The Magic of Christmas (30 page)

‘Then it can come straight back out again,’ I said sourly. ‘I have no intention of being the Demon Chef’s whipping boy. He can find another one.’

‘Whipping girl — and you’re very crabby today,’ she observed, then looked down at her empty plate as if surprised that she’d cleared it down to the last pastry flake. The coloured sticks lay round the edge like the hours on a clock.

‘Which slice did you like best?’

‘To be honest, I couldn’t really taste much difference,’ she confessed. ‘They were all delicious!’

I sighed. ‘Maybe he uses Dark Arts and says a spell over his cooking pots?’

‘You’ll be able to watch him cooking the Christmas dinner and find out,’ she teased. ‘Has he done something to annoy you?’

‘When does he
not
do something to annoy me? But yes, he has excelled himself, because he set Caz on to watch me while he was away!’

‘But Caz already does watch you. I mean, he keeps an eye on the place because it’s part of the estate — and probably also because he thinks of you as family, however remote the connection.’

‘Yes, I know that, but Ritch kissed me the other night when he drove me home and Caz not only interrupted us, but he reported it to Nick!’ And I repeated to her what Nick had said, about not being sure it was Polly playing the nasty tricks and even thinking I’d imagined them at first.

‘Of course, I haven’t told him about Ophelia being in ARG, and I don’t suppose Caz has either. I’m not sure how he would take it and he might feel he has to tell Unks.’

‘He’d probably find it funny, Lizzy!’

‘I wouldn’t put it past him. He seems to find most things I do funny — except the bits involving Ritch. And that was a perfectly innocent kiss, even if it was any of his business who I kiss, which it isn’t.’

‘It
was
?’

I grinned. ‘Well, it was a perfectly
enjoyable
one, at any rate, but just between friends. Ritch knows I don’t want a relationship with him — or anyone else,’ I stated firmly. ‘I’m getting quite tired of Unks, Mimi, Juno and now even Jasper trying to throw Nick and me together, when it must be clear it’s a complete non-starter.’

‘But, Lizzy, it’s very evident even to me that he’s concerned about you,
and
jealous!’

‘Do you really think so?’ I considered the matter carefully, then dismissed it. ‘I’ve noticed he’s a bit jealous, but I’m sure it’s not of me personally, but some dog-in-the-mangerish male thing to do with property. I’m part of his family and living on his land, as it were … except it’s still Unks’ land, of course.’

‘No, you’re wrong, Lizzy: you think I don’t notice these things, but I’ve seen the way he looks at you and I’m sure he’s in love with you.’

‘No
way
,’ I said positively. ‘Just because you’re in love, you think everyone else should be!’

She went slightly pink under the freckles, but carried on doggedly, ‘And you missed him when he was away, so I don’t think it’s all one-sided, either.’

‘No I didn’t,’ I lied, ‘which is just as well, because that’s what he always does, isn’t it? He goes
away.
We split up the first time because he wasn’t going to let a little thing like our romance come between him and his globetrotting, recipe-collecting expedition. I’m only surprised he’s stayed around Middlemoss so long now, because he’s obviously getting itchy feet.’

‘Now, Lizzy, you know if it weren’t for Tom, he’d have spent much more time here in the last few years. He’s quite sincere about loving the place.’

‘He may love the place, but he’s only passionate about his cooking.’

‘Well, he’s using it to try and impress you,’ she insisted stubbornly. ‘He knows the way to your heart is through food.’

‘He’s certainly not going to do that by snatching my gold prizes away. Though if he has got any designs on my virtue, I’d probably do almost anything he asked, for that coffee granita recipe.’

‘Lizzy!’ she exclaimed, shocked.

‘Just joking,’ I said hastily. ‘But you’ve got it all wrong, because
I’m
not interested and
he’s
not interested. After all, if he cared about me that way, what’s to stop him from telling me?’

‘But you were only widowed in August and his divorce isn’t through yet, so that might be holding him back, don’t you think?’

‘Yes … I suppose it might
if
he felt about me like that, which he doesn’t. And I don’t really feel newly widowed, now I’m over the shock, since Tom and I were so estranged.’

‘If Nick was a dog, he’d be a big, dark, Irish wolfhound,’ she said inconsequentially. ‘Ritch is a bit of a tomcat.’

‘I don’t like the way your mind’s working,’ I said severely. ‘Gareth has been a demoralising influence on you. I’m afraid poor Juno’s feeling a bit demoralised too, because she rang Unks and told him she had to explain precisely what Mimi was doing to someone’s stately garden with nail scissors. You know, I thought I saw her holding something metal up when the coach pulled away the morning they left. She must have got them in the corner shop when she was buying sweets.’

After she’d gone I got out the copy-edits of my book and went through them for errors for the second time, before parcelling them up and taking them down to the post office. The cover I pinned to the kitchen notice board in the hope it would grow on me, but it hasn’t yet. Nor do all the flowers depicted in the cottage garden bloom at the same time anywhere other than in the artist’s demented imagination — or not in this hemisphere, anyway.

Jasper seemed to be settling in well, and I sent off a box of chocolate-coated candied peel. I hoped he was eating properly and not pickling his liver with spirits, like many students do.

I’d decided Annie was right about my apple pies and you couldn’t improve on perfection, so Nick winning first prize must have been a fluke. The final one I tried that night, though, using dark Barbados sugar to sweeten the apples, had an interesting slight toffee-apple flavour, which made a nice change.

A policeman who sounded like that boy who favoured finger food called to say that one of the 2CV’s wheel nuts had been handed in by a metal-detecting member of the public and added, in a seemingly casual aside, that it appeared to be in a perfectly good state of repair, the thread undamaged. Then he informed me the inquest was set for the end of January, and rang off.

The light was fading fast. I put on a warm coat and went to lock up the hens and, as I did so, Caz emerged slowly from the shadow of the barn. Since my slight contretemps with Nick I had entirely ignored Caz when he was around, which hadn’t seemed to bother him in the least — if he’d even noticed.

Now I ran my hand distractedly through my tangled hair and said, ‘Oh, Caz, the police have found one of the missing wheel nuts — or rather, I think someone found it and handed it in — and the thread on it looks fine. I’m sure they still think I loosened them on purpose and encouraged Tom to take my car!’

Caz glanced at me in his usual obliquely wary yet not unfriendly way, then said, ‘Don’t you fret, our Lizzy, it’ll all come out in t’wash,’ and loped off towards the woods, his gun under his arm.

I stared after him: if he continued getting so garrulous, we might soon be able to hold an entire conversation.

He’d probably be back later, too, because the Mummers would be coming round to the workshop to practise. I hoped Ritch came too and popped in as usual for coffee and chat afterwards. I felt like some company.

Ritch not only stopped by, he took me out to the café-bar in the former Pharamond’s Butterflake Biscuit factory, which was very pleasant now I had firmly established my unavailability for his healthy sex rota.

Or at least, I think I have …

Of course this didn’t stop him flirting with me, but actually I found that quite enjoyable now that Nick had suddenly gone even more morose and distant than usual. And also, of course, now I knew Ritch had stopped his more dubious habits he had regained a little more of his previous attraction!

‘You look great tonight — that top really shows off your curves,’ he said, leaning forwards towards me across the table. ‘I’ll butter your pie dish any time you give me the word!’

I grinned. ‘Hanging round my kitchen has given you a whole new vocabulary!’

‘And a whole new taste for real home-baking,’ he agreed.

Afterwards Ritch dropped me off at the cottage and I let him have a good-night kiss, though I didn’t want to make a habit of it … well, not if Caz was watching.

There was no sign of him, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t still lurking about somewhere.

Mimi and Juno got back from their coach tour late on the Saturday, then walked down next afternoon to give me my present of a pair of flower-patterned gardening gauntlets, and for Juno to show me the photographs she had taken on her digital camera.

Mimi was, as usual, not only unrepentant about her bit of petty plant-pilfering, but entirely failed to understand what the fuss was about. ‘I don’t suppose they will take, because it is the wrong time of year, but anyway, gardeners should share things,’ she said.

‘It might have been politer to ask first,’ Juno said patiently.

‘Oh, they didn’t really mind,’ Mimi said. ‘I promised them some cuttings from my rare lavender when it’s the right time to take them — and then perhaps Tom could drop them off next time he is heading in that direction.’

‘Tom’s dead, Mimi,’ I said gently.

‘Oh, is he? Then perhaps if I wrap them in wet kitchen towel and a plastic bag and post them, they will be all right. Not that the postal service is all it used to be,’ she added.

We had to have the next CPC meeting at Marian’s, because she had boxes and boxes of big green apples a friend in the WI had given her and she was desperate to get rid of them.

‘Maggie said they were eaters, but they cook well too, and it was such a bumper crop this year that she didn’t know what to do with them,’ she explained. ‘So I said I was sure we could divide them up among our group.’

‘There are an awful lot of them,’ Fay said, ‘and I’ve got more than enough of my own to be going on with.’

‘Me too,’ I agreed, but since there were loads left even after the others had all taken some, I ended up with the lion’s share, simply because I couldn’t bear to see them go to waste. I couldn’t imagine what I was going to do with them.

I spent a large part of that Tuesday filling the freezer with apple pies, purée and crumble, yet had hardly made a dent in the apple mountain …

And Nick was not at the Mystery Play rehearsal, because he’d gone off on his travels yet again, according to Mimi, who’d come down to the village hall with Juno, being in one of her restless phases. Then she added meaningfully that he was catching up on things he should have done before, only he hadn’t wanted to leave Middlemoss, so I expect he’d finally just got bored and restless.

‘Oh, it’s the nativity, my favourite bit!’ Juno said, as the vicar called, ‘Shepherds and angels to the crib, please!’

As they gathered round, I noticed for the first time that the Nine Angels of the Annunciation all had bright white patches on their wings where they had repaired them with fresh sturdy new feathers.

‘See yonder breet light shining on t’owd stable?’ said the First Shepherd, adjusting his tea-towel headdress.

‘Aye, I do that, and a right bobby dazzler it is an’ all!’ replied the Second Shepherd, then nudged his friend as the Three Wise Men appeared. ‘Hey up, we’ve got company.’

‘Why wasn’t there a Wise Woman too?’ Mimi asked in a penetrating whisper.

‘I don’t know — perhaps they didn’t fancy riding a camel all that way?’ suggested Juno.

By the end of a very hectic week, the larder shelves were groaning with apple-based jams and jellies, apple sauce, apple chutney, apples in wine and spiced apple … you name it, and I’d made it.

Of course I’d had to keep up with the pet-sitting and gardening too, but apart from escaping to Butterflake’s for an hour or so again one evening with Ritch, the days passed in a sticky haze.

Then suddenly I was down to the last few apples in the bottom of a box, and made a batch of fritters with them, which I ate sifted with brown sugar, drizzled with honey and blobbed with thick cream. After that I felt completely appled out and never wanted to see another one again, unless, of course, it was as apple wine.

I ceded the apple pie prize to Nick in perpetuity. And speaking of Nick, I’d heard nothing from him for days and then suddenly had a spate of postcards all at once — every single one bearing some kind of tart recipe! Perhaps that was what his next article would be about?

I gave all my CPC friends a jar of apple chutney at the next meeting, but I had a feeling I’d still be trying to offload the remainder next autumn.

Nick was back next day, just in time for the Mystery Play rehearsal but, like Ritch, appeared to have lost interest in going to the pub afterwards. I wasn’t finding it very tempting either, because I could only take playing gooseberry to Gareth and Annie for so long, no matter how kindly they went out of their way to include me in their conversation.

As we came out of the village hall, I thanked Nick for all the postcards, then asked curiously, ‘But why are all the recipes for tarts?’

‘I thought you deserved them,’ he said shortly and then strode off into the night, looking distinctly Mr Rochester again.

I don’t know what was biting him, unless he’d heard about my occasional friendly drink at Butterflake’s Bar with Ritch, and misconstrued it?

I spent the rest of the evening catching up with the next
Perseverance Chronicle
, having not had time to keep up with it while so preoccupied with apples — and apples formed the basis of most of what I wrote! I also made a few more notes for
Just Desserts
, because I needed to get going with that soon, before Senga started snapping at my ankles.

If Nick hadn’t been sulking I could have asked him for some ideas, but at least he’d provided the inspiration for a whole chapter devoted to tarts …