by Holly Bell
‘He’s not my — He’s waiting in the car outside. Hello Aunty.’
‘Hello, dear,’ replied Mrs Sharma, fondly. Mrs Sharma senior had babysat for the little Amanda, and the families had grown close. ‘Cream for the Raj, I expect,’ she anticipated. Nalini handed a small luxury treat over the counter. Amanda laid it at the expectant Tempest’s feet. He and Mrs Sharma exchanged their customary glances of mutual recognition that Amanda still had yet to fathom.
‘You’ve missed all the news!’ Joan exclaimed.
‘Have I?’ responded Amanda, hoping she was to be spared the almost inevitable onslaught of gossip.
‘There’s going to be a new teacher at the school,’ Dennis told her.
‘John was in here the other day asking after you!’ Joan informed her with a wink.
‘His book’s doing well,’ chimed in Dennis.
‘And you'll never guess: Gordon French has put in for planning permission!’ Joan pronounced with a significance that was lost on Amanda. However, some response was clearly expected, so she fell back on a stock favourite:
‘That’s nice.’
Ding!
‘There you are, dearie. I thought you might pop in ’ere for ’is lordship, so I turned back,’ explained Sylvia, propping up her lollipop-shaped stop sign behind the shop door. She greeted the other three occupants of the small space, then drew breath long enough for Dennis to offer another piece of information:
‘There’s been an offer to rent the shop.’
Joan looked doubtful.
‘But it’s a chain: Priti’s Paws Pet Parlour.’
‘Erm,’ responded Amanda hesitantly, ‘I thought they only have one establishment over in Stror.’
‘It’s the thin end of the wedge, dearie,’ put in Sylvia. ‘Next thing you know, you’ve got a drive-in Macdonald’s on your doorstep!’
‘Joan, I really don’t think theirs is a village sort of setup,’ Amanda demurred.
‘Here you are, Amanda.’ Mrs Sharma handed her the pot of cream. ‘I put some by in the fridge as soon as I knew you were coming back today.’
‘Thank you, Aunty, er ... how did you ...?’
‘Your Aunt Amelia popped in, after going to put the heating on in your cottage. It’s been standing empty for several days so best to take the chill off.’
‘That’s very kind of her.’
‘Oh, and you’d better throw out that open packet of ham before it walks out, she said to tell you,’ relayed Mrs Sharma.
‘Ah ... does the entire village know the contents of my fridge?’ Amanda enquired, already suspecting what the answer would be.
‘Of course not, dear,’ Nalini replied comfortably, ‘just the people who were in here at the time.’
That would be a ‘yes’ then, thought Amanda.
‘And you’ll be getting another insurance job from Irma,’ Joan informed her. Mrs Uberhausfest’s party-planning for the over-70s business was a regular customer of Amanda’s furniture restoration business.
‘Oh, dear. Not stiletto dents on the grand piano again?’ Amanda asked anxiously.
‘No love, it’s the chandelier again this time.’
‘Yes, it was a rather hoot —’ began Dennis, who’d been there.
‘That’s all right, Mr Hanley-Page,’ Amanda interjected with feeling. ‘I’m sure I can imagine. I’m afraid I really must be getting back.’
‘Oh course, my dear.’
Having paid for Tempest’s requirements and being told once again that Mr Branscombe was starting on the inspector’s new flat and office on Tuesday, she exited into the street. Amanda almost bumped into Sunken Madley’s oldest and most revered resident. Miss Cynthia de Havillande was momentarily distracted, shouting,
‘Churchill! Heel!’ Her elderly terrier, who had paused to investigate a particularly interesting odour at the side of the pavement, now took refuge in the shadow of his owner’s tweed skirts, at the sight of Tempest. ‘Ah, Amanda. You’re back. Splendid. Did you enjoy your holiday in Cornwall?’
‘Holi—? Oh. Yes, yes, thank you.’
‘Of course, holidays can be rather taxing, so make sure you rest, and don’t feel you must rush back to The Grange. The May Day Ball is still a little while off, and things don’t have to be perfect for it. Take your time.’
‘Thank you, Miss de Havillande.’
‘Oh, and Mr Branscombe is starting at The Elms on the inspector’s suite of rooms on Tuesday.’
‘Yes I —’
‘Ah, I see the inspector is waiting for you.’ Cynthia raised her gloved hand in salute, and he waved back. ‘Excellent. Off you go then, dear.’ Tempest had already tired of intimidating the terrier, who had wandered off once more. ‘Churchill! Heel!’
Amanda hurried back across the road. Tempest strolled at his leisure.
‘It’s like the return to Harmonia Gardens scene from Hello Dolly,’ Trelawney commented drily as she got into the car, having settled her familiar. ‘I’m almost expecting Louis Armstrong to appear.’
Amanda laughed and put on her seatbelt. Moments later, they were drawing up beside her cottage. Trelawney brought her bags to the door.
‘Would you like to come in?’ she invited him.
‘I would, but I’d rather like to check in at The Elms. In case there’s anything I need to do to facilitate matters. Then my mother will be expecting me. Dad has given me a present for her. It’s wrapped up, and I must confess I am curious to know what he’s sent her.’
‘You think it might be an olive branch?’
‘They’ve always been on amicable terms. But of course, there’s always the chance ... however, let’s leave the chicken-counting to one side for now. I’ll see you tomorrow, if that’s all right, Miss Cadabra?’
‘Of course. What time?’
‘May I let you know?’
‘Sure.’
‘I’ll be off then.’ Except he stood there. Amanda looked at him, enquiringly until he spoke again: ‘I just wanted to say ... how much I’ve enjoyed — well perhaps not quite the right word for all of it — but our ... your ....’ Thomas suddenly hurried into a coherent conclusion, ‘I think we will make a good team.’
‘Thank you, Inspector. I have enjoyed it too.’
‘Perhaps ... you should ... that is, when there is more to follow up, and you would like to return to Cornwall, I would be pleased to escort you. In fact, as your partner, I really should, if only for your protection.’
‘Inspector. How kind.’ She had the impulse ... but they were in public view, even at the end of this cul-de-sac. ‘Just a moment.’ She unlocked the front door and beckoned him after her, and once inside pushed it to.
Suddenly Amanda reached up on tiptoe and hugged him. Thomas was surprised into instinctively hugging her back. She let him go after a moment and stood smiling up at him.
‘Thank you, Inspector Trelawney. Thank you for being part of my adventure.’
‘Oh ... er ... not at all, Miss Cadabra. My pleasure. Truly ... I ...You know ... I really —’
‘Yes, you must be on your way. Until tomorrow.’
‘Yes ... until tomorrow.’ He went back to his car, got in, and responded in kind as she waved him off up the street. If anyone had been privileged to catch a glimpse of Thomas’s face, they would have found it hard to read. There was definitely a smile, however subtle, with a hint of hope and the air of a cog, however small, settling into place. Mike’s words regarding Lucy echoed in his mind: ‘Someone extraordinary.’
Tempest, meanwhile, from the hall floor had been regarding this exchange with boredom. Those two, he thought. Glaciers move faster. He turned and padded towards the kitchen and far more important matters. Amanda pulled her bags over the threshold, closed the door, pulled the letters out of the crammed cage this side of the letterbox, and dropped them on the hall table.
‘Later,’ she told them.
In the kitchen, Amanda served some food to Tempest, put the kettle on and went out into the garden, breathing the sweet familiar air, str
oking the still bare fruit trees. She walked up the path between them, greeted the blackbirds hopping across the lawn and the sweetly trilling dunnock calling shyly from the bushes. Amanda reached the door and unlocked her workshop.
There was her work still waiting for her. Mr Crowby’s corner chair. The back just needed gluing in place again. Mrs Bindish’s card table stretcher had broken in too many places this time. Amanda would have to cut a new one from one of her oak battens she’d reclaimed. And that miniature chest of drawers needed sanding down … On the other hand, the kettle would be boiling. She’d just got home. She really should rest .... But it wouldn’t take long.
There were her overalls lying on the ottoman that was waiting to be collected by the upholsterer. On impulse, Amanda went across to the hob on the counter opposite and turned it on, then, while it heated the glue pot, she shed her coat and scarf. Picking up her overalls revealed Tempest was underneath them, having decided that he did not care to eat yet after all. Having wriggled into her overalls, Amanda pulled out a length of beech from her store, in a cracked giant urn, and clamped it by the workbench. She reached down a saw from the wall and made a guide cut. She placed some sandpaper on the little chest. Then feeling in her pocket, she found a clip. Hastily, she put her hair in a messy plait and pinned it up.
Amanda looked over her shoulder at the glue pot, and said,
‘Mecsge ynentel.’ And the brush began to stir. She looked at the saw. ‘Ahiewske.’ At once, it began its to and fro motion. ‘Rutstric ynentel.’ The sandpaper began to smooth away. The air filled with the scent of sandalwood and the taste of tin: the smell of magic.
She smiled. The blue in her eyes began to turn to brown. Amanda sighed contentedly.
‘I’m home.’
Chapter 53
Department 14
The following day, Amanda was invited over to The Grange. Not to work, but just for a catch-up. Surprisingly, Miss de Havillande, whom she usually dealt with regarding restoration work, was absent. However, Amanda was greeted by Cynthia’s bosom friend, Miss Gwendolen Armstrong-Witworth.
Amanda was taken into the small salon, and Moffat, the self-styled ‘butler’, but in reality the de facto manager of the estate, served them tea and hot buttered crumpets.
‘Are you quite recovered, my dear?’ Miss Armstrong-Witworth enquired gently.
‘Oh? Er ....’
‘Yes, I’ve been hearing over the wire how splendidly you did on Bodmin Moor.’
‘Really?’
‘Dear Michael.’
‘Gwendolen … have you known Uncle Mike for a long time? I mean, from when you worked for … in Whitehall?’
‘You could say that. More butter?’
‘Please. But I thought people from other departments didn’t talk to the one his father, Sir Philip ran.’
‘True. But you see, I didn’t always work for MI6.’
‘No?’
‘Eat your crumpet while it’s hot, dear. After the unfortunate assassination attempt I told you about. Well, it was my failure and consequently my fall. I was disgraced and —’
‘Oh!’ Amanda’s eyes grew into saucers as the penny dropped. The half-eaten crumpet fell from her fingers to her plate. ‘It was you. Wasn’t it? Back then. Of course, it all makes sense! Gwendolen. G. G.G. Aunt Gigi! I’m right, aren’t I?’
Miss Armstrong-Witworth laughed.
‘All my secrets are coming out.’
But Amanda was looking at her intently.
‘Except ... you’re more than that now .... I mean more than just someone who worked there.’
‘Oh?’ Gwendolen asked impishly.
Amanda followed her train of thought aloud.
'Department 14 .... There’s no office in Whitehall anymore.’
‘No, indeed. It was deemed inappropriate. Especially when you know why it was called Department 14.’
‘Why was it?’ Amanda asked curiously.
‘Whitehall humour. Fourteen ... Fortean: unexplained phenomena, the paranormal, the supernatural.’
‘As in the magazine?’ Amanda asked with an amazed smile. ‘Fortean Times?’
‘Exactly, my dear.’
‘Uncle Mike said it was squeezed out of Whitehall on account of being called all about voodoo. But just because it didn’t have an office there any more doesn’t mean ... Department 14 still exists ... doesn’t it?’
Gwendolen was regarding Amanda with bright eyes and her head tilted to one side like an interested, amused little bird.
‘Since you’ve got that far, I think it’s only fair to let you in on another little secret. Hmm yes ... it’s time. Come with me.’ Gwendolen placed her china teacup and saucer on the silver tray and stood up. Amanda put her crumpet plate down too and followed Miss Armstrong-Witworth, agog to know where she was to be taken.
Gwendolen led the way to the small dining-room where Amanda had her temporary workshop when working at the Grange. The furniture there had been pushed to the edges of the room and protected by Holland covers. One of these large, white cloths hid a tall, narrow, Victorian, mahogany display cabinet, which Miss Armstrong-Witworth now unveiled.
Amanda peered through the glass front as though seeking for some significant treasure on the shelves. Mostly it was crammed with books, but at the right-hand end of one shelf, at about elbow height, was an ordinary-looking plaster bust of Michelangelo’s David.
Gwendolen reached in and deftly gave it a twist to the left. It must have released a catch of some sort. For now, with a light shove of her hand, it swung out, revealing an opening in the floor and steps leading down.
Amanda stared, speechless, in astonishment.
‘It’s quite safe, dear.’ Gwendolen assured her. ‘There’s a light switch on the right. That’s it. Hold on to the rail at the side.’ Amanda gingerly took the stairs. Miss Armstrong-Witworth followed behind, pulled a lever in the wall and the entrance swung shut over their heads. ‘Keep going,’ she called out cheerily.
‘Good gracious, Gwendolen, I had no idea this was here,’ Amanda marvelled. ‘It isn’t on the plans of the house that I’ve seen.’
‘No, that’s true, dear. A small addition that no one needs to be troubled with.’ At the bottom of the steps was a door. Gwendolen came to Amanda’s side, unlocked it, ushered in her guest and turned on the light. ‘Just a simple little space: good illumination, a desk, a desktop computer, a laptop, an old-fashioned radio, and some more modern equipment.’
Amanda drew a sharp breath of surprise. For there, on the wall opposite, hung a map. A map studded with coloured pins.
Chapter 54
M, Q, and Kindly Advice
‘Ah yes, and as you see, on the wall ... a map.’
‘Brown pins!’
‘Just so.’
Amanda suddenly stood still; her lips parted in an O.
‘Not jeans ... G. I know what Uncle Mike was saying when we drove off. Not “Ammy quells jeans” but “M equals G”! Because you’re “M”. You are the head of Department 14, aren’t you Gwendolen? You run it. From here, from Sunken Madley, from The Grange. You have for years. Haven’t you?’
‘Well, I don’t know about “run it”. We’re more of a cooperative, you know, my dear. There are many fingers in this pie. But I like to think I do my bit.’ Miss Armstrong-Witworth went to the desktop computer, tapped a few keys and appeared to be checking something on the screen. Amanda was still processing these revelations.
‘Sunken Madley. Department 14. It was here all along.’
‘Not always, but it’s ended up here. For the time being, at least.’
‘So now ... Uncle Mike. It’s Uncle Mike who the inspector really works for, yes?’
‘Yes, dear, you could say that.’ She clicked the mouse and moved away from the desk to the countertop at the side of the room.
‘And now I work with the inspector. So ....’ Amanda smiled with delight. ‘Now I work for you! Oh, I like that.’ Gwendolen came to her side at that and clarified kindly,
‘We work for one another and for the good of all Normals as well as well-meaning magical folk. But I suppose .... if you like to think of it like that.’
‘Well, I do. So, if you are M —’
‘Only in honorary terms. That was really Sir Philip.’
‘Well, but who is Q? Who is the Bond gadget whizz?’
Gwendolen looked at Amanda out of the corners of her merry eyes.
‘Can you guess?’ Amanda was at a loss. Miss Armstrong-Witworth unlocked a drawer in the desk and drew forth a certain object. ‘Now standard issue for certain of our agents.’
Amanda leaned forward, staring.
‘Is that ... an IKEA pencil? A Pocket-wand?’ As if in confirmation, Gwendolen flicked the top of the pencil back and pulled out a slim shaft topped with a tiny purple gemstone. ‘Dr Bergstrom’s patent Pocket-wand. Bertil Bergstrom is Q!’
‘The doctors Bergstrom, both Bertil and his wife, Kerstin. A sort of joint Q. But yes.’
‘Does that mean you and Uncle Mike —?’
‘It’s always good to have, just in case a witch who can use it is around, and it’s good for show in a crisis. Plus, you can write things down!’
‘I ... am I an agent?’ Amanda asked keenly.
Gwendolen chuckled.
‘No. Well, we’re all agents for good. We hope.’
‘And Granny and Grandpa?
‘No. No, they were outside the ring. Too maverick. And you were too precious for any but they to protect. It was safer the way that it worked out.’ Miss Armstrong-Witworth picked up a document folder from the desk and put it away in the middle drawer of the filing cabinet. Amanda turned back to the map. Is this ...? It looks a bit yellow.’
‘Yes, the old map. On the wall, over there, is a modern one with all our new borders and country names. But I like to have this one here.’
Amanda nodded sympathetically.
‘I expect it reminds you of Uncle Mike’s parents. Is it long since they died?'
‘Died? Is that what Michael told you?’
‘Well, er, I think so.’
