‘I think it’s really thoughtful of you, Nye,’ Mu said. ‘Why don’t you come in? I’ll make some fresh coffee – or tea?’
Traitor.
‘Coffee would be wonderful,’ he said, tiredly pushing tumbled white-gold hair off his forehead and leaving a greyish streak in its place, which strangely did nothing to mar his looks.
‘I’ve been working all day – the policemen interrupted me – but apart from that . . .’
I didn’t let him get further than the kitchen. Not only was he covered in clay, but I didn’t want to encourage him to stay; the room seemed very full of him, his long legs occupying half the floor space under the table.
‘When you didn’t show up at the studio I assumed you were otherwise occupied, with the cat and the police,’ he said to me. ‘But evidently not.’
Mu gave me a thoughtful look. ‘We went out this afternoon to Oxwich Bay, Nye. I didn’t know you’d definitely agreed to meet at the castle.’
I gave stirring the coffee the careful attention it deserved. ‘We didn’t. I might have said I’d call in sometime.’
‘And we passed by it, too!’ Mu said regretfully. ‘I’d love to see your work, Nye, but perhaps Sappho could come tomorrow and then tell me about it, because I’m going home first thing. Will you be there tomorrow?’
‘I’m always there.’
‘You aren’t now,’ I pointed out, rather snappily.
‘I left early – I wanted to make sure you were all right.’ He frowned. ‘Too many odd things seem to be happening lately, what with Dorinda Ace vanishing, and your cat being hurt, and then Lili. But Lili might be an accident, and the cat your loopy boyfriend’s doing.’
‘Ex. Long-past ex.’
Miranda walked in through the open door. ‘Sappho? Oh, there you are – and Mu. I’ve b-been to see Lili, and she’s going to be fine – they might let her out on Tuesday. Only she says she can’t remember anything. She asked me to d-drop a note off for D-Dave D-Devlyn, which is odd, isn’t it? Except they d-did seem friendly, so perhaps—’
She stopped dead, having spotted Nye, and blushed.
‘Hello, Miranda.’
‘Never mind him,’ I said dismissively. ‘Sit down – have some coffee while it’s still hot.’
Nye cast me one of his unfathomable looks, though how you can be so very fair and yet look so darkly brooding is beyond me. At least the leaden aspect had departed, leaving just a hint of gunpowder smoke in its place.
He smiled enchantingly at Miranda, though. ‘I know all about Dave,’ he said helpfully. ‘I think I know all about everything,’ he added after a minute’s thought. ‘Mu filled me in last night.’
I gave her a look – how long was I asleep on that sofa? Long enough for my entire life history?
‘I’m sure Lili must have just slipped and caught her head,’ Miranda said. ‘And the cat – well, D-Dave seems likely, he’s so jealous of you and he hates cats . . . and he d-did leave the party for a while. B-but he says he was gone only a few minutes, and then he went upstairs with this girl.’
‘Chris came here,’ I said. ‘But that was just pure nosiness.’
‘And Gil went out for a few minutes too, the police said,’ Mu added.
‘Oh, it wasn’t Gil – he likes cats. Anyway, he just wouldn’t,’ Miranda declared confidently. ‘I hope the police aren’t going to start b-bothering him again. He certainly wasn’t gone long enough to get up to the cottage where they found Lili and b-back.’
‘Maybe it was later,’ I suggested, ‘and Lili’d arranged to meet someone there – like Nye.’
‘Leaving aside the fact that the police say she was struck before the heavy rain, when you may recall we were otherwise engaged, why would I want to do that?’ he asked.
‘She had a hold on you?’ I suggested.
‘Blameless past,’ he said, unimpressed.
‘You were secretly married and—’
‘No I wasn’t!’
‘You were having an affair and—’
‘You must know I wasn’t interested in her. Why are you trying to prove it was me?’
Our eyes met and I said, surprised, ‘I’m not – just tossing out various scenarios.’
‘It’s not very fair to poor Nye, though,’ objected Mu. ‘We know he didn’t do it. This isn’t a novel.’
‘Ah, yes – the novels,’ Nye said, and stared at me broodingly again. ‘I started Vengeane: Dark Hours, Dark Deeds last night when I got home.’
‘Weren’t you too tired?’ I blurted out, and then blushed.
‘Yes, but I feel it may hold the key to everything. Some of the characters seem strangely familiar.’
Oh God! I may have to leave the country sooner than I’d thought . . .
Miranda sighed. ‘I’m so tired, I’m going to go home. Sorry for b-bursting in like that b-but I got to thinking and . . .’
‘It’s all right,’ I said.
‘I only hope D-Dave d-doesn’t d-do something in a jealous rage b-because you left with Nye last night,’ she added. ‘B-but then, if he and Lili got friendly . . .?’
I yawned. ‘He won’t be around for long – he’ll take his photos and go away, and anyway, I’m not afraid of him.’
‘You could force the issue,’ Nye suggested. ‘Meet me at this pub he’s staying in for a drink tomorrow night, and see if he’s jealous or indifferent. At least I’ll be there to protect you if he turns nasty. And perhaps seeing you friendly with someone else is all it needs to make him see he’s holding out false hopes.’
‘I’m not friendly with anyone else,’ I said coldly.
‘You can pretend.’
‘That might be a good idea,’ Mu said. ‘I’m worried about leaving you here alone tomorrow.’
‘With the cat – unless you’d like to take her back with you?’
‘You need her, even if she isn’t stone proof.’
‘I’m fine on my own,’ I insisted.
‘Of course, if you’re too frightened to try it – or too scared of me—’ Nye began.
‘I certainly am not! I’ll come with you tomorrow, but don’t blame me if it gets rough.’
‘He’s old enough and certainly big enough to take care of himself,’ Mu said. ‘She accepts your offer, Nye.’
‘Thank you,’ Nye said. ‘And what have I got to lose? If he’s still hung up on Sappho, isn’t he going to have it in for me already? I might as well get some pleasure out of the situation.’
‘What sort of pleasure did you have in mind?’ I asked suspiciously.
‘The pleasure of your company, what else? Don’t go out after dark,’ he added, like I’m going to take any notice of him.
Chapter 27
Sweet and Sour
Did the usual chunk of novel the following morning. Nala was vacillating in a most unusual and annoying way.
She hadn’t quite accepted that Raarg, however handsome, was not the man for her, or that it would be better to rule and live alone than be overwhelmed mentally and physically by Dragonslayer.
I wasn’t sure my readers were ready to accept that, either.
When I’d finished it was time to drive Mu to catch her train, but unfortunately minus the cat.
She was high as a kite with nerves and excitement – but also full of enthusiastic plans for her Indiana Cat-type book, which was taking shape. It was strange how everything was sort of bursting into bloom at once.
‘Now you can go home and spend the rest of the day making yourself beautiful for Nye’s benefit,’ she informed me, standing in the carriage doorway.
‘It would be more likely to put Dave off me if I looked an absolute dog – and I don’t know why I said I’d go to the pub with Nye. It’s a stupid idea. If Dave is there, he’ll just make a scene.’
‘Yes, but he thinks you’ve saved yourself for him all these years, so if he sees you involved with another man it might just disillusion him: shock him back to his senses, even.’
‘I’m not sure he’s got any, ot
her than touch and taste. And what if it was he who attacked Sphinx, and even Lili? If he did, then he’s just a bit over the edge, don’t you think? And seeing me with a rival might push him into doing something even worse.’
‘I thought you didn’t believe he did those things? Haven’t you been telling me all these years that he’s just harmlessly malicious?’ she said.
I shivered suddenly. ‘Yes, but there was something in his eyes at the party that – well, it didn’t frighten me exactly, but it made me think he was just a little demented on the subject of yours truly. I can’t imagine why.’
Mu gave me a hug. ‘I’d better get in before the train leaves me behind. And don’t worry – Nye will look after you!’
I think he’s already done that, and once was enough.
But on the whole I had a feeling that if I tried to wriggle out of tonight he’d come and get me. I didn’t know why he wanted to get involved in my affairs, but I supposed, as he said, he was big enough to look after himself.
Mu pushed the door window down. ‘Don’t cut off your nose to spite your face: I’d go anywhere Nye asked me, Ambler or no Ambler!’ she called.
‘No you wouldn’t – you’re all talk and no action,’ I said rudely as the train began to pull out.
As soon as I got home the Three Graces waylaid me, although two of them departed to jobs after greeting me, leaving Violet in charge of the interrogation.
Could they be a family-sized coven?
‘Heard about that Lili Ford Jakes woman,’ she informed me. ‘Lavender and Poppy think she was just drunk and fell while trying to shelter from the rain. Shame, though. Still, Miranda says she’s going to be out of hospital tomorrow, though she can’t remember anything about it.’
‘Perhaps it’ll come back to her?’
‘Perhaps it will, and then we’ll know the answer to “Did she fall or was she crushed?”’ she chortled. ‘Wearing your cape too, wasn’t she? Makes you wonder – especially after your cat got struck by a stone the same night. Quite a coincidence.’
‘Isn’t it? Lili borrowed my rain cape since I’d left it behind at Miranda’s party.’
‘Was that when you borrowed the man she had her eye on?’
Good grief! Does she know everything? This isn’t bush telegraph, it’s bush telepathy!
She chuckled. ‘Adonis! Nice man, though.’
‘You know Nye, don’t you?’
‘Know all the people in the Castle Craft place – have tea in the café there twice a week with my friends, for a gossip.’
She peered over the hedge as if someone might be hiding behind it and added, sotto voce: ‘There was a man hanging round outside your barn earlier – dark, handsome, bit-of-a-devil type.’
Dave to a T. I suppose he didn’t dare come nearer because of the cat. There was no sign of him now, but I was starting to think having my front door on this side of the house, so people couldn’t lurk unseen, would definitely be a good move.
‘The ex-boyfriend, I presume?’ Violet said interrogatively. ‘Had the look of it: thwarted Heathcliff. I hear he’s staying at the village pub.’
She must be a witch – but at least she couldn’t know about Nye and me on the rock . . . could she?
To my relief she changed tack. ‘That friend of yours, Muriel, was out in the garden with a cat yesterday.’
‘Mu,’ I corrected. ‘Her name isn’t Muriel.’
‘I don’t see what else it can be short for,’ she said, but I just smiled enigmatically.
‘What did you think of the cat?’
It turned out that she’s dying for a weird kitten just like mine if Coochie and Ankaret will oblige again.
The Gower will be overrun with enormous and peculiar moggies.
Miranda delivered a rush-order bouquet before lunch – to me.
It was a Victorian-style Declaration of Love posy – I didn’t need to read the booklet. Lemon geranium – the meeting; red roses – declaration of love; stocks – lasting beauty; phlox – unanimity; and heliotrope – love and devotion.
There was no card – I suppose the flowers said it all, as they were meant to – but it was from Dave. He’d discovered Miranda was running Fantasy Flowers and assumed she’d been the one who had set it up originally, and she hadn’t disillusioned him.
Miranda said he’d been Mr Charming when he ordered the posy, apologizing for spiking the punch and telling her he loved me just as much as ever. He seemed to think I’d just taken Nye for a walk (like a dog) on the night of the party, in order to make him jealous.
Miranda said her heart was a little touched, he seemed so sincere, and I said in that case she was touched in more ways than one.
Nye picked me up at seven and for once he was not streaked with clay, so maybe he wasn’t on the warpath this time. But I did think he must have had second thoughts about the scheme, because his mind was so clearly elsewhere.
I asked him if he wanted to call it off, and he came back from wherever it was for long enough to say, with some surprise, that he didn’t and he was hungry, so hurry up.
Friendly but detached, like the cat. Just what I wanted, wasn’t it?
I’d sort of assumed we’d eat at the Newt and Rocket in the village, but instead we drove into Swansea in his little white van (which was a trifle basic as to comfort, and reeked of wet clay and damp sacking), and went to a Chinese restaurant.
I wield a mean pair of chopsticks.
All through the meal Nye kept scribbling things on bright Post-it notes, but after a bit he seemed to come back to Planet Earth and put them away in his pocket.
‘Dragonslayer was abstracted – something was occupying his mind to the exclusion of all else, including her presence . . .’
‘Sorry, did you say something?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said hastily, pressing the Off button. Perhaps a memo device on a cord was a little bulky for personal jewellery, but if I leave it behind I always regret it.
‘I’m ignoring you,’ he said kindly, ‘but I was just working something out, and you know how it is when your mind’s on your work?’
I nodded. I did understand, though I couldn’t imagine what was vital about the design of a mug or plate. Still, he was obviously a dedicated craftsman, which is something all writers ought to be too, and often aren’t. Sloppy workmanship.
Now he’d fully resurfaced he was again the man of the night of the party – the one before we jumped off the Point of No Return.
It was like putting a familiar coat on: something in cut velvet, with a five-figure price tag attached. I knew I couldn’t afford it, but I enjoyed wrapping it around me just for a while.
He has a deepish voice, which is just as well: you don’t want a man that size who squeaks (assuming you want a man).
He said all the chalet dwellers in Preece’s Plot had been served notice to fold their tents and steal away, because the demolition was due to take place in the autumn.
‘But surely they’re Victorian, aren’t they? Shouldn’t they be preserved for posterity, or something?’
‘I don’t think posterity wants them. They’re decayed to the point of no return. We’ve all bodged them up as best we can, because the landlord’s been letting them fall about our ears in an attempt to get us out. I love it down there, but there’s no mains sanitation, the water’s from standpipes, and there’s a bit of a rat problem.’
‘Rats?’
‘Mostly outside the houses,’ he said nonchalantly, ‘but these being wooden chalets the rats sometimes chew their way in. And mice, of course, but they’re not so much of a problem.’
Or merely not such a big problem?
‘So, how long do you have before you move out? And where will you go?’
‘Until September. A few people wanted to try to barricade themselves in to stop the development, but really it’s on its last legs anyway. So some of them are going to go and live in the yurt village up in North Wales, and a couple of the families will probably be rehomed by the counci
l, and then the rest of us will just have to find somewhere else.’
‘Do you know where yet?’
‘No. But I haven’t really thought about it. I might find a cottage to rent, but now the Gower’s so trendy I could be priced out of the market and end up in a caravan.’
‘You don’t strike me as a happy camper.’
He grinned. ‘I don’t really care where I live as long as I’ve got the workshop, though somewhere with a studio so I could work at home would be perfect. Maybe one day . . .’
‘But you need the craft centre as an outlet to sell, don’t you?’
‘Not really. I sell almost everything I make through commission, or London galleries.’
‘Oh?’ Really, I ought to go down and see what it was he actually produced. He must be good at it . . . as well as other things.
‘I’ll come down to the castle tomorrow and look round.’
‘I’ve heard that before. I’m just surprised you didn’t chicken out of tonight.’
‘I am not, and never have been, a coward!’ I stated.
‘Is that why you drove off the first time we met, after drenching me in icy mud?’
‘I pulled in, didn’t I? If you hadn’t lost your appalling temper and looked as if you were going to murder me, I would have stayed.’
‘I haven’t got an appalling temper and I wouldn’t have hurt you, I was just going to ask you if you had a wheel brace.’
‘A likely story. And I don’t know why you insist you don’t have a bad temper when you seem to lose it so easily.’
He stared at me in seething silence for a moment, but his eyes were only hint-of-a-tint, so I knew he wasn’t really mad.
You know, I thought, his eyelashes are really interesting – darker at the roots and shading off towards gold at the end – and the more I look at him, the more readily I could believe he’s from another planet.
The more I looked at him, the wider his grin got.
I looked away hastily, and laid my chopsticks down. ‘Well, that was a very nice meal,’ I said, declining the dessert menu. ‘And I’ve enjoyed this evening – there’s no reason why we can’t be friends, after all.’
‘After all what?’
A Leap of Faith Page 21
