Trisha Ashley - Twelve Days of Christmas

‘I don’t suppose she’ll come here much anyway,’ Jess said. ‘She didn’t seem to like being in the country at all and wouldn’t go out except in the car, because she hadn’t brought any shoes except stiletto heels, though she could have borrowed some wellies. And she’s scared of horses and dogs. Granny says she’s all fur coat and no knickers, and Guy could do better.’

I swallowed a sip of tea the wrong way and coughed, my eyes watering.

‘I don’t think you should repeat that phrase, really,’ Noël said mildly.

‘How on earth did she meet Jude in the first place?’ I asked. ‘It doesn’t sound as if they had a lot in common.’

‘She is a model and also, I believe, aspires to be an actress. Someone brought her to Jude’s last big retrospective exhibition and introduced her. She’s very, very pretty indeed, if your taste runs to fair women.’

‘Uncle Jude’s must, mustn’t it?’ Jess said.

‘I suppose we do tend to be attracted to our opposites,’ I suggested.

‘You’re very dark, so was your husband fair?’

‘Jess, you really shouldn’t ask people personal questions!’

‘I don’t mind — and yes, my husband had blond hair and blue eyes. His younger sister is my best friend and has the same colouring — she’s very pretty too.’

How I’d longed to be small, blonde and cute when I was at school, rather than towering above everyone, even the boys! I’d been thin as a stick too, which had made me even more self-conscious — though actually I wasn’t sure it was any better later when I filled out and men started to talk to my boobs instead of me. . except Alan, of course.

‘Well, I think we ought to be going!’ Noël said, getting up.

‘I’m walking down to the village tomorrow, to explore,’ I told him. ‘I’ll call in at the lodge to see if there’s anything you’d like me to bring back from the shop.’

‘I’ll ask Tilda,’ he promised. ‘You are very kind!’

It seemed to me that, far from being isolated and alone at Old Place, I was going to be inundated with visitors!

The day had gone by in a flash, so I went to put the dried beet to soak in a bucket for Lady’s bedtime mash and then went out with it and some of Billy’s goat munchies to lure them back into the stable.

Thanks to a bit of timely advice from Becca, I knew that if I was carrying the bucket then Lady would simply follow me into her loosebox and Billy would come with her, and so it was. Then I shut them both up all cosily for the night.

After my conversation with Noël, I abandoned my cookbook notes and brought down Gran’s journal and read on steadily into the evening. I was again tempted to flick forward and see if I could spot any mention of Ned Martland, but I’d been enjoying all the details of Gran’s life as she slowly came out of her shell under Hilda and Pearl’s influence and I didn’t want to rush it: this was a girl whose idea of a night of dissipation was a trip to the cinema!

I finished that journal and read the first page or two of the next in bed before I went to sleep. By then Gran had started referring to the new patient as ‘N.M’! It occurred to me that there was a very natural way her path might have crossed with the Old Place Ned Martland — and after what Noël had said about his brother being a black sheep, I’ll be really worried for her if it turns out to be him.

But I suppose even if it is, then given Gran’s upbringing and nature, it could only have been some kind of Brief Encounter!

Next morning the wind had died down a bit, but everything was thickly furred with frost. But then, it’s been growing steadily colder since I got here and, according to the radio, the odds on it being a white Christmas were getting shorter and shorter by the minute.

The house was already starting to warm through now I’d lit the fire, though, and I was keeping it going by a lavish application of logs from the cellar. The place will soon feel cosy, despite its size.

After breakfast (which I ate with the latest of Gran’s journals propped in front of me) I let Lady and Billy out. Billy ignored the open gate and jumped straight over the fence like a. . well, I was going to say goat!

I hung a filled haynet on the rail, high enough so that Lady wouldn’t catch her feet in it when it was empty (another bit of advice from the invaluable Becca!) and broke a thin skin of ice on the trough, before tidying up the loosebox.

Merlin had wandered off up the paddock, which I thought was probably exercise enough for the morning, so I went back in and prepared to give the sitting room the sort of cleaning my Gran always referred to as ‘a good bottoming’, something it clearly hadn’t had for quite some time.

It’s part of the Homebodies remit that we keep the rooms of the house that we actually use neat and clean, it’s just that the houses aren’t usually quite on this scale!

I don’t enjoy the process of cleaning, but I do love a nice clean room, so I suppose you could call that job satisfaction. Although it’s not in the same league as providing an excellent dinner for twenty-five people with mixed dietary requirements every day for a fortnight with effortless expertise. Now that’s satisfying on a creative level, too — I sometimes think cooking is a kind of ephemeral art form.

Anyway, by the time I’d vacuumed the pattern back into existence on the lovely old carpet, mopped the bit of stone floor around the edges, removed spider’s webs from every corner and polished the brass fender, fireguard and furniture (and even the front door knocker, while I was about it), it all looked wonderful — and I looked a grubby mess and had to go and shower again.

By this time it was late morning, so I put on my warm, down-filled jacket and set out for the village with Merlin, since he was desperate to come with me. The poor old thing seems to have attached himself to me already, but life must have been very confusing for him lately.

As well as exploring, I wanted to see if the shop had the extra supplies I had on my list and anything Tilda might want, so I hoped there would be something to tie Merlin to outside it. I suppose I should have taken the car really, only I like to walk and my rucksack is very roomy.

Noël insisted I went into the lodge for a moment, even though Merlin seemed to take up a lot of space in the small, cluttered room, and when he wagged his tail he nearly took out the Christmas tree and a snowglobe. I felt a bit like Alice in Wonderland when she’d drunk the get-bigger potion, myself.

Tilda was reclining on the sofa, resplendent today in an orange satin blouse and a long black skirt, though I thought she looked a little tired under the lavish makeup. Jess was sitting on the floor doing a vampire jigsaw on the coffee table, the lid with its gory picture propped up in front of her.

‘There aren’t enough corners,’ she said by way of greeting.

‘Life’s like that sometimes,’ I commiserated. ‘Or sometimes there are too many.’

She gave me a look from under her fringe.

‘Have you tried the phone up at the house today? Only you’ll find it keeps going dead, because of the wind,’ Tilda said.

‘The wind?’

‘Blows the wires about, but it’s much worse than usual,’ Noël said. ‘We hadn’t noticed until George Froggat — he owns Hill Farm further up the lane — told us. One of the poles is leaning at an angle between here and the village, so the wire is practically down. He called BT and they say it’ll be after Christmas before they can get someone up here to look at it, but those poles have wanted replacing the last two years and more.’

‘That’s a nuisance,’ I said, but thinking that at least it might spare me one or two of Jude Martland’s irritating calls!

‘It will be if it falls right down and cuts us off completely,’ he agreed. ‘Jess’s mobile works, but not terribly well.’

‘And only if I walk down the lane towards the village,’ Jess said. ‘Uncle Jude phoned when we got back yesterday and the phone was a bit dodgy even then, wasn’t it, Grandpa?’

‘Very, I could only hear what he was saying intermittently.’

‘I suppose he was fretting about Lady again?’

‘Her name did crop up,’ he admitted. ‘But then he said something about you coping, so I expect he has realised that everything will be absolutely fine. The line went dead after that and he didn’t try and ring back again.’

‘Anyone would think we would all fall apart without his lordship home,’ Tilda scoffed. ‘But even when he is here, he spends most of his time shut up in his studio.’

‘Did you want me to get you anything from the village?’ I offered.

‘George brings us the paper every morning, that’s why he stopped by, but you could fetch us a bottle of sherry from the pub,’ Tilda said. ‘In fact, you should have lunch there; they do a good ploughman’s or a pot pie.’

‘Do they? That would be nice,’ I said, remembering that I hadn’t had lunch yet and breakfast seemed an awfully long time ago, ‘but I’ll have to do it another day because I wouldn’t be able to take Merlin in.’

‘Oh, the Daggers won’t mind.’

‘The who?’

‘Daggers. The Dagger family have always had the Auld Christmas. In fact, Nicholas Dagger plays the part of Auld Man Christmas in the Revels on Twelfth Night,’ Noël said. ‘Jude is Saint George and I used to be the Dragon, only I’ve had to hand the part on to a younger man.’