Trisha Ashley - Twelve Days of Christmas

‘There’s a good fire in the sitting room, if you would like to go through with Guy,’ I suggested to Michael.

‘And it’s time we saw to the horses, Jess,’ Becca said. ‘It’s getting late.’

‘Oh, but I’m going to ice the biscuits with Holly!’ she protested.

‘I need to clear up the kitchen and do one or two other things first,’ I told her. ‘We’ll do it when you come back in. And it’s so bitterly cold out there that I’m not sure they should go out today, even double-rugged.’

‘So, who made you an equine expert suddenly?’ Jude said rudely.

‘Oh, you only have to explain something to Holly once, and she’s got it,’ Becca said. ‘But the horses can probably go out for a couple of hours. They’ve got the field shelter.’

When they went out Jude got up too, narrowly missing his head on the lamp that hung over the table.

‘Could we have a word?’ I asked.

‘Later. I want to have a look at Lady in the daylight myself without her rug, and make sure she hasn’t lost any condition. And check on the generator — which, by the way, you needn’t go near now I’m back. After that I’ll be in my room next to the library, catching up with the mail.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Later!’ he snapped again and went out before I could point out that there probably wasn’t going to be any post for a while and also that, if he meant his email, the phone was off, making a dial-up connection impossible.

And before I could mention my urgent desire to remove myself from under his roof.

A little later the generator stopped roaring suddenly as the mains electricity came back on. According to Noël, in winter it flickers on and off more often than the fairy lights on the tree. Still, at least the generator had switched itself off, as it was supposed to.

By late morning we were all gathered in the sitting room over elevenses of tea, coffee and, by Tilda’s request, the Dundee cake that was Old Nan’s annual gift to them.

‘Then we can say how much we enjoyed it, when we see her,’ she pointed out.

‘Are we seeing her?’ asked Guy.

‘Oh yes, she and Richard will be here for dinner as usual tomorrow.’

Jess and I had water-iced the biscuits in bright colours and were hanging them on the tree with loops of embroidery silk that she had found in an old Victorian sewing box from the morning room, for want of ribbon. Becca was steadying the ladder while I reached up to do the higher branches.

Tilda was on the sofa in front of the fire, with Merlin on the rug at her feet, and Noël, Michael and Guy were at the table in the window, trying to finish piecing together one edge of the jigsaw that I’d bought at Oriel Comfort’s shop, with Coco restlessly watching them from the window seat. There is something very compulsive about a jigsaw puzzle, although it didn’t seem to have that effect on Coco; but then, that was probably nicotine deprivation.

Jude had retired to his little studio office next to the library, though he must have heard Coco’s screech when she finally saw George’s tractor coming up the drive pushing aside the fresh snow like an icebreaker, because he was there when I came back from letting him in.

I expect I must have looked a little bit pink and ruffled, but I regained my composure while George got over his surprise at finding Jude back from America.

‘Never mind that,’ interrupted Coco from the window seat. ‘What I want to know is, has the road been cleared, so we can get away?’

‘I hope by “we” you mean you and Michael,’ Guy said.

‘If you are going to be so mean and I can’t get my car out, then I’m sure Michael would drop me at a railway station.’

George took off his battered felt hat and ran his fingers through his thick thatch of silver-fair hair so that it stood on end. ‘Hold your horses! Liam had a hell of a job clearing the lane down to the village this morning, the old snow’s ridged into ice underneath the fresh stuff. And young Ben from Weasel’s Pot was at the pub, and he told him the lane below the farm is impassable and nothing’s moving down on the main Great Mumming road either.’

‘But that’s ridiculous! Surely, if Jude got up here last night, it’s possible to drive down again?’ Coco exclaimed.

‘It hadn’t frozen over with all this fresh snow on top last night,’ George said, looking her over dispassionately, as if she was a rather poor heifer.

‘And I only just made it up the hill to Weasel Pot with chains on the wheels,’ Jude put in.

‘Yes, and though I don’t doubt you could get down to the village and back, it would be pointless going further, you’d just get stuck,’ George agreed.

‘But you or someone else with a tractor could get me out of here, couldn’t you?’ wheedled Coco in a little-girl voice. ‘Me will pay you wots and wots of money!’

‘Excuse me while I throw up,’ I muttered.

George shook his head. ‘I told you, it’s impassable.’ ‘But presumably the council will be out clearing the main road by now, won’t they?’ suggested Michael. ‘Might it be possible later today?’

‘You can’t have been listening to the weather forecast or watched the news — the snow’s wreaked havoc all over the country. The council won’t bother with the little roads either, when it’s all they can do to clear the main ones.’

‘Guy!’ Coco said, turning to him. ‘Do something!’

‘Don’t look at me, I can’t perform miracles,’ he said and she gave an angry sob.

‘It’s your fault I’m here in the first place! Mummy and Daddy will be wondering where on earth I am, and they’ve invited the whole family round on Boxing Day to meet you because we’re engaged and bought champagne to toast us. And—’

‘Oh God, she’s going hysterical again,’ Becca said disgustedly. ‘Shall I throw some cold water on her? Please let me do it this time — I’d feel so much better!’

‘Now, Becca,’ Noël chided. ‘The poor child’s just a little overset.’

But Coco was not so far gone that she hadn’t heard this implied threat. She retreated to sob quietly on a sofa as far removed from Becca as possible and Michael followed her after a minute and sat next to her, talking quietly and patting her hand.

‘I’ll be off then,’ said George, looking hopefully at me, but I avoided his eye and let Guy see him out this time.

‘It looks as if I’m stuck with all of you over Christmas, unless some miraculous thaw takes place, which seems unlikely,’ Jude said with resignation when Guy came back.

‘We might as well make the most of it, then,’ Guy said. ‘Coco, do stop making that noise.’

‘I c-can’t help it — I want to go home!’ she wailed.

‘It’s not looking very likely at the moment.’

‘I’m sorry to put you out like this,’ Michael apologised to Jude.

‘Oh, you’re the least of my worries. Don’t give it a thought.’

‘Perhaps someone will help me dig out my car, just in case it does thaw out this afternoon?’ I asked. Jude turned and looked at me from his treacle-dark eyes and snapped, ‘Why, where the hell do you think you’re going?’

‘Home, if I can get out. But if not, I thought perhaps the pub might do rooms. . I mean, now you’re back, the job I was hired for is finished, isn’t it?’

‘Not so fast,’ he said, ‘you invited a houseful of people here and promised to cook for them, so you can’t just take off like that.’

‘Actually, I only invited half of them.’

‘But, Holly, you can’t go,’ wailed Jess, ‘it won’t be as much fun without you! And what’s more, Uncle Jude can’t cook!’

‘There is that,’ he admitted. ‘Though of course, Tilda can.’

‘Tilda can’t cope with the cooking, not after her fall,’ Noël said. ‘She’s still recovering.’

‘Load of old fusspots — I’m fine,’ Tilda insisted. ‘Though why spoil things when Holly and I have everything organised between us?’

Jude turned his dark eyes forbiddingly in my direction. ‘Anyway, when did I say I wanted you to leave? And, by the way, the pub doesn’t let rooms.’

‘You didn’t say you wanted me to. But now you’re here, the job I was engaged for is ended and I’m sure you would rather I went, so—’

‘The job damned-well isn’t ended!’ he interrupted. ‘I’m paying you at great expense to do the cooking for my family over Christmas and you’re going to stay and earn your money, every last penny of it!’

‘Oh, no, you’re quite wrong, Jude,’ Noël told him, looking surprised. ‘Holly refuses to charge us any extra, though I have told her she should be paid for all her extra trouble, when she was expecting to have a peaceful couple of weeks on her own.’

‘I don’t find cooking for you any trouble,’ I assured him.

‘Of course she doesn’t,’ said Tilda. ‘And very good she is, too.’

‘Thank you,’ I said, touched by this unexpected tribute.

‘Not as good as me, obviously, but very good,’ she qualified.

‘Loth though I am to disillusion you both,’ Jude said to them, ‘I am in fact going to be paying Homebodies through the nose for Holly’s services.’

‘No, you’re not,’ I corrected him. ‘It’s your own fault if you assumed I would do anything you wanted if you offered me enough money, but I’ve already told Ellen that I’ll only be putting in a bill for house-sitting and any extra groceries I’ve had to buy.’

I smiled at Tilda and Noël. ‘I was enjoying myself, actually.’

‘And of course you must stay, Holly, we wouldn’t dream of letting you do anything else!’ Noël insisted. ‘In any case, if she can’t get out, what is she supposed to do, camp out alone in the lodge until she can leave?’

‘I’d be very happy to stay at the lodge, if you didn’t mind?’

‘No, no, of course you are staying here, m’dear!’

‘Yes, for we’ve decided the menus right through to Twelfth Night!’ said Tilda.

‘And Holly’s not only a brilliant cook, she’s fun,’ Jess told her uncle. ‘Merlin loves her too,’ she added as a clincher.

Indeed Merlin, deducing from his master’s voice that he was angry with me, now clambered onto my lap and was facing him protectively, all long, dangling limbs and rough fur.

‘He does seem to be her shadow, I can’t think what’s got into him,’ Jude said, staring at his dog. ‘So, Holly Brown, you’ve wormed your way into the heart of the family in a very short space of time, haven’t you? You seem to be a very dangerous, Becky Sharp sort of woman to me. And I’m still positive I know you from somewhere.’

Having read Vanity Fair, I wasn’t too keen on being likened to Becky Sharp — and I certainly wasn’t a fortune hunter out to marry him!

‘We all thought she looked familiar too,’ Noël said, ‘but I expect it’s only that she has the Martland look — the dark hair, height and light olive skin. So not only does she feel like a member of the family already, she also looks like one and fits right in!’

‘I suppose that could be it,’ Jude agreed.

‘But I get my light grey eyes and dark hair from my grandmother,’ I put in quickly. ‘In fact, apart from being tall and dark, I don’t really look like any of you.’

‘You’re much prettier than Jude, that’s for sure,’ said Guy, eyeing me thoughtfully. ‘Though pretty isn’t really the right word — you’re beautiful, in an unusual way.’

‘What, me?’ I said, astonished. After years of bullying about my height and looks, not to mention Gran’s repeated assertion that I had no reason to be vain, I found this hard to believe.

‘Yes — even George looked smitten with you — and if he didn’t kiss you under that handy bunch of mistletoe in the porch before you brought him in, why were you blushing?’

‘It was nothing, he just took me by surprise. I hadn’t even noticed the mistletoe hung in the porch until he grabbed me.’ I could feel myself going pink again, because there was no mistaking that George fancied me!

‘Becca and I hung that up,’ Noël explained. ‘There’s always a bunch of mistletoe there.’

Behind me, Coco’s piercing voice could be heard saying to Michael, ‘Guy said that housekeeper woman was beautiful — but she’s not, is she? And I mean, she might be tall enough to be a model, but she’s way too fat!’