A Family Recipe

by Veronica Henry

  ‘Well, you wouldn’t because Jilly doesn’t moan. And they were the nicest people you could ever meet.’

  ‘That’s terrible. And she’s so kind.’

  ‘That’s because she’s a good person. Not like you and me.’

  Helena looked at her sharply, nettled. ‘I’m not a bad person.’

  ‘I don’t want you taking advantage, that’s all. You shouldn’t have left her with the kids.’

  ‘She offered,’ said Helena. ‘And I’m so tired. I haven’t slept properly since it happened.’

  ‘None of us have. We’re all in it together, this war,’ Ivy finished. ‘So you’ve got to do your bit. And if anyone needs looking after, it’s Jilly.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Helena. ‘I’m sorry. It’s all been so topsy-turvy.’ She bit her lip. ‘I know I lost my house, but losing your parents? Poor Jilly.’

  ‘Well, now you know. But don’t tell her I told you. She won’t want pity.’

  ‘I’m glad you did.’ Helena smiled at Ivy, unsure. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Truce?’ said Ivy, holding out her hand.

  Helena looked at it for a moment.

  ‘I’m not a thief, by the way,’ she added. ‘I know I’m Kingsmead, but it doesn’t make me a crook.’

  ‘Good,’ said Ivy. ‘Don’t take it personally. It’s my job to look out for Jilly. When you’re nice like she is, people take advantage.’

  Helena nodded and took Ivy’s hand.

  ‘Truce,’ she said, and the two of them shook hands on it.

  ‘Piggy,’ said Dot, and gave a little oink.

  ‘Come on, you,’ said Ivy, scooping Dot up again. ‘I’ll take you to see the piggy while Mummy gets dressed. But she’d better make me a cup of tea later.’

  She gave Helena a wink and was gone.

  For tea, Jilly eked out the few sausages she had to make toad-in-the-hole and made a pan of mash to fill everyone up. As she pounded at the potatoes with the back of a fork, Helena drifted into the kitchen. She looked more anxious than ever.

  ‘Whatever’s the matter?’

  ‘I’ve just come to say …’ Helena stumbled over her words. ‘I’m really sorry about your mum and dad, and I’m sorry I’ve been so awful. It’s just …’ Her eyes became glassy and her voice broke. ‘I really thought we were going to die. Me and the kids. I thought that was it and I was going to die, with Dot in my arms and the other two beside me, and they’d find us all curled up together under that settee—’

  ‘Hey, hey, hey!’ Jilly put the fork down and took Helena in her arms. ‘You haven’t been awful.’

  ‘And I miss my husband and I’m so afraid I’ll never see him and it’s going to happen again.’

  ‘It won’t. We’ve got the cellar. No one can get hurt in there. It’s as strong as anything. I promise you.’

  ‘I’m just so scared. I can’t bear it when the night comes.’

  ‘I know. I know. Me too.’

  To her consternation, Jilly found that tears were coursing down her cheeks as well. The two of them stood in the kitchen, strangers who barely knew each other, gripping on tightly for comfort.

  ‘Tell me it won’t happen again tonight,’ Helena begged. ‘I know they didn’t come last night but I couldn’t bear it if they came back.’

  ‘I promise they won’t,’ said Jilly. And even though she didn’t believe in God or life after death or magic or the power of prayer, she sent a message up to her father: Dear Dad, tell whoever’s up there to get Hitler to leave us alone. He’s made his point. There’s no need to come back for more.

  Afterwards, Jilly felt overwhelmed by the emotion of her exchange with Helena and went into the larder to escape. It was down a corridor by the back of the kitchen, a cool dark room with stone walls painted white, a smooth marble worktop and rows of wooden shelves. There was a meat safe with a mesh front, and another one for cheese. Strings of onions hung from a hook on the ceiling, gleaming pinky gold. She could remember her father in the greenhouse, a piece of string hanging in front of him as he twisted the onions together and layered them up. They filled the air with their sharp pungency.

  On the shelves were rows and rows and rows of jars. As soon as she saw them, Jilly remembered the kitchen filled with the sharp smell of vinegar or the sweet scent of sugary fruit coming to the boil, her mother standing at the Aga stirring the contents of her jam kettle with a wooden spoon. She would show Jilly how to draw the spoon through the chutney to see if it parted: if it did, then it was ready. Or to dollop a blob of jam onto a cold plate and then push it with your finger: if it wrinkled then it was thick enough to be put into jars.

  There was a rhythm and a ritual that was governed by what was in the garden, from raspberries to runner beans. Ruby-red crab-apple jelly; bright yellow piccalilli; sharp green apple chutney; dark-purple blackcurrant compote: no meal was complete without a spoonful of one or another to bring out the flavour and liven up the dullness of wartime fare. Pickled onions, the white globes spinning in the golden liquid – there would often be one or two on the side of their lunch plate, together with a triangle of sharp cheddar and a slice of brown bread. She could imagine the crunch as she bit into one. Deep-burgundy slices of beetroot: woe betide if any of the juice got on your clothes, as the stain would never come out. And her own favourite, sticky damson jam, which she loved on hot buttered toast for breakfast, tea or last thing at night. She would play with the stones: tinker, tailor, soldier … pilot?

  Everything her parents had grown in their garden was contained in these four walls. They had left her a wonderful legacy, she realised. The garden was starting to come to life after the long winter and would offer up its bounty over the next few months. It was up to her to harvest what had been planted, and to preserve it as best she could for the following winter. And to carry on what they had begun by replanting. She felt daunted. Although she sometimes helped them in the garden, she had paid little attention to what was planted where and when, or when was the optimum time to pick. She had taken it all for granted; gone about her own life while they weeded, dug, planted, pruned, harvested, dried, bottled, preserved.

  On one of the shelves was a small brown box, achingly familiar. On the front were printed the words ‘A Family Recipe’ in copperplate script. Jilly opened the lid and inside were stored dozens of index cards, all covered in her mother’s writing, in blue ink. She pulled one out:

  Apple and Date Chutney

  1lb apples, peeled and cored

  2lbs stoned dates

  ½lb sultanas

  1lb chopped onions

  1lb treacle

  2 tbs sugar

  4 oz salt

  pinch cayenne pepper

  2 ½ pints vinegar

  Put onions, apples, dates and sultanas through the mincer.

  Combine all other ingredients and bring to boil.

  Add fruit and onion mixture then cook gently for an hour or until nicely thickened.

  She could almost taste it on her tongue: sharp and sweet, the last windfalls of autumn boiled down for the coming months, to be served with a thick slice of cold ham or a pork pie. All the recipes she would ever need were in there, with careful notes: Very greedy for sugar! The longer kept the better. Don’t pack too tightly.

  She closed the box gently and held it to her heart. This would be her guide to life over the next few months. The garden and the kitchen would give her rhythm and purpose, and somehow she felt her parents would live on in what she was doing.

  18

  September slid into October, the daylight gold and the night soft velvet. Laura looked down at the pot of plums bubbling on the hotplate, breathing in their rich fruity sweetness. She spooned away a layer of froth and gave the plums a stir to make sure they weren’t sticking, then double-checked the recipe to see how much sugar she needed for the next step. It was her great-grandmother’s recipe, she thought from the writing, but both she and Kanga had added notes to the index card: Laura had put in the metric measurements because she f
ound she was starting to think in grams and kilos these days.

  She strained the plums through a fine sieve, squeezing out every last drop of juice, then put it all back in the pan with the sugar. It would boil down until it was unctuously thick and ready to be put in the jars she had sterilising in the Aga.

  By the end of the day she would have a dozen jars gleaming deep dark red behind the glass. For a moment she felt her heart sink. This was one of her signature accompaniments: she made the plum cheese every year and always plonked a jar onto the cheeseboard when she had a dinner party and her guests would usually see off the whole thing over the course of an evening. She was always giving people a jar to take home with them, they loved it so much.

  But with no Dom there had been no parties at Number 11 since he had left nearly a month ago, and she had none planned. She didn’t feel inclined to entertain on her own. Nor had she felt like going out. She – they – had been invited to several social occasions, but she’d made excuses. She couldn’t face either lying or explaining his absence. Usually she said she was going up to York to see Willow, and that seemed like an acceptable excuse. She hadn’t been caught out yet. But neither had she been to York. Again, she couldn’t face the lying. Pretending everything was all right when it wasn’t. Between them, she and Dom had obfuscated so the girls didn’t suspect anything was amiss.

  As she took the warm jars out of the Aga, she wondered what on earth she was going to do with them all. There was only so much plum cheese you could eat on your own. Then she thought – maybe she should sell them?

  For years she’d sold her jams and pickles and preserves at the table-top sale every Christmas at the girls’ school. She had always sold out before everyone else and had made a profit – not for herself, but whichever charity the school had chosen to support that year. She’d made a couple of hundred pounds, usually. Everybody raved about her preserves. She used the old-fashioned recipes from the recipe box that had been handed down, but often gave them a modern twist.

  So why not do them on a commercial basis? She could start small, see what the response was. After all, she needed another source of income. She needed to be ambitious. The Airbnb was a start: she’d managed to clear the rooms out. They weren’t exactly House & Garden standard yet, but they were empty of clutter. She’d rolled up the old carpets and dragged them down the stairs – that had been more effective than going to the gym – and the old sagging mattresses too, then phoned a man with a van to come and take it all to the tip, together with the rest of the junk she didn’t want. She’d been ruthless. She didn’t need a set of purple plastic dumb-bells or a broken music stand or a mouldy old rucksack. She’d boxed up all Dom’s paperwork into date order and put it in the cupboard on the next landing.

  Then she’d gone to the out-of-town industrial estate, where the DIY shops and home superstores were, and ordered several tins of paint for the walls and floorboards, floor-length velvet curtains, bed linen, cushions, bedside lamps: it was all going to be delivered next week, ready for the grand makeover.

  It had been really tempting not to bother adding it all up, to just slam it on the credit card as she drifted from shop to shop, but she was determined to do things properly, so she’d done a budget and kept a meticulous record. Nevertheless she felt a bit queasy when she saw the total. It was nearly two thousand pounds, and that didn’t include the new mattresses.

  She reminded herself the rooms had to look and feel luxurious if she was going to charge good prices. She should be able to have them ready to rent out in the next couple of weeks. The day before she’d had a long FaceTime session with Jaz, who was going to build a simple website for her and set her up on Airbnb.

  ‘You’re quite the entrepreneur, Mum,’ Jaz had teased. ‘But you need to get your head around the tech. You should go and do a course at the college.’

  ‘Why would I do that when I’ve got you?’ Laura bantered back.

  ‘You can run the whole thing from your phone, but you need to know how it works. I’ll show you next time I’m home.’

  Happy that she was set fair to launch in plenty of time for the Christmas shoppers who descended on Bath, Laura decided it was time to add another string to her bow. She went over to the dresser and picked up the old recipe box. She could use this as her brand. A Family Recipe. Get the logo scanned off the front of the box and have some labels made up. Isn’t that what people wanted? To feel as if something had been handed down through the generations? That it had some history to it? This box certainly had that. She could even do a press release. Get a story in local magazines and newspapers, about how the recipes had kept everyone going through the war and were still being used …

  Where could she sell them, though? She couldn’t exactly go down to Waitrose and give them her homespun spiel. She had to start small, try out different flavours, grow the business carefully. Even Jo Malone had started small, she thought. She’d be the Jo Malone of jam.

  She could hardly wait for the mixture to cool down before pouring it into the waiting jars and screwing on the lids. She knew exactly where she should start. She felt a frisson of anticipation: it was exciting. More importantly, it stopped her thinking about Dom. What he was doing. What he was thinking. What was going to happen …

  She ran upstairs to her – their – bedroom and threw open the wardrobe door. She didn’t look at Dom’s end where his remaining shirts hung. Instead, she flicked through her own clothes. She remembered something she had bought in Sadie’s Christmas sale and hadn’t ever got round to wearing. It was a pale-grey suede biker jacket, and Sadie had given it to her for next to nothing because someone had tried it on and got foundation on the collar. Laura had used a wet wipe to get it off, and it was as good as new. But until now, she hadn’t worn it because she’d feared she wasn’t really able to pull it off.

  Today, however, she felt as if the jacket was perfect for her new image as a go-getting entrepreneur. She pulled on fresh jeans and a long sleeved white T-shirt, and she slipped the jacket on over the top. Then she ruffled her hair up a bit and tied it into a side ponytail, put on a flick of eyeliner, mascara and bright-red lipstick.

  She looked in the mirror, turned up the jacket collar and grinned at herself.

  ‘Get you,’ she said, and nearly doubled up laughing.

  Then she pulled on a pair of ankle boots and headed out of the door.

  She loved her city, she thought, as she made her way down Lansdown Hill. Bath suited autumn. The leaves were turning a golden yellow that matched the stone of the facades. She wandered along the pavement with its black iron railings, high above the road. She had a bird’s-eye view of black slate roofs and chimney pots, the windows glittering in the afternoon light, the Doric columns surrounding the front doors standing proud as soldiers.

  At the bottom of the hill by the traffic lights, she turned right along George Street then left into Milsom Street, which led gently down to the centre of the city. With its upmarket shops, restaurants and flagship department store, the pavements were milling with shoppers and every window was a temptation. Boots for the upcoming winter in tobacco suede, dark-blue velvet, burgundy brocade, black patent, with heels in every height and thickness: leg-lengthening wedges, vampy stilettoes, dainty kittens. Men’s shirts and ties, from classic stripes and funky dots to psychedelic. Gorgeous coffee-table books on every subject, from Russian churches to Venetian tapas to coastal birds. Intricately decorated bottles filled with lotions and potions and perfumes and unguents. A florist, its buckets stuffed with roses in glorious colours: pale green and lilac and the deepest blood-red crimson. Every shop was subtly lit and beckoned you inside.

  Laura appreciated these shops but she wasn’t seduced by them. She preferred the smaller, specialist shops off the beaten track, down the narrower side streets with their uneven pavements and cobbles. The deli with its strings of salami and wheels of pungent cheese and bowls of shiny black olives. The chocolatier that smelled of cocoa and vanilla and temptation. Her favourite wa
s the kitchen shop, with the Italian gadgets she lusted after but could never justify: elegant coffee machines and pasta makers with dizzying price tags. There were shops that sold candles, antique maps, gentlemen’s hats, thick black fountain pens waiting to write letters of life-changing importance. She lingered as she looked, wondering if any of the owners of these shops had felt like she had today, about to start out on a new venture. Adventure.

  And then she turned the corner and there it was in front of her. One of the places she loved best in the world, that gave her inspiration and comfort and might just be the key to her future, if she played her cards right.

  The Lulgate Weekly Market was held in a tiny square at the end of a crooked lane. The stalls were clustered around a mighty oak tree and surrounded by a range of quirky shops and small businesses.

  It was Laura’s favourite place in the world to buy food, especially if she wasn’t in the mood to actually cook. There was always something new to try, something you hadn’t heard of, a new culinary fashion or a twist on something old. There was a baker who made every kind of bread you could think of, and some you couldn’t, in every shape and size: sourdough, crusty white, focaccia, ciabatta, soda bread. A specialist in infused oils and flavoured vinegars. A charcuterie stall – she always bought a chunk of fennel salami to nibble on with a glass of wine before supper. Local cheese, of course. Sausages and cider and oysters. Tacos and paella and porchetta rolls. It was Laura’s idea of heaven, and she loved how the customers and the stallholders interacted, often deep in conversation making comparisons. There were always little samples to try – a new flavour combination or texture to experiment with.

  She bought a takeaway latte from a coffee stall called El Beano.

  ‘Is that to rhyme with El Niño?’ she asked the stallholder, who was as enticing as the coffee he sold: tall, with wild dark curls and a smattering of stubble. He was wearing a tight black T-shirt with the company logo on it, and his arms were muscular. She could see what looked to be a tattoo of an angel wing peeping out from under his sleeve.