As I let myself back into Primrose Cottage, I had tears in my eyes, and it was nothing to do with the onions Lauren was frying in the kitchen.
CHAPTER TWO
The trouble with making good resolutions, of course, is that they’re hard to keep. Instead of getting up early the next morning, ready and determined to start my new life as a model citizen by doing a full-on job search, I forgot to set the alarm on my phone and slept in till nearly ten o’clock. The house was in silence, and outside a weak winter sun was now making the fallen snow from the previous day sparkle so brightly I had to squint as I looked out at the garden. But the heating was on and I showered, dressed, went down to the little warm kitchen and fixed myself some breakfast, feeling strangely lost and lonely. Where was Lauren? With a guilty start, I realised I didn’t even know if she went out to work, or what she did.
I took my cereal and coffee into the lounge and put on the TV to catch up with the news, sat on the sofa and within a few minutes I heard the rattle of the cat-flap in the kitchen door, and a chorus of meows, and two fluffy black and white cats came rushing into the lounge, shaking their cold paws and then stopping in surprise when they saw me there.
‘Hello,’ I said, bending down to give them both a stroke. ‘You must be Romeo and Juliet. I’m sorry I don’t know which of you is which, but I’m pleased to meet you.’
The plumper of the two had white socks and ears, while the other one was almost all black, with just a white splodge by his nose. They both responded to the stroking with deep purrs of pleasure, and almost simultaneously made a leap for my lap, where they turned around a few times, nudging each other out of the way, and then settled down, curled together with their heads tucked under each other’s paws. It was so comforting to have them with me, feeling their warm breath and the vibration of their purrs, that I couldn’t bear to move, and ended up sitting there, watching a repeat of some ancient inane sitcom, until nearly lunchtime. When there was a ring at the doorbell, I jumped up as if I’d been shot, scattering the cats in two different directions.
‘Hello?’
There was a stout, elderly woman on the doorstep, looking at me in confusion.
‘Is Lauren not home yet?’ she said.
‘No, I’m afraid she’s not.’
I looked back at her, not sure what to say. Can I help? seemed a bit pointless, given my circumstances.
She frowned. ‘Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude, but you are …?’
I grappled with my uncertainty. I still hadn’t worked out my story. Why I didn’t just say ‘the lodger’, I have no idea, but just then one of the cats shot past my legs into the front garden, and, flustered, I gabbled: ‘I’m just looking after the cats.’
‘Oh! I see.’ The woman stared after the retreating cat. ‘I didn’t realise Lauren employed someone …’
‘It’s a new thing. I mean, I just started yesterday. She doesn’t like them being left on their own, while she’s … out.’
‘I see. Well, perhaps you’d just tell her Mary called round with this.’
She handed me a plastic bag that felt like it had books in it. As she turned to go, she looked back at me over her shoulder and added:
‘Do you look after dogs too?’
‘Um … yes. Cats, dogs, rabbits, whatever.’ I was already regretting the lies but they seemed to just be jumping off my tongue of their own accord.
‘I see,’ she said. ‘And your name is?’
‘Emma. Emma Nightingale,’ I said. Maybe she’d forget, I thought as she walked off down the path. I hoped she wouldn’t mention it to Lauren.
It was, in fact, only another ten minutes before I heard the front door opening, and the sound of Holly’s chatter. I turned off the TV and rushed into the kitchen with my dirty breakfast crockery, trying unsuccessfully to look busy.
‘What are you doing?’ Holly said, fixing me with her blue-eyed stare.
‘Just washing these things up.’ I turned to smile at her. ‘And where have you been?’
‘Preschool of course,’ she said scornfully. ‘I go every morning.’
‘Oh, right. And did you have a nice time?’
‘Yes.’
She obviously wasn’t ready yet to trust me with the intimate details of preschool life. Lauren, meanwhile, was chattering about making sandwiches and asking if I wanted one.
‘Thanks, but no, I’ll go out and get myself something.’
Our arrangement included breakfasts and evening meals but I’d expected to be out at lunchtimes – where, I hadn’t quite worked out yet.
‘OK, if you’re sure.’
‘Oh, and someone called Mary came, and asked me to give you this.’ I nodded at the bag of books.
‘Aha. That’s my latest lot of reading.’ Lauren laughed. ‘Mary’s a retired colleague of my husband’s, from the school. Ever since I told her I’m not very well-read, she’s been trying to educate me. It’s nice of her, but I don’t get a lot of free time for reading, unfortunately. It’s just as well she only brings these bagsful about once a month.’
So at least I wouldn’t have to be interrogated by her too often.
Lauren smiled at me. ‘I didn’t want to wake you this morning. I should have explained, Holly and I always go out at half past eight and get back about this time. I work mornings while she’s at preschool. I’m a teaching assistant at the infants’ school.’
‘Oh, I see.’ I smiled sadly to myself. It must be lovely to work with children, but I’d never be able to do anything like that. Lauren had said she wasn’t well educated, but I was pretty sure she wasn’t a complete dimwit like me.
‘Yes, and with Jon being a teacher, it works well,’ she was saying. ‘We both get the school holidays. Speaking of which,’ she added, ‘I forgot to mention: we’re going away in a few weeks’ time, for the February half-term holiday. I’m sorry it’s a bit soon after you arriving, but I hope you’ll have settled in by then. You won’t mind being on your own here, will you?’
‘Not at all,’ I said, trying not to sound too eager.
‘Good. We’ve found a bargain sunshine break. Tenerife will be lovely in February. The thing is, I’d normally book Romeo and Juliet into the cattery, but the nearest one has just closed down. I wondered … as you said you like cats …’
‘Oh, of course I’ll look after them!’ I said.
What a stroke of luck! I closed my eyes and offered up a silent prayer to the god of stupid lies. I was actually going to be a cat sitter, even if for only a week!
‘That’d be marvellous,’ Lauren was saying. ‘We’ll pay you, of course.’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t expect that. I’m living here anyway, so—’
‘We’ll be saving the cattery fees, which are really expensive, and the cats will be much happier at home. So of course we’ll pay you, or else knock something off your rent, or whatever. We’ll come to an arrangement, definitely.’
‘Well, OK, thank you. I’ve been having a cuddle with them this morning, actually. They’re lovely cats.’ I nodded at the corner of the kitchen, where they were both happily wolfing down some food Lauren had dished up for them. ‘Which one is which?’
Holly gave me a pitying look.
‘Romeo is the boy, and Juliet is the girl, of course.’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Holly, don’t be rude,’ Lauren chided her gently. ‘Romeo’s the one with the white paws, Emma. He’s greedier, so he’s getting a bit fat. But watch out for Juliet. She’s the one who’s more likely to bring in mice and things, I’m afraid.’
‘I’ll bear that in mind.’ I looked at my watch. ‘Well, I’d better be off,’ I said, making a great play of having somewhere to go.
‘Have you got one of your interviews today, then?’
‘Um, yes, that’s right.’
‘At Green Pastures?’ she asked, looking excited.
‘No,’ I said quickly. I’d have to kill that idea stone dead, I realised. She’d soon find out whether I’d been there or not, wh
en she visited her father. ‘No, somewhere else.’
‘OK. I understand, you don’t want to jinx it by telling us too much. Well, good luck, Emma.’
I felt guilty all over again as I strolled down the road into town. I didn’t like lying to Lauren, when she was being so kind to me. I’d have to try to get some real interviews lined up quickly, and with no reliable internet at home, the library would be the best option. It would be warm in there, and I could use one of their computers.
Despite the winter sunshine there was a sharp wind blowing as I walked up Fore Street towards the Town Square. People were scurrying from shop to shop, eager to keep out of the cold, but everyone who passed me gave me a nod and said ‘Good afternoon’, some of them pausing for a moment to give me a look of surprise, which unnerved me a little. Did they recognise me? Surely the stories hadn’t reached this far? I pulled my warm hat down further over my ears. Having red hair could be a curse. It was far too distinctive. Why on earth hadn’t I thought of colouring it before I came here? I stopped outside a hairdresser’s, staring through the steamy window and wondering whether I could afford to have my colour changed professionally. Once again I was overcome with gloom, remembering how little I’d needed to worry about such things in the past. I’d had my own stylist when I lived in New York, and my own manicurist. No expense spared. I sighed, reminding myself that those things hadn’t ended up making me happy. Was I going to be happy living in penury here in Crickleford, making up stories about myself and thinking about disguising my appearance? Well, it was worth a try. I slipped into Superdrug and bought myself a DIY hair colour kit. Cheeky Chestnut. How cheeky was a chestnut? That remained to be seen.
I needed lunch before I did anything else, and next door to the library was a small cosy-looking café with lead light windows of spun glass. It looked as old as the castle on the hill. The heavy oak door had two large signs on it, one declaring the establishment to be Ye Olde Crickle Tea Shoppe, the other, in huge bold type, warning: MINDE YE STEPPES! Ridiculously, I was then too busy smiling at the sign-writer’s sense of humour to actually mind the steps, which were immediately inside the door, and tripped down them, landing on my knees beside the table of a couple of giggling women with a baby. So much for trying not to be noticed.
‘You all right, my lovely?’ said a lady I presumed to be the proprietor, in a heavy Devonian accent. ‘Don’t thee be frecking, my lovely, everyone does that, first time they comes in.’
So would it not have been a good idea, I seethed to myself as I got up, rubbing my knees, to amend the sign to something like STEEPE STEPPES RIGHT INSIDE DOORE? Or do away with the steppes altogether and build a rampe?
‘New here, are you, my luvver?’ the woman asked as I seated myself at a table away from the door. She seemed to carry out all her business from behind the counter – customers happily yelling their orders across the café. I wondered whether she was actually unable to move. I was beginning to wish I’d gone somewhere else – the pub, or the inevitable pizza bar over the road. I’d chosen this place because I thought it would give me more privacy, and I’d ended up being stared at by the entire clientele.
‘Yes,’ I muttered, scanning the menu as quickly as I could, to try to avoid further interrogation.
‘Thought as much,’ she said, looking satisfied. ‘What be dwain round ’ere, then?’
‘Pardon?’
‘Annie asked what you’re doing here,’ someone at another table translated for me. ‘It’s not holiday season, see. We don’t get too many down from Up Country this time of year.’
I was tempted to tell them to mind their own business, but that was obviously only going to provoke even more interest, not to mention making me unpopular.
‘I’m staying with a family in Primrose Gardens.’
Back home in Loughton, even if anyone had been (to my mind) rude enough to ask a stranger what they were doing there, this would have been more than enough to satisfy their curiosity. But the proprietor, Annie, merely waited, arms folded, watching me, and I could feel the hum of expectation all around me until she finally went on, as they all seemed to know she would:
‘Why be that, then?’
‘I’m cat sitting for them,’ I said, exasperated. What the hell? At least it wasn’t exactly a lie any more.
This information seemed to take a while for everyone to digest, judging by the muttering going on around the place – long enough for me to order a coffee and toasted sandwich, anyway, but not long enough to allow me to consume them in peace when they were finally plonked on the counter by Annie, whose manner of service was to bellow ‘White coffee an’ a cheese toastie!’, so that I had to go and collect it from her.
‘Staying here permanent-like, be ye?’ she demanded loudly after I’d seated myself again.
‘Um … perhaps,’ I said, ducking my head, trying to avoid the stares.
Annie nodded thoughtfully to herself and a fresh murmur of interest broke out around me. The toastie was hot, but I ate it so fast, swilling it down with scalding coffee, that I had a sore mouth for the rest of the day. Ye Olde Crickle Tea Shoppe was one place to avoid like the plague, I decided as I stumbled back up ye olde steppes into the street, if I wanted any chance whatsoever of being anonymous around here!
And just to round off the day, the library was closed. I stared at the sign on the door, which managed, without a single Ye or extraneous e on the end of anything, to explain that it was open from 9 till 12 on Mondays and Wednesdays, closed Tuesdays and Thursdays, open again on Fridays from 12 till 3, and then on Saturdays, a comparatively full day of service from 9 till 3.
‘Why?’ I muttered to myself, trying without much success to understand and memorise these peculiarly diverse opening hours.
‘Because it’s a part-time library,’ said a voice from behind me.
It was one of the women who’d been in the olde tea shoppe. I felt like thanking her for stating the bleeding obvious.
‘The council made cuts, see,’ she went on. ‘So the library can’t stay open all week now. That’s if you can still call it a library. What with sessions for toddlers banging tambourines, and meetings for grannies doing their knitting. So anyway, I was wondering if you look after dogs as well as cats.’
‘Um – yes,’ I said, nodding and turning away, hoping to end the conversation as fast as possible. But she put a hand on my arm to detain me.
‘So will you look after my dog while I’m on my holiday? I know you’re new here, but I’m desperate, you see, what with the kennels closing down – bit of a shock, just before my holiday. Last week of February, first week of March, it is. How much do you charge?’
I gulped. The lie was getting serious now. How was I going to get out of this? But then again, I found myself thinking, what was the harm? It wouldn’t stop me looking for a proper job, of course, that’s if I ever actually got started looking for one, but in the meantime, why not? It’d give me something to do (mostly in the warm, I hoped), and earn me a few quid at the same time. And maybe, if I’d understood right that the local boarding kennels and cattery had closed down, a few other people might ask me to help them out till they found somewhere else.
‘Um … five pounds per hour,’ I said, grabbing what I hoped was a realistic figure out of thin air. I had absolutely no idea, of course. Should I charge more for a dog than a cat? More for walking it twice a day than once a day? Who knew? ‘What kind of dog is it, anyway?’ I asked. I imagined, hopefully, a fluffy little mongrel with short legs who’d prefer to doze by the fire than go on long romps over the fields.
‘An Alsatian. He’s energetic, but a bit kind-of nervy.’
Oh.
‘But very intelligent and loving,’ she added quickly. ‘If you give him a couple of good long walks a day he’ll be no trouble at all.’
‘Right.’
‘Best to stay with him all day, though. He cries and barks a lot if he’s left on his own, and all the neighbours complain. Miserable buggers.’
It sounded like I’d be earning my five pounds an hour. But nevertheless I agreed, and I was rewarded, to my surprise, by a hug of gratitude.
‘You’re a life-saver,’ she said. ‘I was beginning to think I’d have to cancel the holiday. I’m Pat, by the way. Sorry, I didn’t even catch your name.’
‘Emma,’ I said. We exchanged contact details and I walked home feeling slightly bemused. I had a booking – a client! How odd. Well, it was nice to be able to help that poor lady out of a predicament. But I’d definitely need to get myself back online when the part-time library opened up, in case she changed her mind and cancelled me. I had considered bringing my laptop to one of the cafés instead, if they had Wi-Fi or had even heard of it. But after today’s experience, I wasn’t so sure about that.
Back in Primrose Cottage, I celebrated by locking myself in the bathroom and smothering my hair in Cheeky Chestnut.
‘Oh! You look very funny,’ Holly told me without a hint of amusement, after I’d finally washed the stuff off and blow-dried my hair into what I thought was an attractive style. ‘Put the other hair back on, it was nicer.’
I’d always thought I liked children. But I don’t think I’d ever realised how much they can dent your confidence.
CHAPTER THREE
The next morning I set off for the library straight after breakfast, determined to get in there while it was open and get started on my job hunt.
‘I’d like to use one of the computers,’ I told the library assistant cheerfully. He was a young lad who didn’t look old enough to have left school.
‘Oh. Sorry,’ he said, idly fiddling with his earring while he shuffled some papers.
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