“Well,” I allowed, “if you could use words like bloody sparingly, or not at all, Bill and I would be grateful. We know our children hear worse language in the school yard, but we do our best to cultivate civility at home.”
“Consider it done,” said Jack.
“No offense,” I added anxiously.
“None taken,” he said. “When in Rome—”
He interrupted himself with a gigantic yawn and I brought the question-and-answer session to a close. There was nothing to be gained from hammering away at a man who was too sleepy to finish his sentences, so I spent the rest of the short trip pointing out notable landmarks. Jack studied Bree’s redbrick house carefully as we passed it, but he barely glanced at Emma’s curving drive, and he seemed unmoved by the lush, green, sheep-dotted pastures that popped into view between the dripping hedgerows.
“I’d rather be counting them than looking at them,” he admitted. “Jet lag’s a bugger.”
I winced inwardly, but Jack seemed to hear himself because he immediately rephrased his comment.
“That is to say,” he said, in a plummy English accent, “jet lag’s a dreadful bore.”
I grinned and gave him an approving thumbs-up, then suggested that he slow down again as we approached my cottage. A moment later, he pulled into the graveled drive, switched off the ignition, and turned to face me. Upon closer inspection, his sky-blue eyes were bloodshot and there was a hint of pallor beneath his deep tan. The sooner he went to bed, I thought, the better.
“May I beg a favor, Lori?” he asked.
“Beg away,” I told him.
“The thing is,” he said, “I’ll never finish all the tucker the ladies piled onto me. Would they mind if I asked you to take some of it off my hands?”
“Yes,” I said without a moment’s hesitation. “Gifts, once given, may not be re-gifted and they must never, under any circumstances, be returned. Not in Finch, at any rate.”
“It could be our little secret,” he said imploringly. “No one would have to know.”
“Everyone would know within the hour,” I said flatly. “Don’t ask me how it happens. It just happens. There are no secrets in Finch, Jack, and the sooner you accept this fact of life, the better off you’ll be. If you want to get rid of the excess, uh, tucker, I suggest you bury it in the woods in the dead of night, but even then there’s a fifty-fifty chance that someone will see you.”
He frowned for a moment, then brightened.
“I could invite people to lunch,” he suggested. “Are you and Bill and the twins free tomorrow?”
“Sorry,” I said, shaking my head. “Sundays are family days. We spend them with Bill’s father.”
“Just as well, really,” Jack said resignedly. “I’ll be bumping into walls until I adjust to the time change. How about Monday?”
“The boys will be in school and Bill will be at the office,” I said, “but I’d be happy to join you for lunch on Monday.”
“You think Bree Pym might come, too?” Jack asked. “It’d give me a chance to thank her for looking after Uncle Hector’s grave.”
“I’ll extend an invitation to her in your name. In the meantime . . .” I took a pen from my purse, scribbled my phone number on a scrap of paper scrounged from the bottom of my trench coat pocket, and handed it to Jack. “If you need anything, give me a call. We may be temporary neighbors, but we’re still neighbors.”
“And in Finch, neighbors help neighbors.” Jack nodded. “I’m beginning to see why Uncle Hector loved it here. See you on Monday, then, around noon or thereabouts?”
“I’ll be there.” I opened the car door. “Are you sure you’re alert enough to get back to Ivy Cottage in one piece? The curve by Bree’s house can be a little tricky, especially when the roads are slick.”
“No worries,” he assured me. “Thanks for the tour, Lori.”
“Thanks for the lift,” I said, getting out of the car. “And welcome to Finch.”
I waited to make sure he was driving toward the village rather than away from it, then splashed up the flagstone path and let myself into the cottage.
An ominous silence greeted me.
I hung my trench coat on the coat rack, stepped out of my rain boots, placed my shoulder bag on the hall table, and tiptoed into the living room, where I found my menfolk—including our sleek black cat, Stanley—asleep in a heap on the couch.
Stanley raised his head briefly at my entrance, but Bill, Will, and Rob didn’t stir. The sugar high had apparently become a sugar low and Bill, worn out from the former, had clearly taken advantage of the latter. I left the four of them to their naps and crept quietly into the kitchen to prepare a simple, nourishing dinner.
With no dessert.
• • •
Bill and I spent after-dinner time looking through books about Australia with the boys. As we marveled at pictures of kangaroos, wallabies, and cassowaries, we also made it clear that people from other countries were allowed to use words little boys living in England were not. I couldn’t tell if the message sank in, but it was a start. Jack’s willingness to change his ways for the sake of the ankle biters would, I hoped, render remedial lessons unnecessary.
Once Will and Rob were in bed, Bill and I snuggled up on the couch in the living room, with a fire crackling in the hearth and Stanley curled into a black ball on Bill’s favorite armchair. While the wind swirled around the chimney and raindrops splashed against the bay window, I told Bill what I’d learned about Hector Huggins’s nephew.
He was unimpressed.
“Are you joking?” he scoffed. “You had Jack MacBride at your mercy for a solid fifteen minutes and all you managed to find out was that Uncle Hector didn’t have a pet?” He wagged a finger at me in mock outrage. “If you go on like this, you’ll be drummed out of the gossips’ guild.”
“What about Malua Bay?” I demanded. “And his parents still living there? And the mysterious black box?”
“Lilian Bunting dug the Malua Bay nugget out of him,” Bill pointed out. “I’ll give you a couple of points for the bit about his parents, but none for the black box. If Jack has to resolve his uncle’s affairs, it stands to reason that he’d have a box full of legal papers.” He shook his head. “It’s not much to show, by Finch’s standards, and it hardly makes my sacrifice worthwhile. While you were out there with Jack, learning very little, I was peeling Will and Rob off the ceiling.”
“Sorry,” I said, snuggling closer to him.
“No worries, mate,” he said, in a truly dreadful Australian accent.
“I’ll have another crack at him on Monday,” I reminded him.
“Ah, yes, lunch at Ivy Cottage,” said Bill. “You’ll be the envy of every woman in the village.” He nuzzled my ear. “I suppose you’ll want to bring a certain person up to date on today’s exciting turn of events?”
“Do you mind?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “As long as you don’t stay up too late. Stanley is a very nice cat, but I’d rather share my bed with my wife.”
“I’ll keep it short,” I promised.
“Good.” Bill kissed me until I ran out of breath, then headed upstairs, with his faithful feline padding after him.
I loosed a quivering sigh, then went to the study, to give a certain person the day’s news.
Four
The study was as silent as it could be with raindrops dashing themselves against the diamond-paned windows above the old oak desk. The strands of ivy crisscrossing the windows shivered beneath the onslaught and I felt a chill creep through me on their behalf. Though I hadn’t intended to light a fire, I struck a match, held it to the tinder in the hearth, and waited until the flames were dancing before I paused to say hello to my oldest friend in the world.
“Hi, Reginald,” I said. “If it doesn’t stop raining soon, the river will overflow, Finch will be flooded, and the villagers will be forced to abandon their homes and flee to higher ground. And I’ll have to wait until the summer drought to rid
e my new bike.”
Since Reginald was a small, powder-pink flannel rabbit, I didn’t expect him to reply, but the gleam in his black-button eyes seemed to suggest that he understood how much my new bike meant to me. The bicycles of my childhood had been purchased from thrift stores or garage sales, and I’d bought the bicycle I’d ridden as a young adult from a guy at a flea market. My new bike was the first brand-new bike I’d ever owned. The thought of turning pedals no one else had turned thrilled me to the core.
Reginald looked very snug in his special niche in the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves beside the fireplace and snug was how I liked to keep him. Reg and I went way back. He’d been made for me before I was born by a woman I’d met only after her death.
The woman’s name was Dimity Westwood and she’d been my late mother’s closest friend. The two women had met in London while serving their respective countries during the Second World War. The shared experience of living in a city under siege created a bond of affection between them that was never broken.
When the war in Europe ended and my mother sailed back to the States, she and Dimity strengthened their friendship by sending a constant stream of letters back and forth across the Atlantic. After my father’s sudden death, the letters became my mother’s refuge, a quiet retreat from the daily pressures of teaching full time while raising a rambunctious daughter on her own.
My mother was extremely protective of her refuge. She told no one about it, not even me. As a child, I knew Dimity Westwood only as Aunt Dimity, the redoubtable heroine of a series of bedtime stories invented by my mother. I was unaware of the real Dimity’s existence until after both she and my mother had passed away.
It was then that Dimity Westwood bequeathed to me a comfortable fortune, the honey-colored cottage in which she’d spent her childhood, the precious postwar correspondence, and a curious blue leather–bound book filled with blank pages. It was through the blue journal that I finally met my benefactress.
Whenever I opened the journal, Aunt Dimity’s handwriting would appear, an old-fashioned copperplate taught in the village school at a time when pupils practiced their penmanship on slate tablets. I stopped breathing for a full minute the first time it happened, but it didn’t take me much longer than a minute to realize that Aunt Dimity’s intentions were wholly benevolent.
I couldn’t explain how Aunt Dimity managed to bridge the gap between this world and the next—and she wasn’t too clear about it, either—but I didn’t much care. The important thing, the only thing that mattered, was that Aunt Dimity was as good a friend to me as she’d been to my mother. The rest was mere mechanics.
I twiddled Reginald’s pink ears, took Aunt Dimity’s journal from its shelf, and curled up with it in one of the tall leather armchairs facing the hearth. The fire crackled cozily as I opened the blue journal and gazed down at it.
“Dimity?” I said. “It’s still raining.”
I smiled as the familiar lines of royal-blue ink began to curl and loop across the blank page.
Really? And here I was, thinking I heard fairy fingers tapping on the windowpane.
“Very funny,” I said. “Honestly, Dimity, I’ve never been to a wetter funeral.”
I believe I have. Fanny Preston’s grave was so waterlogged we had to wait a week to bury her, and even then we were afraid she might float out of it.
“You win, Dimity,” I said, grimacing. “At least we got Hector Huggins in the ground today.”
God rest his soul. Was the poor man’s funeral well attended?
“Naturally,” I said. “Everyone was there, including a surprise guest.”
Splendid! There’s nothing more intriguing than a surprise guest at a funeral. Come along, now. Fill in the picture. Man or woman? Young or old?
“A young man,” I said. “Midtwenties, blond, blue-eyed, adorable, and Australian.”
An adorable Australian? Oh, dear. I do hope he won’t turn your head.
I blushed. I couldn’t help blushing. Aunt Dimity knew all too well that I had, in the past, allowed my head to be turned by a certain kind of male charm. Nor could I deny that on one or two—possibly three—occasions, she’d felt distressed enough by my behavior to remind me of my marriage vows. I could, however, recall with some pride that she hadn’t had to trot them out in quite some time.
“My head is screwed on as tightly as a lid on a Mason jar,” I assured her, “but nearly every other head in Finch is spinning because our visitor is as nice as he is adorable. His name is Jack MacBride and he claims to be Hector Huggins’s nephew.”
Claims to be?
“The vicar’s willing to take his word for it, but I’d like him to prove it,” I said. “I would have asked him for proof this afternoon, but he was so wiggy from jet lag that it seemed unfair to badger him. Never fear, though. I’ll have another chance to wangle the truth out of him on Monday.”
Will he still be within wangling distance on Monday?
“Yes,” I said. “Jack’s staying in Ivy Cottage while he sorts out his uncle’s affairs.”
Affairs? What kind of affairs would a man like Mr. Huggins leave unsorted?
“I asked myself the same question,” I said, nodding.
Canceling a magazine subscription? Retrieving a suit from the dry cleaner? Emptying the refrigerator? Mr. Huggins’s solicitor could have sent a minion to attend to such trivialities. They scarcely merit the onsite oversight of an Australian relation.
“I agree,” I said, “which is why I’m having lunch with Jack on Monday. I want to know who he is and what he’s up to.”
You’re also dying to take a peek inside Ivy Cottage.
“True,” I acknowledged equably. “It would be a feather in my cap to go where no villager, apart from the late Mr. Huggins, has gone before. But my main goal will be to find out why Jack’s here. I’d also like to take a look inside the very interesting black box I saw in the trunk of his car. Bill thinks it’s filled with legal papers, but I’d prefer to see for myself before I decide.”
A wise policy. For all we know, it might contain a treasure map. Mr. Huggins may have buried a cache of gold doubloons beneath his bed.
“If he did, I’ll find out,” I said confidently.
I’d rather you stay out of the bedroom.
“Ho ho ho,” I said, rolling my eyes.
I’m not joking, Lori. Though I was joking about the treasure map and the doubloons. I can’t think of a man less piratical than Hector Huggins.
“Neither can I,” I said, “but you know what they say about the quiet ones—they always have a dark secret to hide.”
It’s hardly ever true, more’s the pity.
“Nevertheless,” I said, “Jack MacBride must have had a good reason to travel halfway around the world and I intend to find out what it is.”
I have no doubt that you will.
“Thank you, Dimity,” I said. “And there’s no reason to worry about . . . anything. Jack is a pretty boy, but Bill’s the man for me.”
I’m glad to hear it. Bill is worth more than all the pretty boys in the world put together. It’s getting late, Lori, and you’ll want to arrive at church early tomorrow, in case any news about Jack has surfaced overnight. I suggest that you lay your unturned head upon your pillow and get some sleep. Who knows? The skies may be clear by morning. You may be able to ride your shiny new bicycle to church.
“Ever the optimist,” I said pessimistically. “Good night, Dimity.”
Good night, my dear. Sleep well. And keep me informed!
“I always do,” I said.
I waited until the graceful lines of royal-blue ink had faded from the page, then returned the blue journal to its shelf, tamped down the fire, touched a finger to Reginald’s snout, and ran upstairs to finish the kiss Bill had started.
• • •
The skies did not clear in the morning and I did not ride my bicycle to church. Thanks to a lost shoe, an unfortunate incident with a glass of orange juice, a broken umbrella, and
two last-minute trips to the toilet, I was also unable to get myself and my family to St. George’s any earlier than usual, which was, as usual, halfway through the processional.
I wasn’t as attentive as I should have been during the service, but at least I stayed awake, which was more than could be said for Dick Peacock, Grant Tavistock, Henry Cook, and Bill. They dozed off as the vicar commenced his learned sermon and awoke, looking refreshed, the moment he finished it.
I couldn’t claim the moral high ground, however, because I didn’t listen to the vicar’s sermon, either. While the men slept, I studied my neighbors, searching for the telltale signs of a gossipmonger bursting with news. I found nothing, not a flushed cheek, a knowing smile, or an arched eyebrow, to indicate that anyone had dug up anything worth repeating about Jack MacBride.
I hadn’t reckoned with Lilian Bunting’s poker face. When she took me aside after the service, I expected her to ask me if I’d learned anything about Jack on the drive home after the funeral luncheon. Instead, she had a million-dollar tidbit to share with me.
“In case you were wondering,” she said, as we huddled beneath her oversized umbrella, “Jack MacBride is exactly who he says he is.”
“I was wondering,” I acknowledged, “but I didn’t expect you to come up with the goods. How did you find out? Did the vicar ring Mr. Winterbottom after all?”
“No,” Lilian replied. “I did. Teddy’s a trusting soul, but I’m a scholar. In my world, facts aren’t facts until they’re confirmed by a reliable source.”
“Well done,” I said admiringly. “Did Mr. Winterbottom tell you anything about Mr. Huggins’s unresolved affairs?”
“He did,” said Lilian.
Her gray eyes twinkled as she pulled me farther into the churchyard, where we were less likely to be overheard by prying ears. It was clearly a gesture born out of habit rather than necessity because the only people left to overhear us were too far away and too preoccupied to do so. Our husbands, my sons, my father-in-law, and Bree Pym were engaged in a lively discussion of the upcoming cricket season in the relative comfort of the church’s south porch. Everyone else had scurried home as fast as their wellies could carry them.
Aunt Dimity and the Wishing Well Page 3