‘Then they won’t have been wasted,’ Lance laughed. ‘Right – are we ready for the next lot?’
They were just removing the first baking tray from the oven when Flo bustled in through the back door.
‘Sorry I’m late, duck, but I had to help Clyde with his demijohns. He’s got eighteen gallons of courgette and rose hip just on the turn and we’d have been awash with the bloody stuff if I hadn’t waded in and helped him and – bloody hell!’ She took in the domestic scene round the kitchen table. ‘What’s he doing here? You haven’t gone stupid and taken him back, have you?’
Having closed the oven door on the second batch, Lance pulled a face. ‘And I love you too, Flo. Clear a space and sit down.’
Laughing, Mitzi blew flour away from the kettle and reached for another mug. ‘You can test the first of our puddings – seeing as Lance has eaten all the biscuits.’
Flo still looked perplexed. ‘But you don’t cook, Mitzi. And you certainly don’t cook with him. And—’ she glanced at the smouldering heaps on the baking tray ‘—they aren’t puddings – they’re overdone fairy cakes.’
True, Mitzi thought, they did look more like little glossy brown cakes. She’d thought they’d emerge in golden fluffy mounds. Still, they looked reasonably edible and smelled – er – okay. But there was no way on earth she’d let Flo know they were, well, dabbling. Fortunately Granny Westward’s recipe book was well hidden beneath the table-top debris.
‘They’re for this afternoon – my first meeting at the village hall,’ she explained glibly, handing Flo a mug. ‘You know how bad the committee are on providing refreshments. And Lance was here and well, got roped in.’
‘Hmmm …’ Flo remained unconvinced, but bravely reached for the baking tray.
Mitzi and Lance exchanged glances.
Flo took a bite, gave a little scream and frantically fanned her mouth. ‘H-h-hot! Bloody hot!’
Mitzi screwed her eyes up and held her breath. Whether the Powers of Persuasion Puddings did their trick or not wasn’t uppermost in her mind. She’d be happy if they were simply edible. And anyway, it didn’t hurt to experiment just a little. As Flo had been the most vociferous of her friends over Lance’s infidelity and had only ever been icily polite to him for the last ten years, it was worth a try.
Watching Flo chomping manfully through the small brown cake, Mitzi silently willed her to be nice to Lance. Just a little bit pleasant. Not quite so acidic. Anything.
‘There,’ Lance said solicitously as Flo finished chewing, ‘that wasn’t too bad, was it?’
Flo swallowed, looked rather startled, then a beatific smile spread across her angular features. Her eyes crinkled and her lips twitched with mischief. ‘Not bad at all. In fact, very nice indeed. May I have another?’
‘Of course.’ Armed with the oven gloves, Lance handed her the baking tray.
‘Thank you,’ Flo twinkled, flapping a coquettish hand at his arm. ‘Wonderfully cooked and perfectly served. And by such a handsome waiter …’
My God! Mitzi clutched at the table. She’s flirting with him!
‘Er—’ she snatched the baking tray from Lance. ‘I think that’ll do – otherwise there won’t be enough left for this afternoon.’
Flo grabbed Lance’s hand, fluttering her sparse eyelashes at him. ‘Oh, go on, Lancie – just one more. Don’t be mean.’
Lance shot a terrified glance at Mitzi, who gave an imperceptible shake of her head. Any more Powers of Persuasion Pudding and Flo would probably turn into full vamp mode – it didn’t bear thinking about.
‘Sorry,’ she said firmly, ‘they need to go into the tin now. Lance …’
With an audible sigh of relief, Lance tipped the remaining cakes into the tin.
‘What the hell is going on?’ He hissed at Mitzi. ‘What the devil did you do to her?’
‘Nothing at all …’ Mitzi muttered shakily. ‘It was the puddings wot done it … Tarnia Snepps here I come!’
Chapter Eight
POWERS OF PERSUASION PUDDINGS
A cup of wholemeal flour
Half a dozen large eggs
A slab of best butter
Chopped carnation petals
A sprinkling of dried gentian
A good handful of pulverised root ginger
Peeled and sliced grapes – black
A generous measure of brown sugar
Three large spoonfuls of black treacle
Beat eggs, flour and butter in large bowl until smooth.
Add carnations, gentian and ginger.
Beat again.
Beat in sugar and treacle.
Fold in grapes.
Pour mixture into small patty tins.
Bake in a hot oven until well risen and dark brown and steaming.
Remove each pudding on to rack to cool.
Note: To invoke full powers of persuasion, the cook of the puddings (and no one else) must silently will the eater of the puddings to do their bidding. This is strong herbal magic so do this only with the best of intentions.
It was bedlam. Everyone seemed to be speaking at once. Mitzi, on the stage behind a trestle table which, among its many indentations, proclaimed that Dave luvved Kirsty ‘4ever’, and something horrendously salacious about the vicar, peered into the body of Hazy Hassocks village hall with mounting trepidation.
Not only was it midnight dark owing to the granite clouds and howling gale outside, and the half a dozen 40-watt light bulbs inside, but it was also filled to capacity. True, half the people there were probably simply Hazy Hassocks residents who’d come along for a bit of a warm and a cup of tea, but even so.
The Powers of Persuasion Puddings were crammed into several Tupperware boxes behind Mitzi’s chair. She wasn’t sure she trusted them. The Wishes Come True happenings were easily explained – but Flo’s miraculous change of heart regarding Lance? Could that have any sort of rational explanation? Mitzi exhaled. They’d been nose to nose over the kitchen table, giggling like schoolchildren when she’d left.
Maybe Granny Westward’s herbal mixtures were really far more potent than any of them had realised. Maybe she should consign the recipe book to the attic where it belonged. Maybe she should – but she’d worry about that later. Right now she had other fish to fry.
‘Excuse me!’ Nervously, Mitzi cleared her throat. ‘Could I have your attention please?!’
No one took the slightest notice. The sea of heads continued chattering happily to their neighbours. Owing to the poor lighting, Mitzi was unable to distinguish the features of those sitting more than four rows back, but she could see all her library cronies: Trilby Man was sitting right in the front with Sally and June and Mick and the rest, his hat rammed down to his eyebrows, a rather intimidating clipboard across his knees. Mitzi hoped he wouldn’t ask any awkward questions.
There were a lot of strangers: she assumed these were the people who’d answered her Baby Boomers Collective ad and to whom she’d spoken on the phone. She wondered which one was Christopher – pyrotechnics and heavy metal? And Dorothy – snooker? But surely the Lily Savage lookalike had to be Ronnie – exotic dance?
Disconcertingly, the Bandings were also sitting in the front row. They had small tinfoil parcels on their laps and Day-Glo purple cycle helmets on their heads. Mitzi avoided their eyes.
She cleared her throat and hammered on the table with her fist. ‘Excuse me! Could I have a bit of hush?!’
The babble died away. All heads turned towards the stage. Several people waved.
‘Thank you,’ Mitzi muttered. Goodness, she was nervous. Her mouth was dry and her lips had developed a sort of curling nervous twitch. She probably looked like a bad Elvis impersonator. ‘Now – um – it’s lovely to see you all, and I’m Mitzi Blessing, and as everyone knows why we’re here today, I’ll get straight to business …’
‘Actually, Mitzi, I don’t know why we’re here,’ Lavender beamed up from the front row. ‘Neither does Lobelia. We just followed Mrs Lovestick. We thou
ght it might be a beetle drive. Like they have in the Snug of The Faery Glen on Thursdays after we’ve collected our pensions.’
‘That’s Wednesdays,’ someone said from the back. ‘Or it might be Tuesdays.’
‘No, Tuesdays is housey-housey. Thursday is bingo.’
‘Bingo is the same as housey-housey, stupid! And it is Tuesdays.’
‘It’d be better if housey-housey was on a Friday.’
‘Friday’s Whist Drive! Allus has been!’
‘Excuse me!’ Mitzi almost screamed above the noise. ‘Can we concentrate on the matter in hand? Thank you.’
Several people glowered. She ignored them.
‘There, you’ve just listed the things that are available in the pub – and very welcome they are – so that’s the sort of thing we want to get going here, isn’t it?’
Complete silence. Clearly not.
‘No, well, what I mean is, not the same as such …’ She stopped. Her palms were sweating. She was beginning to flounder. ‘No, we don’t want to repeat what Otto and Boris have on offer at the pub, of course. Most of you are aware of those anyway.’
Trilby Man brandished his clipboard. ‘Exactly. The stuff at The Faery Glen’s fine for the old codgers who can’t do much more than shuffle about and do a bit of eyes down and look in, but some of us wants more than that.’
‘Excuse me!’ Lobelia shot a viper look along the front row. ‘To whom are you referring as an old codger?’
‘If the cap fits …’
‘PLEASE!’ Mitzi thumped the table again, then scrabbled through her papers. ‘Ladies and gentlemen! I have drawn up a list here of who is interested in doing what, and then here, on this second list, who among you is available to teach new skills. And on this list—’ she held up a third sheet of paper ‘—I’ve done cross-referencing so that you can all get into groups and start organising yourselves into tutors and students.’
If she’d expected rapturous applause, she’d have been bitterly disappointed. Everyone simply stared.
‘That’s a bit complicated, Mitzi dear, if you don’t mind me saying so,’ Lavender adjusted her cycling helmet. ‘And I can’t read anything on that bit of paper from down here.’
‘I’ve made copies for everyone,’ Mitzi was close to tears. ‘I was going to pass them along the rows – and it isn’t complicated at all. Look, as an example, for all the people who said they’d be interested in learning ballroom dancing, you’re listed here, then on the second list are those who can dance and would be willing to teach it and – and here,’ she pointed to the third piece of paper, ‘are the names of both sets of people so you can get together. Similarly, for those keen on forming a football team—’
‘Yeah, yeah, we get the idea,’ Trilby Man interrupted. ‘Just get them bits of paper passed out and we’ll do the rest.’
Mitzi shot him a grateful glance. Maybe there was something to be said for having a bossy-boots in their midst after all.
The organised rows erupted into chaos as the sheets were passed round, chairs were abandoned, and everyone started shouting at everyone else. Mitzi watched the confusion with a sinking heart. With hindsight it would have been far more sensible to give them name badges.
‘Lavender’s putting the kettles on in the kitchen,’ Lobelia called up from the foot of the stage, ‘seeing as we don’t want to sign up for anything. We’ve brought our own sandwiches in case you forgot about food.’
Mitzi glanced down at the tinfoil package. Fish paste. She’d stake her life on it.
‘Cheese salad,’ Lobelia said. ‘A terrible expense, of course, but Shay says it’s important to have a balanced diet. And he knows because he’s medical. You should take a leaf out of his book, Mitzi dear. You look very drawn. And your complexion is quite yellow. You haven’t been hitting the bottle in your lonely moments, have you? Your liver is probably shrivelling to the size of a walnut as we speak. We understand about isolation, dear, none better. Mind you, now we’ve got young Shay, our lives have changed beyond recognition. You should get one.’
A resident paramedic? Not a bad idea.
‘Where’s the biscuits?’ Lavender had joined Lob. ‘I’ve made the tea and put out the plates and the doilies and the cups are on the trays – but there weren’t any biscuits.’ She looked accusingly at Mitzi. ‘You did remember biscuits, didn’t you, dear? We know how easy it is to forget little things when your mind starts to go.’
‘Here—’ Mitzi scrambled behind her chair, snatched at several of the Tupperware boxes, and passed them down from the stage. ‘They’re not biscuits exactly – they’re sort of fairy cakes.’
‘Oooh, lovely …’
‘Take one each and then share the rest round when you do the teas,’ Mitzi said. ‘You can’t have them all.’
Goodness knows what might happen if the Bandings necked back the entirety of Granny Westward’s weird mixture.
‘And why are you wearing cycle helmets indoors? You did remember to lock your bicycles, didn’t you? You know what the kiddies are like round here.’
‘Goodness,’ Lavender chortled, ‘we didn’t cycle here, Mitzi, dear. At our age? Whatever next! No, we walked.’
‘Then, why …?’
‘Because Shay said they were imperative,’ Lobelia said with a grave expression. ‘He said he’d been to an RAC and that a little boy had been badly hurt because he hadn’t been wearing a helmet and—’
‘She means RTA,’ Lavender broke in. ‘She’s useless at Scrabble. But yes, young Shay said everyone must wear cycle helmets. All the time.’ She beamed up at Mitzi. ‘You must get one, dear. It’d suit you.’
‘Please just hand the cakes round,’ Mitzi whimpered. ‘And make sure no one takes more than one.’
The scrum ensuing in the hall still resembled a sort of lunatic Paul Jones without the music.
Lav and Lob, always happy in a crisis, scurried among the crowd dishing out tea and the little dark-brown cakes. The refreshments seemed to be going down better than the organising.
‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ Mitzi muttered, sinking down onto the chair again. ‘Don’t let this turn into yet another dismal Hazy Hassocks failure. Just let them sort themselves out.’
She wasn’t quite sure what had changed, and when or how, but something certainly had. The hall wasn’t quite so manic. The noise wasn’t quite so loud. And the heaving knot seemed to have miraculously separated into neat and orderly groups dotted through the village hall’s gloom.
Blimey, Mitzi thought faintly, it worked.
And twenty minutes later it was still working. Coincidence of course. Again. They would have managed it without the Powers of Persuasion Puddings. Of course they would – wouldn’t they?
Lavender and Lobelia, brown crumbs dusting their upper lips, seemed to have attached themselves to the cricket team. Looking on the bright side, at least they wouldn’t have to shell out for the protective headgear.
Trilby Man, clutching a sheaf of papers, bounded up onto the stage. ‘Any more of them crunchy cakes left, Mrs B? Went down a treat. No? Damn. Well, okay – this is what we’ve got sorted so far …’
Mitzi studied the lists. It all seemed to be extremely well organised. She was particularly delighted to see that her library friends had managed to find several things to do. And even some of the more odd requests from the phone callers seemed to have found a home. If it worked as well in real life as it appeared on paper, then Hazy Hassocks’s grey army would have plenty to get their teeth into. The Baby Boomers Collective was – fingers crossed – practically up and running. Why on earth no one had thought about it before she had no idea. All they had to do now was arrange regular meetings each week to get the final details ironed out and follow up the progress. Wednesday afternoons would be a good idea. She’d suggest it later.
She beamed at Trilby Man. ‘This looks really great. Now all we need to do is fix a time to meet for updates and things, and book the village hall for the indoor classes, say once or twice a week for eac
h activity, and of course, find somewhere outside for the sporty stuff.’
‘Snepps Fields would be ideal.’
Mitzi pulled a face. Snepps Fields were completely out of the question. Tarnia guarded the use of the village hall with all the watchfulness and vengeful fury of Cerberus; trying to get her to agree to the hoi polloi playing rough games on her meadows would be absolutely impossible.
‘Leave it with me. I’ll have to speak to Tarnia about all this anyway.’
‘Rather you than me,’ Trilby Man said mournfully. ‘And if you haven’t squared it with her already, then we might as well kiss it all goodbye. The old bag has always squashed anything we’ve suggested before.’
‘Yes I know but—’
‘But nothing,’ Trilby Man looked most disgruntled. ‘What’s the point in raising all their hopes—’ he jerked his head towards the body of the hall ‘—only to tell them that they can’t have their dancing and firework displays and football and heavy metal bands and—’
‘They’re going to form a heavy metal band?’ Mitzi interrupted. ‘Really? How lovely!’
‘Yeah, well, may as well tell ’em not to bother now … or the dance troupe … or the ones what want to put on a musical …’
Mitzi gave a little groan. It all sounded wonderful. An over-fifties revolution … But if she couldn’t persuade Tarnia to allow them to use the facilities it would all sink without trace and it would be her fault for raising hopes and – she looked down at the stage. A solitary Tupperware box lurked behind her chair. She smiled to herself. Could she? Should she?
Well, why not? It was worth a try, wasn’t it?
‘Just leave it with me,’ she said firmly. ‘I’ll go and see Tarnia as soon as we’ve finished here. It’ll be fine, you’ll see.’
An hour later, sitting in her Mini outside Tarnia Snepps’s house on the outskirts of Hazy Hassocks, Mitzi wasn’t feeling anywhere near so confident. She’d left the village hall like some sort of conquering hero – they’d all been so delighted with the strides the Baby Boomers had made. And they were all now relying on her to secure the use of the hall and the land and the facilities so that their plans could blossom into reality. It was all down to her – and Tarnia Snepps.
Hubble Bubble Page 9
