A Bitter Feast

by Deborah Crombie

  Viv and Bea had decided that they would close the pub after Sunday lunch service. Bea had been able to cancel the few evening bookings, and had already put the closed sign out front again. She’d then taken over the bar and sent Ibby back to the kitchen so that Viv could go and check on Grace.

  “Well, we got through that, at least,” Bea said to Gemma as she racked the clean glasses Gemma had just brought her from the kitchen. She looked shattered, her pale skin almost translucent and the hollows under her eyes almost as dark as bruises.

  Gemma chided herself for having been so concerned over Viv’s welfare that she hadn’t thought about Bea’s, especially as she’d overheard some of Bea’s low-voiced conversations with the locals who’d asked after Jack. “This must have been so tough for you today,” she said.

  Bea sighed. “Better not to have turned people away. And the locals who’d already heard the news wanted to talk about it. And to offer condolences.” She smiled at Gemma. “But you have been a star today. I don’t know how we’d have managed any of this without you.”

  “But, I only—”

  “Viv finds you a comfort. I’m sorry you’ll be leaving us. Today, is it?”

  “I think the kids and I are going to stay over until tomorrow, at least. Duncan has to sort out things with the car, and, to be honest, I want to make sure he gets those injuries looked at again. I hope he didn’t overdo it, taking the dog up to Mark Cain’s. He should have been back by now.” She’d meant to ask Melody if she’d mind giving him a lift up to Beck House, but Melody hadn’t answered her calls. “If you can spare me for a few minutes, I need to make a phone call.”

  “You go right ahead.” Bea summoned a smile. “You’ve done more than enough today already.”

  Thanking her, Gemma walked out into the car park. It was almost empty now, and Booth’s Volvo was gone. First, she tried Kincaid, but the call went to voice mail. Then, instead of trying Melody again, she rang Doug’s number. He picked up on the first ring.

  “Doug? Melody’s not answering her phone. Is everything okay there?”

  “If you mean are the kids okay, they’re fine. They’re having a proper tea party on the terrace with Ivan and Addie.” Doug’s voice sounded strained and starchy.

  “Where’s Melody?”

  “I don’t know. She left.”

  “What? In the car?”

  “No, on foot, I guess. I heard her go out. Her car’s still here.”

  Frowning, Gemma said, “Doug, what the hell is going on? Why would Melody leave the kids when she said she’d look after them?”

  “It’s my fault. I did something really stupid.”

  As he explained the whole sorry business, Gemma started tapping her foot in exasperation. “Doug, how could you be such an idiot?”

  “Good question. And now I’ve stranded myself. She was going to take me to the station. I’ll feel like a prat asking Ivan or Addie. And wasn’t she supposed to drive you and the kids back to London?”

  “We’re staying over. She knows that. I talked to her earlier. But you—I don’t blame her for being furious with you. You’d better stay until you can sort things out with her. If you leave, it’s going to fester, and you may never be able to put it right.”

  “But she won’t talk to me.”

  “Then keep trying until she does. Look, let me see if I can collect Kit, and find Duncan. Apologize to Addie and Ivan for me. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  She rang off, shaking her head. How could someone as smart as Doug Cullen be such a pillock? He did care about Melody, in his own prickly way, and he probably had thought he was doing the right thing. That didn’t make his interference any less wrong—or damaging. Poor Melody. Poor Andy, for that matter. But there was nothing she could do for either of them at the moment.

  She turned and went through the arch into the courtyard, intending to fetch Kit from the kitchen. Viv and Bea were sitting on the bench outside the cottage. Bea had her arm round Viv’s shoulders and Viv looked as if she was crying.

  “What’s wrong?” Gemma asked as she reached them.

  Viv raised a tear-stained face. “She won’t even speak to me. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Grace?”

  “You just have to give her time, love,” Bea said, giving Viv’s shoulders a squeeze. “I’ll have another talk with her, shall I? See if I can convince her she’s being unreasonable.” Getting up, she went into the cottage. Gemma sat down in her place on the bench.

  “I’m so sorry.” Viv sniffed and fished a tissue out of the pocket of her apron. She blew her nose, then gave Gemma a watery smile. “I promise I’m not usually such a mess. First, Fergus, and poor Nell Greene. And now, Jack. But I think I could cope with all of that if it weren’t for Grace being so angry with me. Thank God she’ll talk to Bea.”

  “They’re close, aren’t they? You’re lucky to have that.” Gemma thought of all the support her friend Hazel had been to her and her kids.

  “Bea and I both lost our mums. That’s how we met, you know. I came back to Evesham when my mum was ill—she had a heart condition—and got a job in a pub there. Bea was the front of house manager. After my mum died, Bea and I invested in this place. We’ve been like family ever since.”

  The kitchen door opened and Kit and Ibby came out, carrying bags of rubbish to the big bin. Ibby seemed to be telling Kit a story. Kit was listening, rapt, and laughing as they went back in. He hadn’t even noticed Gemma and Viv.

  “Ibby’s all right, too,” said Viv. “In spite of the attitude. He’s known Grace since she was a baby. If anything were to happen to him—” Viv balled her tissue in her fist and met Gemma’s gaze. “Gemma, who could have done such a terrible thing to Jack?”

  “I’m sure that Detective Inspector Booth will find out. But these things take time. Try not to—”

  But Viv was shaking her head. “I don’t feel safe here anymore. I thought I made the right choice, raising Grace on my own. Coming here. Now I wonder if any of my choices were the right ones.” Her voice rising, she went on, “I should never have agreed to the luncheon. I got greedy, thinking I could have more than this, thinking I could push my cooking up a notch, thinking maybe I could actually have a relationship with Mark. Sometimes I wonder if it was just my wanting those things that brought Fergus here.”

  Before Gemma could ask what she meant, Kincaid and Colin Booth came through the archway from the car park. One look at Kincaid’s face told Gemma that the most important thing she had to do right this instant was to get him to rest. Anything else would have to wait.

  Late September 2007

  The next few weeks went by in a blur of long shifts and short tempers. One of the line cooks quit after Fergus had given him a royal bollocking in the middle of service, leaving Viv and Ibby to take up the slack until Fergus could hire somebody new, which he didn’t seem bothered to do. Even before that, Viv had struggled to get the kitchen running with any kind of precision again. The food was good, Fergus’s plates were exquisite, but the kitchen had lost its chemistry.

  Like a cancer, the disruption spread. There was discontent in front of house. Plates were sent back by dissatisfied customers. Fights broke out among the waitstaff. Front of house got in a brawl after service one night with the crew from a neighboring restaurant, and one of their best waiters ended up in the A and E getting stitches in his head. Viv had been furious, not least because one of the waiters involved had been Ibby’s friend Danny, and for days afterwards Ibby had been impossible to work with.

  She’d carried the newspaper clipping tucked into her work bag, intending to confront Fergus over it, but she was afraid if she let her anger boil over, the situation in the kitchen would become untenable. She had too much invested in this job and this place to risk losing it all. So she avoided being alone with Fergus as much as possible. She cooked, she smoothed ruffled feathers. And then she went home after service to her flat. Alone.

  The days crept by towards the first week in October, and
the closer it came to the release date for the Guide, the higher the tension grew in the kitchen. There was constant gossip in both front and back of house—someone knew someone who’d heard a leak—but there was no mention of O’Reilly’s.

  On the morning of publication, they all gathered early in the kitchen. Fergus looked as though he might be ill, and Ibby was chewing his nails and sniping at everyone. When Viv volunteered to go to the nearest newsagent’s, no one objected.

  She felt a little queasy herself as she watched the newsagent unpack the newly arrived box, then pull out and ring up her copy of the red book. Taking her package outside, she stood, watching the traffic whiz past on Edith Grove, trying to still her shaking hands. Well, it was not going to get any easier, she thought, and slid the book from its plastic bag.

  She thumbed through the pages, breathing hard, despair mounting.

  Then she saw it.

  O’Reilly’s, Chelsea. With the distinctive red rosette. “For an innovative and beautifully presented take on traditional Irish cuisine.”

  They had done it.

  Her mobile rang, then rang again, but she didn’t answer. This news had to be delivered in person.

  She jogged back to Phene Street, and when she reached the restaurant, she almost tumbled down the kitchen stairs. She stood in the doorway, her hands behind her back, trying to keep her poker face. They all turned to stare at her, looking stricken. Before Ibby could start to swear, she thrust the book up overhead and whooped, “We did it! We got the bloody star!”

  “Jesus fecking Christ,” mumbled Fergus, looking like he might faint. Then he crossed the kitchen, grabbed her round the waist and whirled her round before kissing her soundly in front of everyone. Then he snatched the book from her hand. “Woman, did you mean to give me a heart attack?”

  They all gathered round. Fergus read the entry aloud, then the book was passed reverently from hand to hand.

  Lunch and dinner service passed by in a blur. Everything went exactly the way it should and Viv thought they’d never turned out more sublime food. A good thing, too, as the word had spread quickly and the house was packed, with barely a letup in midafternoon.

  When dinner service was finally over and the last work top had been washed down, they were still buzzing. Fergus called for a celebration and opened bottles of champagne for front of house and for the kitchen. A few glasses in, Ibby wrapped one arm round Viv and one round Fergus. “Tattoos,” he mumbled, already a little owlish. “Just the three of us. All the same. With the star.”

  Viv looked at him askance. At heart, she was still a Cotswolds girl, and while lots of cooks sported art, she’d never got up the nerve. “At this time of night?”

  “I know a good place. They’ll open for us, tonight,” Ibby assured them.

  Fergus waved his glass. “I think it’s a grand idea. The Three Musketeers of the fecking rose, that’ll be us.” And so they piled into a taxi to Soho.

  When they emerged from the tattoo parlor a few hours later, all three bore matching crossed chef’s knives and honing rods below the small red rosettes on their left forearms. Fergus hailed a taxi for Ibby and sent him on his way. Then, he looked down at Viv, who’d begun to shiver. It was cold and her arm was smarting. “Come to mine,” he said.

  “No.”

  “I’ll come to yours, then.” Looping his arm round her shoulders, he scanned Frith Street for another taxi. Viv tried to stop herself leaning into his warmth.

  “Fergus, it’s not a good idea—”

  “And why is that? Don’t be stubborn, darlin’. You know I’ve missed you.”

  She pulled away. “Fergus, why didn’t you mention me in that interview, the one in the Times?”

  He looked down at her, surprised. “Is that what’s eating at you, then? Of course I mentioned you. But I had no say over what he decided to print, did I?”

  A taxi was coming, its yellow light glowing like a beacon. Fergus pulled her to him again as he flagged down the cab. “This is our night, yours and mine, Viv. I told you, I need you.” In the light from the streetlamp, his expression was suddenly naked. “On my life, I’ve never said a truer thing.”

  And Viv knew then that she was lost.

  Somehow, Melody had got through the rest of the afternoon. She’d come back to the house to find Doug still there, playing croquet with her parents, Gemma, and all the children, while Kincaid sat in a lawn chair someone had carried down to the croquet lawn for him. “I feel like the invalid uncle,” he said with a smile as she sat on the grass beside him, but she could tell he didn’t feel well. The bruising round his eye had deepened since she’d seen him that morning, and she thought he looked flushed.

  “No, Char, you can’t hit it back through the hoop!” Toby shouted, picking up Charlotte’s ball, and it took Gemma’s intervention to get the game back on track.

  “You’re not playing?” asked Kincaid.

  “I don’t think I’m up to my father’s killer croquet,” she said. “It makes you think it’s a good thing he never took up golf.” Although at the moment, he was patiently coaching Kit in the nuances of a shot.

  “I’m glad we came. In spite of everything that’s happened.” Kincaid’s expression was rueful. “I haven’t really had a chance to thank you for inviting us. Your parents have been great. They’re officially promoted to auntie and uncle status.”

  “They’ll love that,” Melody said, while wondering if Doug had talked to him about Andy. And if Gemma knew as well.

  Doug kept shooting loaded glances at her, but she was determined not to let him get her alone. She didn’t want his apologies—assuming he even meant to apologize.

  When the light began to fade and the croquet set was put away—her father having very obviously allowed Toby to win—Melody helped Gemma get the younger kids up to the house for dinner. As they walked, she said quietly, “I’m sorry about this afternoon.”

  “Not to worry. They had a great time with your mum and dad. Melody”—Gemma stopped her with a touch— “I know you’re upset. But Doug meant well.” So that answered one question, Melody thought. Doug must have told her. “He does care about you, you know,” Gemma added gently.

  “Funny way of showing it.” Melody was horrified to find the tears threatening again.

  “You should give him a chance to make amends.”

  Melody was saved from answering that by the children scuffling over who got to wash their hands first.

  Her mother had, of course, managed to gracefully feed the unexpected masses, pulling a huge fillet of salmon from the freezer, poaching it, and serving it with dill sauce and a cucumber salad. Her father had opened several bottles of his best Grüner Veltliner wine, of which Melody drank considerably more than her share while pushing the salmon round on her plate.

  When everyone had finished, she busied herself with clearing the table and rinsing plates, topping up her wineglass in the process. But when Gemma and Duncan excused themselves to get the little ones ready for bed and Melody saw Doug coming towards her with a tea towel, she simply stopped what she was doing and walked straight out the scullery door.

  The temperature had dropped rapidly since dusk and she was still in only jeans and a T-shirt. It was dark, too, and the light thrown through the French doors served only to cast the rest of the terrace into deeper shadow. Bumping against a chair, she stumbled, then picked her way across the terrace with her arms held out in front of her, like a blind person.

  It was even darker once she left the terrace. The glasshouse loomed in front of her, and for a moment she thought of taking refuge in it. But it was too close to the house. She went on, down through the kitchen garden, falling once and skinning her knee on the edge of one of the boxed herb beds. When she reached the river path, she stepped right into a puddle left from last night’s rain, soaking both feet.

  Reaching the clearing, she realized she’d known all along where she was going. As before, Joe seemed to sense her presence and came out before she reached the porc
h.

  “Melody? What on earth are you doing here?”

  “I don’t know,” she said honestly. She couldn’t seem to stop her teeth chattering and her feet felt like blocks of ice. “Can I come in?”

  “Of course.”

  She stumbled again on the porch step and he hurried forward to help her, putting his arm firmly round her shoulders and propelling her through the door. “What happened to you?”

  “Fell. Stupid,” she managed, trying to push the hair back from her face, realizing too late that she must look an awful mess. “Needed to get out of the house.”

  The hanging lantern cast a soft light, and a fire crackled in the woodstove. Joe had obviously been sitting at the table, using a little battery-powered work light to tie fishing flies.

  “You’re freezing.” Fetching the tartan rug from his bed, he draped it over her shoulders and urged her into the other chair, then studied her. “And you look a bit pissed, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

  “Not a’tall,” Melody said, not sure if she meant she wasn’t pissed or that she didn’t mind him saying so. “Can I have some of that good whisky you keep for my dad?”

  He raised an eyebrow at that, but fetched the bottle and tumblers and poured them both a generous measure.

  “Ta.” Melody accepted the proffered glass, took a swig, and coughed. Joe thumped her on the back.

  “You sure you’re all right?” he said, sitting down beside her when she’d got her breath back.

  Melody sipped more gingerly. “I’m fine. Really. It’s just . . . things.”

  “I heard about Jack Doyle.” Joe studied her, his dark eyes serious. “Is it true? That someone ran him down on purpose?”

  “I don’t know. I mean, I know the police think it’s possible. But I haven’t really been in the loop today.” Her head was swimming. She tried to blink the room into focus. “Did you know him?”

  “Well enough. Nice bloke.” Joe drank half his whisky in one swallow. “Can’t imagine why anyone would want to do that to him.” It sounded like a question. “You’re still shivering,” he added, frowning at her.