Tremarnock Summer

by Burstall, Emma

  ‘Come and join us!’ he cried, beckoning her over. ‘Heard the dreadful news? We all need cheering up.’

  Pleased to have someone to talk to, Bramble moved her drink to the men’s table and mentioned that she’d called in on Fergus two days ago.

  This seemed to brighten Tony no end. ‘What do you make of him?’ he asked, forgetting Pat for a moment and shuffling closer. ‘Bit of an odd fellow, isn’t he? I see him coming and going but he never stops for a chat. Doesn’t seem to like company. Can’t work him out at all.’

  Rafael, who was sitting on Bramble’s other side, fiddled with an earring and jiggled his leg up and down as she described the studio and paintings. Having never met the artist, it was hardly surprising that he hadn’t the slightest interest. When he’d finished his drink, he stretched noisily and announced that he was tired and wanted to go home.

  ‘Do you have your key?’ Tony asked and, rising, the teenager patted the pocket of his black jeans and nodded.

  As he strolled towards the exit, staring at his feet, he almost bumped into Audrey, with Rick in tow.

  ‘Excuse me!’ she snapped, glaring at the young man as he slunk past. When he failed to reply she hissed, ‘Rude boy’, and poked Rick with an impatient finger.

  ‘Isn’t he?’ she demanded, and Rick nodded miserably. She hadn’t yet noticed Tony and Felipe, and when their eyes finally met she pursed her glossy red lips and glanced the other way.

  ‘Bitch,’ Tony muttered under his breath, and Bramble thought it was just as well that Audrey hadn’t heard. She looked so formidable – tall and broad-shouldered, in a startling red polka-dot top and big gold necklace – that she’d probably be a match for both Tony and Felipe put together. She did have awfully long red nails, too.

  ‘Shh!’ Bramble whispered, giggling with nerves. ‘She’ll have your guts for garters!’

  ‘Just let her try,’ Tony replied. ‘Felipe did boxing at school, didn’t you, darling?’

  The Brazilian frowned. ‘But I do not think I can punch a woman, even one who is a...’ He grinned mischievously. ‘How you say? She-zombie.’

  ‘Devil,’ Tony replied patiently. ‘She-devil, though actually zombie’s more graphic.’

  Katie came out from behind the bar to collect some dirty glasses from the table next door and stopped for a brief chat. She was looking gorgeous, even in the pub’s regulation red T-shirt and jeans, with silky dark hair that had been ironed dead straight and her favourite silver jewellery. On her feet were pale-tan wedge espadrilles that gave her extra height, and her carefully made-up face was glowing. The most startling thing about her, however, was her fake black eyelashes, which were so thick and lush they seemed to have a life of their own.

  ‘We’re all devastated,’ Tony said sonorously when Katie mentioned Pat. ‘Liz and poor little Rosie are beside themselves, and Esme’s hardly left her flat. As for Loveday, she’s barely stopped crying since she heard the news. She’s practically drowning in tears.’

  He didn’t notice Katie turn and stare when Tabitha sashayed in and Danny hurried out from behind the bar to greet her. He pulled out a stool and settled down beside her, whispering something in her ear that made her smile. Bramble, though, saw it all, as well as the look on Katie’s face as she watched them. After a few moments she tossed her hair and waltzed back to the bar as if she hadn’t a care in the world, but Bramble knew better.

  ‘Can I get either of you a drink?’ she heard Katie ask sweetly, resting her slim arms on the counter and showing off her silver bangles to full advantage, but Bramble couldn’t hear the response. Perhaps Tabitha and Danny hadn’t heard either, because they hardly took their eyes off one another. Katie would have to up her game to be in with a chance; there was some serious competition.

  The tête-à-tête was interrupted by the arrival of Ryan, the fishmonger, and two male friends talking in loud Cornish accents. Ryan’s black hair was still damp from the shower and he was wearing a clean white shirt rolled up at the sleeves. Bramble had seen the way he’d acted around her and Katie at Tabitha’s gig night, and Katie had given him no encouragement whatsoever. Now, though, she batted her extraordinary eyelashes provocatively.

  Tabitha left after about half an hour, and once Felipe and Tony had gone too Bramble joined Katie and her new companion at the bar; it was so quiet that it didn’t matter. Even Danny had moved to Audrey and Rick’s table as there was no one to serve. Ryan wasn’t the smartest person on the planet, but he seemed very kind, and every time Katie mentioned a task he offered to help. If she’d accepted all his proposals, he’d have had to give up his job to become her full-time assistant.

  At one point he asked if she liked sea bass, and when she admitted that she’d never tried it he looked genuinely shocked and promised to drop some off at the manor tomorrow.

  ‘No, honestly,’ she said, but he wouldn’t listen.

  ‘Just season it with salt and pepper, then fry it in a little oil.’ He smacked his lips. ‘It’s dead easy.’

  If he was hoping she’d ask him to cook the fish for her, he was disappointed. She did, however, invite him to the dinner party, on a date yet to be fixed, at which his bushy black eyebrows shot up almost to meet his hairline and his face lit up in a delighted smile.

  ‘That’d be smashin’,’ he grinned. ‘I can make pretty much any night. I don’t get out a lot, to be honest with you.’

  Katie looked unimpressed, but her frown soon disappeared.

  ‘Be sure not to drive,’ she smiled sweetly. ‘Get a taxi, because things could get messy!’

  Bramble did wonder whether it was wise of her friend to encourage Ryan and she raised the issue as they drove home that night.

  ‘He doesn’t seem your type at all, and he’s so gentle – you’ll make mincemeat of him!’ She glanced at Katie suspiciously. ‘Have you given up on Danny then?’

  Katie, sitting beside her in the passenger seat, stared out of the windscreen and gave a Mona Lisa smile. ‘Wait and see.’

  *

  Liz had no desire to do her usual volunteering at the Methodist church hall when she woke the following Tuesday after another restless night. She’d done very little since Pat had died, preferring to stay at home and lick her wounds in private, and she was already dreading the funeral next week; there wouldn’t be a dry eye in the house.

  Lowenna, unused to spending so much time indoors, had been hard work, getting into mischief, making a big fuss at meal and bath times and generally running Liz ragged. It was as if she sensed that something was the matter, and even Rosie, normally so attentive, had been walking about with a long face and virtually ignoring her sister, which only made matters worse.

  ‘Don’t go today, darling,’ Robert told Liz when he emerged from the shower, with damp hair and a soggy white towel around his waist, to find his wife sitting up in bed with her head on her knees. ‘You’re tired and upset. They’ll understand. Pat was one of your dearest friends.’

  But Liz wouldn’t hear of it. ‘People look forward to the community meal, and it’s hard even with six or seven of us helping. Loveday’s supposed to be coming but she won’t be much use; she can’t stop crying. I can’t let the others down.’

  Robert scratched his head and paced around the room. ‘I’ll come with you!’ he said suddenly. ‘We haven’t got many bookings today. Alex can manage without me for once.’

  ‘Would you? Could you?’

  All at once the day seemed far less daunting, and Liz jumped up to hug her husband, making herself wet in the process. She knew that this was a big deal for him, as he took his business very seriously and hardly ever had an unscheduled day off. She really was grateful.

  Lowenna perked up when her mother fetched the pushchair and wheeled her to Jean’s house, Dynnargh, with Robert walking alongside. Jean, however, was in pieces, as to add to all her other woes someone had sneaked into her front garden on Friday night and stolen her precious flowerpots, as well as the prized metal statuette of a boy on a bicycle carryin
g a splendid array of blooms.

  ‘Tom reckons it must have happened between eight thirty and ten,’ she told Liz and Robert gloomily. ‘Everything was fine when he did the watering, but when he went to put the bins out later, it was carnage.’

  ‘Look at it!’ she continued, waving her arms around wildly. ‘It’s stripped bare! I’m not so bothered about the pots, to be honest – we can always buy new ones of those – but we bought that statuette on holiday in Tenerife. We’re not going back there any time soon. It’s a crying shame.’

  ‘Who could do such a thing?’ Liz asked, glancing around at the devastation, but she soon regretted the question.

  ‘Audrey reckons it’s that boy, Rafael,’ Jean replied, leaning in close. ‘He was with Tony and Felipe that evening at The Hole in the Wall; she saw him in there. He got up and left for no reason, just like that, and went off on his own. First Pat and now this...’ She let out a sob. ‘It’s too much, it really is.’

  Liz’s mind started to race. The graffiti, the broken window... there did appear to be a pattern. Someone was clearly intent on making trouble in the village, but Rafael? It seemed hard to believe.

  ‘Did you call the police?’ asked Robert, and Jean nodded.

  ‘Don’t s’pose they’ll do anything, though. I mean, it’s hardly a priority for them, is it? It wasn’t worth much, that statuette, but it had great sentimental value.’

  Jean’s face, normally so round and smiley, suddenly darkened. ‘I’d like to catch that villain red-handed. I’d grab him by the scruff of the neck and hold on tight till the coppers arrived. Proper punishment, that’s what he needs, and a plane ticket back to Venezuela or wherever it is he comes from.’

  Thinking how upset the rumours would make Tony and Felipe, Liz’s heart sank. Then Jean added that they’d find out soon enough, because Rick’s wheelie bin had also gone missing that same night and turned up on the beach yesterday morning, upside down with all the rubbish spilling everywhere.

  ‘Dreadful mess it was,’ she said fiercely. ‘Audrey’s properly on the warpath now. She won’t let this drop.’

  ‘Hold on to your hats!’ Robert muttered gravely when he and Liz were out of earshot, and suddenly she felt rather relieved to be doing the community meal today after all. With any luck, it would mean they’d be well out of the way when Audrey, Tony and Felipe came face-to-face again, though you’d probably be able to hear the fireworks in John O’Groats.

  Liz and Robert popped into A Winkle in Time on the way to the church hall to fetch the leftovers from yesterday – some assorted vegetables and a mound of smoked haddock that Jesse had left out of the freezer by mistake.

  ‘We could make fishcakes?’ Robert suggested. ‘Or fish pie?’

  ‘Or kedgeree – with extra rice for you,’ Liz joked. Her husband hated rice, as well as tomatoes and grapes, which was weird given that he ran a restaurant. There again, lots of things about him were a bit odd, including his dislike of heights and swimming, which others might mock but she found utterly endearing.

  Loveday was late, as usual, and flung herself into her uncle’s arms the moment she saw him, ignoring Jenny, Mike and Liz, who pretended to get on with their tasks in the kitchen. Loveday was wearing high, wobbly platforms, and Robert staggered slightly before righting himself.

  ‘I haven’t slept a wink,’ she wailed, sobbing against his pale-blue shirt while he stood rather stiffly and patted her dark hair, which clearly hadn’t seen a brush or comb for some time. She really was a mess.

  Thank God for Jesse, Liz thought. He’d been a rock these past few days since Pat had died and she didn’t know how Loveday would have coped without him. She still held herself responsible in some ways for the accident last year – which had led to the old woman breaking her arm badly, from which she’d never fully recovered – and it had been a hard job trying to persuade her that she was in no way to blame for the heart attack either.

  When at last the tears had subsided, Loveday took a step or two back and stared at Robert as if she’d only just noticed him.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

  Quite whose shirt it was that she thought she’d been soaking was unclear, and Robert was momentarily lost for words.

  ‘He’s helping us out this morning,’ Liz quickly explained, fetching Loveday a chopping board and knife. ‘We’re all at sixes and sevens a bit because of Pat. We could do with an extra pair of hands.’

  ‘I hope you’re not going to boss me about like Jesse.’ Loveday plonked her handbag, a bright-pink satchel, on the counter.

  ‘He wouldn’t dare – none of us would,’ Jenny laughed. ‘Now, put that away. You know it can’t stay there.’

  Other volunteers had already done the rounds of the supermarkets and there was a sizeable haul of slightly squashed fresh fruit – strawberries, raspberries and blueberries – which Jenny asked Loveday to make into a crumble. Meanwhile, Mike set up the tables and chairs next door while Liz and Jenny helped Robert prepare three individual fish pies, as there wasn’t a dish big enough to feed everyone.

  Although Robert wasn’t a trained chef himself, he certainly knew how to cook, and in no time at all the pies were in the oven, waiting to be warmed up.

  ‘I hope they like it,’ he said, lowering his eyes, when Jenny expressed her admiration. He loathed being the centre of attention. ‘Alex and Jesse are the real experts. They can turn anything into a feast.’

  Soon it was midday and Liz was so busy talking to Stan, who’d arrived first as usual, that initially she didn’t notice a boy of about seven or eight with shaggy brown hair hovering near the door, and beside him, a tall, thin man with a straggly beard carrying a heavy toddler. The man looked as if he’d like to be anywhere but here, his eyes darting nervously this way and that, the fist of his free hand clenching and unclenching as if he didn’t know what to do with himself.

  Liz had never seen him before, but she recognised the boys as Shannon’s brothers whom she’d met at their rundown cottage. As she watched, the older one, Liam, grabbed the man by the arm and pulled him closer to where she was standing, as if fearing that at any minute he might bolt.

  ‘Hello, Liam,’ she smiled, coming over to greet them. ‘How nice to see you!’ She ruffled the younger boy, Conor’s hair before turning to the man. ‘And you must be their dad?’

  As she held out her hand the man shrank back, so she dropped it, pretending that she hadn’t noticed. ‘Come and sit down! You’ve not been here before, right?’

  Robert had clocked the strange trio from the kitchen, too, and approached to see if his wife needed support, but she gave a subtle signal that she wanted to do this on her own before leading the newcomers to an empty table.

  The man was silent as she poured some water for them from the jug on the table, while Liam looked at him anxiously.

  ‘My dad likes tea, not water, don’t you, Dad?’ he said at last. No response. ‘With two sugars and...’ He hesitated, as if he was unsure whether to go on. ‘...and milk.’

  They didn’t normally serve tea, but Liz decided to make an exception.

  ‘I’ll bring your starters at the same time. It’s lentil and cheese slices today. I think you’ll approve.’

  They all looked as if they needed feeding up, and they weren’t particularly clean either. Liam’s navy T-shirt was stained, Conor’s face was crying out for a good wipe and the man smelled, as if he hadn’t had a bath or shower in ages. She half-thought that they might do a runner when her back was turned and was relieved when she returned with a laden tray to find them still there. The boys had already polished off a good deal of the bread and butter on the table and there were telltale smears around their mouths, while the man eyed the hot lentil slices greedily.

  ‘Have one,’ Liz coaxed, passing him the plate and noticing his dirty, torn fingernails. The sides of his thumbs were red raw where he’d picked at the skin until it bled.

  He accepted without a murmur, tearing off a corner of food and passing it to
the toddler, before gobbling up the rest himself. Liam, meanwhile, picked up his fork and took a rather cautious bite, but his eyes lit up once he’d tasted it and he crammed the rest in so fast that he almost choked. He was clearly ravenous.

  Liz left them to it for a while and joined Robert, who was sitting between Stan and a middle-aged woman with grey dreadlocks in a grubby, crocheted orange poncho.

  ‘Where do you live then?’ Robert enquired, running a hand through his messy brown hair in that way he had, and Liz’s heart melted. He wasn’t good at small talk – in fact, it was his worst nightmare – but he was doing his very best.

  Stan gave his address, but the woman in the orange poncho was too busy eating to reply, so Liz leaned forwards and mentioned that Robert had a restaurant in the village.

  ‘He made the fish pie,’ she said proudly. ‘It’s very tasty.’

  She expected a nod at least, or perhaps a murmur of appreciation, but instead the woman stopped eating, pushed back her chair, dabbed her mouth on the hem of her dark skirt and cleared her throat before announcing imperiously, ‘I beg to differ. It’s rather bland, if you don’t mind my saying, and it could do with a bit more salt and some tartar sauce.’

  Robert’s jaw dropped and Liz had to stifle a laugh. He was used to fussy customers but hadn’t anticipated any here.

  ‘Sorry about that,’ he said, rallying. ‘I’ll bear it in mind for next time.’ He glanced at Liz, who gave a surreptitious wink in return.

  It was only during pudding that she felt able to approach Liam and his family again and start to probe – very tentatively, because she was afraid of scaring them off.

  ‘How’s Shannon?’ she asked Liam, who was scraping the last vestiges of fruit crumble and custard from the bottom of his bowl.

  ‘All right,’ he replied, wiping his mouth with the back of a grubby hand.

  ‘I live here in Tremarnock,’ she went on. ‘I’ve been looking out for you on the beach. I thought I might see you.’

  The boy sat back comfortably and put his hands behind his head like an old fellow in the pub. ‘Nah, we stay at home mostly. It’s easier.’