Wish Upon a Star

by Trisha Ashley

  ‘That’s very kind and generous of you,’ I said, touched. ‘But I’m sorry that seeing me brought back sad memories.’

  ‘Well, it’s all a long time ago, when all’s said and done. There’s no denying it hit Gladdie hard. When he was reported missing, believed killed, she still hoped he’d turn up after the war finished, but he didn’t. The Almonds had his name put on the family memorial and there was a church service that Gladdie went to and she was terribly cut up when she came back from that. She went back to Scarborough afterwards, but she mourned him right up to the moment she found out he hadn’t been killed, after all.’

  ‘That must have been a huge shock,’ Jago said sympathetically and she gave him a startled look. I think she’d been so lost in the past and he’d been so quiet, she’d forgotten he was there.

  ‘You can say that again! You could have knocked us all down with a feather. Still, eventually she met her husband when he was staying at the hotel, and after that she never looked back. Happy as Larry, she was.’

  Charlene crashed back into the room just then with the trolley and, while the cake was being decanted from the tin and slices cut and the pretty pink-iced buns arranged on a chintz china plate, we were otherwise occupied.

  Now I knew the full story, I thought it was more than generous of Miss Honey to invite me back. And perhaps, since evidently she’d come to terms with it, she’d be ready to move on … once she’d loaded her plate with a cheese and tomato sandwich and an iced bun. For such a small and extremely elderly lady, she had a very healthy appetite.

  ‘I had a word with that daft child at the estate agents. What’s he called, Charlie?’

  ‘That’s the one who showed me round,’ Jago agreed.

  ‘He said yours was the best offer I could expect and you were a cash buyer, so there was no chain and it would go through quickly. When you’re a hundred and two and settling your affairs, quick is good,’ she added drily.

  ‘It could be as quick as you liked,’ Jago told her eagerly. ‘I’m keen to start up my new business.’

  ‘But if I let you have the place, what would you do about all the old stock? There’s some furniture in the house too that I didn’t want to part with, like Mother’s organ, which she used to play hymns on, come Sundays.’

  Jago pulled his chair a bit closer and prepared to play his ace. ‘I had a great idea about how we could preserve Honey’s Haberdasher’s shop for ever, and share the history of it with everyone,’ he said modestly, then outlined his plan for relocating the stock to a recreated Honey’s up at the Hemlock Mill nature reserve.

  ‘This is the old Hemlock Mill site? Isn’t the mill there any more?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid it was demolished years ago,’ I told her gently. ‘Only the mill owner’s house and some attached outbuildings remain.’

  ‘Everything’s changing,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘It was a good mill, they’d no cause to knock it down. I remember many of my friends working there before the war … and the annual picnic, I went on that once, to Rivington Pike. I used to go to Blackpool with my friends for the August Bank Holiday week, too … Eh, you’ve seen nothing unless you’ve seen Blackpool on a bank holiday!’

  She ordered me to pass her a slice of my cake with a piece of crumbly Lancashire cheese on the side, then resumed her inquisition.

  ‘So, they’d display all the stock up at the mill?’

  ‘They’d completely recreate the whole shop,’ he assured her. ‘It’s exactly what they wanted, so they’re really hoping you’ll say yes to the idea.’ He paused. ‘The other thing is that they’re furnishing the mill owner’s house as it was in Victorian times and would love to have the organ and the other large pieces of furniture too. Of course, they’d look after it very well and it would all be labelled as coming from your family home.’

  ‘Well, that’s something to think on … everything being preserved as it was …’ she murmured.

  ‘People will be fascinated to learn all about your family, the Honeys, and how they built the business up.’

  ‘I hadn’t realised before what a museum piece I must be too,’ she said with a sudden flash of humour. She handed me her now empty plate.

  ‘As for you – well, it’s still a pity that you’re a relative of the Almonds, but you look a nice sort of girl and not the flighty type, despite having a little girl out of wedlock.’

  ‘No, I’m certainly not flighty,’ I said. ‘And as I explained in my letter, I’m entirely focused on raising the money to take Stella to America for her operation, nothing else.’

  ‘Poor little thing. You’ll have to bring her to see me next time,’ she suggested, and I shuddered at the thought.

  ‘I’m sure she’d love that,’ I said truthfully, even if I was unsure how Miss Honey would feel about being told she looked really, really old and asked why wasn’t she dead yet?

  ‘But it doesn’t really matter what you think of me, does it? It’s what you think of Jago that counts, because he’s the one who’s going to be living there.’

  ‘I think your young man has his head screwed on the right way.’

  ‘He isn’t my young man, Miss Honey, I keep telling you!’ I said slightly desperately. ‘In fact, I don’t even need to cross the threshold of Honey’s at all, ever, if you don’t want me to.’

  ‘Don’t be daft, you can’t pull the wool over my eyes! Of course you’ll be going over the threshold – in fact, your young man should carry you over it, when you get wed.’

  Jago, instead of backing me up, laughed and said he would be more than happy to carry me over the threshold one day, but for the moment he was just focusing on getting his business up and running.

  ‘Quite right,’ she approved. ‘I said you were a sensible boy.’

  ‘So … will you let me buy Honey’s?’ he asked eagerly.

  ‘I think …’ She paused and her beady eyes examined us both. ‘I think it’s the best thing to do. I like the idea of the old Honey’s shop being there at the mill for everyone to learn about for years to come. And I like the idea of you two raising a family behind the shop in the high street, just like my parents did, and generations of Honeys before them.’

  ‘But …’ I began to protest again, since I really didn’t want to mislead her so that she sold the property under false pretences, but she was closing her eyes and murmuring, ‘Happy days …’

  Then she slipped into the light, sudden doze of old age, so we exchanged a glance, got up and tiptoed out.

  Once we were outside on the gravelled drive Jago gave me a sudden hug, which I enthusiastically returned.

  ‘Wonderful!’ he said.

  ‘Isn’t it? I really didn’t think after what Ma told me that Miss Honey would ever forgive me for being related to the Almonds – and even less so when I heard the rest of the story. But I’m so glad she did and you’ve got the place.’

  ‘She really liked my idea about Hemlock Mill and they are really keen too. It’s all going to turn out amazingly well,’ he said optimistically.

  He checked his phone before we drove off and said he had five messages. ‘Aimee,’ he muttered. ‘Now she’s got my mobile number she’s texting me non-stop.’ He looked down and added morosely, ‘What’s it got to do with her where I am and who with?’

  ‘Is that what she wants to know?’

  ‘Yes.’ He messaged her back shortly and shoved the phone in his pocket. ‘Not that it’s any of her business, but I’ve said I’m out with a friend.’

  I still wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about his ex, even now: in his heart, did he really want her back, but found it hard to forgive her? Or was he, as he said, just trying to let her down gently?

  Hal was cutting the front hedge when we got back, the cat Moses sitting nearby, observing things. Or maybe directing the operation?

  I asked him if he’d like to join us for dinner tonight and he thanked me, but said he was taking Ma to the Green Man for sausage with mustard mash and a game of darts.

&nb
sp; ‘Really? I mean, it’s not like she doesn’t go out walking at night, she always has – it used to petrify my father, when we lived in Hampstead – but she’s never been much of a one for pubs.’

  ‘It’s generally just the Winter’s End gardeners in the back where the dartboard is, and I’ve told her no one cares about the old stories about the family any more, because times have changed.’

  ‘True,’ I agreed.

  I was still surprised though, and even more so when he added, ‘Sometimes I go out walking with her nights, if I hear the gate squeak, though she’s safe enough round here. I don’t seem to sleep so much these days, I might as well be out walking.’

  ‘How’s the sciatica?’

  ‘It comes and goes,’ he said vaguely.

  ‘Did you have a good time this afternoon at the Gardening Club?’

  ‘Yes, but your ma’s had enough of folk and she wanted to go up to the studio for a couple of hours on her own.’

  He seemed to understand my mother very well, I thought, taking Jago into the house and introducing him to Jenny, who was in the sitting room with Stella and Toto.

  Stella was pleased to see us, but said she’d had the best time ever and Jenny was her favourite person after Mummy, Grandma, Hal and Jago.

  Then she counted us on her fingers and said, ‘Five best.’

  ‘Fifth,’ I corrected automatically.

  Jenny said, ‘My, she’s so sharp for her age she could cut herself!’

  Then she got her coat and went home, saying she had a little job to do on the way back.

  After she’d gone the three of us – four if you counted Toto – went into the kitchen and had an early dinner of the chicken pie I’d made yesterday, followed up by a sort of Eton mess made with microwave meringue, cream and tinned fruit.

  Then we popped some corn and watched Mamma Mia! for the millionth time, followed by While You Were Sleeping, after Stella had gone to bed, which I suppose was apt.

  Sitting on the sofa with the big bowl of popcorn between us, Jago said with a happy sigh, ‘This is wonderful! I’ve had a really lovely evening and it’s got me out of David and Sarah’s way for a while, too … Are you and Stella still on for Rufford Old Hall tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes, that would be lovely, though Stella might still be tired from today and need carrying round.’

  ‘I can do that,’ he volunteered. ‘She’s light as a feather.’

  ‘I’d have to be back by mid-afternoon, because Celia and Will are coming over for a fundraising discussion and then dinner, but it would be lovely if you could stay for both, too.’

  ‘If you’re sure you don’t mind an extra mouth to feed.’

  ‘Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding,’ I promised.

  ‘I can’t resist you!’ he said, grinning. ‘Especially since Sarah and David are starting to paint and decorate the flat tomorrow, ready for when she moves up here permanently.’

  ‘Ah, an ulterior motive. Shouldn’t you help them with that?’

  ‘I think I’d rather eat roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, actually,’ he said.

  Jago

  When Jago got back to the flat it already reeked of paint, so Sarah and David must have been unable to resist starting on the redecoration after the shop had shut. The fireplace alcoves had been papered in a bold retro dandelion-head design in shades of blue, black and grey, and one wall painted in experimental squares of grey ranging from soft dove to darkest battleship.

  At least, Jago thought they were experimental squares …

  He went into his bedroom, almost falling over the folded stepladder someone had stored there, and switched on his mobile, to find it full of missed messages from Aimee. It instantly rang again, as though she’d telepathically divined when he’d switched it back on.

  ‘Hi, Aimee,’ he sighed wearily.

  ‘There you are at last!’ she said, sounding exasperated. ‘I tried to get you for ages earlier and then your phone went off.’

  ‘Sorry, I was busy, though I did send you a message. Then the battery went dead,’ he lied. ‘Just got back to the flat and plugged the charger in. Was it anything urgent?’ he asked, though he couldn’t think of any emergency he could, or would, want to help her with.

  ‘Not urgent, exactly, it’s just that some friends of Daddy’s are selling up their perfect little country house hotel and I had a brilliant idea – we could take it on.’

  ‘We?’ Jago said blankly.

  ‘Yes, it would be ideal. You can cook and I’ll be the hostess and manager – just think of the themed house parties I could organise!’

  He did and shuddered.

  ‘It’s in the Cotswolds so it’s near loads of friends as well as Daddy, but really accessible for London. I thought you could drive down here tomorrow and I’ll take you to see it, before I go back to London. But if you can’t, then next weekend you—’

  ‘Whoa, hold it right there, Aimee!’ Jago interrupted hastily. ‘I’m a baker; I’m not remotely interested in becoming a hotel cook!’

  ‘But it would be our own hotel and if you can bake, I don’t see why you can’t cook anything.’

  ‘Aimee,’ he said, with much more patience than he felt, ‘I don’t know what made you think I’d be interested in buying a hotel, or even living in the Cotswolds, but I’ve already told you I’m looking around here for premises to run my croquembouche business from. In fact, today I’ve had an offer on a property in a local village accepted – that’s what I was doing earlier.’

  ‘But I don’t want to live up there,’ she protested.

  ‘That’s all right, because you don’t have to. We’re not engaged any more, remember? We’re just friends.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Jago,’ she wheedled. ‘You know you don’t mean that. I can understand that you want to punish me a bit, but you’re the only man I’ve ever really loved and now I’m ready to settle down with you and—’

  ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t feel the same way any more, Aimee. It’s not that I’m trying to punish you, because that never entered my head – and yes, I’m still fond of you and hope we’ll stay friends, but that’s as far as it goes. Now, it’s late, so—’

  ‘Wait, you can’t possibly mean that,’ she snapped, then paused and added in a more conciliating tone, ‘I’m sorry, Jago, perhaps I’ve been a bit too quick off the mark and made assumptions … though I can’t believe I’ve lost your love for ever.’

  Jago thought that was a pretty trite line.

  ‘I’m not absolutely set on the hotel idea,’ she added. ‘Maybe we could set up a party package business like the Middletons instead, but just for weddings, because they seem to have made a good thing out of it. Only I don’t think the North of England would be a good base for that kind of thing.’

  ‘I’m sure it wouldn’t,’ he said.

  ‘I tell you what, I’ll come up and see you next weekend and you can show me this place you want to buy,’ she suggested magnanimously.

  Jago had a horrible mental vision of Aimee in the cluttered, dusty, cobwebbed shop, clad in dirt-magnet taupe silk and linen, with teetering stilettos that would catch in the wooden floorboards.

  ‘I’m sorry, that’s not convenient because I’m going to be very busy all weekend.’

  ‘You’re just trying to put me off … unless you really have taken up with someone else, like your best buddy was hinting at?’ she said more sharply.

  ‘I have been seeing a lot of a local friend lately, that’s who he meant,’ Jago explained.

  ‘A female friend?’

  ‘Well, yes. She’s got a little girl who’s nearly four and has serious health problems, so I’m helping her to raise the money to take her to America for life-saving surgery.’

  ‘Always the bleeding heart,’ she said sarcastically. ‘She hasn’t persuaded you to give her all your winnings, has she?’

  ‘No. In fact, she won’t take a penny of them.’

  ‘How long have you known this woman?’

  ‘Oh, I met her
years ago in London, when I was at Gilligan’s. She’s a cookery writer specialising in baking, so we’ve got loads in common,’ he said enthusiastically, forgetting for the moment who he was speaking to. ‘It was great to find she’d moved up here.’

  ‘I bet it was!’ Aimee snarled and from the sound of it, then hurled her phone at the wall. He turned his off quickly, in case she hadn’t broken it and thought of anything else to add.

  Chapter 22: Princess Possibilities

  After Jago had gone I felt suddenly exhausted, but also strangely wide awake, so I tried out that mincemeat Eton mess idea I’d had. It came out well and I’d just roughly written up the recipe for Sweet Home on my laptop in the little breakfast nook, when Ma came back from the pub.

  ‘Had a good time?’ I asked, looking up.

  ‘Yes. Ottie came down with Seth and Sophy, but Ottie’s lethal with a dart so they banned her after the first go. What are these?’ she added, picking up a tumbler of Eton mess.

  ‘It’s a Christmas dessert and it’s come out quite well: I might make it again for pudding after dinner tomorrow. You’ve remembered Celia and Will are coming over in the afternoon and staying for dinner, haven’t you?’

  She nodded. ‘And Hal has remembered he’s invited to dinner, too. Is this mincemeat at the bottom?’ Ma had fetched a spoon and was digging into the pudding, watched keenly by Moses and Toto.

  ‘Yes. It’s mincemeat, cream and crumbled meringue. I mixed a tiny bit of brandy in with the mincemeat. By the way,’ I added, ‘Jago’s going to be here for dinner tomorrow too, because we’re going out to Rufford Old Hall in the morning.’

  ‘Right,’ she said vaguely, putting down the empty pot and then wandering out of the room.

  ‘Good night, Ma!’ I called, before putting a bit of polish on the article for ‘Tea & Cake’.

  Individual Christmas Eton mess desserts are a refreshing twist for a seasonal dinner party. In a pan, gently warm one generous tablespoon of mincemeat per person, then stir in a tablespoon of brandy. Divide between small dishes or tumblers and allow to cool. Crumble up some meringue (microwave meringue works very well) and mix with whipped cream. Spoon this over the mincemeat and then sprinkle a little more crushed meringue onto the top. An edible gold or silver star adds the final touch.