by Marie Laval
Cassie moaned. ‘I see you haven’t given up on that silly idea of a reunion sing-along.’
‘It will be a laugh, you’ll see.’
‘It’ll be a disaster! We haven’t rehearsed anything. I’m not even sure I can remember any of the songs.’
‘The words will be on the screen, and we could never sing that well anyway, so it will be just like the old days. Oh, I nearly forgot… Bring your feather duster too.’
‘Whatever for? So I can do a spot of cleaning in the pub between songs?’
‘You’ll need it to tickle people. You’re the good mood fairy after all.’
‘Tickling random people as they eat and drink will make them choke, not laugh.’
‘Just do as I say, will you? Wait a sec, your granddad wants to talk to you. I’ll put him on.’
There were muffled sounds as Rachel put the phone down then her granddad’s voice bellowed down the phone. ‘Hello! Is that you, Trifle? Can you hear me?’
Cassie grimaced and pulled the phone away from her ear. ‘Yes, Granddad, you don’t need to shout.’
He explained that he needed fresh clothes, his smart suit and shoes for the wedding. ‘Can you also take some money from the cash machine? My card and the pin number are in their usual place in the filing cabinet upstairs.’
She sighed. How many times had she told him not to keep his bank details together? ‘Anything else?’
‘Rachel wants you to invite Lambert to Kerry’s wedding reception. One of the groom’s guests cancelled and they’re a man short at the table. Apparently, it’s upsetting the balance or something like that.’
Cassie gasped. ‘Can Rachel not find anyone else to replace the missing guest?’
Her grandfather chuckled. ‘You don’t sound too keen, pet, and yet I had the impression you liked him.’
‘Well, you got the wrong impression, and he feels the same about me. Most of the time, he grabs hold of his coat and his car keys as soon as I arrive, as if he can’t wait to get out of my way.’
‘That’s because he’s shy. Ask him please. We’re counting on you.’
Cassie reluctantly promised, and arranged to drive up to the farm with her grandfather’s clothes and money the following day.
Like every Friday night, the pub was heaving. A crowd of men cheered in front of the giant TV screen where a rugby match was in full swing. Cecilia and Salomé were already at the bar, and Cassie started towards them.
‘If that isn’t the sexiest cleaner in the whole of Cumbria.’ Piers’s voice behind her stopped her in her tracks.
Her spirits sank. She should have realised Piers would be with his rugby pals tonight. Forcing a smile, she swung round. ‘Good evening, Piers.’
Immediately, he wrapped one arm around her waist and bent down to kiss her cheek, his lips straying dangerously close to her mouth yet again. ‘Hmm. You smell nice, as usual.’
And you smell of beer and sweaty rugby socks, as usual, she wanted to reply. She tightened her lips and said nothing.
‘What can I get you to drink?’ he asked.
‘I can’t stop, sorry. I’m meeting my friends.’ She gestured towards the bar where Cecilia, Salomé and Sadie were giggling as they read the cocktail menu. She tried to slide out of his grip but his arm tightened around her waist.
‘Have a drink with me, Cassie.’
‘Sorry, but I’m already late.’
He let go of her at last and she took a step back, away from his wandering hands.
‘Never mind, I’ll take you for lunch when you come to my office for your performance review next week.’
‘What performance review?’ Cassie stared at him, puzzled.
‘The review meeting when you show me your paperwork, I audit your invoices, and we look at the comments in the guestbooks in the holiday cottages.’ He was still smiling but his pale blue eyes had grown cold, and there was now an edge to his voice.
She frowned. ‘We’ve never had a performance review before, and you know I only ever get nice comments about my work.’
‘Charlie’s sister emailed me. She wants detailed reports about the estate. I have no idea why. Charlie’s father used to trust me with everything, but now apparently Gabrielle is taking an interest… As if she knows what she’s talking about. She’s an actress, or a singer, or whatever, not an accountant. She doesn’t have a bloody clue about running the estate.’ He sounded annoyed and his face had turned bright red.
‘By the way, how are things with the French guy at Belthorn? I heard Sophie left you in the lurch. Are you managing all right on your own?’
‘I’m fine. Lambert is fine. Everything’s fine,’ she answered more sharply than she’d intended.
‘Good. Don’t forget Charles promised you a bonus if Lambert gives you a good report. You have to keep him happy.’
‘I’m doing my best.’ With a last, forced smile, she made a quick escape and joined Salomé and Cecilia at the bar.
‘Look who has a big jingly hat!’ Salomé laughed, pointing her finger at her pom-pom hat. ‘It’s Miss Santa Claus!’
Sadie waved her hand towards her friends in a dismissive gesture. ‘Don’t mind them. They’ve had a couple of Big Jim’s festive cocktails already.’
As usual, the barmaid looked very glamorous, dressed in a tight black top and leggings, her make-up perfect, her eyelashes impossibly long and thick, and her hair smooth and shiny. She handed Cassie a drinks menu. ‘All the cocktails are half price tonight. Would you like one?’
Cassie took her coat off and turned to Salomé and Cecilia. ‘Why not? What do you recommend, girls?’
Salomé raised her glass half-filled with a red and yellow drink. Pomegranate seeds trapped in ice cubes floated on the surface.
‘So far, I tried a Red Spanker and an Angel Titsel, and they’re all… hic… delicious!’
Cassie laughed at the silly names and pointed at her friend’s drink. ‘What is this one called?’
‘Rudolph’s Snot. I know. Revolting name, but it’s actually really nice. Here, have a sip. And it’s red, so it’ll match your coat.’
‘I’ll have that one, then, Sadie.’
‘Let’s hope for a successful festive season!’ Cecilia said when Sadie brought Cassie’s cocktail.
‘I’ll drink to that,’ Salomé said, and the three women clinked their cocktail glasses together.
‘Remember… we must look into one another’s eyes and take care not to cross our glasses,’ Cassie said. ‘We don’t want seven years of bad luck.’
‘I thought it was seven years of bad sex?’ Cecilia said.
Salomé shrugged. ‘Pff! I don’t care if I never have sex again. Sex is awfully overrated, if you want my opinion.’
Cecilia pointed to Cassie’s new top. ‘It really suits you. I’m glad you bought it.’
Cassie always felt frumpy next to her friends – fabulously exotic Salomé, with her chocolate-brown eyes and long dark hair, and petite Cecilia, with her bobbed, candyfloss-pink hair, who was always arty and stylish, even in jeans, baggy pullover and wellies.
‘I received some new stock this week,’ Cecilia added. ‘You should pop in some time.’
‘I may do just that. I wouldn’t mind a new dress for Kerry’s wedding.’ It had nothing to do with the fact that Stefan Lambert might be there, of course…
‘I hope there’s a wide choice of sexy bachelors.’ Cecilia sighed. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind dancing with your granddad or his friends, but apart from Mason Austin and Matt Jamieson, all the attractive men around here are either married or retired – or both!’
Just then, there was a choir of loud expletives from the rugby club members. Salomé slid Cassie a sideways look. ‘At least you’ll have someone to dance with next Saturday. You seem very friendly with Piers Hardy.’
Cassie pulled a face. ‘I have to be. He’s my boss, in a manner of speaking, since he manages Charles Ashville’s estate.’
‘He’s quite good looking, and he looks as
if he fancies you,’ Cecilia remarked, cocking her head to one side.
‘He fancies any woman the wind blows his way.’
‘You don’t sound too keen on the guy.’
Cassie sighed. ‘I’ve had enough of him groping me at every opportunity.’
‘Why don’t you tell him to get lost?’
Because she needed the Ashville contract to keep Bluebell Cleaning afloat. She also needed Piers to carry on letting Bluebell Cottage to her granddad. Of course, she couldn’t say that aloud because it made her feel weak and pathetic, so she drank a sip of her cocktail and said with more assurance than she felt, ‘I can cope with Piers.’
Salomé frowned and pointed with her chin to the other end of the counter. ‘The guy from the campsite has been staring at us – or at you, rather – for the past ten minutes.’
Cassie followed her gaze. Darren Morse smiled at her. She nodded back.
‘You don’t look too keen on him either,’ Cecilia remarked.
Salomé shuddered. ‘I don’t care if all the grannies and granddads of Red Moss sing his praises, he gives me the creeps.’
‘Same here,’ Sadie remarked as she whisked the empty glasses off the counter. ‘The one I’d like to see more of is that sexy Frenchman who is staying at Belthorn.’
Salomé and Cecilia looked at Cassie, their eyes shining with curiosity. ‘You can tell us all about him. What’s he like? What’s he doing at Belthorn? Is he really a helicopter pilot? And does he know when we’re finally going to see the elusive Charles Ashville?’
Cassie laughed and raised her hands. ‘Girls! One question at a time, please.’
Answering her friends didn’t take long, because there wasn’t much she could tell them about Stefan.
‘As for Charlie Ashville,’ she finished, ‘I have no idea when he’s planning to come here, if ever. The only communications I have with him are infrequent emails, either directly or through Piers’s office. Stefan said he was working somewhere in Mali.’
Cecilia sighed. ‘I was told he is a very good doctor and that he’s very clever, very handsome and very—’
‘Very arrogant, rude and disagreeable,’ Salomé finished, narrowing her eyes. ‘I had the misfortune to meet him when he came for his father’s funeral, and I for one would be happy never to see him again.’ As if to make her point, she slammed her empty cocktail glass down on the counter.
Cecilia added, ‘I heard he doesn’t like it here. Someone even mentioned some kind of curse on the family. What’s that all about?’
It was no wonder her friends didn’t know much about the Grey Friar’s curse, being relative newcomers. Salomé had bought the bakery two years before, and Cecilia had moved from London at around the same time.
‘It’s a long story,’ Cassie started reluctantly.
‘Then let’s get another drink and you can tell us all about it.’ Cecilia ordered more cocktails and bags of crisps and the three women settled at a table in the back room.
Chapter Sixteen
Cassie sipped her cocktail. ‘You both know Belthorn Abbey, or what’s left of it, don’t you?’
‘George…’ Salomé paused. ‘I mean, Lord Ashville, gave me a tour once.’
Cassie looked at her friend in surprise. ‘Did he?’
Salomé smiled. ‘I was delivering some cakes he’d ordered for a party and he offered to show me round. He invited me back on several occasions to give me tours of the manor house… among other things.’ She sighed and added in a wistful voice, ‘He was a charming and fascinating guide.’
Charles Ashville’s father had enjoyed a fearsome reputation as a ladies’ man. He probably wouldn’t have been able to resist trying to add Salomé to his long list of conquests, and what better than a private tour of the grounds and a few old family ghost stories to impress the young woman… From Salomé’s dreamy voice and the faraway look in her eyes, it seemed he had succeeded.
‘You were lucky to be given a tour,’ Cecilia remarked. ‘I only ever saw the ruins from the path when I was hiking up the fell.’
‘That’s because the Ashvilles never opened Belthorn Abbey to the public,’ Cassie explained.
‘So what is the curse people are talking about?’ Cecilia asked.
‘Well, a long time before the manor house was built, Belthorn was a small but wealthy abbey belonging to the Cistercian order.’
‘George said they were called the grey friars,’ Salomé remarked.
Cassie nodded. ‘That’s right. When Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries in the North of England, he sent one of his trusted men, Sir Thomas Ashville, to close down the abbey and confiscate their assets. Rumour has it that Thomas kept much of the abbey’s gold and valuables for himself, and set about destroying the place with more enthusiasm than was needed. There were accounts of terrible atrocities committed by him and his men.’
Salomé pulled a face. ‘With ancestors such as these, it’s no wonder Charles is such a horrid bully. It must be in his genes.’
Cassie cocked her head to one side to look at her friend. Charles shared the same genes with his father, whom Salomé seemed to have been rather fond of. What on earth had Charles Ashville done to make friendly Salomé so angry?
‘The king gave the Belthorn estate to Sir Thomas,’ she carried on.
Cecilia picked up one of the pomegranate seeds floating in her glass and crunched it between her teeth. ‘Why do people talk of the Grey Friar’s curse?’
‘Well, Thomas Ashville died shortly after the manor house was built. He broke his neck when his horse threw him. People said that it was spooked by the figure of a grey friar… but all friars had been either massacred or driven away, so it could only be—’
‘A ghost!’ Cecilia exclaimed.
Cassie nodded. ‘It was said that it was the ghost of the abbey’s last abbot, seeking revenge for the murder of his monks. Over the centuries, people have claimed that the Grey Friar always appeared before a member of the Ashville family died, hence the legend about a curse.’
‘George did mention something about it, I recall, but he laughed it off,’ Salomé said, toying with her straw.
Cecilia shivered. ‘He fell down a shaft in one of the disused quarries up the hill, didn’t he? I wonder if he saw the ghost too before he died.’
She looked at Cassie. ‘What about you? Have you ever seen that Grey Friar?’
Cassie’s heart grew heavy. She looked down and stirred her straw in what was left of her cocktail. ‘I saw something once, but I’m not sure what it was. All I know is that it was very scary.’
As if sensing her reluctance, Salomé glanced at her and shrugged. ‘Well, I for one don’t believe in silly old ghosts, so let’s talk about something else.’
Cassie breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Good idea! Actually I may need some input from you two.’ She told them about the Tarzan and Jane themed wedding she had now promised to arrange for the following Saturday, and both her friends laughed so much they almost spat their drinks out.
‘I think I have just what you need,’ Cecilia said. ‘I just received a flamingo made of recycled flip-flops from a Kenyan artist.’
‘Never mind the fake wildlife… What about Tarzan?’ Salomé asked. ‘You need a man who can look good in trunks, and from what I have seen of Kerry’s fiancé, I don’t think that’s him.’
Cassie pulled a face. ‘You’re right. Finding Tarzan is going to prove difficult.’
‘I can think of a few men who would fill a loincloth nicely,’ Salomé remarked, toying with her cocktail’s paper umbrella, ‘starting with Piers over there.’
‘Mason Austin and Matt Jamieson would do too,’ Cecilia added.
‘I think Stefan Lambert would make the best Tarzan,’ Cassie declared.
‘Oh yes?’ Salomé smirked. ‘And why would that be?’
‘He has the eyes for it,’ Cassie answered in a dreamy voice, ‘tawny like a lion’s, fearless like a warrior’s, but full of shadows and vulnerability.’
Cecilia whistled between her teeth. ‘Wordsworth, eat your heart out.’
Salomé poked Cassie with the tip of her paper umbrella. ‘It looks like this Jane has found her Tarzan.’
‘And this monkey has found her banana,’ Cecilia joked.
Cassie’s face caught fire under her friends’ mocking gaze. ‘Don’t be silly. I was just… Oh, and forget about Tarzan. Help me make a list of the things I need to turn the campsite clubhouse into a jungle instead!’
It was nearly closing time when Cassie parted company with her friends, who lived close to each other and were walking home together.
Still smiling, and a little giddy from the cocktails and the thought of Stefan Lambert clad only in a loincloth swinging from a vine and wrestling a crocodile with his bare hands – Johnny Weissmuller style – Cassie dug her hands inside the pockets of her coat and returned to Bluebell Cottage, taking care not to slip on the pavement covered with icy, compacted snow.
She unlocked her front door, took a few steps in the corridor and froze.
The light was on in the kitchen. But she was sure she had switched it off before leaving. Was her grandfather back from Patterdale Farm?
‘Granddad?’ she called. ‘Are you here?’
Her voice echoed throughout the house but no one answered. What if someone had sneaked in? Red Moss was usually safe, but there had been those burglaries in recent weeks…
The thought sobered her up immediately. Her heart racing, her fingers gripping the strap of her handbag, she took a few hesitant steps, and peered into the kitchen.
It was empty.
Of course, it was empty! What had she expected to see, the ghost of the Grey Friar sitting at the table, having a cup of tea and munching on one of her granddad’s custard creams?
Shaking her head she filled the kettle, opened the cupboard to get a mug and a tea bag. And stepped into a puddle of water… Her heartbeat picked up pace again. Why was the floor wet? Her gaze followed a trail of splashes to the back door.
Then she remembered that she had taken the bin out earlier. The backyard was covered with snow, some must have stuck to her shoes, and it had melted. She relaxed once again. She should calm down and stop imagining things. It wasn’t good for her heart or her blood pressure!
