Trisha Ashley - Twelve Days of Christmas

Surely, I thought, I wouldn’t need presents for people I’d barely met, who were only coming for dinner? But then, it might be better to be sure than sorry.

‘All right,’ I capitulated, ‘but I ought to leave Henry’s now, in case I don’t see him again before Christmas.’

‘I’ll slap a bit of gift-wrap on it for free and take it across later, shall I?’ she suggested obligingly.

‘If you wouldn’t mind, that would be great.’

‘Not at all.’

‘Well, that must be everything!’

But she wasn’t about to let me go without a struggle. ‘What about Jess’s Christmas stocking? Got everything you need for that?’

I stared at her, startled. A stocking on Christmas morning like all my friends had had was the thing I’d most desperately longed for when I was a little girl: but surely Jess was now too old?

‘She’s nearly thirteen, so I would have thought she was too grown up for one this year? But if she isn’t then I suppose her mother or Tilda will have seen to it.’

‘Perhaps — perhaps not. And in my experience, you’re never too old for a stocking. Perhaps you should take a couple of bits and pieces, just in case they’ve forgotten about it?’

‘Like what? I’ve no idea what she would like!’

‘Let me see,’ she mused. ‘It’s a funny age: they’re a child one minute, quite grownup the next.’

She took down a jar containing sugar mice with string tails in white, lurid yellow, or pink and prepared to give me a master class in Christmas stocking preparation.

‘You need one of these at the bottom, with a tangerine or something like that to start with. When I was a little girl there used to be a handful of nuts, though I never knew why, since you could hardly crack Brazil nuts in bed with your teeth, could you?’

‘We’ve got fruit and nuts, but I don’t think Jess would be very excited by finding them in her stocking, since she can help herself any time she likes.’

‘It helps to fill it up, but we can put in a packet of Love Hearts instead. Most of my toys are too young for her, but there’s a pack of Happy Family cards and a couple of jokes, like the whoopee cushion and the ink blot, that I expect she’d like. And maybe a fluffy toy sheepdog? I keep them for the summer visitors, with the postcards and stuff.’

‘Do you think she’s a fluffy toy sort of girl?’ I asked doubtfully, but she was already delving deep into a large wicker basket and came up with a black, wolfish-looking creature with yellow eyes that had been lurking at the bottom.

‘I just remembered — this came in mixed with the last lot of collies, and I never got round to sending it back.’

‘Right,’ I said, and then on impulse added an elasticated bracelet of polished dark grey stones.

‘How about a jigsaw puzzle? I always think a big puzzle is something the whole family can do together on Christmas Day.’

‘I’m sure I saw a whole stack of them in the old nursery,’ I said quickly.

‘This one’s got a lovely Christmas scene on the front — and if you return it afterwards with all the pieces, I’ll buy it back for half price,’ she added enticingly and, my willpower totally sapped by now, I nodded dumbly.

Paying for that lot pretty well cleaned me out of cash, since Mrs Comfort didn’t take cards of any kind, and once I’d filled the rucksack I had to buy a big jute bag with one of Oriel’s inspirational thoughts on it: A Loving Heart Keeps You Warm on Winter’s Nights.

It had been a choice between that or Love Circles — Pass It On.

You know, when I looked closer, the things on that stand were irresistibly awful!

I hauled my purchases over to the church and sat on a stone bench in the porch out of the wind, to phone Laura on my mobile. (I did dutifully try Jude’s number again, but got the same message.)

‘Oh, good,’ she said when she answered, sounding relieved, ‘I’ve been trying to get through to the house and it kept saying there was a fault on the line.’

‘There is — one of the poles holding the phone wires up has fallen down and taken the next one with it. Is everything okay? How are you?’

‘Oh, I’m all right and the baby’s kicking like mad. The other three are so excited about Christmas they’re hysterical and Dan’s just helpfully vanished, presumably to buy my present. He’s always so last minute! But how are you doing? I’m worried about you, taking so much on and being so isolated.’

‘Isolated is the last way I’d describe Old Place, actually, Laura!’

‘You sound a bit worried — which is not like you at all. What is it, are you finding it too much?’

‘Of course not — you know me, I thrive on a challenge,’ I assured her, though she didn’t yet know quite how much of a challenge my current post had become! ‘But there’s something on my mind I’d like to run past you, to see if you think I’m imagining things.’

‘Go on, then, tell me.’

‘It’s Gran’s diaries. Things between her and Ned Martland have hotted up quite a bit and. . well, I think they had sex.’

‘Good heavens,’ she said mildly, ‘I didn’t think that was invented until the sixties.’

‘It certainly wasn’t for good Strange Baptist girls like Gran, that’s for sure, especially in 1945! She must have been sure they were going to marry, but obviously that didn’t happen — and since I just found out that Ned was killed in an accident I’m hoping that was the reason, not because he abandoned her!’

‘Didn’t you skip forward and try to find out? I would have!’

‘No, because to be honest, so much is happening that I’m exhausted by bedtime and I hardly have a minute to myself during the day, though I did have another quick look while I drank my first cup of coffee this morning.’

‘And did you find out what happened?’

‘No, she’s been wrestling with her conscience for pages and pages, but I’m keeping the current journal in the kitchen and dipping into it whenever I have a minute on my own. But the thing that’s worrying me is that Noël implied that Ned was a bad lot as far as women were concerned: charming and lovable, but unreliable. I keep thinking: what if Gran got pregnant and relied on him to make an honest woman of her?’

‘Aren’t you jumping the gun a bit? She hasn’t said so, has she?’

‘Not so far, but I can’t help wondering. .’ I paused. ‘Laura, you know I’m not fanciful, but I’ve felt at home here from the minute I arrived and that I sort of. . fit in. And the other thing is, I’m constantly being mistaken for one of the family — even Noël forgets that I’m not. The Martlands are all tall and dark, though they don’t have light grey eyes like me and Gran.’

‘Your Gran wasn’t tall, but didn’t she have dark hair when she was young?

‘Yes, and she told me my colouring came from her side of the family — her ancestors came from Liverpool, a seafaring port and I’ve always assumed there was a good dose of foreign blood. So I might just be imagining any resemblance to the Martlands. . My mother was quite tall and had black hair too,’ I added, though that proved nothing one way or the other. Unfortunately, I have no idea what my father looked like, because after my mother died soon after giving birth to me, he emigrated to Australia and vanished out of our lives. Gran neatly cut him out of all the wedding photographs.

There were rumours that he’d started a new family over there, so I might have half-siblings somewhere, but although I’d had one try at tracing him (without Gran’s knowledge!) I didn’t get anywhere.

‘I can see where you’re going with all this, Holly, but it could still be just a coincidence that you’re tall and dark. And with your grandfather being a Strange Baptist minister, I don’t suppose he would have married your gran if he knew she was pregnant by another man, would he?’

‘It doesn’t sound very likely when you put it like that,’ I admitted.

‘He was much older than she was, wasn’t he?’

‘Yes, she told me once he was the father of her childhood sweetheart, who was killed in the war, and it seemed natural that they should marry and console each other. I barely remember him, though everyone says he was the nicest, kindest of men.’

‘Perhaps you should just carry on reading the journal and not try to join up the dots yet,’ Laura suggested.

‘I suppose you’re right — and besides, I’m way too busy to worry about it, really. But I might just try and discover when Ned’s accident was and then check that against the dates Gran got married and my mother was born — I’ve brought the whole trunk of her papers with me. If it doesn’t all match up, then I’ll know for sure.’

‘That’s true,’ she said. ‘And there’s no point in worrying over it, when it’s all in the past. I mean, it’s not like you’re going to claim a stake in the family fortune or anything, is it?’

I laughed. ‘I don’t think there is one! The house is pretty shabby and Jude Martland didn’t hire any live-in staff when the last ones left, plus he seems obsessed with how much money I’m costing him — or he thinks I’m costing him. I really should charge him for all the extra work I’ll be doing, because things are escalating!’

‘So what’s happening? I thought you were just having the family from the lodge up for Christmas dinner?’

‘I was, only they’ve moved in already and so has Becca, Noël’s sister, so I’m hosting a Christmas family house-party at Old Place. I’m cook, groom, maid and cleaner — though to be fair, Becca seems to have taken over looking after the horses.’

And I told her all about Tilda’s accident and how inviting them to move into Old Place immediately was the only possible solution, and then Becca turning up on Nutkin and the discovery that there would also be two more guests for Christmas dinner — the retired vicar and the family’s old nanny.

‘If Jude Martland doesn’t like any of this, it’s tough, and he’ll have to sort it out with his relatives when he gets back, because I could hardly stop them, could I? And we couldn’t consult him first, because of the lines being down.’

‘You could call him on your mobile, or from the village?’ she suggested.

‘I just tried and it said his number was unavailable. It’s a relief not having him calling me every day and harassing me, really, because none of my clients have ever done that before!’

‘It’ll be okay, Holly — I mean, what else could you do? It was really taken out of your hands,’ she said, laughing.

‘You’re right, I couldn’t do anything else, even though it means a lot more work — and being part of a big family Christmas celebration.’

‘You might even find yourself enjoying it,’ she suggested.

‘At least there’s enough food and drink in the house for a twelve-month siege, and Noël has the keys to the cellar, so that’s his responsibility.’

‘So, even if you are totally snowed in, you can manage?’

‘Oh yes, and I’ve just bought up the village shop, too! There were a few things I was running out of and I suddenly wondered if I needed some presents.’

When I explained about the sweets and then Oriel Comfort’s suggestion of a Christmas stocking for Jess, Laura thought that was funny too.

‘If Jess isn’t too old for one, surely her granny or mum will have it in hand?’ I said.

‘Perhaps, but you can never have too many things in your stocking.’

‘I bought a huge jigsaw puzzle of a Christmas scene too, because I thought it would keep everyone occupied if the weather was bad. Oriel says if I take it back afterwards with all the pieces, she’ll give me back half the price.’

‘She sounds a hoot.’

‘She is — and I think she’s also my love rival. George, the farmer who gave me a lift down today, is an admirer.’

‘Oh? What’s he like?’ she asked, interested. ‘Hunky?’

‘He’s well-built, with white-blond hair, bright blue eyes and a very attractive smile.’

‘Sounds lovely!’

‘But on the downside, well the wrong side of forty and a widower with an adult son. He said I was a strapping lass and he liked my mince pies, which may constitute an offer of marriage round here, for all I know. Only I think, from something he said, that Oriel was favourite before my mince pies stole his heart.’