Springtime at the Cider Kitchen

by Fay Keenan

‘What does your brother say?’ Jack asked.

  ‘He’s still making up his mind,’ Jonathan replied. That wasn’t strictly true; Matthew was on the verge of rejecting the takeover out of hand, but the company had taken a huge hit when Tesco had decided not to stock their products any more. Even though Matthew knew a takeover made financial sense, he was still reluctant to let go of the reins.

  ‘Jonathan. Son.’ Jack suddenly looked very, very tired and very, very old. ‘You know you can push this through without my say so. But I am asking you one more time. Think about it. Think about the people we employ. Think about what a merger with Buckthorn truly means. Everything we hold dear, everything four generations of this family has worked for, will be subsumed in a corporation that cares less about quality than it does about volume. Aren’t we big enough? We don’t need this.’

  Jonathan nodded. ‘I promise I’ll give it some serious thought, Dad. But in return, can you at least look at what they’re proposing.’

  Jack nodded back. ‘Go and get the paperwork from my study. I’ll take a look later.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Jonathan reached out a hand and briefly touched his father’s upper arm. ‘I promise you, it makes sense Dad.’

  ‘Perhaps on paper,’ Jack touched Jonathan’s hand with the tips of his fingers. ‘But you need to realise that sometimes there’s more to business than numbers on a page.’

  They sat that evening in companionable silence. Before Jonathan went to bed, he dug out Jack’s copy of the Buckthorn paperwork and left it on his side table by his armchair in the lounge, hoping that his father would see sense.

  40

  Caroline, true to her word, left for Farnham the following morning. After a meeting with Gino and Emma – Gino had looked quizzically at her but said nothing – she’d briefed her front of house team about her leave of absence and then driven Solly to the cattery. In truth, she thought, the front of house and the kitchen were so used to working together that they’d manage perfectly well without her, barring any major crisis. She’d driven away from The Cider Kitchen with a heavy heart, but also hopeful that perhaps Jonathan could help her to solve the Paul Stone problem. She tried to still the voice in her head that was supplying a rather convincing counter argument that Stone would just laugh in Jonathan’s face. Part of her still hated herself for confiding in Jonathan, but she’d spent so long denying to herself what was going on, the relief at sharing the burden, trusting him, immediately made things seem better.

  As she crossed from Somerset into Wiltshire and the landscape changed from green, fielded hills to the drier, chalkier vales surrounding Salisbury, she could feel herself being drawn back towards a life she no longer desired. That feeling stayed with her all the way to Surrey, and pulling out the key to the flat she’d hoped she’d never live in again, she was sorely tempted to slam the door, get back into her car and belt back to The Cider Kitchen.

  But Jonathan, darling, alley cat Jonathan, had made her a promise, and she had to honour her side of the bargain. Could he keep his? She had no doubt that that he’d give it his very best shot, but this meant he was, yet again, going against his brother. If Matthew found out the truth about the missing money, would Jonathan be cast out of the Eden of Little Somerby just as she would be?

  Entering the flat, she was assailed by memories. Logically, it was the worst place to return to, but with Paul Stone in Bristol, and hopefully unaware that she’d come back to Farnham, she’d be safe. Jonathan had made her promise to ring him when she arrived, but she couldn’t guarantee she could speak to him without breaking down so she sent him a text message instead. Then, after checking the place over, she made the bed with the linen she’d brought with her and considered her options. She had two weeks’ grace, and she actually did have some decorating to do as she’d moved out so quickly that she hadn’t had the chance to touch up the walls. Trying to put the restaurant out of her mind for now, she settled down to work out the best course of action.

  *

  Jonathan, for all his assurances to Caroline, didn’t yet have a plan for dealing with Paul Stone. Somehow he knew that just calling him up and declaring who he was wasn’t going to cut it. And if his brother got wind of what was going on there’d be hell to pay. To pre-empt any difficult questions from his brother, Jonathan had phoned Matthew shortly after he’d seen Caroline and told him he was in the process of investigating. Luckily, Matthew was so stretched on other business, he seemed willing to let Jonathan take the lead, for now at least. Then, after his meeting with the restaurant staff, assuring them that he’d be on hand to sort out any problems in Caroline’s absence, he set his mind to work.

  Stone wasn’t just going to roll over and back off; Jonathan needed leverage. A morning’s digging on the internet provided some leads; Paul Stone’s picture was on the website of the events management company in Bristol and his laid back, confident smile made Jonathan’s hackles rise. So this was the bastard who’d been intimidating Caroline. Some primal urge to confront Stone and smash his front teeth in struck Jonathan powerfully, but he knew he’d have to be cleverer than that. Closing the web page, he got to thinking. He’d have to act fast if he wanted to put an end to all this. Then he had a brainwave. Punching out the number of the company, he made the call. It was almost too easy to schedule a meeting to discuss a fictional event that he wanted to hold in the grounds of the local National Trust property. Jonathan pretended that he was a rep for the Trust, looking to arrange a champagne reception for some local businesses in the grounds of the house. When he requested Stone as a liaison, lying that he’d been recommended by a friend, the receptionist readily agreed. Arranging a meeting for next Tuesday, he ended the call. Just him and Stone, on neutral ground. Given that he’d left the receptionist with a false name, with a bit of luck the bastard wouldn’t know the true purpose of the meeting until it was far too late.

  That afternoon, feeling as though he’d made a start on saving Caroline’s hide and her business, Jonathan decided to leave work early. He’d been working his backside off recently. The sun was setting over the Mendip Hills as he walked the distance between the office and his father’s bungalow. Not for the first time, he thought that he really should make alternative living arrangements. He couldn’t live with his father forever.

  Orchard Cottage was in darkness as Jonathan walked up the drive, but since Jack’s sitting room was at the back of the bungalow, Jonathan assumed he hadn’t bothered turning on any other lights. Fumbling to fit his key into the lock, he pushed open the front door and then closed it carefully behind him so as not to startle Jack, whose heart probably couldn’t take too many shocks these days. Crossing the hall carefully, he pushed open the door to the living room. His father’s chair faced away from the door and Jonathan could see the top of Jack’s head above the back of the chair as he entered the room.

  ‘Dad?’ he said softly. ‘Are you awake?’

  Jack made no response. In fact, the silence was almost deafening. Jonathan realised, a beat too late, that he couldn’t even hear his father breathing, let alone snoring.

  ‘Dad?’ Jonathan crossed the room. ‘I’m home. Do you want me to get you anything?’

  There was still no response from Jack. Nearly tripping over the fringed edge of the rug, as not even Jack’s side table light was on, Jonathan stumbled towards the old man in the chair. As he righted himself, he noticed that Jack was holding the Buckthorn contract in his hands.

  Jonathan’s voice, higher pitched with worry now, sounded childish in the darkness. ‘Dad? Can you hear me?’ He leaned over and touched his dad’s shoulder, but still nothing. The panic ratcheted up another notch as Jack remained unresponsive. ‘Dad? Dad! Wake up.’ All the things he’d ever learned about CPR and resuscitation seemed frustratingly out of reach as he frantically loosened his father’s collar. Fumbling in the pocket of his jeans for his phone, he punched out the number of the emergency services and waited to be connected.

  ‘Ambulance, Orchard Cottage, Little Somerby.
It’s my father. He’s not… responding. Please hurry.’

  Jonathan was breathless with fear and tried hard to focus on his father. He lifted Jack’s left wrist to feel for a pulse, and, to his horror, as skin made contact with skin, ice dripped down his spine. ‘Oh Christ,’ he whispered. The pulse point on Jack’s wrist was still. Frantically, Jonathan felt for the reassuring beat in Jack’s neck but found nothing. Jack’s head was tilted to one side, his eyes half open as if he was drifting off to sleep, but as Jonathan leaned in, desperate to feel a breath, he knew Jack was far beyond that. His heart lurched; why had he pushed him so hard about Buckthorn? Why had he not checked more carefully that his father was taking his medication?

  ‘Dad?’ he said softly. But he knew it was hopeless; Jack was beyond hearing. Placing his lips to the old man’s forehead, he breathed in the remnants of his father’s cologne and drew a deep, shuddering breath. Then, with a presence of mind that surprised him, he pulled his phone out of his pocket.

  ‘Matthew? It’s me.’ Jonathan paused, knowing that what he said next would change his brother’s life forever, just as finding Jack had changed his. He drew a deep breath, which caught agonisingly in his throat. ‘It’s Dad. He’s dead.’

  A short time later, the emergency services arrived at Orchard Cottage. Matthew and Jonathan stood silently as Jack’s GP, who had been called by the paramedics, confirmed that Jack had passed away and then made the arrangements to move the body. It was all remarkably calm and swift. As they left, taking Jack with them in a private ambulance to the local mortuary, Matthew turned to his brother.

  ‘Are you all right?’ he asked, seeing Jonathan’s pallor, and the fact that as Jack’s body had been moved out on the gurney, his brother had started to shake.

  Jonathan shook his head. ‘I can’t believe it.’ He ran a hand over his eyes, trying to keep it together. ‘I should never have…’

  ‘What?’ Matthew put a hand on Jonathan’s shoulder.

  ‘The Buckthorn deal. I shouldn’t have pushed him on it. We had words this morning. And last night. Christ…’ Jonathan trailed off, clenching his jaw in an attempt not to break down.

  ‘It wasn’t your fault,’ Matthew said. ‘You said he’d not been taking his tablets properly. This could have happened at any time.’

  ‘I should’ve made sure he was taking them. I was here every morning.’ Jonathan turned away from his brother and walked to the window. ‘If only I’d…’

  Matthew joined his brother at the window, looking out onto Jack’s immaculately tended garden. ‘It wasn’t your fault, Jonno. We both know how stubborn Dad is. Was.’ He swallowed. ‘Look, don’t stay here on your own. Come back to Cowslip Barn tonight.’

  Jonathan shook his head. ‘No. I’ll be fine. Honestly. I need some time to get my head around this. And Dad wouldn’t want… wouldn’t want this place empty.’

  ‘Are you sure? Anna always cooks for an army and I don’t like the thought of you being here on your own.’ He put a hand on Jonathan’s shoulder.

  ‘I’ll come over tomorrow,’ Jonathan said. ‘Tonight I just want to get my head together before I see the girls.’

  Matthew regarded his brother long and hard and then leaned forward and hugged him briefly. ‘All right,’ he said roughly. ‘But you know where I am. We’ll get together tomorrow to sort out the arrangements.’

  Jonathan nodded. When Matthew finally left, and with remarkable presence of mind, he poured himself a stiff scotch from Jack’s decanter. It was only when he caught sight of Jack’s glass on the sideboard, never to be drunk from again, that he started to cry.

  41

  Jonathan’s mind hadn’t been on his mother when she died. His mind had, in fact, been very much on another woman; his brother Matthew’s first wife, Tara. Cecily Carter’s funeral had been a nightmare of undercurrents, tensions and oddness, culminating in Jonathan having to escort his father back to Orchard Cottage after he’d had one too many at the wake. Jack had rambled when he and Jonathan had been alone, confessing drunkenly to all manner of sins, most of which, to Jonathan’s younger self, seemed as distant and irrelevant as the inconstant, shadowed moon above them. It was January when his mother died and the sharpness of the cold night underpinned the family’s grief. Not even the church organist, whose playing style resembled Les Dawson’s skilled, yet practiced ineptitude, was enough to provide a light in the darkness.

  The moment Jonathan had settled his father on the sofa with a bottle and a blanket, he’d belted back to Pippin Cottage, where he was living rent free. Bought by his father in the early seventies, it was, forty years later, to become the homecoming property of his brother’s future second wife, Anna Hemingway. But then, in those relentless mid-noughties days, it was Jonathan’s home. On the night the Carter family buried its matriarch, Jonathan and Tara snatched a few forbidden moments alone while Matthew took Meredith, still a toddler, home to her bed. Those moments were frenzied, borne as much of pain as of need, and at the end of it Jonathan felt nothing but a feverish longing for more.

  How things, and how people, had changed. With Jack Carter lying cold in the mortuary, Jonathan couldn’t think of anything, or anyone else, but his father. The painful realisation that his father had been looking at the Buckthorn papers on Jonathan’s insistence when he died, was eating into his soul. He should never have pushed him; never have forced an issue that in the grand scheme of things, meant so little. But he had, and his own hubris had finally caught up with him.

  The morning after Jonathan was paralysed by grief. He ignored the landline telephone ringing off the hook, presumably with people wanting to commiserate or find out the gory details. A private ambulance travelling through the village had not gone unnoticed and the Little Somerby rumour mill was in full force. Jonathan bolted the door.

  At around lunchtime his mobile phone buzzed. Glancing at it he saw Anna’s number. He watched the phone for a few seconds before it clicked through to voice mail. The inertia, the total inability to function, was what frightened him the most. When Matthew came round that afternoon, he listlessly agreed with whatever his brother proposed about Jack’s funeral, and then closed the door, relieved to be alone again.

  *

  At the other end of the village, Anna thumbed her phone to lock it and sighed. She didn’t know whether to just go to see Jonathan or whether to leave him be. Matthew had gone into work to inform his employees of Jack’s death and was going to try to sort out some of the funeral arrangements from his office. He needed to maintain some sense of normality even though underneath he was struggling. As she was fretting over the decision, she heard the back door open and Matthew came into the kitchen. He looked akin to how he’d looked when Meredith was lying in a coma in hospital after the car accident that nearly cost her life. Anna’s heart ached.

  Before Anna could ask him anything, he spoke. ‘I went round to see Jonathan.’

  ‘How was he?’ Anna asked.

  ‘Fragile,’ Matthew replied. He sat down heavily in one of the kitchen chairs. Meredith was upstairs in her room studying for her English Literature mock exam the next day. Ellie had crashed out the moment Anna had put her to bed, exhausted from all the emotions she was only beginning to understand.

  ‘And, how are you?’ Anna crossed from the kitchen sink over to where Matthew was sitting in his usual chair.

  Matthew said nothing, but his hands, clasped in front of him on the kitchen table, clenched convulsively. Wordlessly, Anna walked up beside him and put her arms around him. He turned into her embrace, burying his face in the warmth of her soft cashmere jumper. Eventually, he pulled back from her and looked up. ‘I’m so glad I’ve got you,’ he said hoarsely.

  ‘I’m glad I’m here,’ Anna replied. Her heart broke as she saw the sadness in her husband’s eyes.

  ‘Dad was so, so happy to find out about the baby,’ Matthew said. ‘He didn’t think he was ever going to get another grandchild. I wish he was going to be here to meet him or her.’

  �
�Me too,’ Anna said, her left hand still stroking Matthew’s thick dark and silver hair.

  ‘He’s been so happy to see Jonathan and me finally running the business together. It was good that he actually saw his wishes realised before he… before he died.’ Matthew swallowed again. ‘It was just tragic that it took so long for Jonno and I to sort ourselves out and do what he wanted.’

  ‘But he saw it in the end,’ Anna said softly. ‘He loved the fact that you took it on together, and were finally at peace with each other.’ She shook her head. ‘And now he’s at peace, too.’

  ‘I hope Mum’s up there, giving him a glass of sherry and a good telling off!’ Matthew said shakily. He looked up at Anna. ‘She’d have liked you, I think. She never was sure about Tara.’

  Anna’s eyes filled with tears. ‘So much loss,’ she said softly. ‘Don’t you think we’ve all had our fair share by now?’

  Matthew shook his head. ‘We’ve got each other. And the children.’ His face clouded over. ‘And we may need to take care of Jonathan for a while. He thinks he should have been there. That he shouldn’t have pushed the takeover idea with Dad. He thinks he caused Dad’s heart to fail.’

  Anna pulled Matthew close again. ‘He couldn’t have known. Jack’s heart could have gone at any time.’

  ‘I know.’ Matthew reached up a hand and touched Anna’s cheek. ‘But Jonathan’s struggling to believe that. Not that there’s any doubt now about Buckthorn; there’s no way we’re going in with them. Dad was right.’

  Anna nodded. ‘Sounds like you’ve made your mind up.’ She paused. ‘I texted Caroline this afternoon. I know she’s on holiday but she needs to know what’s happened.’ She omitted to say that Caroline hadn’t yet replied and resolved to try and call her later. Perhaps wherever she’d gone didn’t have the best phone reception.

  Matthew’s face clouded over. This was not unnoticed by Anna. ‘What is it?’ she said.