Secret Schemes and Daring Dreams (18 page)

‘Do you know this girl, then?'

‘Caroline? She's on the same course as me at uni,' he explained. ‘That's why Split Bamboo played at the May Ball – she was on the organising committee.'

‘So how come they split up?' Emma asked.

‘Ah, well – that's the mystery,' said Freddie with a smile. ‘My theory is that Jake's got his eye on someone else.'

‘Maybe he'll bring whoever it is to the party,' Emma suggested. ‘After all, he appears to be issuing invitations right, left and centre.'

‘What do you mean?'

Emma told him about Lily's ridiculous idea.

‘I told Jake to invite her,' Freddie said. ‘You didn't seriously think I'd ignore the cousin of —'

He broke off as the others came back into the cottage.

‘Talk later.' As he whispered in her ear, his lips brushed her cheek. Emma felt a frisson of anticipation ripple through her body.

‘Yes, let's,' she said as huskily as she could.

On Tuesday evening, Lucy, Adam and Emma were sitting on the terrace at Donwell with George, spooning Haagen-Dazs ice cream down their throats and running through the final plans for the party. The marquee was being erected on the lawn in front of them, matting had been laid as walkways and fairy lights were being strung through all the trees leading to the house.

‘We're going to have flares on the path from the house to the marquee,' Emma enthused. ‘And chocolate and gold ribbons – chocolate, get it? – on the tables and . . .'

‘And it's time Freddie gave us some more money,' George broke in. ‘The deposit's been used up and, now Mum's back doing the books, she's keeping a very close watch on it all.'

Emma smugly handed him an envelope, slightly stained with Cookies and Cream ice cream. ‘Freddie gave it to me today,' she said. ‘Another thousand pounds. Happy now?'

‘Wow!' Lucy exclaimed. ‘Imagine having that kind of money. That's more than I'll earn all summer.'

‘It better not be,' Emma said, laughing. ‘We need more than that to get round Australia.'

It was the lack of a reply, together with the guilty glance that flashed between Adam and Lucy, that set
Emma's stomach churning. Lucy was going to back out. She couldn't. She wouldn't do a thing like that to her best friend. She was just worried about the cash, that was all.

‘OK, so can we check numbers?' George cut in briskly. ‘Luigi's nagging Mum about quantities for the food.'

‘Freddie's invited fifty,' Emma said. ‘But only eighteen are staying at the hotel.'

‘And these are our friends – the ones who can come,' Lucy added hurriedly, clearly grateful for the change of subject.

Emma scanned the names. ‘Alice, Angus, Serena, Tabitha, Chelsea, Simon – oh yuck . . .'

‘He really likes you,' Lucy murmured. ‘And besides, he invited us to that sailing party, remember?'

‘Rufus, Candy – gosh are those two still together? Weird.' Emma went on, ignoring her. ‘Maddy, Greg, Theo . . . you are so not inviting him!'

‘Hang on,' Adam said laughing. ‘You were the one who insisted that he got an invitation, remember? For Harriet's sake.'

‘Well, things have changed and you'll just have to un-invite him,' Emma declared. ‘No way is that guy setting foot —'

‘You can't stop him now,' George reasoned. ‘I know he's acted like a jerk, but he is a mate of mine and —'

‘You have strange taste in friends,' Emma grumbled. ‘Still, I guess it's too late to do anything about it. Let's just hope Harriet can hack it.'

CHAPTER 9

‘
EMMA, DARLING, LOOK WHO
'
S HERE
!'
TARQUIN BURST
into the kitchen at Hartfield while Emma was still polishing off her breakfast smoothie.

‘Thalia!' Emma jumped up and gave Freddie and Adam's granny a hug.

‘Emma, sweetheart, how are you?' Thalia plopped down on the nearest chair and kicked off her shoes. ‘I was just on my way next door with these.'

She patted a bubble-wrapped parcel of pictures. George's parents allowed Thalia to display the work of local artists on the walls of the dining room; as Max said, it covered up the dirty marks on the wallpaper and gave people something to talk about.

‘It's lovely to see you,' Emma said, and meant it. Thalia was the sort of person Emma hoped she would be when she was ancient: she didn't care what anyone else thought and yet she had the kindest heart in the world. The one thing Emma didn't aspire to was Thalia's dress sense, or lack of it; it was eccentric in
the extreme. On this occasion, she was wearing a calf-length patchwork skirt, a crochet top that would have made an excellent tea cosy and a pair of bright pink wellington boots. The whole outfit was topped off with a fraying straw sunhat, which sported three silk roses and a hatpin that would have come in handy for skewering kebabs.

‘You might not say that when you hear the favour I need from you,' she said, laughing. ‘Do those biscuits need eating?' Without waiting for a reply, she pulled the lid off the biscuit tin and began chomping on a chocolate digestive.

‘It's this wretched business with Freddie,' she went on. ‘No doubt you've heard.'

‘What exactly?' Emma queried, her antennae for gossip coming into play.

‘The argument with his father.' Thalia sighed. ‘Such silliness. He told you why, I take it?'

Emma shook her head. ‘No – no one knows, not even Adam,' she replied.

‘What? Oh, this is stupidity, sheer and utter stupidity!' She grabbed another biscuit and bit into it angrily. ‘I'll have to have a word with that boy, and soon,' she muttered. ‘Of course, if his mother were here . . . but she's motorbiking across Mexico with that ridiculous husband of hers. As if her son wasn't more important!'

‘Coffee, Thalia?' Tarquin asked, proffering the cafetière. ‘It's Fair Trade from Venezuela, very pungent.'

‘Darling, I don't care if it's come from the moon as long as it's heaped with caffeine,' Thalia said. ‘Now what
was I saying? Oh yes, Freddie. I have a plan and that's where you come in, Emma, dear.'

‘Me?'

‘Yes, dear, I want you to look after the gallery for a couple of hours while I pop up to . . . well, never mind where. What you don't know you can't lie about. Tarquin, these biscuits are most frightfully good. It would be such a shame to let them go stale.'

‘Help yourself,' he replied. ‘Look, I must fly – I'm seeing a man about solar-powered water heaters. By the way, Thalia, that gallery of yours is a disgrace – you have lights on all day.'

‘I'll have you know I bought an energy-saving bulb yesterday,' Thalia countered. ‘Silly shape though, not aesthetic at all.'

She waved Tarquin out of the door as if she owned the place and turned to Emma. ‘Now,' she said, ‘we must go. If this is going to work, timing is everything.'

Wealden Art Gallery stood in the middle of Ditchdean High Street, between the Copper Kettle tearoom and the fifteenth-century Priest's House, and as a consequence there were always tourists gawping through the window at the pictures and ceramics on display. Few, however, ventured through the door and even fewer made a purchase, beyond the odd postcard or calendar of
Sussex through the Seasons.

‘Now dear,' Thalia said, unlocking the door and turning the
Closed
sign to
Open.
‘All you have to do is answer the phone, smile invitingly at anyone who sets foot across the threshold and should my grandson
appear, spin him some yarn about my going to the dentist or some such and get rid of him fast, OK?'

‘Is Freddie likely to appear?' Emma tried to keep the eagerness out of her voice.

‘I wasn't thinking about Freddie, I meant Adam,' Thalia replied, eyeing Emma closely. ‘Tell me, you haven't got a thing about Freddie, have you?'

‘Me? No – I just meant . . .' To her annoyance, Emma felt her cheeks burn.

‘Hmm.' Thalia sniffed and picked up her outsize handbag. ‘Well, just don't . . . I mean . . . oh, I just don't want you to get hurt.'

‘I won't,' Emma assured her. ‘Why do I have to get rid of him if he comes?'

‘That guy on
England Today
was right,' Thalia remarked. ‘The young ask too many questions. Just do it.' And with that, she disappeared out of the door.

Emma had just begun to feel bored – there's only so much excitement to be gained from selling two Sussex by the Sea pencils and a postcard of Ditchdean Beacon – when the door opened and Freddie sauntered in with Jake following close behind.

They both looked extremely surprised to see her.

‘What are you doing here?' Freddie exclaimed, glancing around the empty gallery. ‘Where's Granny?'

‘Er – she's at the dentist,' Emma replied hastily. ‘Toothache. Really bad.' She glanced surreptitiously at her watch. ‘What did you want her for?'

‘What? Oh, nothing really,' Freddie said. ‘Just wanted her advice about something.'

It occurred to Emma that, for the first time ever, he wasn't his confident, assured self.

‘Can I do something?' she offered.

Jake glanced at Freddie. ‘Shall we tell her?' he ventured. ‘If she knows, it's going to make life a whole heap easier.'

‘Tell her about Ravi, you mean? Sure.' Freddie laughed, turning to Emma. ‘Know what? Ravi's really got the hots for Jake's cousin.'

‘Freddie, that's a bit unfair,' Jake began.

‘For Lily?' Emma was incredulous. She'd always thought of Lily as the least likely girl on the planet to pull a guy.

‘The thing is,' Freddie went on, ‘Ravi's dead shy. I mean, seriously buttoned up. That's right, isn't it, Jake?'

Jake sighed and nodded. ‘Yeah and he's not the only one,' he muttered under his breath.

‘So if you can drop the hint to Lily, suss out how she feels about him . . .'

He paused as the telephone on the desk rang.

‘Wealden Art Gallery, Emma Woodhouse speaking, how may I help you?'

‘Emma? Thalia. I'm ten minutes away – is the coast clear?'

‘Ah. Not really,' Emma mumbled. ‘It will be very soon. OK, then. Bye!'

‘That was, er, the firework people,' she gabbled. ‘They need you up at the hotel to check out – stuff.'

Freddie frowned. ‘Surely George can do that?'

‘George isn't around,' Emma said. ‘And from what they said, there's a problem with . . . something. It's urgent.'

‘OK, no sweat, we'll go up there,' Freddie said, opening the door on to the street. ‘And find out whether Lily likes Ravi, OK? Oh, and when Granny gets back, can you tell her we were here? To discuss what she was talking about?'

‘Sure – what was that exactly?'

‘She'll understand,' Freddie assured her.

I'm glad someone will, thought Emma. Something was clearly going on, and she had every intention of finding out exactly what it was.

‘Emma, you're a star,' Thalia exclaimed ten minutes later. ‘Now, off you go.'

‘It's OK, I'm not in any rush,' Emma assured her. ‘I could help you hang those if you like.' She gestured to a pile of screen prints stacked in the corner of the gallery.

‘No, darling, it's sweet of you but, well, to be honest, I need some space. Down time, you know? So off you pop.'

She wants rid of me, thought Emma. She's positively buzzed. I wonder if she's got a secret lover, and that's where she's been. Eyeing Thalia's crêpe-like neck and the age spots on her slender hands, she dismissed the thought as ridiculous.

‘Oh, Freddie was here, with Jake,' Emma told her as Thalia held the door open for her. ‘He said he needed advice and you'd know what it was about.'

‘Oh, I know all right.' Thalia sighed. ‘And hopefully after this weekend, he'll come to his senses and all this stupidity will be over.'