‘Oh…’ Ella hastily suppressed the beam of pleasure. ‘Oh, OK then. But no criticism of my driving.’
‘Sod it.’ Ash pulled a face. ‘You always spoil my fun.’
‘We’re lost,’ Ella said half an hour later as they drove along yet another high-hedge, flower-filled lane. ‘Aren’t we?’
‘Possibly, probably,’ Ash said, turning to the back seat. ‘George?’
George chattered and waved a small red plastic lorry to illustrate his theory.
‘He says it isn’t Fiddlesticks,’ Ella said, peering through the windscreen. ‘Thanks, George, but we knew that. Ooh, how annoying – just when I thought I’d got all these little lanes sussed.’
Her phone rang.
‘Your phone’s ringing,’ Ash said helpfully. ‘You should answer it. It might be Dewberrys’ Dinners urging you to apply for the show before it’s too late, or – and this is more likely – it might be Trixie’s favourite Fairy Sat Nav to tell you exactly where you are.’
Laughing, Ella pulled into the side of the lane praying some tractor or other massive vehicle wouldn’t come thundering from the other direction.
‘If it’s private, shall I get out?’
‘No.’ She glanced at the phone and sighed. ‘It’s Mark – and please stay there. Hi. Yes, fine, thanks. You? Oh, really? Good.… Yes, scorching here too.… Are you… ? With who? Oh, right. Have a nice time, then. Look, I can’t talk now, I’m in the car. I’ll ring you later, when you’re back, OK? Bye.’
Pushing the phone back into her bag, she started the car again.
‘I could have got out,’ Ash said. ‘I didn’t want to spoil your chat. Poll told me – well, she told me that you had a boyfriend in London and, well, you must miss him.’
‘Mmm, yes it’s a bit odd being alone,’ Ella said noncommittally, hoping that Poll had kept her word and not divulged any of the rest of the Mark information. ‘Still, we both agreed on me taking this job and it’s hardly on the other side of the world, is it? And it’s not for ever. Anyway, now we have more important things to think about.’
And definitely not about Mark, she thought sadly. Mark, it appeared, was missing her, but not enough to prevent him embarking on a stag weekend to Prague with the lads. Not, she thought, that it would have stopped him going even if they’d still been together.
George suddenly chattered happily from his booster seat.
‘Did he just mention Dewberrys’ Dinners?’ Ash queried.
‘No – he said we were going the wrong way. You’re the one who keeps mentioning Dewberrys’ Dinners.’
‘Having withdrawal symptoms. Can’t wait for the next series – especially as it’s local. I wonder if they’ve chosen anyone yet?’
‘Doubtful –’ Ella pulled up at yet another minuscule and overgrown crossroads ‘– seeing as they haven’t even reached the closing date for applications yet. Why? Do you want to apply?’
‘Do you?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘Me neither.’
‘OK – now, can you see any traffic from your direction?’
‘Nothing. Just a lot of hedge… Go straight on and we’ll find someone to ask.’
After a further five minutes of what seemed like driving through the Hampton Court maze, they emerged into fairly clear countryside and Ella gave a little yelp of recognition. ‘I know where we are!’
‘Fiddlesticks?’ Ash said hopefully.
‘Angel Meadows! I came here on my first day – I was lost then, too – and got directions to Hideaway. It’s a funny place but it does have a shop of sorts, so we should be able to find someone to ask.’
And with any luck, not the odd couple of her first visit, Ella thought, turning the corner towards the Miracle Mart.
‘Good God!’ Ash exclaimed. ‘Are they having a public hanging?’
Ella blinked as she stopped the car. There was a crowd, several deep, clustered round the Miracle Mart – and, more worryingly, an ambulance.
George whooped with delighted excitement at the sight of an unfamiliar vehicle.
‘Stay there, sweetheart,’ Ella said, undoing her seat belt. ‘OK.’ Ash grinned.
Laughing, with the relentless sun baking on her head, she made her way towards the back of the throng. Whatever was going on she really didn’t want to be involved, but with so many people, someone surely would be able to tell her how to get to Fiddlesticks, wouldn’t they?
‘Excuse me.’
‘Not now, duck.’ A plump woman turned and scowled at her. ‘Can’t hear what’s going on in there.’
‘Oh, right – sorry – but I just wondered…’
A mass ‘shush’ was hissed by the crowd.
Ella, ignoring the glares of those nearest to her, wriggled her way through the perspiring throng. At least all those tedious rush-hour tube journeys had taught her a thing or two about using her elbows to their best advantage, and despite the massed efforts of the crowd to hamper her progress, she rapidly reached the front.
Squeezing in between two children of indiscriminate gender dressed in Manchester United replica shirts and a woman wearing a quilted housecoat and a chiffon scarf tied over a startling array of vibrantly coloured rollers, Ella tried again.
‘Excuse me.’ She looked hopefully at the roller woman beside her. ‘I wondered if you could tell me –’
‘What’s going on in there right now?’ The rainbow rollers jiggled alarmingly. ‘That’s what we’d all like to know. We haven’t had an update for ages. I only popped out for me sliced white – the kiddies won’t eat any of that wholemeal stuff, disgusting the way they leaves them gritty bits in – and found Mrs Webb standing outside like the bloomin’ Gestapo saying we wasn’t allowed in.’
‘Mrs Webb?’ Ella queried. ‘Is she the owner?
‘Is she the owner?’ The roller woman looked aghast. ‘You a newcomer round here? Course Mrs Webb owns the Mart. Did you see another shop anywhere for miles? No, you did not. Bloomin’ monopoly Mrs Webb’s got.’
‘I can see that she must have, but –’
‘Lovers Knot don’t have a shop at all any more, hasn’t done for years now, and the other little place here shut down eighteen months since. So everyone has to come to the Mart, see?’
Ella, really not wanting to get enmeshed in a heated political or social discussion on the wholesale closure of rural businesses, nodded. ‘Yes – but could you tell me… ?’
‘If you wants to do a proper big shop there’s Hazy Hassocks, they’ve got all sorts there.’ The roller woman was in full swing now. ‘And course, there’s Coddle’s Post Office stores over in Bagley-cum-Russet, which is fine if you’ve got a car, which I haven’t. We’re not a two-car family and anyway I can’t drive and my Pete has the car for work. So Bagley’s no use to me, is it?’
Ella made sympathetic noises.
The rollers waggled. ‘Or then there’s the village shop over at Fiddlesticks, which is nearer and not too bad for walking –’
‘Ah, yes, Fiddlesticks.’ Ella pounced joyfully on the name. ‘Now, please can you tell me –’
Roller woman ignored the interruption. ‘But Mona Jupp what runs the Fiddlesticks shop, she’s gone all Fortnum and Mason recently.’
‘Really?’ Ella said, trying to control her mounting irritated impatience. ‘That must be lovely.’
‘Lovely?’
‘Yes, well, not that I’ve ever been able to afford to shop at Fortnum and Mason myself, but if there’s a call for those sort of delicacies round here then it must be a good thing and –’
‘Good thing?’ Roller woman looked confused. ‘Delicacies? Mona Jupp don’t do delicacies. She does bog-standard like everyone else. No, like I said she’s gone Fortnum and Mason. Self-service! Self-service, I ask you. Lost a lot of trade because of it, she has. People don’t want to be fiddle-faddling about with little baskets in a proper shop, do they? Stands to reason. If you wants self-service then you goes to a supermarket, don’t you?’
‘
Yes, I suppose you do, but I’m not sure Fortnum and Mason –’
‘So, when you go into a proper little shop you wants to stand at the counter and have a chat about this and that and then ask for what you wants. What do they get paid for? Standing behind the counter chatting and serving you – that’s what. And there’s no serving if you’re helping yourself and putting stuff in your own little basket, is there?’
‘Well, no, but –’
‘So most of Mona Jupp’s regulars have come over to the Miracle Mart, but they won’t be standing for all this nonsense. I just wish they’d get a move on with it in there.’
So did Ella. Whatever it was.
‘Um, so could you just tell me how –’
‘And don’t get me started on pubs.’ The rollers jiggled. ‘All gone. There’s no pub for miles round any more. My Pete, he has to go to the Weasel and Bucket in Fiddlesticks for his pint.’
‘Fiddlesticks – yes. Can you give me –’
‘And because you can’t drink and drive he has to walk and sometimes I don’t see him until halfway through the next day. Scandalous, I call it.’
‘Yes, I suppose it is. Coming home from the pub the next day and –’
‘Not my Pete coming home the next day,’ the roller woman said scornfully. ‘The fact that we ain’t go no pubs in our own villages no more.’
‘Oh, right, yes, of course.’ Ella sighed. Maybe she should try a different tack? ‘Um, so what’s happening in the shop here, then?’
‘Fat Stacey – her with the black and white hair what used to work at Londis – she’s gone into labour by the dog biscuits.’
‘Oh, dear, poor thing. Is that why the ambulance –’
The rollers agreed vigorously. ‘Mrs Webb panicked if you ask me. No need for an amberlance. Fat Stacey has got at least five kiddies already. She’d probably have had time to finish her shopping, get home and have a nice bath and a bacon sandwich, then catch the bus into Winterbrook hospital before anyone needed to start boiling water and fetching towels.’
‘Is that what they’re doing in there at the moment, then?’
‘As far as we can tell. Well, Mrs Webb is. She came out all puffed up to tell us when she barred us all from going in. Not that she’d know what’s what, being childless, but she watches a lot of soaps, see, so she’s always getting the wrong end of the stick so to speak. Doubt if the paramedics want boiled water unless it’s for a cuppa. Pointless.’
‘Yes, I suppose it is. But I’m trying to get to –’
The rollers quivered. ‘If Fat Stacey’s that far gone they might as well just let her get on with it and let the rest of us get on with our shopping.’
Ella nodded. ‘But if she’s in labour –’
‘Yes, but like I said, it’s only by the dog biscuits. In the far corner. We wouldn’t bother her at all. We mostly only wants bread and milk. We could all skirt round her.’
A piercing scream tore through the gloriously bucolic morning. Ella winced and hoped George hadn’t heard it. The Manchester United children looked excited.
‘Won’t be long now, thank the Lord,’ roller woman said. ‘My kiddies need their sliced white. It’s one of their five-a-day.’
Ella felt too shell-shocked to query this remark. She tried not to listen to the horrendous noises echoing from the Miracle Mart. ‘Er, look, while you’re waiting, could you tell me how to get to Fiddlesticks from here, please?’
The rollers danced under their chiffon. ‘Is that all you wanted? No shopping? Then why didn’t you say so – Ah! Here they come!’
Ella, perspiration prickling her scalp and trickling down her back, stood aside as the paramedics emerged from Miracle Mart ministering to a large girl with badly striped black and blonde hair slumped in a wheelchair.
‘Gas and air, lucky cow,’ roller woman sighed enviously. ‘I could do with some of that. Good luck, Stace!’
The cry was taken up by the rest of the crowd which parted like the Red Sea to allow the procession through. Stacey, still sucking greedily, waved a regal hand like the Queen on the Mall as her wheelchair was expertly manoeuvred into the ambulance.
Everyone cheered as it roared away.
‘Right!’ A box-shaped woman in a floral wrap-over and ankle boots who, Ella knew, simply had to be the redoubtable Mrs Webb, stood in Miracle Mart’s doorway. ‘Excitement over. Let’s have you in an orderly queue. There’s people here desperate for their cigs and Suns. And you –’ she gestured at the Manchester United children ‘– Jay-Zee and Dizzy Crumpshall, you can go to the back of the line. You only wants to look at the mucky mags and I keep telling you we don’t stock ’em.’
Ella giggled. ‘Jay-Zee and Dizzy? Who on earth would give their kids names like that?’
The roller woman went ominously still. ‘People like me and my Pete, actually.’
‘Ah, right.’
‘And we’ve got P Diddy and Li’l Kim at home too. Lovely names, they are. Modern.’
‘Er, um, oh, yes, they are,’ Ella said quickly. ‘Lovely. And so unusual. Well, thanks for your help, um, I must dash.’
Hysterically, she hurled herself back into the car. George was making ambulance-siren noises, aided and abetted by Ash.
‘What the hell was all that about?’ Ash stopped nee-nawing and looked at her.
Ella started the car. ‘Don’t ask.’
‘And did you get directions?’
She shook her head.
‘Are you crying?’
‘Laughing – I think.’ The car bucketed away from the Miracle Mart. ‘Hold tight – and for God’s sake don’t look back.’
Chapter Nineteen
‘We’re just like a proper family now, aren’t we?’ Poll said happily to the dogs as she pegged out the following week’s washing in the early morning’s blazing sun. ‘Sharing everything, getting together over dinner to talk about our day, but still respecting one another’s privacy. It’s working out just wonderfully, isn’t it?’
The dogs wagged lethargic tails, too sleepy with the never-ending heat to argue.
‘And I do hope Ella will want to stay until the three months are up,’ Poll said, finally anchoring the last pillowcase to the line. It had bothered her because the pillowcase was navy blue and she only had green pegs left which wouldn’t go with it at all, so she’d had to undo the cream towel, remove its pale-blue pegs, swap them over and start again. ‘I know she must miss her Mark dreadfully, and of course I hope they sort things out, but not yet…’
The dogs thumped their tails again.
‘And I must ring the solicitor and see where the contract has got to. She hasn’t signed anything yet, but I love her so much, and she’s just so wonderful with George, and it would break my heart if she decided to leave early.’
She hung the peg bag on the line and picked up the washing basket. The dogs rolled over in the welcome shade of the washing hanging listlessly on the line and blissfully closed their eyes.
Drifting back to the kitchen, Poll paused in the doorway. George and Ella were busily mixing something in a large bowl at the table. They both had expressions of fierce concentration on their faces and were totally immersed in their task.
What an absolute tragedy it would be, Poll thought, that Ella – if she and Mark got back together – might be denied children of her own.
‘Hi,’ she said. ‘And what are you two making?’
‘Fairy cakes,’ Ella said, wiping a floury hand across her face. ‘In Trixie’s honour. We’re going to put red and blue and yellow icing on them and call them scarlet pimpernel, speedwell and cowslip.’
Poll pushed the washing basket away and laughed. ‘Ah, yes, I’ve been given the wildflower fairies routine, too. That’s a nice idea, but you haven’t forgotten that George is due to go to Doll Blessing’s this morning, have you?’
‘No.’ Ella shook her head. ‘We’re going to put the mixture in the fridge now and finish them off later. George can’t wait to play with Doll’s brood.’
‘No, it’s nice of her to ask him. I know he’s happy here, but he does need to mix with other children before he starts playgroup – and Doll, love her, has plenty of those. Blimey, though, it’s so hot, isn’t it?’
‘Baking,’ Ella sighed. ‘It’s practically impossible to sleep at night now as well, even with the fan going.’
Poll shuddered. ‘I know. And the minute you have a shower you need another one. Everyone is getting so scratchy. Right – I’m going to take some iced juice down to the barn for Billy… Oh, Ella, there’s a shopping list on the pinboard – if you’ve got time when you go into Hassocks… ?’
‘No problem. I’ll drop George off first, then I’ll be delighted to plunge into Big Sava – it’s ice-cold in there with the air-con going full blast. I’ll probably be in there for hours. Although I know I’ve promised to make a start on sorting out your paperwork.’
‘You take as long as you like in Big Sava.’ Poll smiled. ‘And don’t make me feel guilty about tackling the paperwork – it’s total chaos.’
‘I’m looking forward to it.’ Ella grinned. ‘It’ll be nice to be doing some clerical work again, knowing that it’s only temporary.’
‘Don’t speak too soon.’ Poll shook her head. ‘You haven’t seen the paper mountain I’ve accumulated. I’m so very grateful to you for even offering to give it a go – oh, look, if you’ll brave the correspondence muddle, please don’t worry about collecting George again at lunchtime. I’ll do that. I always like a chat with Doll to catch up with what Mitzi and Lulu are up to.’
‘OK, thanks.’ Ella ripped off cling film with her teeth and fastened it over the cake mixture bowl. ‘Right, George, we’ll pop this in the fridge and finish them later. Let’s go and get you ready for the delights of Doll Blessing’s paddling pool.’
With a whoop of excitement, George slid from his chair and scampered out of the kitchen with Ella in – literally – hot pursuit.
‘My word!’ Poll said, twenty minutes later, as she walked into the largest barn’s deliciously dark and cool interior. ‘It looks like a proper building now. You’ve worked miracles!’
The Way to a Woman's Heart Page 14