Love in an English Garden

by Victoria Connelly

  ‘What?’

  ‘Jonathan. I never thought I’d find love again. I really didn’t. I thought I’d ramble into old age on my own.’

  ‘But that’s you,’ Jenna said.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘People like you – you’re lucky.’

  ‘You call losing my husband to cancer lucky?’

  ‘No, but you always fall on your feet. But people like me always fall on our faces.’

  ‘That’s not true and you mustn’t think like that!’

  ‘I can’t help it.’

  ‘Well, you should try. Starting today – right this minute in fact. You’ve got to be positive, Jenna. Positive things happen to positive people.’ She smiled. ‘You do believe that, don’t you?’

  Jenna gave a little pout. ‘I guess I could try to believe it.’

  Vanessa took a deep breath and then wondered if that was wise as she noted a huge mouldy patch of wallpaper in the corner of the room.

  ‘There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about,’ Vanessa said. ‘I’ve really loved having you at Orley. You work so hard in the garden and—’

  ‘You’re firing me, aren’t you? You don’t want me to come back.’

  ‘No!’ Vanessa cried. ‘The very opposite in fact.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I want to offer you a job. A part-time job in the garden.’

  ‘But I don’t know that much. You could find someone much better than me.’

  ‘But I want you, Jenna!’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You really have to ask?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Because you have spirit and determination. You have a wicked sense of humour and a willingness to learn. Because I like the way you ask me questions and really listen to the answers. Because I like you, Jenna.’

  Tears had arisen in Jenna’s eyes again. ‘Really?’

  ‘I want you as part of our permanent team at Orley. You know more than you think you do and you’d be working with Jonathan. An apprentice, if you like. He’d teach you everything you need to know. We want to open the gardens to the public and I can’t manage it all on my own. Jonathan’s team are doing a great job, but that’s just two days a week and you’ve seen the size of the place. If Orley’s going to do this professionally then that means hiring help.’

  ‘But why me? Why not Andy or Oz or—’

  ‘Because you’ve been doing a great job, and I’ve loved working with you. You’ve got a natural feel for the plants. Andy and Oz and the rest of the team – they’re all great lads. They work hard, but they don’t use their initiative like you do and they never give more than they have to. I don’t think they care as much either. Just look at how you stayed behind to work the other day and how you’re always making suggestions – really good ones too. And how hard you’ve been working with me in the south garden.’

  ‘So this isn’t just a pity thing?’

  ‘Of course it isn’t. I need your help. This is purely selfish on my part.’ She paused, waiting for the girl’s response. ‘Of course, if you don’t want the job, I could always ask Andy or—’

  ‘No!’ Jenna cried. ‘That’s my job. I’ll take it!’

  ‘You will?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Oh, I’m so pleased.’ Vanessa hugged her tightly. ‘I really didn’t want to have to work with Andy!’

  Jenna laughed and Vanessa was so relieved to hear her dear friend – and new employee – sound happy once again.

  Chapter 21

  A hot July slowly slipped into a sultry August. The roses were resting between flushes, the hollyhocks had reached skyscraper proportions and there were more tomatoes in the greenhouse than Jonathan’s team could cope with.

  ‘I’ve got tomatoes coming out of my ears!’ Andy cried as Vanessa tried to get him to take a bag home with him.

  ‘I’ve got them coming out somewhere further south,’ Nat said. ‘I swear my pee’s turned red.’

  ‘Please don’t make me eat any more of them things,’ Oz said, and Vanessa took pity on him.

  ‘Fine,’ she said. ‘I’ll make a sauce and bottle it for the fete.’

  ‘What, sell it?’ Oz asked.

  ‘It’s called adding value,’ she told him. ‘I’ll cook it up with some onions, basil and herbs – all from the garden – and we can sell it for five pounds a bottle.’

  ‘Cool!’ he said with a broad grin.

  Jonathan looked impressed. ‘Want a hand with that?’

  ‘I think I can cope.’

  ‘He just wants a cut of your profits,’ Andy said.

  ‘You know all the money will go back into this project,’ she told them. ‘We’re already planning what you guys will be growing next year.’

  ‘Next year!’ Oz shouted. ‘We’ll still be doing this in a year?’

  Vanessa was a little taken aback by his apparent horror. ‘Well, only if you want to be here,’ she said.

  Oz winked at her. ‘Of course I want to be here. I was only messing with you!’

  ‘Oh!’ Vanessa said, mightily relieved.

  ‘Oz has never had any sort of job for more than two months, have you?’ Jonathan said.

  ‘Two months?’ Oz said. ‘Are you kidding me? I’ve never lasted two months! Two weeks, more like!’

  Jonathan shook his head in despair. ‘Hey, Andy – are you keeping an eye on those cabbages of yours? Make sure the butterflies can’t get through the nets or you’ll end up with more hole than cabbage leaf and nobody will want to buy them.’

  ‘Have you seen my beans, Jonathan?’ Oz asked.

  ‘I have, Oz. They’re looking spectacular.’

  ‘They’re going to knock the socks off Andy’s cabbages!’ Oz said.

  Jonathan grinned and Vanessa watched as he got back to work with a hoe. The rain of the week before had not only fed the flowers, fruit and vegetables, but the weeds too. She studied him for a moment. He looked so at home there working in the walled garden that it was now hard for Vanessa to imagine a time when he hadn’t been a part of life at Orley.

  She joined him.

  ‘Hey,’ she said.

  ‘You okay?’

  ‘I’m good,’ she said. ‘How’s Jenna doing?’

  Jonathan glanced over to where Jenna was pinching out side shoots on the tomatoes in the greenhouse.

  ‘I think she’s doing okay,’ he said.

  ‘Me too.’

  ‘She loves her new job. This place is like a second home to her.’

  ‘I’m so happy to hear that,’ Vanessa said.

  Jonathan and Jenna had started working in the south garden at Orley a couple of weeks ago and had made good progress, widening a border and dividing plants and cleaning out the large ornamental pond.

  ‘Yeah. She talks about it incessantly on the ride home. It’s driving me nuts!’

  ‘No it isn’t. You love it!’

  ‘Yeah. I do.’ He moved an inch towards her. ‘I’ll tell you something else. I love you.’

  Vanessa blinked in surprise. Had she heard him right? Had he just told her he loved her as she was holding a garden fork in one hand and a rebellious thistle in the other?

  ‘Jonathan . . .’ she began, not quite knowing where the sentence was going.

  ‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘You don’t need to say anything. I said it because I wanted to, not because I expect you to say it too.’

  ‘But I—’

  ‘I hope you don’t mind. I hope you don’t think it’s too soon and that I’m rushing things, because I don’t want to put any pressure on you.’

  ‘You’re not. You’re really not.’ She took a step towards him and, even though she was aware that the whole team was watching their every move, cupped his face in her hands and kissed him fully on the mouth.

  A huge cheer went up from the team and wolf whistles echoed around the walled garden.

  ‘I love you too,’ she said.

  ‘There,’ he said. ‘I knew I could winkl
e it out of you!’

  She gasped and slapped his arm, but she was laughing.

  That evening, Vanessa thought it was about time that she told Dolly and her daughters about the fete she and Jonathan were planning. She’d dropped a few hints about it over the last few weeks, but nobody had really been listening to her.

  ‘So, what do you think?’ she asked them now. They were sitting in the living room after dinner and, buoyed up with enthusiasm for absolutely everything since she and Jonathan had confessed their love for each other, she was ready for anything anyone might say. Sure enough, Dolly was the first to show her disapproval although she didn’t express herself as callously as she might once have done.

  ‘But we haven’t had the fete since before Oliver became ill.’

  ‘I know, Dolly.’

  ‘So why now?’

  ‘Because,’ she began and then she took a deep breath, ‘I’m ready. And Orley’s ready.’

  The three Jacobs women stared at her in silence. Tilda was the first to speak.

  ‘When?’

  ‘August Bank Holiday.’

  ‘Oh, Mum! Everyone knows that the weather’s always awful on bank holidays,’ Tilda said.

  ‘Yes, but the numbers of people visiting are always good then.’

  ‘I’m not sure about this,’ Dolly said.

  ‘You don’t have to be sure. You just have to support us. Well, you don’t even have to do that,’ Vanessa stated, ‘but we’d like it very much if you did.’

  Dolly scowled, but she was nodding too. ‘Oliver would have wanted it, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘I believe he would have, yes,’ Vanessa agreed.

  ‘Then let’s do it,’ Dolly said.

  Vanessa smiled. ‘Great. Jonathan and the team will be so pleased that you’re on board.’

  ‘As long as I don’t have to bake anything. My baking days are over,’ Dolly informed her.

  ‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ Vanessa said. ‘Your coconut cookies were always bestsellers. Remember the year that Joan Keaton actually pushed Harriet Bradley out of the way so she could get the last few?’

  Dolly gave a little smile and her cheeks flushed pink with pride. ‘Well, maybe I could rustle up a batch or two,’ she responded.

  ‘That would be amazing,’ Vanessa said, thinking how proud Jonathan would be of her for trying to win Dolly over with flattery. ‘Jassy? How do you feel about having a fete again?’

  Jassy shifted in her place on the sofa. She hadn’t yet said anything.

  ‘It won’t be the same, will it?’

  ‘No,’ Vanessa said, guessing what was going through her daughter’s mind. ‘It will be the first fete without your father.’

  Jassy nodded, seeming to take this in. ‘I won’t have to paint kids’ faces, will I?’

  ‘Not if you don’t want to.’

  ‘I definitely don’t want to.’

  ‘Okay, then.’

  ‘But maybe I could set up a painting table. I could teach them. That would be acceptable.’

  ‘That’s a very nice idea, Jassy.’

  ‘Marcus could help me.’

  ‘Would he actually want to?’ Vanessa asked.

  ‘Oh, yes. Marcus does everything I tell him to.’

  ‘You’re so bossy,’ Tilda told her sister.

  ‘No I’m not,’ Jassy said. ‘I’m just full of good ideas.’

  In his study in the north wing, Laurence gazed at his computer even though he wasn’t really concentrating on it. Since Tilda had told him that she needed space, he’d kept his distance even though it’d been killing him. They exchanged only a few words when they passed each other in the hallway. Jassy had been keeping him updated on what was going on in her sister’s life and it sounded like things were moving apace at Morton’s studio in London. She was, apparently, spending a lot of time there and he couldn’t help feeling a little jealous of the young music producer. How on earth could a boring financial adviser hope to compete with a dynamic music producer? he asked himself. He didn’t have a hope, did he?

  And so he’d decided not to think about competing. Tilda knew how he felt about her, and if that wasn’t good enough then so be it. He wasn’t going to make a fool of himself.

  Anyway, he had his work, which was going surprisingly well. The wonder of word-of-mouth advertising was really beginning to kick in and he’d had a lot of new clients from the local area signing up for his services. Oh, yes, he had more than enough on his plate without any romantic complications. He was good and busy. He probably didn’t have time for a relationship anyway, even if she changed her mind and came knocking on his door.

  That’s what he told himself anyway.

  It was on one of those summer days when the air was so close that you started praying for rain that the incident occurred. It was as if the season had grown bored and tired of itself. Jassy was working with Marcus in the oast house, but neither of them was producing good work. It was too hot. Even with the door wide open, there was barely a breath of air to be found. Skinny had slunk off in disgust and Jassy was seriously wondering whether to take a dip in the pond. Grandma Dolly always disapproved of such behaviour. ‘Unladylike,’ she’d tell her, but, since Jassy’s outburst, it was obvious that Dolly was making a real effort with everyone, and you could see her almost literally biting her tongue before speaking her mind.

  Jassy shook her head, dismissing the thought of a quick dip as she saw Marcus struggling with his painting.

  ‘You need some more blue,’ she told him. ‘Here – try this.’ She passed him a tube of Prussian-blue paint.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t want it.’

  ‘The painting needs it,’ she said. ‘Never mess with what a painting needs.’

  She watched him for a moment as he stood staring down at the tube of paint.

  ‘Marcus? Are you okay?’ His breathing seemed to be laboured. Was it the heat or was it something more sinister than that? ‘Do you want to sit down?’ Jassy reached an arm out, but he batted it away. Something inside him seemed to break and, before she knew what was happening, he’d kicked his easel over. It landed on the floor with a bang, the painting sliding off. Jassy screamed as Marcus’s heavy boots stood on it, breaking right through the canvas.

  ‘No!’ she cried, but it was too late. There was no stopping him as he moved to the other side of the oast house where his paintings from the last few weeks were stacked. He picked one up and flung it across the room. Jassy screamed again.

  ‘Marcus! Stop!’ But he didn’t seem to hear her.

  Jassy ran out and on to the main house.

  ‘Laurence?’ she shouted as soon as she was in the hallway. ‘LAURENCE!’

  ‘What is it?’ he said a moment later, appearing at the top of the stairs.

  ‘It’s your dad. He’s gone mad.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Laurence asked as he came down the stairs two at a time.

  Jassy flapped her hands in front of her face as she tried to gather her thoughts. ‘Be logical,’ Tilda often advised her. ‘In times of stress, you need to calm down and be logical.’

  ‘Is there something I should know about Prussian blue?’ Jassy asked, her face screwing up as she tried to navigate her way through the situation. That’s when the trouble had started, wasn’t it? With that innocuous tube of Prussian-blue paint.

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Oh, never mind!’ Jassy said, slinging logic out of the window. ‘Come on!’ She grabbed Laurence by the arm and they ran through the north garden towards the oast house.

  ‘Dad?’ Laurence said as he entered. There were paintbrushes and broken jars all over the floor, but what was even more disturbing were the canvases that seemed to have been flung in what looked like an angry rage.

  ‘Marcus?’ Jassy asked, swallowing hard as she surveyed the scene. She’d been known to make a mess in her beloved studio, but she’d never achieved anything on this scale. All of his beautiful paintings destroyed. How could he have done that
to himself after all his hard work?

  And there was Marcus standing in the middle of the chaos. He was perfectly still now, his head slightly lowered like a beaten animal.

  ‘Jassy?’ Laurence said, turning to her. ‘Would you mind if I took things from here?’

  ‘You want to be alone?’

  ‘Is that okay?’

  She nodded, leaving the two Sturridge men together.

  ‘Dad?’ Laurence said tentatively. He wasn’t sure how to begin, but he had to find out what was going on. ‘Do you want to sit down?’ He’d noticed a couple of stools had been knocked over and he went to pick them up. ‘There,’ he said a moment later. ‘Come and sit down.’

  Marcus did as he was told. He looked as if every ounce of energy had drained out of him.

  ‘Can I get you anything? A drink?’

  ‘No.’

  Laurence sat in silence for a moment. A cool wind had arrived in the garden and the sky had darkened dramatically.

  ‘I think it’s going to rain,’ he said, looking out of the oast house window before his eyes fixed again on the wreckage of the room. There were abstracts and landscapes and still lifes galore. Some had been punched through the centre and Laurence saw now that his father’s right knuckles were covered in paint. Another – a painting of a row of blue bottles – looked as if it had been stamped on. But the thing that caught his eye was a portrait up against the opposite wall. Unharmed. He hadn’t seen it when he’d first come in, but he studied it now. There was no mistaking who it was. Tara. His mother. With her dark wavy hair and the clear green eyes he’d inherited, she was just as he remembered her. Beautiful. What had been going through his father’s mind as he’d painted her? he wondered.

  ‘Dad – what’s going on?’ Laurence asked.

  His father’s face was ashen. ‘I wanted to spare you this, son.’

  ‘Spare me what? Dad?’

  Marcus closed his eyes for a moment and exhaled slowly. ‘Your mother. The day she died.’

  Laurence swallowed hard. He had pushed and pushed his father to talk about that day but, now that he was going to, Laurence wasn’t sure that he was ready.