Page 49 of A Recipe for Romance

‘And my blood is still boiling at the sheer cheek of the man – first of all ingratiating himself with Kat and then daring to try and draw my Jake in too!’ I said to Poppy while we waited in the snug of the Falling Star for Felix to arrive.

He’d had to go off somewhere after the latest Parish Council meeting.

‘Oh, Jake is much too sensible to be drawn in by someone like that, especially since he knows all about Mann-Drake,’ she assured me, ‘and I expect Kat was just being polite to someone so much older than herself. I hope the Dolly Mops girl is too – I’d already heard about that invitation from Effie Yatton, and that the old cowshed has been turned into a kind of pagan temple. ’

‘Effie Yatton seems to know an awful lot!’

‘It’s because she runs the Brownies – it means she has moles everywhere! She says it’s clear that Mann-Drake is trying to corrupt our youth. He’s even invited the son of the farmer next to Badger’s Bolt too, so he’s casting his nets wide, isn’t he?’

‘He’s already drawn in David and some of his friends, but I’m not worried about them because they’re old enough to know what they’re doing.’

‘I wouldn’t have thought it was David’s kind of thing?’

‘It isn’t really. I think it’s Mel Christopher’s influence.’

‘Hebe Winter wanted Mike to stop the party, but of course he can’t unless they break the law in some way.

Raffy said some of the rumours he’d heard about the meetings Mann-Drake used to hold at his Devon house weren’t very savoury and I thought he meant orgies, though I shouldn’t think the cowshed is big enough for that. ’

‘I wouldn’t know, I’ve never been to an orgy.’

‘That’s what Raffy said when I asked him,’ she said innocently. ‘Then Felix said Mann-Drake ought to be careful about inviting young people to his parties, because there have been cases where teenagers have posted the details on internet sites and hundreds of uninvited guests have turned up.’

‘Yes, I’ve read about that – parents coming back and finding their homes trashed.’

‘We all agreed it would be terrible if that happened to Mann-Drake’s party,’ she said meaningfully.

‘Right…’ I said. ‘Did Felix tell the Parish Council about Grumps’ big discovery? He’s highly pleased with himself!’

‘Oh, yes – it was amazing about the plague pit. Fancy it being forgotten! Though the Palm Sunday procession has always stopped there for special prayers, so that’s probably a throw-back to that time.

Raffy’s going to see if there’s anything about it in the church records.

But it is quite nice in a way that generations of families have played and picnicked there, where their ancestors are buried, isn’t it? ’

‘I suppose it is. And it will certainly put a crimp in the plans to build homes there, I would have thought.’

‘Yes, Conrad told me that the developers, Mango Homes, are coming to look at the lido field on Tuesday morning at ten and Mann-Drake is meeting them there. Hebe is organising a protest and newspaper coverage, and then they are going on to picket the Town Hall in Merchester afterwards. We’ll have to make banners and go. ’

‘Are Mango Homes the ones who call the roads on their estates after fruit?’ I asked. ‘Like Raspberry Road and Galia Gardens?’

‘And Plum Place for the posh end?’ Poppy giggled. ‘Yes, those are the ones and they usually stucco their houses and paint them in ice-cream colours, so it would look like a chunk of the Cornish Riviera had been transplanted to Sticklepond.’

‘That wouldn’t fit in with the local houses at all.’

‘No, that’s what we all said. That was about the end of the meeting then, and I came out with Felix and Raffy.

But Felix said he had to go and see a customer and dashed off, and although I asked Raffy to join us here later, he said he was very busy at the moment.

Easter does seem to be, for vicars,’ she added.

‘But before he went, he said he was a donkey – that was a bit odd.’

‘A donkey ?’

She nodded, her curls, which had now permanently replaced the frizz, bobbing. ‘I’m not sure why, unless I misheard, though I had told him about the Palm Sunday walk earlier and he asked me then if the donkey was compulsory.’

‘He is a donkey if he’s avoiding me, because I keep telling him I forgive him.’

‘Perhaps he needs time to forgive himself, now he knows the whole truth?’

‘Maybe, but I think he’s wallowing in it a bit too much. And he still seems to think that David and I are an item, no matter what I say.’

‘I think even Felix has now grasped that you aren’t!’

‘No, I’m not remotely attracted to him now – and thank God I never married him!’

‘So your mum actually did you a good turn, there,’ she pointed out with a grin.

‘Yes, unintentionally, I suppose she did.’

Poppy looked restively at the door for about the twentieth time. ‘Felix is ages , isn’t he?’

‘You’re getting just like Siamese twins, joined at the hip! How did the riding lesson go?’

‘I don’t think he’s a natural, but he didn’t fall off and he quite liked it, really,’ she said, giggling, then her eyes went back to the door and glazed over.

‘Felix!’

‘ Poppy! ’ he replied, in a soppy voice.

They gazed meltingly at each other for a few moments (which is clearly as far as things have progressed), until he came to his senses and kissed us both in a brotherly way on the cheek and said how nice we were looking – which we were, because ever since Southport we’ve made a bit more of an effort when going out in the evenings.

‘I just called in to see Jake,’ he said, slightly self-consciously, since this wasn’t something he made a habit of. ‘That’s why I’m late.’

‘Ah…’ I said, ‘and I suppose you suggested that he spreads the word about Mann-Drake’s party?’

‘Well…sort of,’ he admitted.

‘Poppy’s just been telling me all about the meeting – that’s how I guessed – but I don’t want Jake to get into trouble.’

‘He won’t – I didn’t ask him to do anything,’ Felix said. ‘In fact, he said he knew someone at college with millions of Facebook friends, who couldn’t keep a secret, and he would have to be careful not to accidentally tell him anything about it.’

‘Right,’ I said, and though I was still angry over Mann-Drake’s attempt to draw my little brother into his orbit (he would have regretted it if he had), I said no more about it.

‘Great news about the plague pit, isn’t it?’ Felix said brightly.

‘Yes, wonderful. Grumps told me about it this morning and I don’t see how they could build there now, because the whole village would be up in arms.’

‘And what with that and the river being prone to flooding in winter at the tennis courts and one edge of the lido field, there’s not really a lot you could do with either of them, is there?’ he said.

‘Perhaps in the end the village will get them back again, one way or another,’ Poppy suggested optimistically.

There was no sign of Mrs Snowball tonight, so Molly allowed us to have drinks other than coffee, and it was just another nice evening like we’ve so often had before…except that somehow the dynamics of our little trio was subtly changing, so that I was starting to feel sort of…lonely.

I asked Jake when I got back what he intended to do about Felix’s suggestion and he smiled in a really mysterious and annoying way and said I should keep out of it, but that he’d just accidentally pressed ‘reply all’ when he emailed Kat about the party, so the news had gone to his entire contact list.

Then he warned me that he’d heard weird chanting from the museum and a strange smell of incense was seeping under the adjoining door, so if I’d thought of popping in to see Zillah, right then probably wouldn’t be a good moment unless I went all the way round the front of the museum.

However, Grumps’ coven had been meeting frequently to counter Mann-Drake’s threat, so I was quite used to it by now, even if the idea of a lot of old wrinklies standing hand in hand in a circle next door, starkers and chanting, did gross Jake out.

By the time the Mango Homes people and Mann-Drake arrived at the lido field on Tuesday morning, Hebe had organised a reception committee of placard-wielding villagers, with Felix, Poppy and me among them.

She and Raffy awaited them, flanked by a reporter and photographer from the local paper, ready primed.

The placards said things like ‘Honour Our Dead!’, ‘Leave Our Ancestors in Peace!’ and ‘Sacrilege!’

Mine read ‘Grave Concerns!’ I was quite pleased with that.

Hebe buttonholed the property developers the moment they got out of their car and, in her terribly clear and carrying voice, told them all about the plague pit and the winter flooding, talking right over the top of all Mann-Drake’s attempts to interrupt.

Then Raffy put his oar in and said that the whole village would like the lido field and the bodies of their ancestors left in peace and we all cheered.

After that, it wasn’t surprising that the Mango Homes people didn’t stay long, because a new estate built on a plague pit was never going to be easy to market, Pustule Place and Bubo Bank not having quite the right ring, especially since the river edge of it would have to be mounted on stilts.

Mann-Drake, however, switched tack and tried sweet-talking his way around everyone but, finding it wasn’t working, was eventually driven away too, by a languid and leached young man who was either his PA or acolyte, or possibly a strange hybrid of the two.

Hebe and some of the villagers went on to Merchester to picket the Town Hall, with the reporters in close attendance, but Felix, Poppy and I had to get back to do some work, and Raffy apparently had a big annual church council meeting to go to, because he dashed off as well.

The coverage in the local papers on Thursday was wonderful (‘A plague on you – Sticklepond wants its dead kept buried!’) and was syndicated to a national daily.

There were lots of great photos, including one of Hebe Winter and Raffy (‘Sticklepond’s ex-pop star vicar!’), and a long shot of the protesters including me and my placard, with all the feathery fronds of my hair blown upright into a Mohican.

The papers had also dug a few stories out about Mann-Drake, hinting at dark deeds and secret societies, and somehow managing to suggest that his house in Devon was burned down by a firebrand-waving mob of locals, but without actually coming out and directly saying so.

There was an interview with local bookseller and antiquarian Felix Hemmings on the historical importance of the Plague Pit Field, which I knew about, but also, to my surprise, one with novelist Gregory Warlock.

He gave his books and the museum’s imminent opening a good plug, and then pointed out the harmless – and frequently benign – effects of magic down the centuries, as opposed to the pernicious nonsense of pseudo-magical mountebanks like Crowley and Mann-Drake.

He was also quoted as saying that magic, when properly practised, could happily marry with a Christian way of life, which I can only put down to Raffy’s influence. All those visits must be paying off!

Grumps has an amazingly good eye for publicity, though according to Zillah he might have got a trifle carried away by his enthusiasm, and led the reporters to believe that some kind of semi-satanic orgy was to take place at Badger’s Bolt on Saturday night…

In a moment of compunction I phoned David up early on the Saturday morning to suggest that he cry off Mann-Drake’s party, though since I couldn’t really say why, he just thought I was jealous again. I might as well have saved myself the trouble.

Jake went to Kat’s house early in the evening, where they would have a ringside seat, since the side gate faced onto the lane that led to Badger’s Bolt.

He phoned when the dinner guests arrived, including David with Mel Christopher, and said several very strange people were already staying at the cottage.

‘I’ll tell you what happens in the morning,’ he said, then rang off, before I could tell him not to leave Kat’s parents’ house that evening, though they seemed very sensible people.

The village was really quiet for ages after that, until suddenly there seemed to be a huge number of vehicles making their way through the narrow streets. Then later, just as I was falling sleep, I could hear sirens in the distance…