it and a few other things.”

    “Uh—yeah.” Well, Euan wasn’t all bad, so Jack asked cautiously: “How’s he been?”

    He made a face. “Rather down, to tell you the truth. Well, career-wise he’s had innumerable Hollywood offers since my film of The Captain’s Daughter came out. Offers of unsuitable dreck, unfortunately, but at least he feels wanted. He loathes the Shakespeare thing he’s doing at the moment, but he’s under contract for a whole series, you see—can’t get out of it.”

    “Right.”

    “They finished filming the telly version some time back, not long after the premiere,”—Jack nodded, he got it that he meant the premiere of his own film—“but now they’re doing it at Stratford: alternating it with several other shows—rep style, it’s all gone to Mattingforth’s head now that Stratford’s begging for his services. Revolving sets for the different pieces—God knows what. Find the stage boring, myself—limited.” He looked at Jack’s dubious face. “Professionally, dear chap, not as a member of the audience!” he said with a laugh. “Nothing like live theatre, eh?”

    “I get you,” said Jack feebly. “So he’s got a bit more to do, has he?”

    “Yes, another stint in September and then bloody Mattingforth will let him go back to his natural hair colour. Not to say his natural weight. Well, that’s not all the dieting. Moping,” he said with a grimace.

    “Yeah, but won’t this place bring back memories he, um, doesn’t want?”

    “That’s what I thought,” he said, lowering his voice, “but apparently not. He’s well and truly over Katie. The moping’s because he had something really worthwhile when we were in Queensland—you can see it in his performance: he shines off the screen. And being him, he carelessly let it slip right through his fingers. –Ssh!” he added as the toilet flushed upstairs.

    Jack was goggling at him. According to Isabel Potter, what Euan Keel had had in Queensland was Molly Leach! Which, correspondingly, had got to be the holiday fling with a British bloke that she’d mentioned. Face lighting up like a Christmas tree—right. “Molly?” he hissed. The great director nodded, smiling. “Does she know he’s here?” he hissed.

    Derry shook his head vigorously. “Ssh!”

    Euan came downstairs all smiles and admitted that if Derry didn’t want the place he might rethink, himself. Jack was barely capable of a reply. Did he oughta warn Molly? Warn Rosie to warn— Fuck, couldn’t do that, the two of them were headed over to Miller’s Bay next!

    He clambered into the truck, frowning. He hardly knew Molly, she’d think he was sticking his oar in. And anyway, how did ya broach a topic like that? He headed the trusty truck’s nose down the hill, tooted loudly outside Ma Granville Thinnes’s choice residence for the sake of it, and turned into Dipper Street.

    No, well, he supposed it was up to her what she did, if Euan did want to see her again. She could always tell him where to put it. Jack thought of the remarks about back gardens and so forth that time he’d dropped in, and winced. Yeah, she could look after herself, all right. As a matter of fact, if either of them needed looking after, he had a pretty fair idea it was Euan, not her!

    He began to think about lead-lighting instead. Didn’t look that hard. No harder than that fake stained-glass crap you saw everywhere these days—and Rosie reckoned the craft shops sold little kits for that, anyone could do it. Might even get one to practise on—nothing stopping him, was there?

    The old green truck rattled down the High Street, dodging the triple-parked conveyances outside the Garden Centre, Dimity’s Tea Shoppe and The Bakery with the ease of long practice, and headed for the junction with George Street and the easy way back to Bottom Street and thence home to Top Lane.