by Unknown
‘Coward,’ he said, over her shoulder, as she pulled out the bags, making her jump because she hadn’t heard him following. ‘You said you were going to cook.’
‘I decided not to kill you quite yet.’ She fumbled for the off-licence bags, which had fallen off the seat. ‘I have two more wishes to be granted, after all.’
‘Good point. You look beautiful, by the way.’
‘What?’ She almost dropped a bag of prawn crackers and sauces, as she spun round to find his face far too close to hers, those disturbing eyes as stormy and electrically charged as the sky overhead.
‘You look beautiful – you are beautiful. I should have said it before.’
Ellen couldn’t tear her eyes from his, reading the desire in them with hopeless excitement. The bangs and whistles all started going off at once in her body, along with a warning siren in her head. ‘We’d better eat this before it gets cold.’ She handed him a bag and scuttled towards the terrace, heart pounding.
‘Don’t you want to put it on plates?’
‘It’ll be fine like this. I picked up some chopsticks. We’ve got everything we need.’
‘Have you locked yourself out again or something?’
‘I prefer to stay outside.’
‘If I’d known you were that keen, I’d have brought a tent round for us to camp in the garden.’ He went to light a few more torches. ‘My mother could get Gladys to bring us out Marmite sandwiches and Bovril.’
Her childishness obviously irritated him. The tomboyish flirt Spurs had got dirty with all weekend was showing her flipside. Knowing how he wanted the evening to pan out made Ellen feel fifteen again, those pre-Richard years when being adult meant driving Miami Vice cars, having Jackie Collins sex every night and tall, dark strangers giving you Milk Tray.
A rumble of thunder made Spurs look up at the menacing sky. ‘Ever made love in a storm?’
‘Not recently,’ she mumbled.
‘A great-uncle of mine was struck by lightning while screwing his mistress against an oak tree on the ridge. Killed them both.’ His cold, angry laugh made Ellen jump.
Almost hyperventilating with nerves, she scattered the foil containers randomly on the table and took a seat at the far end, deliberately placing herself between two sturdy plastic legs. I can, and I will stop this happening, she told herself. This is just a friendly thank-you meal, nothing more, however much spin he tries to add to it.
‘Did you agree to ride Dilly’s horse while she’s back at school?’ she asked chattily, determined to set the tone.
‘I said I’d think about it.’ He cursed under his breath as another match blew out the second he struck it. ‘Depends how busy I am.’
‘What do you do during the week?’
He looked up at her. ‘I’m a professional prodigal son.’
‘Meaning?’
‘I prod a gal here, and prod a gal there.’
‘And you think you’re going to prod me tonight?’
‘No. I don’t think that.’ His eyes burned into hers.
Ellen looked away. If her flipside was stupid, schoolgirl gaucheness, his was far more dangerous and threatening. She’d been so obsessed with her own nerves that she hadn’t noticed how tense he was, and getting more so by the minute.
‘Tuck in!’ she offered brightly, pulling the lids off the foil dishes.
He was still trying to light the torches, battling to keep a match alight in the wind, his own fuse almost burnt through. ‘What’s the hurry?’
A great rip of thunder split the sky, followed seconds later by forked lightning diving out from a cloud above the church. The first torch flared, its great yellow flame writhing in the wind. Spurs pulled it from the ground like a knight with a medieval sconce and set about igniting the others with it.
By the time he’d enclosed the terrace in a fiery circle, the food was cold and the beer bottles Ellen had opened dripped with condensation, their labels sliding from their green shoulders.
‘Cheers.’ He stepped back on to the terrace and lifted one.
‘To wishes coming true.’ Ellen lifted hers, looking at his face anxiously.
Another thunder roar rippled through the sky. Spurs’ silver eyes gleamed. ‘Why d’you have to make it so difficult?’ he asked quietly.
‘My wish?’
‘No. That was the easy part.’
‘And this is the Chinesey part,’ she joked feebly, not at all certain how to read his intense expression. ‘Sit down and eat.’
She looked at the trays of food and knew for certain that she wouldn’t be able to eat a single grain of rice.
Spurs didn’t sit down. He paced between the torches then faced her. ‘I have a confession to make,’ he blurted. ‘On Friday night – at the restaurant. I . . . I – oh, fuck.’ He laughed, the wind tossing his hair every way and flattening the white shirt against his chest. ‘I agreed to something so fucking awful.’
Ellen felt her blood freeze. Every bad word she’d heard about him echoed in her head – violence, drugs, gangland, danger, merciless.
The torches were roaring up in the wind, sending great sparks across the lawn and threatening to set light to the clematis. By contrast most of the tea-lights had blown out as the sky blackened, ready to unleash the downpour.
‘I have to tell someone – no, I have to tell you.’ He wrapped his arms round himself and stood facing the wind, so close to the torches that Ellen thought he’d shoot up in flames. ‘I don’t know what the hell to do.’
‘What did you agree to?’
He pressed his hand to his mouth and stared at the stormclouds, the torch flames turning his eyes from silver to molten gold.
Ellen stood up cautiously and moved behind him. ‘What, Spurs?’
He dipped his head and turned to her, his face in shadow, half covered with his hair. ‘Do you love me?’
‘A bit.’
His lip curled for a second and he reached out a hand for hers.
The moment their fingers connected, Ellen lost all sense of time and place.
Had another bolt of lightning shot from the sky and delivered a direct hit she couldn’t have been more charged. It literally rocked her on her toes, propelling her forward and against Spurs, as if they were two magnets slamming together, skin against skin, muscle against muscle, lip against lip. It wasn’t a kiss. It was too angry and too urgent.
‘Ellen!’ a voice called excitedly. ‘Dilly’s just left and I have a huge bottle of vino and a joint for us to guzzle while we watch the storm. Gosh – those torches are wonderful!’
Ellen broke away, sending a chair flying. Spurs gripped her hand tightly. ‘Get rid of her,’ he breathed, stepping back into the shadows.
‘Hang on – I’m coming round.’ Pheely’s voice was approaching fast. ‘I have been desperate to talk to you all weekend about lovely Lloyd – I saw his car still parked here in the early hours of Saturday, you naughty minx. Didn’t I say you’d be perfect together?’
Ellen turned to Spurs in a panic, but he had already slipped between the torches and on to the lawn.
The silver eyes flashed for a second and then he was gone, darting through the gap in the hedge and across Hunter’s fields faster than a hare. By the time Pheely rounded the corner of the cottage with her bottle of wine, he’d disappeared.
‘Wow! What a feast! Can I pick? I am livid with Daffodil. You will never guess who she’s asked to ride her horse . . .’
Ellen didn’t see Spurs for days. She thought about him obsessively on long walks with Snorkel, searching the village and hills for Fins while her head searched for equally elusive answers. But both her black and white cat and her black-souled friend were lying low, and her head remained hopelessly muddled.
She wasn’t sure whether to be angry with Spurs for running away before she could explain that Pheely had got the wrong end of the stick, angry with Pheely for interrupting before Spurs could tell her what he had agreed to do, or angry with herself for letting him go.
&
nbsp; In the end she settled for being angry with Fins for not coming home when the storm broke as she’d expected him to. He hated rain. She needed to know that he was safe.
After the storm that had raged through the Lodes Valley on Sunday night, pulling branches from trees and tiles from roofs, the week was blustery and overcast. Bad-tempered clouds moved moodily over the hills, rushing from Morrell to Maddington to Ibcote to soak the tourists as they moved between antiques and collectors’ fairs at the three towns’ corn-markets. The Oddlode pensioners congregated by the post-office counter, shaking out Rain Mates, patting perms and grumbling that it was horribly wet and windy, just as they had grumbled that it was horribly hot and humid the week before. To Joel and Lily’s ongoing fascination, Ellen bought an increasing array of tinned fish, fresh smoked salmon, cheeses and hams. They thought she had really got her appetite back, but they were all left in Fins’ bowl by the bootroom window to lure him in. Several local rats and a fox took advantage, but there was no sign of free-agent Fins. Nor was there any sign of her estate agent.
Lloyd Fenniweather was ‘out of the office’ every time Ellen called to check on progress with the second Goose Cottage marketing wave; nor did he respond to her messages. No for-sale sign appeared, all the advertising deadlines came and went, and there seemed to be no sign of new brochures or – most importantly – viewings.
‘I think you should let me appoint another agent,’ Ellen told her father, when he called to see how she was. ‘Seaton’s have lost interest, and this is the perfect time to sell. Three houses have sold in the village in the last month and they’re far less attractive than the Goose. I’ve checked out which agents they used.’ No need to mention that two of them had sold through Seaton’s – the other through a rival agency.
‘Let your mother and me talk about it, duckling,’ was all Theo could promise, in his cider-and-haymaking Somerset brogue. Jennifer, he explained, was in a bad mood, having sent him out for milk and eggs only to find him bearing a goat and half a dozen laying hens when he returned. ‘I’ve always wanted livestock. I loved the idea of having geese at Goose Cottage, but your mother wouldn’t tolerate it, said they’d ruin the garden. How is the garden, by the way?’
‘Great. Lots of action.’
‘Always at its best at the end of May. Reg keeping everything from running riot?’
‘I – er – I don’t really think you need him and Dot any more. I can do everything.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely. It’s not as though I’ve anything else to do and it saves you the expense.’
‘Oh, you are a duck, trying to stop the aged parents ending up in penury. I’ll call them and let them know.’
‘No need – I’ve already had a word, sown the, er, seed.’
‘Were the Wycks okay about it?’
‘They took it on the chin.’
‘They’re a stoic old pair.’
‘Aren’t they? Dad . . .’ Ellen chewed her lip. ‘How are you feeling – I mean, your health? How is it?’
‘Rude, just as it’s rude of you to ask.’
‘Sorry.’
‘No, no need. I know you worry, duckling, but it’s fine. I’m feeling great.’
‘Well, you take care of yourself.’ She tried not to think about Hell’s Bells and the terrible secret that Spurs wasn’t supposed to tell a soul. Her father, she was certain, would tell her if something was wrong.
‘I will. I’ve got your mother to look after – and Gladys Knight and the Pips.’
‘Who?’
‘The goat and the hens.’
‘You don’t want a collie to round them up and a cat to keep the rats at bay, do you? You can rename them Tina and Ike.’
He gave a laugh as sweet as clotted cream. ‘I don’t think I’d get that one past your mother – more chance with a new estate agent. You really sure Seaton’s aren’t up to the job?’
‘Absolutely.’
Ellen tried Lloyd’s mobile when she’d finished speaking to her father, and was again diverted to his voicemail. She shuddered at the fawning, super-smooth outgoing message that promised to ‘catch you later’. She suspected it wasn’t the only thing people caught from the over-friendly agent.
‘You have until tomorrow to return this call or you and your agency are fired,’ she fumed, then added ‘and thanks for dinner on Friday. It was food for thought.’
She dug out an old photograph of Fins, looking thinner but no less despotic, stuck it to a piece of A4 and wrote out a ‘Missing’ notice, detailing his gigantic proportions and advising the public not to approach him, then took it to the post-office stores to photocopy.
‘Aw, your sweet little pussy has slipped away, honey?’ Lily Lubowski cooed over it as she bore it off behind the counter to the Xerox. With her mad peroxide hair and love of frills, she was disturbingly like Mrs Slocombe from Are You Being Served? but with what Theo called a ‘translangtic’ accent – three parts California waves to one part estuary sludge.
‘Yes, I thought he’d be back by now, but he’s still missing.’ Ellen gathered an armful of local papers in case, by a miracle, Lloyd had followed her instructions and run adverts for the cottage.
‘Is he neutered?’ Lily asked.
What was it with this village and domestic animals’ sexual capabilities, Ellen wondered.
‘Only my Abyssinian is going through her . . . girl thing,’ Lily whispered, so as not to be overheard by her husband at the till, ‘and I’d hate her to get raped.’
‘Fins isn’t a rapist,’ Ellen assured her. ‘He’s gay.’
‘Really?’ Lily’s plucked eyebrows shot up. ‘When did you find out?’
‘He came out of the closet about a year ago.’ Ellen cast a guilty look at Joel too, but he was being chatted up by the Oddlode Pensioners Collective, and wasn’t listening.
‘Oh, my. How amazing. Have you taken him to a pet therapist?’
‘No, but he never misses an episode of Animal Hospital. He adores Rolf.’
‘How cute! You must miss him so. Ten copies okay for you?’
‘Great.’
The door pinged and Glad Tidings bustled in. She trotted straight up to the posse beside the till with a self-important air. ‘You’ll never guess what young Jasper’s done now,’ she panted, having clearly run all the way from the manor to tell the news. ‘It’s nothing short of heinous.’
‘What?’ Her audience surged around her. ‘Do tell.’
‘He’s persuaded that no-good cousin of his to lend him a horse to race the Devil’s Marsh. Ely’s accepted the entry – says he won’t stand in the lad’s way. Probably hopes he’ll go and kill himself proper this time.’
‘No!’ There was a chorus of shocked gasps.
‘After what happened and everything.’ Gladys clutched her quilted bosom disapprovingly. ‘He has no shame. Her ladyship is beside herself.’
‘Can’t she stop him?’
‘Handsome is as handsome does in her eyes – always has been,’ Gladys clucked. ‘Besides, she can’t risk him running off again, not with her wanting to marry him off.’
‘You sure that’s why he’s back, Glad?’
‘Oh, yes, dear. Lady Belling has plans for that young man. We’ve had the vicar to dine every month because she wants a church wedding, and God’s still having a spot of bother forgiving Spurs all them misdemeanours, it seems, especially the ones involving the east transept. I told her a nice ceremony in a marquee at Eastlode Park is just as good. They do a very good fork buffet, I hear.’
Ellen found herself clutching the post-office counter.
‘Are you saying she’s gotten someone to take him on?’ Joel chuckled. ‘From what I hear, he’ll be one helluva handful to take in marriage.’
‘Some fool flibbertigibbet with eyes on that house, I’ll fathom.’ She sniffed, suddenly catching sight of Ellen and giving her a beady look that made it clear her spies had caught all the weekend action in Goose Cottage. ‘She’ll have to be a good
breeder, though, to get rid of that bad blood. Shame her ladyship preferred breeding them darned horses. If Jasper had a brother, the Surgeon could disinherit him and favour another but, as it is, he’s stuck with that good-for-nothing. I just hope they’ve found a nice young brood mare for him.’
‘She’ll need a bob or two and all, I reckon,’ laughed one of the pensioners. ‘Rumour has it the Surgeon ain’t got as much as he once had.’
‘Where did you hear that?’ Gladys demanded defensively.
‘Dot Wyck told me he borrowed a tenner off Reg in the bookie’s last week. His credit card had got rejected, she says.’
‘Don’t believe anything that sister of mine says,’ Gladys snapped. ‘She always was a liar. She taught young Jasper everything he knows.’
‘Didn’t you know Gladys and Dot are sisters?’ Pheely laughed when a shocked Ellen told her about the overheard conversation later while patrolling the village on a dog-walking and postering campaign. ‘They’re twins, but they’re barely on speaking terms. Not only did Gladys get the plum job in the village, working at the manor while her sister has to clean up after the rabble, but she married a Gates, and Dot married a Wyck. It’s like Aclima and Jumella.’
‘Who?’
‘Cain and Abel’s twins – married their own brothers,’ Pheely explained in an oddly good-girl voice, as though reciting her times tables.
Ellen, who had patiently endured endless scripture with her church-going mother, didn’t remember them. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Oh, yes. Bear in mind that Adam and Eve didn’t have an awful lot of eligible bachelors around to choose from – and neither does any Oddlode parent trying to palm off a brace of girls.’ She let out a delighted cackle.
‘What about a devoted mother trying to palm off her black sheep of a son?’ Ellen tried to steer the conversation back on track. She had only mentioned Gladys’s outburst because she was telling Pheely the far more disturbing news that Spurs was on the marriage market.
