Sowing Secrets (21 page)

Back to the royal ‘we’ again, I noticed. The Spyder would probably soon be sporting a ‘Nia ‘n’ Roddy’ windscreen sticker – it was very promising.

‘But we’re only going to open the house at weekends until summer,’ Rhodri explained. ‘By then we hope the gift shop and tearoom will be finished. The plan is to have people buy their tickets to see the house
in
the gift shop and have to enter and leave the house through it – but they can just come and look at the craft shops for free. Nia thought of that one – she’s so clever and practical!’ He beamed at her fondly and she went faintly pink.

‘You’re not going to have much privacy, Rhodri.’

‘Ah, but this paved terrace behind the new wing, where I’ll be living, is going to be roped off – maybe hedged and trellised later to provide a bit of personal space.’

‘I’m still thinking about that one,’ agreed Gabe.

‘My workshop is functional now, and a couple of the others will have moved in by Easter, when we open with the Grand Easter Egg Hunt. I’ve already done the leaflets – and you’re going to help me hide the eggs, Fran, really early that morning,’ Nia told me in her usual bossy way.

‘I am?’

‘And me,’ Gabe said. ‘I’m doing the official opening, so I may as well make myself useful!’

‘What if it’s raining?’

‘We’ll just have to put them in plastic bags or something – don’t be a wet blanket!’

‘OK,’ I conceded. ‘Well, that should get things going!’

‘Is Rosie coming home for Easter?’ Rhodri asked. ‘She could help too.’

‘Only for a couple of days and then she’s going to Ma’s: her local vet’s going to give her a week’s work experience. I’m not sure what she’s doing after that.’

‘Well, tell her if she’s at a loose end over the summer I’ll give her a job up at Plas Gwyn,’ he said kindly. ‘We’ll probably take on a few students.’

‘Once word about the filming gets out, we should have hordes of people here to watch,’ Nia said. ‘Perhaps we should have “Help the Restoration” donation boxes dotted about.’

‘It wouldn’t hurt,’ agreed Rhodri.

‘Won’t you mind crowds of people watching you?’ I asked Gabe. It sounded like my idea of hell.

‘No, we’re used to it. We’ll cordon off where we’re working for safety, of course – they can only watch us from a distance.’

‘I don’t suppose
you’ll
be spending much time on site anyway; only when they’re filming.’

‘Then you suppose wrong! I thought you’d seen the programme,’ he said, giving me a surprised and indignant look. ‘I’m a gardener, not an actor, so I don’t suddenly spring into action when there’s a camera on me; I work all the time.’

‘Actually, he works harder than anyone,’ Rhodri said admiringly. ‘He built a dry-stone wall himself in the last series!’

‘That’s the fun bit, my reward for doing the camera thing,’ Gabe said. ‘I like getting my hands dirty.’

‘Oh?’ I said, thoughtfully looking at his strong, long-fingered hands again. Come to think of it, they didn’t look as though he had a daily manicure – or even a yearly one.

‘Of course, I’ll have to go off and do a day’s shooting at earlier projects from time to time. But even after the programmes are made, when I’m living here, it will be hard to resist the temptation to come and muck in.’

‘And I don’t think
I
could stay away if you were planting a rose garden,’ I admitted ruefully. ‘Though I suppose it will give me lots of new varieties to paint once they’re established, so in the long term I would be helping my work!’

‘This is all going to be such fun,’ Rhodri said happily, and I could see that suddenly the Famous Three had become Four. He raised his beer glass: ‘Here’s to success!’

Since I was suddenly feeling tired again, even though all the lovely calories in my glass of beer and two packets of crisps had made me much less shaky, I took myself off, leaving them hunched over the plans like three conspirators.

Carrie had already gone, leaving Huw sitting morosely in the corner over a pint of bitter, which did not look promising. I must ask her what’s happening. They have been together such a long time it would be a pity if they parted simply because of some malicious rumour-mongering.

I was glad to get home, but instead of having something to eat and an early night, which was what I had intended, I ended up talking on the phone for hours. My ear was hot by the time I’d finished.

Ma was first, to say she had spoken to ‘dear Gabriel’ again (she must have his mobile phone number, unless they have established telepathic links) and was glad to hear that already he felt we were old friends and he was looking forward to seeing my rose garden!

She really did tell him he could use the cottage whenever he wanted while he was working at Plas Gwyn until the sale went through, which I think is pretty rash of her, because what if it turns out he is bankrupt, or she changes her mind or something?

When I pointed this out she said, ‘Don’t be silly, my love. He’s such a nice young man. Do you know, he says that he would love me to carry on using the cottage whenever I like, even after he has bought it! He’s all alone in the world, no family at all.’

He didn’t mention
that
part of it, and neither can I see him in the role of Little Orphan Annie.

‘You can’t call him a young man, Ma – he’s older than I am, so he must be in his forties. And you can’t shack up with strange men!’

‘He’s not strange, and he’s only forty-three, I asked. That’s practically a boy to me,’ she said stubbornly, ‘and you know I’m
never
wrong about people!’

I wouldn’t exactly say that, but prudence kept me quiet, especially on the subject of divorce, paternity claims and estranged family on the other side of the Atlantic. And is this love? Should I be worried? Does Gabe Weston have a sort of generic attraction for female members of the March family?

Ma hopes to arrive before lunch tomorrow to talk things over with Gabe. And I suppose we will have to sort out the contents of the cottage fairly soon – not a job I am looking forward to.

Gabriel Weston appears to be insinuating himself into my life here without any apparent effort at all, and even Nia seems to have fallen under his spell. Maybe she sees him as a sort of honorary Druid.

I’d hardly put the phone down after talking to Ma when it rang again and Rosie aggrievedly demanded to know where I’d been, like an anxious mother (somebody else’s – mine was never anxious since she always assumed I would be fine).

‘The pub, with Nia, Rhodri and that
Restoration Gardener
man, Gabriel Weston,’ I told her, and then added that Ma had definitely agreed to sell Fairy Glen to him.

‘I suppose it’s quite exciting for you, having him coming to live in the village,’ she said kindly. ‘How old is he? And is he good-looking?’

‘Early forties, and he’s not handsome the way Mal is,’ I said, ‘though I suppose he’s attractive in his way … charismatic. He has lots of fans – some of them were drooling over him in the pub tonight.’

‘How
is
Mal?’ she asked, losing interest in geriatric gardeners.

‘Fine – he loves it out there. You know his idea of heaven is to bask in the sunshine like a lizard, preferably on the deck of a boat. He’s got an apartment with a swimming pool and maid service, but he says they’re all like that on Grand Cayman,’ I added doubtfully.

‘Granny says she’s going out to visit him too, because he’s lost in the joys of Mammon and needs to be shown the hard path back to righteousness … or, at least, something like that.’

I was astonished. ‘That’s the first I’ve heard it! Are you sure, because Mal hasn’t mentioned it?’ It was hard to conjure up a vision of Mrs M. on a Caribbean island.

‘Yes, certain, but I think she’s only just decided. She doesn’t expect to enjoy herself, she said, but it was her duty to go. I wish she thought it was her duty to take me with her!’

‘I wish you could go too, darling. How is the course going?’

‘OK,’ she said uninformatively. ‘I’m coming home on Friday with all my stuff – and then, Mum, I hope you don’t mind, but on Saturday morning, very, very early, Tom’s picking me up and taking me over to the Lleyn Peninsula to learn to surf!’

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘I mean, well, that
will
be fun, won’t it? But won’t the water be terribly cold?’

‘Wetsuits. I’ll be able to borrow one. Then I’m back on Sunday to pick my car up and go over to Gran’s.’

‘If you want to watch them shooting the opening scenes of
Restoration Gardener
, you’ll have to take a day off,’ I said. ‘I expect half the village will be watching.’

‘I probably won’t bother. I’m only working that week, after all, and it’s good experience: the practice does livestock as well as domestic pets.’

‘How’s Colum?’

‘Who?’

‘Your boyfriend.’

‘Oh,
him
,’ she said dismissively. ‘He’s all right. He’s a bit jealous of Tom, actually, even though I’ve told him … well, I’ve told him he’s stupid.’

‘Right,’ I agreed.

‘Tom’s old enough to be my father, even if he
isn’t
– and he’s a lot of fun.’

‘He always was,’ I said reflectively. ‘It used to get a bit wearing sometimes, all that nonstop boyish high spirits.’

‘Well, it makes a change from Mal,’ she said shortly, which is true: the last thing you could accuse him of is an excess of
joie de vivre
. ‘Tom says he’s been thinking about you a lot since he saw you again, and he never forgot you, which is romantic, isn’t it?’

‘It might be, if he hadn’t dumped me in the first place.’

‘Yes, but he said he realised it was a mistake almost immediately. You could have got back together again.’

‘No, we couldn’t,’ I said patiently. ‘Even if I hadn’t discovered I was pregnant with you, darling, I was over him by the time he wrote to me to try and make up.’

‘He’s still pretty good-looking, isn’t he?’ she persisted. ‘You wouldn’t think he was forty! The surfing must keep him fit.’

‘I expect so, for a geriatric,’ I agreed slightly tartly. ‘But I can’t say I really noticed at the Druid’s Rest – other things were on my mind.’

‘He was really sorry about that, but he’d like to meet you just for a chat sometime – and he says Mal must be absolutely out of his mind to go away for six months leaving you all alone!’

‘You know Mal had to take this contract, Rosie, and I’ll soon be seeing him. And it appears I’ll soon be seeing Tom too, if he’s picking you up on Saturday.’

‘He always drives up overnight, so it will be really, really early. You might not be at your best then, Mum.’

‘I’m sure he’ll survive the experience,’ I said drily. It might even do him good to see me freshly risen from my bed, since methinks she is plugging Tom’s charms just a little too much. Wonder what she’s told him about Mal.

After that, I unplugged the phone and went to bed. Chances were that Mal would be trying to phone me later, possibly already regaled with Wevill-borne tales of my driving around and visiting pubs with TV celebrities, but to hell with it, I was beyond exhausted.

This time I dreamed that Gabe was offering me a rose, but I couldn’t quite make out what kind, since I kept snatching my hand back at the last minute.

Maybe it had thorns.

I woke up really early and checked my emails, finding one from Mal saying my phone line was out of order when he tried to ring me last night, and he would try again today. How he thinks I’ll be able to read his email if my phone line is
really
out of order, I don’t know, though the way emails come down phone lines and TV gets plucked out of thin air by the aerial never ceases to amaze me. Certainly it seems much more magical and unlikely than Gabriel’s claim to be able to sense lost garden features.

Bigblondsurfdude had also been emailing again.

Dear Fran,

Rosie’s probably told you I’m taking her surfing next weekend – don’t suppose you want to come too? You’d love it, surfing’s great fun, and we could spend some time together, catching up. Looking forward to seeing you soon anyway.

Love, Tom

Is he completely insane? Even were it summer I would still not be up for encasing myself in rubber and throwing myself gaily into the briny deep. And, also, what sort of catching up does he have in mind? Am I reading too much into his little communications?

It is ironic that I would positively welcome the same ambiguity in Mal’s, since they have become increasingly short, terse and businesslike, except when he is enthusing over any of his major interests, of which clearly I am not one.

Dear Tom,

Thanks, but no thanks – watersports aren’t my thing. I hope you and Rosie have lots of fun, though, and I expect I will see you briefly when you pick her up, if my eyes will open far enough at that time of the morning.

Fran

I was out in the garden the moment it was light enough to see what I was doing, pulling out the decapitated rose stems from along the trellis and pruning the ends properly. I was wearing one of my best smoky blue patchwork tops and the crochet edging kept getting caught up, which didn’t make the job any easier. I can’t think what got into me to put it on this morning instead of a sensible T-shirt.

It was a long fence, and I wasn’t halfway along it and tiring fast, when I heard the squeak of the side gate.

‘Good morning! Can I come in?’ called Gabe, standing on the patio with his hands in the pockets of his jeans and the light breeze tossing his knotted tangle of hair about like a slightly nonplussed invisible hairdresser. He was wearing the kind of old jumper that would have gone straight into the rag bag at the church jumble sale: pre-owned is one thing, pre-holed another.

‘You
are
in,’ I said resignedly, sinking down on to the edge of the wheelbarrow to rest my trembling legs. ‘How did you know where I was?’

‘Rhodri told me you were usually to be found working in your studio in the back garden, but left the side gate unlocked for friends. I didn’t want to disturb you if you were busy, but I’ve got the morning free until your mother arrives, and I’d love to see your roses, so I thought—’

He stopped, having got near enough to take in the significance of what I was doing. ‘That’s a fairly radical way to prune climbing roses!’

‘
I
know that,’ I interrupted brusquely, ‘but my neighbours don’t seem to. I found it like this yesterday.’

‘Your
neighbours
did this?’

‘If you don’t believe me, just look where I haven’t trimmed yet: they’ve stuck their secateurs through the holes in the trellis all the way along and cut through everything they could reach.’

‘I didn’t say I didn’t believe you,’ he said, examining the butchered stems, ‘and the evidence bears you out. But why would your neighbours do such a thing?’

I shrugged. ‘They’re both weird, and they seem to have it in for me, although I haven’t done anything to provoke them. This is the worst thing yet. I’m not sure my poor Mermaid will ever recover, and it took so long to get it established.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t advise hacking a Mermaid down, but it looks pretty healthy, so there’s a good chance it will recover. I hope so – it’s one of my favourites too. What’s the one you’ve already pruned?’

‘Golden Showers. I’m not so worried about that: it barely touched the ground before it was off like a rocket, so it should be all right.’

I wiped a tired hand across my forehead, which had damp wisps of hair clinging to it. ‘I’d better get on.’

‘You’re shattered – look, let me do it. It would be a pity to snag that pretty top on the thorns too. It’s exactly the same woodsmoke colour as your eyes.’

‘Oh, this old thing doesn’t matter,’ I said, going slightly pink.

He held out his hand for the secateurs, but I still hesitated.

‘Don’t you trust me with your roses?’ he said, grinning.

‘Yes, of course – you must have pruned more of them than I have.’ I handed them over, but still watched him critically as he began to snip, quickly and neatly.

‘So,’ he said, his back turned, ‘what else have your weird neighbours done?’

I sighed. ‘It’s more a case of what they
haven’t
done. They’ve spread rumours about me by telling people that they
don’t
believe in some story they’ve just invented … and they – they watch me all the time.’

I paused. ‘It never sounds very much when I try and describe it because it’s all such petty stuff, but since they moved here about eighteen months ago they seem to have been slowly building up a sort of harassment campaign against me, and I’ve no idea why.’

‘Does your husband know about this?’

‘No – it’s pointless telling him, because he’d just think I was exaggerating things. They’re totally different when he’s there – they’re different when most other people are around. He even goes sailing with Owen Wevill, they’re
friends
. If they hadn’t been nasty to me once or twice when Nia was around I might even have started to think I was getting paranoid! Oh, and Ma can’t stand them either.’

He looked over his shoulder and smiled at me. ‘Well, not only do I have the greatest respect for your mother’s judgement, but I’ve seen the proof myself now, and I certainly don’t think you’d damage your roses when you thought hard about letting even me near them!’

He was carefully working his way along, but was still much faster than I was, so I got up and started to gather the clippings together in one big heap.

‘Does Nia have a thing going with Rhodri?’ he suddenly asked, to my surprise.

‘I hope so, but Nia’s a very private person, and she’ll tell me when she wants to.’

‘But the three of you are really old friends?’

‘Yes, we’ve been friends as long as I can remember. Rhodri and Nia have both got divorced recently, but I’m hoping when they get over that they will realise they are just so right for each other.’

‘He’s a brave man. Your friend Nia frightens me to death!’

‘I can’t believe that! And, anyway, she’s got lots of backbone, which Rhodri needs, and
he’s
got a sweet, affectionate, loyal nature—’

‘Like a dog?’ he suggested blandly, but I ignored him.

‘Which is what
she
needs after her ex, Paul, dumped her like that for someone much younger. They both deserve a little happiness.’

‘And do
you
deserve a little happiness?’ He turned and looked at me again, the April sunshine catching golden glints in his dark honey hair.

‘Me?’ I said, surprised. ‘But I’ve already got my lovely garden, and my work and Rosie, so this is as close to paradise as life gets. Especially when my husband is home,’ I added firmly.

‘He can’t see it quite the same way, to leave it – and you – for six months?’

‘He’s always gone away on contracts. It just happens that this one is slightly longer than usual,’ I said defensively. ‘I’m flying out there soon, and we’re going to renew our wedding vows and have a second honeymoon.’

Now, what on earth made me blurt that out?

‘Very romantic,’ Gabe said drily, and turned back to the clipping.

‘Have you heard any more from your daughter?’ I asked, changing the subject.

‘An email, just general chit-chat. I’ve told her about Fairy Glen. I thought it might – well, I thought she might find the idea fascinating. I’m going to email her some pictures of the cottage with the little turret.’

‘I don’t see how she could resist that,’ I agreed.

I made some tea (Earl Grey in rose-spattered Royal Albert mugs), and brought it out to find he’d finished pruning and was now stuffing all the debris into the old fertiliser sacks I’d left on the grass ready.

‘What are you going to do with these?’

‘Put them by the gate and feed them into the wheelie bin over the next couple of weeks until they’ve all gone.’ I sipped my tea, watching him and thinking that I quite liked this sort of gardening, where someone else did the hard work. Ma has a point.

The three brown hens, treading delicately, finally ventured out of their run onto the lawn and, making ‘oh-er!’ noises, began to scratch around with one eye on us.

‘Thank you for helping me,’ I said. ‘I’m not very fit yet, and I was getting tired. It’s terribly frustrating: I feel I should be completely back to normal by now, and then my arms and legs go all rubbery on me!’

‘Don’t be too hard on yourself: you’ve been through a really bad time and should still be taking it easy. I’m just glad I showed up this morning – but when I’m around, all you need to do is ask if you want me to help you with anything.’

‘You’re very kind!’ I said, tears pricking my eyes, because I’m still prone to crying at the slightest provocation.

‘Look on me as an old friend,’ he said, grinning. ‘Not as old as Rhodri and Nia, but perhaps a little more
intimate
.’

‘I do wish you wouldn’t say that kind of thing!’ I snapped, the tears popping straight back into the ducts again.

He widened his eyes in hurt innocence. ‘What kind of thing?’

‘You know.’ I got up. ‘Come on, I’ll show you the rest of the garden – but there’s nothing much to see. Sometimes I have roses practically all winter, but it’s been a bit colder than usual this year.’

The hens followed after us under the arch, but at a safe distance in case we suddenly turned into psycho chicken-murderers.

It was so lovely to have a fellow enthusiast there that after a bit I forgot who I was talking to and ended up telling him about my artwork too, and taking him into the studio to show him my latest Fran March Rose Calendar designs.

‘And this is a painting I did of the Mermaid in bloom last year. I do hope it will recover, it’s one of my favourites!’

‘It’ll be fine, trust me. When you work to a schedule like mine you find yourself pruning and planting everything at the wrong season, just because it fits in with the filming schedule. We’ll probably be planting the roses in the Regency garden in late May.’

‘Will they be all right?’

‘Well, they’ll be container-grown, but I’ve found they usually settle, though sometimes it’s as well to remove any buds the first year so they can concentrate on making strong roots. I don’t expect it to look very spectacular for a couple of years, but then that goes for a lot of the restoration gardening. It doesn’t happen overnight.’

‘I looked up some of the roses you could have found in a Regency garden,’ I said, picking up a list, ‘and most of them still appear in specialist rose nursery catalogues. Some are the older roses that have been around for ever, like the Alba – Cuisse de Nymph would be nice, don’t you think?’

‘Very,’ he said gravely. ‘When you can get it. Go on, what else?’

‘
Banksiae
for climbers … China roses, like Old Blush … cabbage roses – the Centifolia. Oh, and I wondered whether you’d considered infilling the knot garden with Petite de Hollande. I think it would look very pretty.’

‘I’ll make a note of it.’

‘Then there are Damasks, and Gallicas – Rosa Mundi, of course – Moss roses … ’ I stopped for breath. ‘I expect you’ve already thought of most of those.’

‘I have started making a list and sourcing them,’ he admitted. ‘But perhaps you could bring your list up to Plas Gwyn next time I’m down and we’ll go over the terrace again and compare notes. You might have some ideas for the newer rose garden below too.’

I was quite flattered even though I was sure he didn’t really need my help – but there was no way I could resist the lure of talking roses. ‘OK,’ I agreed. ‘When are you thinking of coming back?’

‘A couple of days before Easter, when we shoot the opening scenes, and I’ll stay on to open Plas Gwyn and help with the Easter egg hunt. I’m looking forward to that.’

He was now wandering around looking at all the stuff I’d got pinned to the walls, including cuttings of my cartoons, which might as well have been wallpaper last time Mal was up here for all the notice he took of them.

‘I love your sense of humour!’ he said, grinning.

‘It’s a bit black, generally.’ I looked down at a half-finished Alphawoman strip. ‘And sometimes feminist.’

He leaned over my shoulder to see. ‘You do comic strips too? Are they published?’

‘This is my very first one, and an alternative women’s magazine has taken it as a regular feature.’

‘What’s it called?’ he said, reading the captions. ‘I’ll subscribe!’

‘
Skint Old Northern Woman
, and you can’t possibly subscribe – it’s not your kind of thing at all!’

‘I don’t see why not. Clearly I ought to be exploring my feminine side.’

I gave him a look of disbelief and he laughed. ‘Well, I can see you are dying to get back to work, so will I see you later at Fairy Glen to give the sale the royal seal of approval?’

‘It’s all up to Ma, but I’ll pop over later if she wants me to.’

After he left I went back to the comic strip feeling rather revived: must have been all the invigorating rose talk. I mean, talking about roses to the hens gets my juices going, never mind someone who actually
responds
.

I’d left Alison Alphawoman crisply informing her tiny daughter that she couldn’t possibly produce an angel costume overnight for the school nativity play, she had work to do and it wasn’t
scheduled.

In the next frames she’s opening the kitchen cupboard to get a bar of chocolate as a consolation prize for her weeping offspring, and then we see her smeared round the mouth with chocolate and metamorphosing into – tara! – Blobwoman.

I began to draw the final picture where she’s sitting in the school hall as Alphawoman again, and someone is asking her how she managed to make such a wonderful costume when she is so busy. ‘Something just came over me,’ she says. ‘Must dash – I’ve got a meeting.’

Oh, Alphawoman, if I could only transform myself into you, I would be Mal’s idea of perfection!