Page 5

‘This is brilliant, Shona! When Pippa agreed to give us a write-up, I never expected her to be so thorough!’

We were sitting at a table in the teashop, and I’d been anxiously waiting for Callie’s verdict on Pippa’s feature. I needn’t have worried. I beamed with maternal pride as Callie lowered the copy of last night’s Cotswolds Courier, looking deeply impressed by what she’d just read.

‘She’s always been very thorough in whatever she does. No half-measures with our Pippa,’ I told her.

My youngest had certainly done Rowan Vale proud.

Not only had she interviewed Callie and Brodie, but she’d also talked to Betty and Nick from the farm, the staff at the cinema, the mill museum, the bakery – and me, of course.

She’d made the event sound amazing, and I wasn’t surprised that Callie was so pleased.

‘Will you thank her for me when you see her? I hope she’s going to be attending – just as a guest, I mean. I’m not expecting her to write another piece.’

‘As a matter of fact,’ I said, ‘she’s already confirmed she’s going to be here to cover it. It’s local news, after all. The Courier are going to promote it over the next few weeks so we should have a nice crowd at the event.’

Callie visibly swallowed. ‘Blimey. Whose bright idea was this again?’

‘Yours,’ I said firmly, ‘and a very good one it is, too.’

‘You think? This all started, you know, because Lawrie got a phone call from an old friend of his, asking if it would be possible to hold a vintage car rally in the village. The field they usually use has been snapped up for development and, even though work won’t start until next year, the new owner just dropped the bombshell on them that they can’t use it any more. Lawrie asked me if it would be okay.

‘Of course, I said yes. Then I thought about all those old cars rolling into the village and it stirred something in my mind. Many of them are from the thirties and forties, apparently, and someone’s even got an old wartime American army jeep!

They said they’d be very happy to be part of the event if it went ahead so…

’ She gazed down at the paper. ‘Maybe I got a bit carried away.’

‘Why are you doubting yourself?’ Aunt Polly demanded. ‘If you hadn’t thought it would work, you wouldn’t have suggested it in the first place, would you? This is just nerves, love. It sounds like smashing fun to me.’

‘Not everyone in this village seems so keen,’ Callie murmured. Her gaze slid over to the corner table where Erin and Rissa, the two young women employed to act as land girls on Rowan Farm, were chatting over cups of tea and slices of Victoria sponge.

‘Hmm. Well, we all know Rissa’s problem,’ I said softly.

I felt a bit sorry for the girl. Everyone in the village knew she’d had a massive crush on Brodie.

They’d even dated for a while until she got too intense.

It seemed Rissa was still carrying a torch for him because she’d made it very clear she didn’t like Callie and she wanted no truck with the 1940s weekend, whatever her employers said.

‘You don’t want to worry about the odd few naysayers,’ Aunt Polly told her. ‘Most people are all for it. I hear things, you know. Accidentally, like.’

I tried not to laugh, knowing how much she loved to eavesdrop on the locals and pick up any gossip.

‘And what I hear,’ she continued, ignoring the smirk I knew I’d failed to hide, ‘is that most people are excited about this weekend you’re organising. Even that moaning old Mr Thwaite’s said a few grudging positive things about it.’

‘Thank you, Mrs Herron,’ Callie said gratefully. ‘That’s a relief to hear.’

‘My name’s Polly, love. I’ve told you before. Mrs Herron was my mother-in-law and bless her, I loved her to bits but I’m not that old! I’m only thirty-seven, you know.’

Callie and I tactfully didn’t point out that, strictly speaking, she was well over a hundred years old if you counted all her birthdays since she’d died.

‘Thank you, Polly.’ Callie corrected herself with a smile.

‘I know it’s a good idea but it’s a tight deadline.

It’s just, the car rally’s always held then, apparently, and I thought, with September being when war was declared, it all fitted.

And besides, any later in the year and we’d be more likely to have bad weather. ’

‘Not that you can guarantee good weather at any time in this country,’ I pointed out, nodding at the teashop windows, through which we could see grey skies. The mid-July sunshine hadn’t lasted long.

Callie nibbled on the cheese scone I’d given her and scanned the article that Pippa had written for The Courier once again.

‘She’s made it sound really good,’ she said, clearly feeling a bit happier. Though that could have been down to the scone, which was delicious, if I do say so myself.

‘That’s because it will be,’ Aunt Polly promised. ‘All the ghosts are on board, you know. Well – nearly all of them.’

‘Let me guess who isn’t,’ Callie said, wrinkling her nose. ‘Silas Alexander?’

Aunt Polly laughed. ‘What are you? A clairvoyant?’ She folded her arms and leaned towards Callie. ‘What about them two up at the Hall? Are they up for it?’

Callie squirmed slightly in her chair. ‘Er…’

‘Gotcha.’ Aunt Polly nodded knowingly. ‘I was chatting to Isaac the other day,’ she said, referring to the ghost of a seventeenth century former landlord of The Quicken Tree, ‘and he was saying he doubted very much that we’d see the old – I mean, Agnes Ashcroft.

She’s far too grand to honour us with her presence.

And sadly, Aubrey Wyndham’s as bad these days.

He used to be a lovely chap, you know, but now he’s gone the same way as his so-called lady wife. ’

Agnes and Aubrey were two ghosts who lived at Callie’s home, Howling Hall.

Oops, I mean Harling Hall! Built by the original owners of the Harling Estate (they’d even been mentioned in the Domesday Book) it was a beautiful, sixteenth-century manor house, until recently owned by Sir Lawrence Davenport (or Lawrie as we all called him) and before that, by every previous owner of the estate since it was built.

Aubrey had once been one of those owners. According to Aunt Polly, he was a Victorian gentleman who’d somehow, postmortem , saddled himself with the imperious Agnes Ashcroft, who’d been the wife of a previous owner during the Georgian and Regency period.

It amused the ghosts that Lady Muck, as some of them called her, was living in sin with Aubrey. Apparently, Silas Alexander didn’t find it so funny, but then, he didn’t find anything funny by the sound of it.

Agnes and Aubrey never visited the village these days. Aunt Polly said they hadn’t been near for donkey’s years.

Callie also leaned forward and whispered to Aunt Polly, ‘Do you know why they don’t leave the grounds of the Hall?

I thought it might be because of Silas. From what I’ve seen and heard, he’s always having a go about them and their sinful ways.

He calls the Hall a den of iniquity.’ She reddened.

‘I wonder what he thinks about me and Brodie sharing the place now we’re together?

Not,’ she added quickly, ‘that we share a suite. Brodie and Lawrie have their own suite in the east wing, and Immi and I are in the west wing. Even so…’

‘I’ve wondered myself,’ Aunt Polly confessed.

‘Not about you and Brodie! I mean, about why they won’t come to the village.

They used to, after all, even when I joined the ranks of ghosts.

I know it upset Agnes when Silas ranted at her, but she’d just turn up her nose and ignore him.

Or I thought she was ignoring him. Maybe it went deeper than we realised.

But Aubrey just used to shake his head and tell Silas he was a sad little man.

He insisted that he and Agnes had done nothing to be ashamed of, and that Silas ought to be the one who was ashamed, haranguing a lady like Agnes who’d done nothing to deserve it, and him a man of the cloth. ’

‘So you don’t think it is because of Silas then?’ I asked, curious even though I’d never seen or heard any of the ghosts they were discussing.

‘Well…’ Aunt Polly tilted her head, considering.

‘When I think about it, Agnes’s visits got further and further apart, but Aubrey still liked a daily wander.

But they both completely stopped coming here about – what?

Ten, fifteen years ago? Not entirely sure when it was exactly, but somewhere around then.

Maybe Silas said something particularly brutal that upset them.

’ She shook her head. ‘I wouldn’t put it past him. Man of the cloth indeed. Huh!’

I glanced round, noting a few more tables had filled up with customers.

‘I’d better give Paige a hand,’ I said, getting to my feet.

‘And I’d better get back home,’ Callie said, before popping the last of the scone into her mouth.

At that moment, Rissa and Erin got up to leave, throwing jackets over their working uniforms of breeches and green jumpers.

Erin nodded and gave us a rather sheepish smile as she passed our table, mumbling something about going next door to buy pasties for Bram and Lars, their co-workers on the farm.

Rissa pointedly ignored us, and we watched as they both left the teashop and passed by the window, heading to Blighty’s.

‘Little madam,’ Aunt Polly said with a sigh.

‘It’s all a bit awkward,’ Callie admitted. ‘I do feel quite bad about her.’

‘No need,’ I assured her. ‘Rissa and Brodie broke up long before you arrived on the scene. She’s just going to have to learn to accept that. If someone doesn’t love you, wishing it was different won’t make it so.’

Didn’t I know it! How long had I wished I could make Luke love me again? Far too long.