Springtime at the Cider Kitchen

by Fay Keenan

  ‘I don’t think the desk has ever been used for that before,’ Matthew mused, a broad smile on his face.

  ‘Nice to know we’re the first,’ Anna teased back. Both of them had got used to the fact that there were some experiences that were bound to cross over, second time around, but Anna was secretly pleased she’d not been second to this particular scenario.

  ‘Although I can’t be sure my father didn’t indulge when he was more sprightly,’ Matthew teased. Jack was known for his love of the ladies and Anna couldn’t help but giggle, disturbing as the image was.

  ‘Is there anything in this house that doesn’t come with at least fifty years of history?’ Anna teased.

  ‘Me. For a little while yet,’ Matthew replied, quick as a flash.

  And with that, they decided to make an early night of it.

  18

  Despite having left education well over a decade ago, September brought with it that all too familiar back to school feeling for Caroline. The Cider Kitchen’s summer season had been a success and, despite her reservations about putting game on the menu, it had gone down well with customers. After Ian Smith’s review for the Somerset Herald, which stuck to the facts and was surprisingly positive, given his confrontation with Caroline, several other reviewers had come to The Cider Kitchen, including the much read and lauded food journalist from the Bristol Post, Mark Taylor. He’d given The Cider Kitchen a very commendable four out of five stars, which Caroline knew was definitely something to shout about. The subsequent article had been cut out, framed and placed behind the bar and Caroline had put it on the restaurant’s website, too.

  Gino and Emma were going from strength to strength and had come up with some superb new dishes to keep the menus fresh. Emma had accepted a part time position at the restaurant when her course finished, but since they were still only doing about twenty-five covers a night, she was working at The Stationmaster the rest of the time. Caroline’s plan was to train her as front of house for the lunchtime service with a view to handing over the reins one night a week or perhaps even taking a few days off at some point, but at the moment she didn’t have the budget to hire her full time. The pheasant and venison dishes now sat alongside some delectable local options that included cured meat from Caroline’s new charcutier contact in Wrington, an artisan cheeseboard from a supplier in Cheddar (with the obligatory Carters’ Cider chutney cooked by Gino, on the side, of course), and mouth watering free range pork from Sid Porter the well known Gloucester Old Spot breeder in the village. The restaurant opened for service every lunchtime, but was closed on a Sunday evening, and Caroline was learning quickly how to plan the staff rotas so that no-one was overstretched. She herself was present for every service at the moment, but hoped to be able to take a full day off when things had bedded in a little further.

  It was all going so well in fact, that Caroline, as was her tendency, began to wonder what was going to happen to derail it. She’d always had a fairly fatalistic outlook and the events of the past few years hadn’t done much to change that. She wasn’t used to feeling so optimistic, albeit cautiously, as the leaves began to turn and the cider apples began to hang heavily on the trees.

  At the moment, the restaurant was opening at eleven o’clock in the morning, then closing for two hours at four, before opening again at six for the evening service. Bookings were steady, which was a relief as, tucked away behind the Royal Orchard, The Cider Kitchen wasn’t visible from the main road running through Little Somerby. This particular Thursday, there had been a full complement of covers for lunch, and she had nearly all the tables booked for the evening. She still had to refine the restauranteur’s art of ‘turning tables’ more quickly but things were developing nicely.

  After having the game menu sprung on her, Caroline had arranged to meet Jonathan twice a week, usually in the hour or so before the evening service started. It was better to schedule in a regular meeting than have him just turning up, she thought. She was, by nature, a compartmentaliser, and whether Jonathan liked it or not, she had put him in a pigeon hole firmly marked ‘business’ and not pleasure.

  Caroline glanced at her watch; Jonathan was due in ten minutes but he was often early. She caught sight of her reflection in the mirror behind the bar and, irritated with herself for caring, decided to nip upstairs and run a brush through her hair before he arrived. She’d had it cut a week ago and it was still not quite what she wanted it to be. At the moment, it was sticking out in all directions as she’d not had the chance to put her straighteners on it that morning. Vowing not to make too much of an effort, she’d just reached the door of her flat when she heard the restaurant door open. Cursing, she turned round and headed back towards the stairs.

  Having the advantage, for once, of height, Caroline took a moment to observe Jonathan as he crossed the floor and took a seat at one of the tables by the bar. He was, as usual, dressed in an impeccably cut suit, this time in a shade of cobalt blue that would have looked ostentatious on anyone else, but worked irritatingly well with his colouring. She could just see the collar of a blue checked shirt above his jacket; doubtless a nod to his so-called country heritage, she thought. He glanced around, clearly unaware of her scrutiny from the mezzanine and then looked at his watch. Cheeky sod, Caroline thought. He was early, after all. Taking a deep breath, she walked back down the stairs.

  ‘Hi Jonathan,’ she said brightly. ‘How are you?’

  Jonathan rose from his chair as Caroline approached. She was reluctantly charmed by his old school chivalry. Perhaps all privately educated schoolboys were taught manners along with their other subjects, she thought.

  ‘Good to see you,’ Jonathan replied. ‘Have I caught you on the hop?’ He looked back up from whence she’d come.

  ‘Not at all,’ Caroline said. ‘I was just, er, checking I’d turned my straighteners off.’

  Jonathan raised an eyebrow but said nothing. Caroline cursed at being caught out in such an obvious lie, given the state of her hair.

  ‘Anyway. Shall we?’ she asked, sitting back down on the chair opposite him.

  ‘Of course.’ Jonathan looked as though he was about to say something else but thought better of it. ‘How’s trade been this week?’

  A couple of minutes of pleasantries followed and Jonathan expressed his approval at the figures for the week. They were looking good, as well they should, and the long term projections were sound. Most restaurants were make or break in the first year, but with Carter’s as the backer, they both hoped The Cider Kitchen would continue to thrive.

  ‘So, have you got any more promotional ideas for the rest of the autumn and winter seasons, then?’ Jonathan asked once the financial discussions had concluded. Unselfconscious as a cat, he stretched his arms above his head.

  Caroline tore her gaze away from Jonathan’s bare wrists and took a breath. ‘Well, Halloween’s coming up so I thought we might run a small event for that. Nothing too cheesy,’ she said hastily as Jonathan’s eyes lit up. ‘Just a special menu and a few spiders’ webs on the ceiling or something.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ Jonathan replied. ‘I know the witch of Wookey Hole personally if you’d like her to do an appearance,’ he raised an eyebrow.

  I bet you do, Caroline thought. She never knew when to take him seriously. ‘And then of course, come November we’ll be into the run up to Christmas. Gino and Emma are already putting their minds to a menu for that so we can publicise it in the next week or two.’ She glanced at her notebook, which she’d grabbed from behind the bar. ‘I’m planning on contacting the usual local papers and putting in some adverts for that. Perhaps we could make the Halloween event ticket only, though; sell some exclusivity.’

  ‘I like your thinking,’ Jonathan said. ‘And I reckon we could get some cider punch into the menu, too. We’re working on something at the moment. And then of course there’s the meet for the local hunt in mid November.’

  Caroline stopped writing in her notebook. ‘Come again?’ She raised her head
to meet his gaze levelly. ‘I think I misheard you.’

  ‘The Old Somerset Hunt have asked us if we’d host a pre-ride meet out the front of the restaurant. They’re prepared to pay a reasonable price for some mulled cider and posh canapés before they set off. And it’ll bring in the locals to gawp, as well.’

  ‘A hunt as in a fox hunt?’ Caroline was shaking her head before Jonathan could even finish. ‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘Absolutely not.’

  Jonathan looked puzzled. ‘What’s the problem? There’s plenty of room outside for them to park their horse boxes and all you need to do is get Gino to whip up a few dozen pigs in blankets and a vat of mulled cider, which we’ll supply anyway, and bob’s your uncle.’

  Caroline stood up abruptly from her chair, the wooden legs of it squeaking harshly on the stone floor. ‘Putting pheasant on the menu for a few weeks was one thing – at least those birds had better lives than a lot of battery hens, but I don’t agree with the principle of fox hunting. It’s like asking this place to host a dog fight.’

  Jonathan let out an exasperated sigh. ‘Oh, that’s right,’ he said. ‘I forgot that as a confirmed townie, you know everything there is to know about the ethics and practices of what is actually now drag hunting. Forgive me.’

  His sarcasm didn’t go down well with Caroline. ‘What, just because I don’t have a fourth generation countryside pedigree like you, I’m not allowed an opinion?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Jonathan replied. ‘I just didn’t expect you to hold such a misinformed one.’

  ‘Oh, come on!’ Caroline retorted. ‘I know enough to know that even now foxes get chased across fields and I don’t like it. You’ll be telling me you ride with the Old Somerset Hunt next.’ She was further irritated as a vision of Jonathan in a hunting coat and jodhpurs looking dashing atop a huge stallion popped into her mind. She’d read enough Jilly Cooper novels to find that a pleasant image even if she fundamentally disagreed with it.

  ‘Not me, but Merry’s been riding with them since she was ten.’

  ‘Are you serious?’ Caroline felt sick. She liked Meredith and she was a very good waitress, too. ‘How can she justify it?’ Meredith was such a kind, compassionate soul, who loved her animals madly. Caroline couldn’t square that with the notion of the girl hunting.

  ‘It’s good for the horses,’ Jonathan said. ‘And the Old Somerset hasn’t seen hide nor hair of a fox in years. Most of the members of the hunt are in their fifties with a smattering of younger riders like Merry who use it as a good run for their animals. They’re hardly blooding each other with brushes any more, you know.’

  ‘It’s the principle, Jonathan!’ Caroline said. ‘I’ve always hated the idea of rich, over privileged country toffs cutting up the countryside and ripping innocent foxes to pieces for fun. And now you’re asking me to host a frigging meet for them?’

  Caroline’s hair reminded Jonathan of a young fox and the colour in her cheeks as she argued was just the right side of clashing with it. He felt a stab of lust. But, attractive or not, she was still being bloody stubborn.

  ‘Caroline,’ he said softly, changing tack. ‘It’s good exposure for this place. Your takings are fine but we want to get the ball really rolling. Matthew’s keen to host this meet to pull in more of the public; it’s a village tradition and it’ll bring the punters in to drink and eat.’ He risked a quick smile at her. ‘I know you’ve got your principles, but if I can convince you that the hunt isn’t this barbaric bunch of inbred monsters you think it is, will you at least consider it?’

  Caroline was caught off guard by Jonathan’s sudden calmness. ‘You won’t change my mind, Jonathan. I don’t agree with hunting with hounds, drag or not, at all. And what about Scrumpy and Solly? Those gigantic monster dogs’ll probably rip them to pieces if they catch sight of them.’ Caroline glanced up at the mezzanine where the tortoiseshell kittens were snuggled in their basket, fast asleep.

  ‘Surely you can shut them in your flat for a couple of hours with a litter tray and a pouch of that posh food you insist on feeding them?’ Jonathan said. ‘They’ll be perfectly safe up there. If I can arrange a meeting with Rob Kelloway the hunt master, will you go and see his hounds? He’ll put it in context better than I can. What do you think?’

  Caroline felt like she was being pushed in a direction she definitely didn’t want to go; but she also knew that she had to at least give Jonathan the chance to negotiate. ‘All right. I’ll go and see the master and his undomesticated pack of dogs.’ She picked up a smudged glass from one of the tables nearby. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got tonight’s service to prepare for.’

  Jonathan smiled to himself as he got up from the table. ‘I’ll see you soon,’ he said as he walked towards the front door.

  ‘Not if I see you first,’ Caroline replied mutinously. As she turned back to the kitchen to consult the diary, she wondered yet again why she’d allowed herself to be talked into something by Jonathan. The man had the most irritating way of getting her to question her principles; it was becoming a habit she knew she needed to break.

  19

  Anna, although still managing the tea shop during the day, had also started researching the Carter family’s history in the evenings. As a former academic librarian specialising in historical documents she’d had extensive experience in handling and cataloguing papers of special interest, and knowing that Matthew’s family had a collection relating to the history of the family and the business that included both personal and commercial documents, she had been itching to go through them. Most of them had been somewhat haphazardly stored in tea chests and suitcases in the attic for at least as long as Matthew had been alive. She was gradually going through them in the evenings when Ellie was in bed, trying to get the information into some kind of sensible chronological order. So far, she’d got four box files on the go, one for each generation, and despite being side tracked by some old photographs that showed the current Carter brothers bore a striking resemblance to their cider making forebears, she was starting to get a clearer picture of who was related to whom.

  This was how Matthew found her as he walked into the kitchen on a September evening. She’d been poring over the documents for a little while, since Ellie had gone to bed, and she smiled as he came through the back door.

  ‘There’s some pretty interesting stuff here,’ Anna said. She’d spread the most recent papers that Matthew had unearthed across the kitchen table and was gradually sorting them into more logical piles. ‘How much do you know about how your great grandfather, Samuel, got started in cider making?’

  ‘A bit,’ Matthew replied. ‘Although, to be honest, he wasn’t the greatest record keeper. My great grandmother kept a few journals which it looks as though you’ve managed to locate already, and there were a few letters, as well as invoices to and from suppliers.’

  ‘There’s a bit more than that,’ Anna replied. She passed him a sheet of paper, yellowed with age and written in a close hand. ‘This was tucked inside your great grandmother Elsie’s last diary. It’s a letter from your great aunt Jane.’

  ‘My grandfather’s younger sister?’ Matthew squinted at the paper, reluctant to reach for his newly prescribed reading glasses. He held it slightly further away, strategically ignoring Anna’s brief smirk at the action. As he read, his mouth dropped open in astonishment.

  ‘Does this suggest what I think it does?’ He said eventually, handing the paper back to her.

  ‘Well, Jane did spend some time away from home when she turned eighteen – that much I can trace from the other letters to and from her and Elsie.’

  ‘This suggests that Jane had a child before she married my great uncle Hugh. But there’s never been any mention of it – Dad’s never mentioned anything about having any cousins other than Jane and Hugh’s children.’

  ‘Perhaps Jane never told Hugh when she married him,’ Anna mused. ‘After all, in those days unmarried mothers would have very limited options. Unfortunately, I haven’t come acr
oss any other papers that might shed light on what happened to the child, but adoption records weren’t great back then, either.’

  ‘Is there any clue as to who the father might have been?’ Matthew asked.

  ‘Not exactly, but I have found some newspaper clippings about a man in his twenties being found face down in one of the vats at around about the same time as the letter from Jane. It would be easy to just tie the two sources together, but I can’t really do that without more evidence.’

  ‘But if there was a link, that means that the man’s death might not have been an accident.’ Matthew grimaced. ‘I’m beginning to think that getting you to archive the family history wasn’t such a good idea after all.’

  ‘Every family has their secrets,’ Anna replied. ‘And four generations are bound to throw up some interesting facts. I wouldn’t get too worked up about it until I’ve spent a bit more time looking into it all.’

  ‘And to think all this scandal has been sitting in the loft for decades! I wonder if we should have left it there. It all feels a bit Pandora’s Box, now. Although…’ a naughty, schoolboyish grin spread over his features, ‘that gives me an idea.’

  Anna, who was beginning to realise that Matthew’s grin usually meant the best kind of trouble, smiled. ‘What have you got in mind?’

  ‘How do you think Caroline would feel about hosting our annual suppliers’ dinner at The Cider Kitchen? She’s got such an amazing track record in events management, I think she’d be the perfect choice.’

  ‘I think she’d probably jump at it,’ Anna said. ‘She’s always looking for ways to prove the restaurant’s worth to the wider business and this would be a good way to do it.’

  ‘And how would you feel about putting all of this research to dramatic use?’

  Anna looked baffled. ‘How?’

  ‘Well,’ Matthew slid an arm around his wife, ‘it seems a shame just to file it all away again. What if we did some kind of theme for the suppliers’ dinner?’ He looked thoughtful. ‘We could even make it a murder mystery evening.’