that everything will be absolutely fine. The line went dead after that and he didn’t try and ring back again.’
‘Anyone would think we would all fall apart without his lordship home,’ Tilda scoffed. ‘But even when he is here, he spends most of his time shut up in his studio.’
‘Did you want me to get you anything from the village?’ I offered.
‘George brings us the paper every morning, that’s why he stopped by, but you could fetch us a bottle of sherry from the pub,’ Tilda said. ‘In fact, you should have lunch there; they do a good ploughman’s or a pot pie.’
‘Do they? That would be nice,’ I said, remembering that I hadn’t had lunch yet and breakfast seemed an awfully long time ago, ‘but I’ll have to do it another day because I wouldn’t be able to take Merlin in.’
‘Oh, the Daggers won’t mind.’
‘The who?’
‘Daggers. The Dagger family have always had the Auld Christmas. In fact, Nicholas Dagger plays the part of Auld Man Christmas in the Revels on Twelfth Night,’ Noël said. ‘Jude is Saint George and I used to be the Dragon, only I’ve had to hand the part on to a younger man.’
‘I’m sure Holly isn’t interested in our local customs, you old fool,’ Tilda said.
‘I think they sound fascinating,’ I said politely, though I’ve never been a great one for Morris dancing and the like, and if this one was all Christmassy too, then that took the icing and the cherry off what was already a quite uninteresting cake.
‘It’s a pity you will miss it,’ Noël said.
‘Yes, I’ll be leaving that morning, because your nephew will be on his way home from the airport. Now, I’d better get going.’
‘Can I come down to the village with you?’ asked Jess. ‘In fact, can I come to lunch at the pub with you, too?’
‘Well, I—’ I began, hesitantly, glancing at her grandparents.
‘Not if you don’t want her to,’ Noël told me.
‘I’m afraid she is having a very boring holiday here in the lodge this year,’ Tilda said, ‘but that is no reason why she should impose herself on you if you don’t feel like company.’
I didn’t really mind and, even if I had, it would have been impossible to say so. I just hoped they were right about the pub letting in dogs. Jess went off to get her coat, which was of course black, and Tilda made her put on a beanie hat and gloves. Then, to her complete disgust, she handed her a wicker basket shaped like a coracle in which reposed three greaseproof-wrapped parcels.
‘Cheese straws,’ confided Jess once we were walking down the lane. ‘Granny keeps making them because they’re dead easy, but they don’t taste of anything much, especially cheese. They’re for the oldies in the almshouses.’
‘Oh yes, that’s the old Nanny—’
‘Everyone calls her Old Nan – she’s ninety something.’
‘And the retired vicar?’
‘Richard, Richard Sampson. He’s pretty old too, but he walks miles, though he’s a bit absent-minded and sometimes forgets to turn around and come back. People phone up Uncle Jude from miles away and he has to go and collect him in the car.’
‘Then let’s hope the weather keeps him at home until your uncle gets back! The other house is Henry the gardener’s isn’t it?’
‘Yes, but he’s pretty active too and although he’s retired he’s always up at Old Place.’
‘Yes, the walled garden and the generator do seem to be his chosen stamping grounds. He sounded a bit territorial about them.’
‘His daughter lives in the village and keeps an eye on him – she works in the Weasel Pot farm shop in summer. But Old Nan and Richard haven’t got any relatives left, they’re way too old, so they’re used to coming up to the house for Christmas Day dinner. I’m not sure what they’re going to do this year – I’m not even sure I’ve got it into their heads yet that it isn’t going to happen.’
I had another of those inconvenient pangs of conscience – which are so unfair, since none of this was my fault in the least!
‘Now Jude has gone away I wish Edwina, Granny and Grandpa’s housekeeper, were still here, because I think Granny’s Christmas lunch will be a major disaster,’ Jess said frankly. ‘And she’s overdoing things. I don’t really think she’s up to it.’
‘Mr Martland’s absence does seem to have made it very difficult: selfishly flouncing off when he must know that everyone depended on him!’
‘Yes, he’s a selfish pig,’ she agreed and sighed. ‘Even having Christmas dinner with Mo and Jim was something to look forward to, but now everything is so boring I was even glad to see Aunt Becca yesterday.’
‘Don’t you like her?’ I asked, surprised. ‘I thought she was very nice.’
‘I like her, but all she ever talks about is horses, fishing and shooting things and she didn’t even stop more than a couple of minutes because the wind was too cold to leave Nutkin tied up outside.’
‘She was a great help telling me what to do with Lady. A horse is quite a responsibility when you’re not used to looking after them.’
‘She said you were competent and capable and she didn’t see why there should be any problems.’
‘No, I don’t either, though it’s good to know I can get hold of someone who knows a lot more about horses than I do if a problem comes up.’
‘Aunt Becca said Mo and Jim left you the huge turkey and everything for the Christmas dinner we were having,’ Jess remarked with a sideways look at me from under her fringe. ‘Couldn’t you cook it instead, Holly?’
I was taken aback by her directness. ‘You haven’t been talking to your Uncle Jude, have you?’
‘No, it just seemed like a good idea.’
‘Well, it might do to you, but it’s not what I bargained for when I agreed to take this job! I do house-sitting so I can have a rest from cooking the rest of the year,’ I told her firmly, and her face fell. ‘And remember I said that I don’t celebrate Christmas anyway? In fact, I do my best to ignore it.’
‘Oh, that’s right, it’s against your religion.’
‘Strictly speaking, I don’t actually have a religion any more,’ I admitted, ‘but the grandparents who brought me up only celebrated the religious aspects of it – extra chapel services and readings from the gospels – so it’s not something I really miss.’
‘You mean when you were little there were no presents, or a Christmas stocking or anything?’ she demanded, turning stunned brown eyes up towards me.
‘No, there was nothing like that, and no big blow-out special dinner either, though Gran was a good plain cook. Her raised pork pie was legendary.’
Jess was unimpressed by pork pies in the face of my other childhood deprivations. ‘No tree, or decorations, or Father Christmas …?’
‘No, though I secretly used to exchange presents with my best friend, Laura – I did a paper round, so I had some money of my own. But when I got married my husband loved all that side of Christmas, so we celebrated it just like everyone else. We’d buy the biggest tree we could tie on top of the car and load it down with lights and baubles; hang garlands and Chinese lanterns and make each other surprise stockings full of silly bits and pieces … it was fun.’
But then, everything I’d done with Alan had been fun …
‘Then why did you stop?’
‘Because