‘That’s alright; I’m sure you would. I was going to book some tradesmen later if that’s OK with you, so I could do with us getting our heads together to decide what we need to do first.’
‘No problem,’ Posy said. ‘Let me know when you want to do that and I’ll make sure I’m back from the village. I am here to be at your service, after all.’
‘Oh, I do like the sound of that – my own personal assistant. But Giles is already convinced I was Louis XVI in a previous life; perhaps we’d better not give him any more reasons to think so!’
Chapter Fifteen
It was grey and muggy as Posy walked the road that led to the village of Astercombe. That didn’t bother her one bit; in fact, it would be a blessing if she had anything larger than a tub of butter to carry back. Asa had offered to drive her, but she’d told him that sort of defeated the point of her trying to make herself useful, and then he’d said she could take his car, but she’d said she would have been nervous driving it because she’d never driven it before. Besides, she wouldn’t be able to buy all that much in Astercombe anyway if the shopping was as limited as he’d said it was, so it probably wouldn’t be such a hardship to get it back on foot.
Occasionally, as she walked, a damp, useless sort of breeze would do its best to lift her hair, but it was hardly anything to speak of. For the most part, the humidity did nothing but somehow intensify the smells of the wildflowers growing alongside the road and various other farming aromas which made her nose wrinkle and reminded her that the countryside didn’t always smell sweet.
She stopped at a field of cows and laughed as one poked its head through the hedgerow to get a better look at her. She cooed at the calves she could see on the grassland beyond through the gaps in the shrubbery, and then she walked on. Another field contained a handful of sheep, but most were vast and empty, until she noted the neat strips of green on the hills further away that marked out Lachlan’s vineyard. Seeing them got her thinking of him, though as soon as she did she had to wonder why she was donating any brainpower to such an undeserving cause.
Astercombe was picture-postcard perfect. Posy hit the first houses and was instantly bowled over by a vision of thatched roofs, climbing roses and pristine white picket fences. Some were built from neutral stone, some rendered cream or pink or white. One was a beautiful sky blue with honeysuckle embracing the frame of a tiny front door and old bullseye windows, and Posy found herself staring at it for a moment, until she realised what she was doing and moved on quickly in case the owners came out. A stream separated the two sides of the high street, a single stone bridge linking the opposite parts of the village together.
Perhaps high street was a little generous as descriptions went, however, Posy mused as she smiled at a family of ducks paddling in the brook; it was little more than a loose collection of small shops operating from inside repurposed cottages. As she took in the view, she couldn’t help but wonder which house John Palmer had lived in. Perhaps, if she felt brave enough and it still bothered her, she’d ask Asa later…
About half a dozen people passed by as she made her way – most of them wearing hiking boots and backpacks, some with walking sticks and some taking photos. They were almost certainly tourists, and Posy had to wonder how many months of the year the locals here spent outnumbered by visitors. She supposed it was what they’d come to expect, a necessary trade-off for living in such a beautiful place. She bid one or two of the tourists a good morning and then turned her attention to scanning the shopfronts to figure out where she needed to be.
* * *
The farm shop had a cute little bell that tinkled above the door like something from a black-and-white TV drama. The rest of the shop would have fitted that era well too – scrubbed wooden floors with the smell of sawdust, bullseye window panes and low beamed ceilings.
While the convenience store a little further up the road had everything Posy needed on a practical level it hadn’t been very inspiring and, after a brief glimpse inside, she’d decided to try the farm shop first and go back there for anything they didn’t have.
As she walked in to see wooden shelves groaning with baskets of produce, jars full of jams and preserves sealed with gingham cloth and boxes of home-made bread and cakes, this, she thought, was more like it. This was what she’d come to Astercombe for.
A girl who couldn’t have been older than eighteen was behind the counter, a tortoiseshell cat lounging across the surface in front of her. The girl was running an absent hand down its back while holding a book to her nose with the other. At the sound of the bell she hurriedly dropped a bookmark onto her page and closed it.
‘Hello.’
She was taller than average with a delicate, almost nervy type of grace and about the brightest shade of ginger hair Posy had ever seen. She also had an abundance of freckles and Posy would have bet a good deal of her shopping budget that the poor girl didn’t often make the most of the summer sun because she’d probably burn to a crisp just looking out of the window for too long. She did, however, have the sort of quirky beauty that made her stand out. If ever she decided to take a walk down Oxford Street, some talent scout would be on her like a shot, desperate to sign her as the next big catwalk star. Perhaps Posy ought to sow the seed. But, then again, perhaps not. Perhaps life here would be a lot more wholesome and a lot less stressful, and Posy wasn’t sure she fancied being the architect of a ruined life.
‘Do you want something in particular or would you just like to look?’ the girl asked.
‘I’ll have a mooch if that’s alright. I do want things, I just don’t know what they are until I see them. I’m one of those sorts of shoppers, I’m afraid.’
‘That’s OK. Call me if you need anything.’
Posy smiled and the girl went back to her book.
Everything looked so good Posy hardly knew where to start. She picked up a hand basket and began to wander.
The food was displayed with a sort of rustic honesty. No waxed lemons or polished apples here, no shrink-wrapped asparagus, spotless balls of lettuce or poker-straight carrots, but vegetables and fruit as nature intended and probably as nutritious too.
Posy deliberated over a punnet of strawberries before popping them into her basket. She had no idea if anyone at Oleander House liked strawberries but decided it would be no hardship to eat them herself if they didn’t. Gooseberries followed. She had no idea if she liked gooseberries because she’d never eaten them but thought she’d give them a go.
Next she dropped in a handful of peas still in their pods and some oranges that doubtlessly hadn’t been grown locally but looked tasty all the same. She picked up a pack of butter churned on a farm less than five miles away and some eggs. Maybe she’d bake. Giles did a lot of baking and, though Posy was no expert, perhaps he’d give her some tips.
She was checking out some home-made flapjacks when the little bell over the shop door rang and she turned to see Lachlan walk in.
Great! Just what I need!
‘Come to pick up your pork?’ the girl said brightly. ‘Butcher only dropped it off half an hour ago.’
‘Thanks, Amber,’ he said gruffly.
So, Posy thought, there is a shred of humanity in there after all; at least he could be bothered to recall someone’s name.
The girl went into a room behind the counter and Lachlan stood and waited silently. Posy’s gaze was somehow stuck to the back of his head as if magnetised. But then he seemed to sense it, and he turned to look.
In a violent (and later, she’d think, silly) reaction, she ducked behind a shelving unit and pretended to be fascinated by a bag of blanched almonds.
‘So you’re back…’
Posy stood up. Lachlan had to be talking to her because there was currently no one else in the shop. And he was looking directly at her. Not with any warmth, she noted, but with the expectation of someone who was used to getting immediate answers to his questions.
‘Um, yes.’
‘Holiday?’
/> ‘Sort of. I’m staying at Oleander House for a few weeks.’
‘Hmm…’ He nodded, but his features hardly softened at all. ‘I hope they’ve explained how things work around here.’
‘How things work?’ Posy repeated.
‘I don’t go wandering around their orchards and they don’t walk on my vineyard unless it’s agreed in advance.’
Posy stared at him. Her mouth opened and then closed again.
‘I didn’t walk on your vineyard!’ she finally managed to splutter. ‘And I have it on good authority that the land I did walk on is a public right of way!’
‘Who told you that?’
‘It’s none of your business who told me!’
Posy was aware that she was beginning to screech – at least she felt she sounded a little hysterical – but Lachlan was infuriatingly unruffled by it.
‘The information you were given is wrong,’ he said. ‘Let me make it absolutely clear that—’
He stopped, mid-sentence, as Amber came back through to the shop with a large parcel wrapped in greaseproof paper and tied with rough brown string.
‘It’s fifteen pounds,’ she said in a quavering voice, clearly aware that she’d walked into the middle of some kind of animosity between the two customers in her shop.
Lachlan thrust the exact money at her. ‘Thanks,’ he said stiffly. Amber handed the parcel over and he turned to leave, Posy still staring at him, smarting that he was prepared to walk out on what she felt was very unfinished business without another word. She half thought about chasing him to continue the argument, but, with a final glower her way, he was gone before she’d decided what to do.
Posy watched the door slam, the cheery little bell tinkling with some irony as he swept out. Then she took her basket to the counter, still reeling from whatever the hell had just happened.
‘Do you have a bag I could buy for all this?’
Her enthusiasm for shopping had suddenly evaporated; all she wanted to do now was pay and get back to Oleander House.
‘Of course,’ Amber said, producing one from beneath the counter. She began to ring Posy’s items through the till. ‘You’re staying with Giles and Sandra then?’ she asked.
‘Yes. Well, with Asa, technically.’
‘Don’t pay any mind to Lachlan,’ Amber continued. ‘He looks scarier than he is.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes.’ Amber laughed at Posy’s look of disbelief. ‘He’s actually quite kind; he’s just not a people person, you know?’
‘Well, I can definitely vouch for the last bit, though I haven’t seen much evidence of the first.’
‘His vineyard is very precious to him. We have some of his wine here if you want to try a bottle…’
Posy waved away the offer. ‘I think Sandra has some – or at least, she says she usually has. But thanks.’
She paused, recalling suddenly that Sandra had once said Lachlan needed every penny of profit. It was hard to know what made her do it, but she thought about how Amber had just defended him and said he was a different man once you got to know him, and something changed her mind. ‘Do you know what? I think I will take a bottle of that wine.’
‘We’ve just got the sparkling. Will that be OK?’
‘Yes; it all goes down the same,’ Posy said with a smile. She watched as Amber took some from the shelving and put it in the bag before she continued to add the other items to her bill. ‘If you don’t mind me asking, do you know him well?’
‘Lachlan?’
Posy nodded.
‘Not really. But when Mum fell off a ladder trying to rescue the cat from the extension roof last spring and Dad was away for the day, Lachlan was passing. He jumped out of the car straight away to help. He drove us all the way to the hospital in Yeovil and that’s miles away. And he stayed while they put her arm in a cast.’
‘He did?’ Posy gave a wry smile. ‘I think I’d have taken my chances with the broken arm.’
‘He’s just quiet. And very serious. Some people are just like that, aren’t they?’
‘I suppose they are. I just don’t know anyone who’s quite that serious. Well, now I know what I’m dealing with I’ll do my best to stay out of his way; then I can’t fall foul of his spurious rules again.’
Amber gave a slight frown, as if she might try to defend Lachlan again, but then she seemed to think better of it and her expression cleared.
‘He’s fine with anyone if they respect his privacy,’ she said.
She rang the last item through the till and announced the total. Posy was used to high prices in London, but even she had to ask Amber to repeat it, certain that her tiny bag of goods couldn’t have come to that much. She very nearly asked Amber to put the bottle of wine from Lachlan’s vineyard back after all, but decided to swallow the hit instead and handed over the money. Maybe next time the convenience store would be a better bet – for staples at least. Her savings would be gone in no time if she shopped here for everything, and no amount of pasture-fed milk or locally grown sparkling white was worth that.
Chapter Sixteen
Giles and Sandra had gone to the theatre in Bristol. Somehow, Posy couldn’t imagine them being theatre-goers when outwardly they both seemed the sort of practical farming folk who wouldn’t have the time or inclination to watch Ibsen’s existential outpourings, but it just went to show that you never could tell. Their absence left her and Asa sharing a bottle of wine on the patio of the big house (as her uncle called it). Asa said he didn’t want to drink cider as he was sick of the sight of it and they didn’t have any of Lachlan’s wine left, so they’d raided the cellar and settled for a good, reliable Chardonnay.
Asa waved an agitated hand. He wasn’t quite drunk, but he was certainly on his way. ‘The man acts like he owns the place! If he wasn’t so good-looking I’m sure there’d be a petition to have him burned at the stake in the square in Astercombe. I’d get tickets too…’ He shook his head as he filled Posy’s glass. ‘The only reason he doesn’t come to the orchard is because that would mean the miserable toad would have to talk to actual real live human beings. Imagine how difficult that must be for someone who spends his evenings talking to rocks or something…’
‘He had no trouble talking to me today.’ Posy reached for the fresh glass of wine. She’d been taking it slower than Asa, but even she was on her way to pleasant tipsiness. They were getting on so well that the question she’d wanted to ask about John Palmer’s house had been filed away; Posy worried that it might cause awkwardness if she aired it now. Instead, the conversation had turned to her run-in with Lachlan at the farm shop. ‘He told me exactly what he thought of me – absolutely no communication problems whatsoever.’
‘Don’t even give it a second’s thought – you’ve done nothing wrong.’
‘I still feel as if I have. I bet he’s told everyone in the village that I’m trouble.’
‘I doubt it. Again, that would involve social interaction. If he talks to more than ten people in a day he probably explodes or something.’
‘He complained to Karen.’
‘Hmm…’
Asa took a large gulp of his wine and gave Posy a telling look.
‘What does hmm mean?’
‘He seems to turn to Karen a lot.’
‘So?’
‘The witch doesn’t share a bit of it with anyone.’
‘I suppose he just finds her easy to confide in. I can see why because she is. Although, she didn’t seem very pleased to see him at the guest house the other day.’
‘She doesn’t take any bullshit from him; I know that much.’
‘Maybe that’s what he likes about her – that she’s straight with him and gives as good as she gets.’
Asa stretched lazily. ‘I have no idea but it’s weird.’
‘Not really. There’s no accounting for things like that, is there? It’s probably no more than Karen being really approachable,’ Posy said. ‘He probably goes to her because she makes him
feel he can, where others aren’t so welcoming.’
‘It’s not like nobody tried when he first arrived – it’s not our fault he didn’t want to know.’
‘You don’t think there’s anything else to it, do you?’
‘Why?’ Asa asked with a wicked glint in his eye. ‘Because you’re hoping he’s available for you? There’s no shame in admitting that – we’ve all been there.’
‘God no! Imagine how miserable life would be with a man like that.’
‘But you must think he’s handsome.’
‘I’d be mad to think anything else – nobody can deny he’s built like Adonis.’
‘And you’ve already been up close and personal…’
‘Not deliberately, I can assure you.’
‘But it must have got you imagining all sorts…’
Posy grinned. ‘I wouldn’t tell you if it had.’
‘Ah! So you admit it has!’
‘Asa…’ she said, trying not to laugh again. ‘Is this an entirely appropriate conversation for an uncle to be having with his niece?’
‘I think we established early on I was never going to be a good influence.’
Posy grinned again.
‘But,’ he continued, ‘in answer to your question, it’s more likely to be something going on between Lachlan and Pavla than Lachlan and Karen.’
‘You think so? I suppose she’s very attractive. Seems a bit high-maintenance for him, though.’
Asa shrugged. ‘Who knows?’
Posy was thoughtful as she reached for her wine again.
Why did it matter what Lachlan did or who he might be seeing? Was it because Asa was right? Despite what ought to be, was Posy attracted to a dour, uncommunicative, misanthropic Scotsman who had no right occupying any of her thoughts at all? She reminded herself sternly that she had a new and very lovely boyfriend waiting back at home – refreshingly fun and honest and not hung up on any weird, self-absorbed, tortured-soul nonsense. Jackson was far better suited to her than a man like Lachlan could ever be – she just had to remember that.
The Little Orchard on the Lane: An absolutely perfect and uplifting romantic comedy Page 16
