Last-Minute Bridesmaid

by Nina Harrington

  Heath stood back up and looked in silence towards the silent house, where two of Alice’s younger cousins had just arrived, before replying in a tone of total disbelief, ‘So you expect me to organise a party? For this evening? Without any advance notice?’ And he shook his head slowly from side to side.

  Kate held out the side of her jacket and gave a small curtsey. ‘You are welcome. Leave the extras to me. In return I shall expect you to willingly volunteer to stand on a ladder and attach a range of bunting and balloons to the ceiling. And smile while you are doing it. Right? Of course right. The other guests will be dragooned and shanghaied into similar duties and you will all have a thoroughly enjoyable time. Now,’ she said, checking her watch, ‘we don’t have much time. I need to get back to my place to pick up some gloves and then to Saskia’s for the party stuff, then whizz back here pronto to put it all up...and where are you going?’

  ‘This was your crazy plan and I have a mountain of work to do.’

  Kate grabbed hold of his hand and held it with all of the strength that she could muster.

  ‘Not a chance, Mister. I wasn’t kidding just now. I need someone who can do the heavy lifting and that person is you. Joining in and doing something different just to please your old pater. Making it convincing. Right?’

  ‘You cannot be serious.’

  ‘I have never been more serious in my life. But relax.’ She laughed as he groaned. ‘You can work in the car if you must. How bad can it be?’

  SEVEN

  How bad could it be?

  Until that morning Heath had no idea how frustrating it was to be a passenger in a car, which smelt of his father, being driven by a girl who insisted on keeping below the speed limit on every single road, lane, highway and alley between the Manor and the quaint London street where she lived.

  It had become very apparent, very quickly, that Kate had not owned a car since passing her driving test. Why should she when she lived in London and worked in London and enjoyed public transport in London?

  So basically he was sitting next to a girl who had not driven a car for ten years. The concept of a global positioning system was a mystery to her and he had been obliged to use his smartphone to compensate for her total lack of a sense of direction after they had driven around the same roundabout three times looking for the exit back to London.

  The real problem, of course, was that with the radio on and Kate chattering about the party extras which she wanted to pick up from Saskia’s house, his mind was running on overtime and top speed about the conversation that he had just had with his father back at the Manor.

  Just when he thought that he was starting to create some form of working relationship with his father, Charles Sheridan had confirmed his worst suspicions.

  The rumours were true.

  He had been looking at contract printing overseas. No decisions, not yet, but to him it really was a viable option. Other companies and publishers were doing it, so why couldn’t Sheridan Press?

  But what really stung was that his father simply could not understand why Heath was so angry at not being informed when the market was already buzzing with rumours about the future of the Boston print works.

  They had worked together for weeks on the new promotional campaign that Lucas was rolling out and not once, during all of those chatty business dinners and coffee breaks, had his father said one word about looking for other book printers.

  Communication skills were clearly not a Sheridan strength.

  Heath pressed his fingertips firmly into his forehead and tried to drill some insights and flashes of inspiration into his skull.

  Perhaps he should be thanking Kate for providing him with a valid excuse to walk away from his father that morning and snatch the thinking time he desperately needed on his own.

  The ramifications and pressure of what he needed to do and how fast he needed to work burned through his mind, so that by the time Kate bump parked the truck of a car onto the pavement outside her house, his nerves were shot, he felt exhausted and his shoulders ached with tension.

  It was with huge relief that Heath could finally stretch out his long legs and he ran around to her side of the vehicle to open the driver’s door for her.

  ‘How very gallant.’ She smiled and grabbed her bag from the foot well of the car. ‘I must say you have been an excellent passenger and not criticised my driving once, despite the small diversions now and again, and for that I thank you. In fact, you have been so splendid that if you want to come inside for a moment as a special treat I will let you peek inside my parlour.’

  She turned on the pavement and leant closer towards him. ‘I don’t usually allow visitors to see where the magic happens, you understand, but in your case I’m prepared to make an exception.’

  ‘How can I possibly refuse such an enticing invitation?’ he said, smiling. Some of the exhaustion rolled off his shoulders as he waited for Kate to find her keys in the huge shoulder bag and open up the shop in the unbroken sunshine.

  The quiet street was a mixture of private homes and small shops, no more than two storeys high. All of the buildings must have been homes at one time and some of them had been converted into shops at the bottom floor. It was really an enchanting area. Quiet but close to the hustle and bustle of the city.

  The sort of place where a person could get to know their neighbours in the community and make a home. He almost envied Kate for having that privilege.

  The only place he had ever truly called home was the tall stone-built house in Boston, where he had lived with his parents until he was seventeen. Since then home had been university accommodation, followed by a series of hotels, apartments and rented houses like the one he was living in now. Efficient, modern, clean. But not home.

  Strange. He had never really thought about that until today.

  Tiredness did that to people. Made them melancholy. And he was tired, so very tired.

  Maybe next week he should make the effort to take some time out and relax more. The next few weeks were going to be tough. He needed to stay sharp. Even the keenest knife needed to be sharpened now and again.

  Suddenly there was a rustle of papers and movement and he looked around just as Kate beckoned to him to follow her into the hallway of her terraced house.

  When he’d come around to pick her up that morning, Saskia had chatted away merrily to him on the doorstep and handed him Kate’s luggage, so this was the first time that he had actually stepped inside her home.

  The hallway was narrow and long and seemed to extend towards a kitchen area past a steep staircase, which must go to the bedrooms.

  Kate paused outside a door to his left, withdrew a small brass key from her purse and carefully turned it in the lock. He followed her inside, but immediately halted at the door with shock at what he was looking at.

  It was one of the most depressing rooms he had ever seen.

  Despite the bright July sunshine outside on the pavement, the room was dark and gloomy and lit only by an electric light bulb which hung from the ceiling on a twisted cord so that it looked more like a museum or a store room than a functional workspace.

  The faint light only seemed to make the shadows darker and he could barely make out what the dark shapes on three large work tables could possibly be used for. Rows of hand tools hung from a rail along one wall opposite the door. Some he recognised from the print works in Boston but others were a complete mystery.

  Large transparent plastic storage tubs with coloured lids were stacked three or four high across the floor so that he had to move slowly between the boxes to actually walk into the room.

  As he did so clouds of dust rose up and he ran his finger across the nearest work table, leaving a trail in the dirt.

  Kate could not possibly work under these conditions. And why was it so dark? The warehouse studio for
Katherine Lovat Designs had been light and clean and modern and the exact opposite to what he was looking at now.

  ‘I take it that housekeeping is not one of your strong points,’ he murmured, trying to make an effort to be charitable. ‘And what is that smell?’

  She snorted a reply and pulled out yet another cardboard box from a wide shelf labelled with fading handwritten paper tags, which he tried to peer at but he couldn’t make out the words.

  ‘Not a priority,’ she replied with a cough, as a thick layer of dust drifted off the lid of the box as she opened it and she tried to waft it away one-handed. ‘As for the smell? That’s from the leather which is laid out on those wide flat shelves at the back. I rather like it myself.’

  ‘A suggestion,’ he coughed. ‘Perhaps you might see more clearly if I opened the curtains?’ And with that he moved slowly towards the window, but he had only taken a couple of steps when Kate stepped back and placed one hand on his wrist and held it tight with a remarkably firm grip.

  ‘The sunlight fades the leather and the paper patterns—’ she shrugged ‘—and we will only need a few more minutes.’ And then she sighed and her shoulders slumped dramatically. ‘Ah. There you are. Sneaky little devil. What are you doing with the fuchsia satin bracelet-lengths?’

  He folded his arms and stared at her in silence for a few seconds.

  ‘Do you often talk to cartons?’

  ‘Frequently,’ Kate replied with a grin, and held up four slim cream-coloured boxes. ‘Result!’

  ‘Aren’t you going to check what is inside? There might be moths or they might be damaged or something.’

  Her eyebrows went north. ‘Moths? Through three layers of cardboard? I will have you know that my French grandmother may not have had the finest command of the English language, but she was one of the neatest and most orderly people that I have ever met. Only pristine gloves were packed into Lovat boxes ready for the department stores. There are no moths here.’

  ‘And how many years have they been on those shelves?’

  Her hands stilled and she looked up at the stacks and stacks of bulging cartons with their fading labels and blinked as though she was working through the calculations.

  ‘Nana died when I was about nine, so it has to be twenty years.’ A faint whimpering sigh escaped her lips and her tongue flicked out and moistened her lower lip. ‘Wow. I had forgotten it had been that long.’ She looked up at the shelves and whispered, ‘I really must do a stocktake one day soon.’

  ‘But not today! I don’t think we have enough time,’ Heath said between his teeth.

  She squeezed her eyes tight into slits and tutted. Loudly. ‘Patience is a virtue, you know. But, if it will make you happy, you can take these into the hall and we can check them together before we leave.’

  She shoved the slim boxes into his hands. ‘I am expecting to see a size seven and five-eighths. White lace elbow gloves and please don’t get them dirty. Now scoot. I have three more pairs to find and I don’t want to be late for Saskia.’

  ‘Heaven forfend.’ He gave her a two finger to the forehead salute. ‘I shall be right outside.’

  Heath wandered back into the hall and lowered the boxes onto an antique console table and wiped his fingers on a snowy white handkerchief. He was just about to open the lids when his gaze fell on a framed photograph on the wall to his left.

  The sunlight streaming in through the coloured glass panel above the front door filled the narrow hallway with rainbow light and he could clearly make out the faces of the people in the photographs.

  A young couple were standing in front of a shop front which looked familiar. He stepped closer and smiled. Little wonder—he was standing inside that same shop.

  The woman was tiny, dark-haired and stunningly pretty and was smiling up into the face of a tall, slim, handsome man with curly dark hair. His arm was around her shoulders and he was grinning back at her with an expression of such love that it seemed to reach out and grab Heath and force him to look closer.

  They looked so very happy.

  ‘Ah, I see that you have found my grandparents,’ Kate said behind him and he half turned back towards her as she staggered out with even more boxes. ‘That photo was taken on the day they opened Lovat Gloves.’ She grinned and shook her head. ‘Look at them. Do you know the weird thing? He was still looking at her like that the day she died.’

  ‘He was very handsome.’

  ‘George Lovat was a remarkable man and I adored him. He taught me so much. They both did.’

  Then Kate sucked in a breath and bit her lower lip. ‘Come and see this,’ she said, gesturing with her head back into the workroom.

  Heath winced and looked at his watch. ‘I don’t think that we have the time to...’

  She grabbed his hand and slipped her fingers between his. They were tiny and warm and without a moment of hesitation his fingers meshed with hers as though it was the most natural thing to do in the world.

  It all happened so fast that his brain was still catching up as Kate marched through the door with her arm outstretched, tugging him behind her.

  ‘That was where Nana sat—making gloves under the window. She said she needed the light for the fine stitching and her sewing machine but I think she just liked to see the garden she had planted. Now, Granddad, he was over here on the other side of the room, at his workbench with all of his leather work tools laid out on the bench. He pretended not to notice when Nana hummed to herself as she worked but we could all see the little smile on his face.’

  Her forefinger touched the corner of her mouth. ‘Just here. Then we used to giggle together until she realised that she was singing and rolled her eyes and laughed at us.’

  Kate’s gaze locked onto an old sewing machine. ‘Singer, you see. She was singing while she was using her sewing machine, which was made by...’

  He chuckled out loud. ‘I get it.’ His shoulders relaxed and they stood in easy comfort for the first time, her fingers completely enclosed in his paw. ‘I’m not sure I could do that. Work with my wife in the same room day after day. Didn’t they ever want to rent a workshop somewhere?’

  ‘Nope. They loved being together, working side by side. Each had their own skill and craft but somehow the different types of creativity and different types of customer worked. Nana sold ladies’ gloves to the big London department stores so she worked alone most of the time and that suited her very well. While Granddad?’

  She gestured towards an old pedestal chair with a cracked leather seat.

  ‘This was where he sat every day. I can see him now, hunched up in front of his work station, a bright lamp shining down on the leather, waiting for him to finish sharpening his scalpel blade and cut the intricate pattern on the lovely piece of leather that he had selected from the wide shelves behind him for this particular piece of work.’

  She dragged her feet over to the work table and flicked on the light.

  Kate’s face broke out into a huge grin and she laughed up at Heath and swung his hand from side to side. ‘He loved chatting with the customers who came to see him with their projects. And they came from everywhere. He specialised in gloves for theatres and film studios, so there were wardrobe experts from all over London—and beyond—knocking on the door day and sometimes night. Oh, they were such real characters—but they all had the same passion.’

  She leant forwards and whispered, ‘Gloves.’

  Then she stepped back. ‘But you know all about passion, Mr Big Powerful Publisher.’

  Heath peered at the handwritten labels and made out words like feathers and diamanté.

  Tools were neatly laid out next to a modern sewing machine and glove templates hung from a teacup hook screwed into the shelf. Wooden hands stood upright on top of a cabinet with gloves on them. All different. All special. All...sad.

  H
e felt Kate’s fingers take a tighter grip around his, as though she had to hold on to something solid and real.

  They stood in silence for a second and he inhaled the dust and heady atmosphere of a confined space, which seemed totally wrong somehow for this girl with so much verve and life and positive energy.

  Why did she keep the door locked when all there was inside was a dark, lonely place?

  ‘Do you live here alone?’ Heath finally asked, desperate to break the gloomy silence of the space.

  ‘Oh, no—I have the ghosts and memories of my grandparents to keep me company.’

  He couldn’t resist it. He had to chuckle out loud. ‘Not so useful when you need someone to talk to—or do you talk to them anyway?’

  ‘Wonderful inventions, telephones,’ she said, smiling. ‘I call upon my friends and amuse them with idle chatter about the silly things that have been happening in the world of tailoring or I go around to Saskia’s place and help her with the house.’

  ‘But they don’t come here, do they?’

  She half turned to face him in the tight, closed-in space and in the harsh light from the lamp he could see the dark shadows of her cheekbones.

  ‘No, Heath. I rarely invite anyone into my parlour,’ she said in a sad, low voice, which had the power to reach out and draw him in.

  ‘Because of the ghosts?’

  A faint smile flashed across her lips and she winked. ‘Absolutely—they hate strangers barging into their home. And they refuse to talk to anyone except me so it would be terribly rude for guests.’

  He glanced around before coming back to gaze into her sweet, lovely face. He was missing her smile suddenly and that flash of her green eyes when she irked him.

  ‘You’re quite right. I can’t hear a thing. But what do they say to you?’

  He could see a shiver run across her shoulders, and instinctively moved closer to give her some of his warmth. It might be a hot July afternoon outside, but the ghosts of Kate’s past walked in this room and called her name.

  ‘What do they say? Katherine, Katherine, why haven’t you cleaned me? Why do you keep the door locked? You cannot seriously be still waiting for your parents to give up their scientific careers and make this a happy place like it used to be? That is not going to happen. That ship has sailed, sweet girl. They aren’t coming back. They are not. Coming back.’