Page 26 of New Beginnings At Pencarrow Bay

Sienna was ranting on. ‘The horrific amount of energy it must take to wash all these millions of glasses and launder the piles of linen every day… Kostas is bringing the planet to its knees almost single-handedly. But he doesn’t give a toss about anything except money.’

Peggy almost laughed. You don’t have to come here , she thought . She said, ‘I suppose you can’t charge someone four hundred quid a night and expect them to share a towel with the whole corridor.’

Sienna stared at her, then burst out laughing. Her whole demeanour softened, her dark eyes coming alive. ‘I’d like to try, though, just to see their faces.’

Peggy laughed too, charmed by this glimpse of the human side to Paul’s wife, while still recovering from the fairy devotee.

‘To get back to your school,’ she said. ‘I’m uniquely qualified if you’re talking kids with educational challenges.

’ She went on to tell Sienna about her work at Great Ormond Street.

By the time Peggy had finished her coffee, the conversation was flowing.

Sienna seemed to have shrugged off her proselytizing cloak and was showing fewer signs of the strange euphoria, the disconnection, that had overcome her earlier.

They talked more about how the school would work.

Peggy got the sense that although Sienna was slightly out of her depth in the minefield of running an educational establishment, she would find whatever help she needed– throw money at it if necessary– to make it work.

Peggy respected that. In fact, having been in the system for thirty years, she thought she could probably be quite useful to Sienna.

The meeting was winding up. ‘So this isn’t your second home?’ Sienna asked, almost as an afterthought– she had so far not enquired into Peggy’s life.

Peggy flinched at the term ‘second home’, almost expecting a lightning bolt to split the otherwise bright blue sky and strike them down.

The phrase, to the permanent residents of the bay, was like shouting, ‘Fire!’ in a packed theatre.

They immediately started ranting about mythical ‘young families’ who’d been priced out of the market– now so long gone, they might never have existed at all.

Peggy was pretty sure, too, that these families wouldn’t stay even if they could afford the houses.

Without the tourists renting the second homes and indulging in pricey crab sandwiches, boat hire, ice creams and Spanish crisps at five pounds a bag, there would be no work for miles.

It would be like winter, all year round. It was a case of Catch-22.

Now she shook her head. ‘We’re totally committed to the bay. My partner, Ted, runs the coffee stall up by the castle. We’re retired but not retired.’

Sienna raised a well-shaped eyebrow. ‘Good coffee,’ she said, with a smile, giving her still full cup a disdainful glance.

‘Okay, now, a pic for Insta. Lean forward,’ she said, raising her mobile.

‘I want to involve people in my process, each stage of getting this school up and running. It’ll be a documentary in itself by the time I’m done.

’ She angled the phone. ‘I’m posting about every single move I make…

to chivvy our supporters, get them inspired. ’

Peggy froze. She hated having her photograph taken.

Do I really want to be on Sienna’s Instagram feed?

But by the time she realized this meant she had the job– although the terms of employment or exactly what her teaching would entail had barely been touched upon– Sienna had clicked and the photo was taken.

I got the job. Yippee! xxx Peggy texted Ted, as she left the hotel and walked past the crab shack on the quay– run by the lovely Tina during the summer months, selling crab sandwiches that were hugely popular with tourists.

But today it was not Tina in the hatch of the white van.

Peggy waved and called, ‘Hi,’ anyway, but Emerald, Tina’s perennially sulky partner, did not respond, although she glanced up briefly from the bread she was spreading.

Peggy, though, still feeling exhilarated by her interview with Sienna, was not in the mood to take offence.

Sienna is certainly on the strange side , she thought, as she began to climb the hill out of the centre of the village. But she was also intelligent and interesting. Not to mention focused and wilful. They had exchanged emails. She’d said she’d be in touch. Peggy was thrilled.

Raising her head from her phone– Ted hadn’t yet replied– she noticed Joe Dixon, Gen’s father, walking slowly towards her, supporting himself, at intervals, with a gnarled hand on the stone sea wall.

As usual, he wore shabby shorts and a T-shirt, his face so tanned from his wanderings along the sea front he looked almost healthy– although Peggy knew he could not be.

She smiled and gave a little wave, slowed her pace a bit.

She was dying to get to Ted, to tell him about Sienna, but so many of the locals swerved to avoid Joe.

Captain Jack from the sailing club looked after him when things got bad and he had to be supported home.

‘Morning,’ Joe said, his voice raspy and deep– Peggy was never sure if he remembered her name. He waved a vague hand towards the water below. ‘Feeble southerly today. No chance of a run.’ He gave a half-laugh, his startling light blue eyes coming alive for a second as he stared at her.

He must have been very attractive in his youth , Peggy thought. She knew he no longer sailed, but he still spoke in baffling sailing terms that she seldom fully understood.

‘Certainly can’t,’ she said, with a smile.

But Joe had lost interest in the conversation. He turned his back on her, resting his forearms on the wall, and gazed out to sea. She said goodbye and hurried on up the hill.

When she reached the castle, she noticed Pam– plump and middle-aged, who baked for the stall– was behind the hatch, unusually, serving a couple of older ladies, their dogs making friends with Bolt.

‘Hello, my lovely,’ Pam greeted her over the heads of her customers, looking red-faced and somewhat harassed.

‘Where’s Ted?’ Peggy asked. Bolt was there, so he couldn’t be far away.

‘Gone off with Mrs McDonald in her car.’ Pam cleaned for Lindy, as well as baking for Ted, but obviously hadn’t got around to calling her ‘Lindy’.

‘Really? Where were they going?’ Peggy asked, a little anxiously.

Pam took payment for the drinks, struggling a bit with the terminal, then replied, ‘Didn’t say.

They were over there having coffee,’ she pointed to a corner table, ‘and suddenly Mrs McDonald got upset like, raising her voice, and running off towards her car. And Ted got in with her. Called out he’d be back in a minute…

but that was half an hour ago.’ She looked as baffled as Peggy felt, grabbed the metal milk jug and began to rinse it out.

Peggy could see there was a certain amount of chaos around her in the van.

‘Listen, I can take over if you like,’ Peggy offered. What on earth has happened? she wondered, worrying that things must have escalated with Felix.

Pam hesitated. ‘Oh, would you? I have to get Mum to the doctor’s by twelve and she takes an age to sort herself out at the minute.’

Before she climbed the drop-down steps into Henri, Peggy shot off an enquiring text to Ted, asking where he was and if Lindy was all right.

But with midday approaching and the weather so good, she was too busy to check whether he’d replied or not, a steady stream of customers taking up her undivided attention.

It was nearly two when there was finally a lull.

Taking the opportunity to tidy the van, she looked up to see Lindy’s bronze Audi e-tron glide to a stop on the edge of the car park. Ted got out; Lindy drove swiftly away.