by Liz Fielding
A SHARP rap on the window jerked Elle back to reality. She banged her elbow on the steering wheel as she disentangled herself, then she was back in her seat, pink, dishevelled, flustered, while Sean slid back the window.
‘Henry?’ Sean said, calmly acknowledging the man who’d rapped on the window.
‘Sorry to interrupt when you’re so obviously busy, Sean, but I haven’t got a lot of time.’
‘Hang on, we’ll be right with you.’
Sean, apparently not the least embarrassed or flustered, drove into the staff car park, angling the van across three spaces so that the serving window was facing the centre of the courtyard.
A silver Range Rover pulled into a space next to them and Henry, who looked so much like Sean that he couldn’t be anything other than his brother, climbed out.
‘So, what’s going on here?’ he asked as Sean slid back the serving hatch, giving her a chance to catch her breath, fan the heat from her cheeks.
‘Charity, Henry. The way it works is that Elle will give you an ice, while I relieve you of a donation for the Pink Ribbon Club.’
‘Oh, right!’ he said, laughing. ‘Walked right into that one, didn’t I?’ He offered her his hand. ‘Henry Haughton.’
‘Elle…’ She cleared her throat. ‘Elle Amery. How d’you do?’
‘Amery?’ He glanced at Sean.
‘Basil’s great-niece,’ he explained. ‘She’s standing in for him.’
‘I’m not complaining.’
‘You may not say that when you see the mess I make of your ice cream,’ Elle said, taking a starched white coat from a laundry bag, several sizes too big, she’d found in one of the cupboards. Perching a cap on her head.
‘What can we get you?’ Sean said. ‘A vanilla cornet with all the extras?’
‘I think you’re the one getting the extras,’ Henry said, grinning, as he took a wallet from his back pocket. ‘I’ll pass on the ice, thank you, Elle. But put this in the kitty for your good cause.’
He handed her a note and she stared at it. Fifty pounds?
‘Thank you, Sir Henry. That’s incredibly generous.’
‘Henry will do. Any girlfriend of Sean’s—’
‘Is a girlfriend of Sean’s,’ Sean cut in sharply.
Henry shrugged unrepentantly. ‘No harm in putting in a bid, is there? I rather like that milkmaid look.’
‘You’ll be okay?’ Sean asked her as his brother headed into the office.
‘Fine,’ she assured him.
‘Any problems just—wind up the jingle.’
Before she could answer, he’d jumped down, heading for the office.
Girlfriend…
‘No…’ He’d got that wrong. Sean didn’t have girlfriends; he just slept with girls who were his friends.
And the problem with that was…?
As if her hot, vivid thoughts had reached out and touched him, he turned in the doorway, looked back. One corner of his mouth tilted up in a smile as if he knew exactly what she was thinking, as if he was thinking much the same thing. Her heart jolted as if it had been hit by one of those cardiac paddles that were the mainstay of hospital dramas. And not just her heart.
Desperate, Sorrel had said and maybe she was right. But Freddy was never going to generate anything like that reaction inside her body.
Not if he—or she—lived to be a hundred.
‘Pretty girl,’ Henry said as they walked towards the office. ‘Deliciously…buxom.’
‘And all mine,’ Sean said without thinking.
His brother raised an eyebrow. ‘That’s unusually possessive of you.’
‘Just warning you off before you get any ideas. How are your domestic arrangements these days?’ he asked pointedly.
Henry smiled. ‘Not a lot of fun. Hattie is pregnant.’
Pregnant? It took him a moment before he gathered himself sufficiently to respond. ‘Well, congratulations. I had no idea you were contemplating adding to your brood.’
‘Hattie’s idea. Second wives,’ he added, as if that said it all. But he was smiling nevertheless. His potency confirmed. ‘She’s well?’
‘Morning sickness morning, noon and night. I thought I’d seen the last of that. But she’s through the first three months, the scan is good and I’m allowed to share the news.’
‘She must be so happy.’
‘Ecstatic. When she’s not being sick. But it’s going to mean a few changes. I’m going to be easing back on work in the City, spending more time here.’
‘Oh? Problems?’
‘No.’ He shrugged. ‘Yes… Banking isn’t what it was but there’ll be a nice golden handshake and I’m going to sell the London house, buy a flat instead.’
‘Well, you seem to have everything worked out. And it will be good to have a family living in the house. I’ve noticed how the public respond to that lived-in warmth when I’ve been to look at other historic houses,’ Sean said.
‘Hattie suggested we might do weddings.’
‘Definitely problems.’
‘That would be intrusive,’ he pointed out. ‘If you’re going to be living here. The Manor isn’t that big.’
‘In the Orangery, she thought. I said she’d have to talk to you. And Olivia had some scheme she’s mad keen on, too,’ Henry said.
‘We did exchange a few words on the subject.’
‘I heard.’
‘She’s split up with that idiot she’s married to, Sean. She didn’t want me to tell you. You’re so judgemental, but if you could give her a little slack?’
Judgemental? Was that him? Walking around with a holier than thou attitude? Sean wondered in dismay.
‘Just find her something to keep her mind off things. She’ll soon lose interest,’ Henry said. ‘Occupational therapy.’
‘Exactly. I can leave that to you, then?’
Sean glanced out of the window to where people were gathering around the ice cream van. He could see Elle laughing as she handed the estate surveyor an ice, completely at ease, but then she spent her life dealing with the public.
She looked across, as if aware that he was watching her, and he knew exactly what she’d say to him if she was standing beside him.
Half-sisters are family, too. To be cherished, kept close.
It was what she’d done. Taking responsibility for them all, giving up her own dreams, her own chance of a family, because there weren’t many men who’d take on that kind of baggage. Troublesome teens, an ageing grandmother losing her grip on reality.
He, on the other hand, had spent his entire life keeping his family at arm’s length, watching as their marriages fell apart and feeling smugly superior.
But while they’d got it wrong more times than not, they hadn’t been afraid to take the risk. Or pick themselves up and try again.
Was he, after all, the loser?
‘I don’t suppose there’s any chance that you’ll settle down soon?’ Henry asked, leaving the question unanswered. ‘You seemed to be pretty close to the girl in the ice cream van just now,’ he said, looking out into the courtyard. ‘That is a smile that would be a pleasure to come home to. Very welcoming. On the other hand, there’s nothing wrong with a romp in the hay.’ He shrugged. ‘After all, you do live in a barn. Where is Amery, by the way? Not done a bunk, has he?’
‘His rent is paid for the quarter. He’s gone away for a while, leaving Elle to hold the fort. I’ve been showing her how everything works.’
‘And doing a very thorough job, I noticed.’
‘Watch your mouth, Henry.’
His brother smiled, clearly satisfied with the response he’d provoked. And Sean’s prickly reaction was proof that his brother was right on target. Henry’s broad grin suggested that he knew it too, but he didn’t push his luck, just said, ‘Remind her that Basil always put in an appearance at the Steam Fair at the end of the month.’
‘I don’t think…’ he began, then let it go. It was probably one of the bookings in Basil’s diary. ‘Tell
me,’ he asked instead, ‘do the initials RSG mean anything to you?’
Henry considered for a moment. ‘Royal something or other? Society, maybe.’
‘Unlikely, I’d have thought.’
He shrugged. ‘Try the Internet.’
‘Well? How did you do?’
Elle’s smile was as wide as the Cheshire cat’s.
‘Fourteen more or less perfectly turned out ices, all with chocolate flakes or sprinkles. Fourteen happy customers. And, along with your brother’s contribution, a total of a hundred and twenty pounds for the Pink Ribbon Club.’
Sean whistled. ‘Did I say you were a fast learner?’
‘The Haughton Manor staff are incredibly generous. Obviously they were prepared to pay for the ices, but when I told them that the ices were free and all I wanted was a small donation for a very worthwhile cause…’
Her smile, impossibly, widened and she lifted her shoulders, practically to her ears, so totally delighted that he wanted to pick her up and hug her. She was just so thrilled. Nothing held back. His brother was right. She had a smile you’d want to come home to.
‘Don’t forget to take out your costs,’ he warned, fighting off the impulse to go for it, make it his. He’d been telling himself that it was Elle he was protecting by keeping his distance, but it wasn’t anything that noble.
He was the one who’d be left hurting if it didn’t work out. Abandoned. Even as he yearned for her touch. The natural, eager, open-hearted warmth that had got her mother into so much trouble.
He needed to keep it practical. Feet on the ground.
‘Diesel, supplies,’ he added.
‘Oh, but I couldn’t—’
‘You must. You’ll have to replace the ice cream mixture, buy fuel,’ he reminded her as he turned away to settle into the driving seat. Start her up. Keep his mind, his hands busy. ‘You’re giving your time, Elle. No one expects you to subsidise the charity. Or Basil. You can’t afford it.’
‘I suppose,’ she said, slightly deflated, as she settled beside him.
‘Just keep clear records, receipts, so that you can prove what you spent to the taxman.’
‘No problem. I’m used to accounting for every penny,’ she said, even more dispiritedly. Then, making an effort, ‘I liked your brother.’
‘Women always do, but then he always reacts generously to a sexy smile. It’s why his first wife divorced him.’ Then, instantly regretting his cynical response to what had been a genuine reaction to Henry’s generosity, ‘You caught him on a good day. Wife number two is expecting a baby.’
She frowned. ‘You don’t approve?’
‘Not my business.’ He was clearly going to have to work harder at being a warm human being if he was going to pass Elle’s empathy antenna. ‘He said it was Hattie’s idea, but he seemed pleased with himself.’
It wasn’t the reaction his own birth had evoked and a shadow crossed Elle’s face, too. No doubt she was thinking about the unknown father she had sought out year after year at the Longbourne Fair.
His own father had been a very distant figure, but at least he had taken responsibility for him.
Elle, however, shook off whatever dark thought she was harbouring and laughed. ‘I know what your problem is. You’ve just realised you’re going to have one more little niece or nephew to plaster you with ice cream.’
‘A nephew, I hope. They’re more likely to grab an ice and run. Not like little girls, who want to decorate them.’ Decorate him. He glanced at her. ‘On the downside, Olivia, one of my numerous half-siblings, has split up from her husband.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It was her second marriage. My family seems to feel single-handedly obliged to keep the statistics dynamic.’
‘With you as ballast.’
He glanced at her. ‘That’s pretty much what Henry said.’ Then, afraid that he’d said too much, ‘He also reminded me that Basil is expected to bring Rosie to the Steam Fair we hold in the park over the long holiday weekend at the end of May. Is it in the diary?’
‘The weekend was blocked out, but Basil hadn’t written anything in.’
‘I suppose he thought I’d tell you.’
She turned to look at him, then, ‘Why? He’s taken a lot for granted, Sean,’ Elle said. ‘We’re family, but why would you bother?’
Sean had asked himself the same thing. Why had Basil got him involved with all of this? They were acquaintances with a shared interest in old vehicles. Basil allowed him to buy him a pint now and then at the Haughton Arms. But this went way beyond that.
‘Maybe,’ he said, struggling for an answer, ‘maybe he thought it was time I did.’
‘Bother?’
Bother. Get involved. Get a life. Not end up like Basil, old and living on his own.
‘You did explain the situation?’ she asked. ‘To your brother.’
‘You’ll make a mint of money,’ he pointed out, avoiding a direct answer. Because he hadn’t explained. He wanted her in the park for three whole days. Wanted her close enough so that he could look up and see her in the place he called home. Look up and smile when she saw him. ‘Basil will make a mint of money,’ she retaliated. ‘If the sun shines. All I’d get out of it is three days when I couldn’t go to work. When I wouldn’t be paid.’
‘Read the letter again, Elle. Basil transferred ownership of the van and all that went with it to you. He made it clear enough that whatever you earn is yours. And the Steam Fair is for enthusiasts who come from all over the country. A drop of rain won’t put them off.’
‘But…’
‘What kind of deposit did Basil take for his bookings?’
‘I don’t know about the film company, the man wasn’t exactly chatty, but the bride told me she’d given him a non-refundable twenty-five per cent deposit. Twenty-five per cent of what, I have no idea,’ she added.
‘Enough to cover the cost of buying supplies,’ he suggested thoughtfully. ‘Presumably he did that for every booking. He has left you well stocked. Ready to go without any outlay.’
‘You’re saying that he’s used the money to start me—well, Gran—up in business?’
‘He didn’t normally do more than one or two events a month. He wouldn’t have needed that much.’
She frowned. ‘But…’
‘It was a hobby for him, not a business and he turned away a lot more bookings that he accepted. With all the bookings he’s lined up for the next couple of months… Well, it suggests he might have been thinking along those lines.’
‘I thought he’d taken the money and run,’ she said dazedly.
‘Apparently not.’
‘But if that’s the case, why didn’t he give us the paperwork on his clients?’ she demanded. ‘Explain what he was doing more clearly? Why did he just disappear?’
‘I’ve no idea, but I suspect he knows a lot more about you than you realise. Maybe he thinks it’s time you got out of the Blue Boar and chased your dream?’
‘I promise you,’ she said frankly, ‘I never dreamed I’d be driving an ice cream van for a living.’
‘But that’s not what you’ll be doing,’ he pointed out. ‘You’ve got bookings from a film company, for a wedding, and didn’t you say there was some kind of business do as well as the more usual kids parties?’
‘A business do and a retirement party,’ she admitted.
‘Then you haven’t got an ice cream round, Elle. What you have is an events business.’
She opened her mouth to protest, closed it again. Then she looked at him. ‘Where is he, Sean? What is RSG? I’m getting really worried about him.’
Sean took her hand for a moment, an instinctive gesture of comfort. But, even as he did that, he began to suspect that what Basil was doing was playing games. The old man wanted to be back in the comfort of his family home, the centre of attention, but he’d made some promise he couldn’t break.
Upper Haughton was the kind of picturesque village that decorated biscuit tin lids. No intr
usive modern street lighting or yellow lines painted on the road and, since there was only one way into the village from the main road, there was no through traffic to cause problems.
All it needed to become the fictitious village in a nineteen-sixties drama series was for the modern cars and signs to be removed before the cameras could roll. Since it had already been used in a picturesquely rural detective drama, and the parish council had been handsomely rewarded for the inconvenience, the villagers knew the ropes and were, on the whole, happy to co-operate.
Elle had become intimately acquainted with every part of it throughout a very long morning.
‘An hour should do it’, Kevin Sutherland had said. Ha!
She’d turned up in good time but it had been two hours before anyone took any notice of her. She’d then spent an age trying to teach the idiot actor how to produce an ice cream that anyone would want to eat, trying not to think about Sean, his arm around her as he’d taught her to do the same thing.
Finally, she’d driven around the green dressed in a white coat and peaked cap so that from a distance it would look as if it was the actor driving the van while the director filmed ‘establishing’ shots. Playing the jingle and trying really, really hard, not to think about how she’d kissed Sean. Bold as brass. A proper little hussy…
It would have been fun but for the fact that she was supposed to be at work at twelve and it was already half past. She couldn’t even phone and let Freddy know she’d be late. The production assistant had locked her cellphone away before she was allowed on the set. The last thing they needed, apparently, was for one to start ringing in the middle of a ‘take’.
And now, just when she could escape, she’d been grabbed by a reporter from the Country Chronicle, the monthly county magazine. She assumed it was because everyone else was too busy, but apparently not.
‘We’re doing a major feature on the filming and we’re particularly interested in any local businesses that are involved,’ she said. ‘It’ll be good publicity for the county. Bring in visitors.’
She doubted whether a picture of her and Rosie would do much for the local economy but, irretrievably late for work, she answered questions and posed for pictures with Rosie, ice cream in hand.
