Chocolate Wishes (4 page)

‘But Winter witches do, don’t they? In any case, she’s a much whiter witch than poor old Grumps. I’m pretty sure he strays across the line into the grey bits from time to time, though always with the best of intentions.’

‘I think your grandfather is scary.’

‘You know he’s all bark and not a lot of bite, really.’

‘I can’t forget that when I was small he used to look at me as though he would like to turn me into something froglike. The fear has never quite worn off.’

‘He doesn’t see any point in babies and children until they’re old enough to hold a sensible conversation,’ I explained. ‘It isn’t that he doesn’t love us, in his own way.’

‘Yes, I suppose so,’ Poppy said, not sounding totally convinced. ‘But your granny was adorable.’

‘She was, wasn’t she? And though Zillah couldn’t take her place, I’m very fond of her, too.’

‘Hebe Winter calls herself a herbalist, rather than a witch,’ Poppy said, reverting to the previous topic. ‘I’ve heard some of the potions, like the love philtre, really work – and actually, I bought one!’

‘Poppy! Who are you thinking of trying it on?’ I demanded, because although neither of us had been lucky in love, Poppy still hadn’t totally given up hope of finding Mr Right, and she was such a truly special person she deserved all the happy-ever-afterness going.

‘Oh, no one,’ she said hastily. ‘It was just an impulse, Chloe. You know me – I can’t love anything without four hoofs and a mane.’

‘I think that’s a slight exaggeration. You just haven’t met the right man yet, that’s all.’

‘I think I often have, it’s just that they don’t think
I’m
the right girl. And nobody at all wanted to meet me from that internet dating site I joined.’

‘Probably just as well, because you can’t tell what kind of men you’re in contact with. They could be really weird.’

‘I suppose you’re right and at least if you’re going to be living nearby we can meet more often, so that will be fun.’

‘And Felix too – we can be three singletons together,’ I agreed. ‘The Lonely Hearts Club of Sticklepond. Meanwhile, perhaps you’d better keep the news about who’s bought the Old Smithy to yourself for a bit, Poppy, if you think it might make an upset. Let it suddenly burst on Sticklepond as a
fait accompli
.’

‘But you’ll tell Felix, won’t you?’

‘Yes, I’m going to ring him in a minute, but I’ll swear him to secrecy too. In fact, the reason why I’m ringing you now is because I’ve arranged to get the keys to the Smithy from Conrad tomorrow, and I thought you might be able to get away and meet me for lunch in the Falling Star afterwards, so I can tell you all about it.’

‘Hang on, I’ll just ask Mum how we’re fixed.’

She covered the phone, but I could still hear her shouting: ‘Mum! Chloe wants me to meet her for lunch tomorrow – could you manage? What…?’

But although Poppy’s mother has an equally healthy pair of lungs (despite being a chain smoker), the other end of the conversation was just a faint noise in the background, so she must have been upstairs.

Poppy came back on. ‘Mum says that’s OK. It’s a quiet day for lessons and the work experience girl can help her muck out and clean the tack.’

‘About twelve then – and you can tell me what you’ve been doing recently.’

‘Not a lot. Staying up all night with a pony with laminitis is about the most exciting it’s got lately,’ she said sadly. ‘Oh, except that at the last Parish Council meeting, before we started talking about the museum, Miss Winter said the bishop is still looking for a non-stipendiary vicar to take over All Angels, because the alternative is to amalgamate our parish with another one and none of us is keen on that. That’s what the
last
emergency Parish Council meeting was about, and there’s yet another one this evening, so perhaps he’s actually found us a vicar now – but I’ll tell you about it tomorrow.’

‘I can hardly wait.’

‘At least we will be back in the village hall tonight. We had to have the last meeting in the church vestry because the Scouts were clearing away their jumble sale, and it was freezing. Mr Merryman, the temporary vicar, seems a very nervous man, though I don’t think the fact that three of the council were already wearing Elizabethan dress for the Re-enactment Society meeting afterwards really helped – Miss Winter as Queen Elizabeth the First is quite terrifying! And then Mr Lees, the organist, was practising fugues all the way through, so that was really gloomy.’

‘I can imagine. And what did you say a non-stipendiary vicar was, again?’

‘Someone who has got ordained but doesn’t need a salary, basically.’

‘Oh, right – an economy vicar. And tell me again, who’s on the Parish Council as well as you and Felix and Miss Winter as chairman?’

‘I don’t think you ever listen to a word I say,’ she
complained, but complied. ‘Well, there’s the Winter’s End steward, Laurence Yatton…’

‘Oh, I know – elderly, silver-haired and handsome, drives an old Land Rover.’

‘Yes, that’s him. And you’ve probably seen his sister Effie, too. She used to be a gym mistress in a private school but now she works off all that excess energy by running the Brownies, the tennis club and the Elizabethan Re-enactment Society. Then there’s the vicar and the village policeman, Mike Berry.’

‘I’ve met Mike a couple of times in Felix’s shop with his girlfriend, Anya, the one with red dreadlocks.’

‘Yes, she’s very nice, isn’t she? She’s an old friend of Sophy Winter, who inherited the Winter’s End estate the year before last and she runs the gift shop there when the house is open to the public.’

‘Is that everyone?’

She counted up: ‘Me, Felix, Miss Winter, the vicar, Mike, Laurence and Effie…Yes, that’s it.’

‘Small, but perfectly formed,’ I commented.

When I rang Felix he wanted to come over to the Old Smithy with me, but I wouldn’t let him. It was hard to explain, but I felt I wanted to be on my own this first time, especially when I saw the cottage where Jake and I would be living. He agreed to meet me and Poppy at the pub at twelve, though, to hear all about it.

‘In fact, I might as well shut for the whole day; the village is as quiet as a grave and probably will be until Easter, when Winter’s End reopens.’

‘Oh, I think it might get slightly livelier before that. Don’t forget, Jake will be moving in too.’

‘Oh my God!’ he said, though actually he had suffered much less from Jake’s practical jokes and general awfulness than any of my boyfriends had, probably due to being just a friend rather than a potential suitor who might take me away.

‘Not to worry, he seemed to grow out of that phase ages ago,’ I assured him. ‘Or maybe he just stopped because I’d finally given up on men?’

‘But you haven’t really, of course, you’ve just been busy like me and the years have slipped away,’ he said. ‘Then one morning you wake up and think how nice it would be to have another person there to share things with, someone undemanding and comfortable and—’

‘Like a cosy pair of slippers?’ I suggested sweetly. ‘Well, you are older than me, Felix, so I’m not saying I might not feel like that one day, but if I do, I’ll get a dog.’

As usual I couldn’t fall asleep that night until I heard Jake come in, which he did fairly quietly considering the size of his big, black boots. But I still got up extra early next morning, so I had time to pick up the latest chapter from Grumps and pack Chocolate Wishes orders, before driving over to Sticklepond.

I collected the key from the house agents on the way there – the main branch is here in Merchester – and promised Poppy’s cousin Conrad that I would lock it up carefully behind me and return them later.

‘Not that I’ve shown the property to anyone else since the Misses Frinton accepted your grandfather’s offer, of course,’ Conrad said quickly. ‘And even before that, once he’d expressed an interest in buying it, because he told me—’ He broke off, looking embarrassed and uncomfortable.

‘He told you that if you did, he would put a curse on you, one that would render your life unutterably hideous?’ I asked helpfully.

‘Er…yes,’ he agreed sheepishly. ‘Of course, he was joking – I know your grandfather!’

He didn’t sound too sure about it, though.

The Old Smithy is at the very end of the High Street, almost opposite the Falling Star, where I was to meet Felix and Poppy later. As I drove past, Mrs Snowball, the publican’s ninety-year-old mother, was outside the front door donkey-stoning a square of the grey pavement into sparkling whiteness. She’d done it all her life and old habits died hard. Behind her, the meteor-shaped brass door knocker sparkled blindingly in the weak February sunshine.

The Falling Star is much older than the Green Man, the more popular pub at the other end of the village, and since it was once a coaching inn, I suppose it made sense at the time to have the blacksmith nearby.

The Old Smithy itself is a collection of mismatched parts that have been rendered into a vaguely cohesive whole by the application of a lot of whitewash. As I arrived I was just in time to see the museum sign being loaded into a large van, presumably at Grumps’ direction, to be repainted. He must be pretty sure of himself, because I didn’t think he’d exchanged contracts yet, though I could have been wrong – he was infuriatingly secretive.

Following Conrad’s directions, I parked in the small gravelled area behind the museum, which was sheltered by a bronze-leaved beech hedge. I had the most enormous bunch of keys, some of them so ancient as to be collector’s pieces, but luckily they were all labelled.

I started with the Victorian house, which was quite substantial and also, since it was where the Frinton sisters had lived, perfectly comfortable and up to date as regards
bathrooms and electrical wiring. If the décor was a trifle on the gloomy Victorian side, then so too was Grumps. But the scarlet Aga in the enormous kitchen struck a surprisingly modern note and Zillah would adore it. By the time she had swathed the windows in bright lengths of fabric in clashing colours, littered the place with lace-edged runners, splashily painted toleware jugs and hideous ornaments constructed out of seashells, it would look like an explosion inside a traditional gypsy vardo, just as our present kitchen did.

A door from an inner hallway gave access to the museum, which was quite big, with a wooden floor and lots of ceiling lights. There were rows of empty glass display cabinets and a fixed mahogany desk near the museum entrance, with a cash drawer and a yellowing roll of admission tickets, all a bit sad and dusty. The room was certainly more than large enough to accommodate all of Grumps’ treasures, even if he divided one end off for his meetings. I hoped it would be the end
furthest
away from my cottage.

And the cottage was the thing I most wanted to see – so of course I’d left it till last, like you do with the most exciting-looking present under the Christmas tree. But now I found the key for the door and entered what would be my new home with a feeling of excited anticipation.

I went down two shallow, worn steps, straight into what had been the doll’s hospital, with a glazed shop window built out onto Angel Lane, round the corner from the museum. Presumably the Misses Frinton had had the extension done long before planning regulations became so restrictive.

A polished wooden counter ran right across the front of the room and behind it were worktops, a sink and racks of
drawers labelled with fascinating things like ‘Teddy Bear Noses’, ‘Doll’s Eyes – Blue’ and ‘Whiskers – Large, Black’.

There were several electric sockets where I could plug in the Bath – the machine that tempered the couverture chocolate – and even a small double gas ring, presumably once used for melting glue, or something like that, but now perfect for a
bain-marie
, or for making toffee. The place was ideal!

Behind it was a small sitting room that looked as if it had been used most recently for storage, since the one bare bulb dangling from the ceiling shone down onto flattened cardboard cartons littering the balding lino floor. The deeply recessed window facing onto the garden was murky and festooned with furry cobwebs, but had a seat built in beneath it. There was an open fireplace bordered by art nouveau purplish-pink glazed tiles, and a twisting staircase went up in one corner behind what I had thought was a cupboard door until I opened it.

The kitchen had been added onto the back at some more recent point in time, with a very utilitarian white bathroom above it – though I was just grateful it had one at all and not just an outside toilet! But Grumps had said something about the Frintons having had tenants in the cottage in the dim and distant past, so I suppose they had updated it a bit then.

Upstairs, as well as the bathroom, were two bedrooms and a small airing cupboard housing the water tank and an ancient immersion heater – all mod cons provided! And although the cottage smelled chilly and unused, it didn’t seem damp and the thick stone walls would keep the heat in in winter, and out in summer.

Finally I went out through the kitchen into the garden,
which was surrounded by a tall wall of mellow bricks, with matching paths in a herringbone pattern, slimy with damp and disuse. Large, half-moon beds ran around the walls and there was a big central round bed in which was a tree – plum, I suspected. It looked half dead, but plum trees love to fool you like that.

It was all very overgrown, and at this time of year it was hard to tell what was there. It would be exciting to see what came up in the spring, and to clear and replant parts of it. There was certainly lots of room for my pots and my little greenhouse – there was even sufficient space to have a bigger one, when I could afford it.

I absolutely loved it – it was like having my very own Secret Garden – and I decided then and there that I would have the back bedroom overlooking the courtyard, leaving the front for Jake, even though it was slightly larger.

When I finally looked at my watch it was already noon and I had been there for hours, although it felt more like minutes! I left hastily, retracing my path through the Old Smithy and the house, locking the doors behind me, one by one.

When I emerged the road was momentarily deserted, though to the right I could just see Felix’s swinging sign for Marked Pages, the first of the High Street shops. They were increasing steadily in number: as well as the Spar near the Green and an old-established saddlers, there was now a new café-cum-craft gallery (Witch Crafts), a delicatessen and a couple of gift shops. Another teashop was in the throes of being renovated.

The Shakespeare find at Winter’s End a couple of years ago had really revitalised the village, so Grumps was lucky to have got the Old Smithy, especially at what seemed to
be a very advantageous price. I wondered how he’d managed that.

There was no sign of Felix and Poppy until I crossed the road to the Falling Star and saw them waving at me from the bow window of the snug. Mind you, if I didn’t know them so well, I wouldn’t have recognised them behind the thick bull’s-eye glass panes, because they looked like dubious sea creatures seen dimly lurking in green waters.

As usual I tried to avoid stepping on the clean square of pavement as I went in, because it seemed an unlucky thing to do. Mrs Snowball was now sitting behind a tiny reception desk under the stairway (the inn lets rooms, mostly to business reps), knitting something voluminously pink and fluffy while watching a portable TV. She looked up at me, described a suspiciously pentagram-like shape in the air with one needle, and grinned gappily.

Oh God, not another of them? She’d never done that before!

Slightly shaken, I turned right into the snug, where Felix was now at the bar buying me a ladylike half of bitter shandy (I was driving, after all). He turned and gave me a hug – a tall, loose-limbed man with soft, light brown eyes, floppy hair and the sort of nose that has a knobbly bit in the middle. It’s a nice face, in its way, but you can’t call it handsome.

‘Hi, Chloe – you look lovely,’ he said warmly, though I was just wearing jeans garnished with cobwebs and the odd streak of garden slime, but he’d probably just said exactly the same to Poppy, because he’s nothing if not kind. I sometimes think I’m imagining that he’s trying to move our relationship onto a new, more romantic footing and actually I do truly hope so, because I like things just the way they are.

‘Is that my drink? I’ll carry it, then you can manage the other two,’ I said, kissing his cheek. He smelled, not un-attractively, of old leather book bindings.

‘Look what Felix found for me!’ called Poppy, gaily waving a paperback copy of
I Had Two Ponies
by Josephine Pullein-Thompson. ‘The last one of hers I hadn’t got!’

‘Great,’ I said, sitting down next to her. She smelled of sweet hay and horses, and I expect I was permanently chocolate-fragranced, with just a hint of scented geranium, so anyone with a good nose could guess blindfold what the three of us did for a living.

‘I thought I had a Heyer for you, Chloe, but the cover was torn,’ Felix said.

While Poppy loves old children’s pony adventure books, I collect vintage Georgette Heyer hardbacks in those lovely, misty, dream-like paper jackets. Felix also looks out for the rarer volumes Grumps would like to add to his already huge, esoteric and eclectic library, which is probably where most of his income goes.

Poppy was almost as excited about my moving to the Old Smithy as I was. ‘But I still think it was mean, not letting us view it with you.’

‘I just wanted to see it on my own the first time,’ I explained. ‘I’ll have to come back and measure for curtains and furniture, so perhaps if you can both get away, you can see it then?’

‘I’ve been in the museum and the doll’s hospital, but not for years,’ Poppy said. ‘So, what’s the rest like?’

I described it all in detail, but I may have dwelled rather longer on the garden than the rest of it put together. Anyway, they both generously volunteered to help me clean and paint the cottage.

‘Or anything, really, that you need another pair of hands to do,’ Poppy added. ‘Now, do you want to hear our news?’

‘
Our?
’ I looked from one to the other of them, with a raised eyebrow. ‘You’re getting married and you want me to be bridesmaid?’

‘Don’t be silly,’ Poppy giggled.

‘It would be nice to settle down with someone, though, wouldn’t it?’ Felix suggested rather pointedly. ‘Just not Poppy!’

‘Yes, because the three of us are so like family that it would be like marrying a sibling,’ she agreed. ‘Completely out of the question.’

‘It certainly would be,’ I agreed heartily, and Felix looked gloomy.

Poppy said, ‘What I meant was the news from last night’s emergency Parish Council meeting.’

‘Did you tell them that Grumps had bought the museum?’

‘No, though I expect we both looked totally guilty. Luckily, something else was distracting Miss Winter, because she usually has eagle eyes. You remember I told you that the bishop was trying to find a non-stipendiary vicar to take over All Angels?’

I nodded. ‘Have they found one?’

‘Yes, and the brilliant thing is that he’s buying the vicarage too!’

‘And he’s the kind of vicar you were telling me about, who doesn’t need to be paid?’ I asked. ‘A freebie?’

‘Well, in effect,’ Felix agreed. ‘Basically, it’s someone who’s been ordained but is either still following another career, or so rich he doesn’t need a salary. Hebe Winter is terribly pleased about it, but the bishop didn’t say a lot about the
new vicar except that he used to be some kind of pop star. And she seemed to think that when he came to look at the vicarage he should have called in to see her too, so she
was
a bit narked about that.’

‘I expect he came when the estate agents had that open day and perhaps he hadn’t even made his mind up to move to Sticklepond then. But isn’t that exciting news, Chloe?’ Poppy’s cheeks glowed and her eyes, the soft blue of washed-out denim, sparkled. ‘An ex-pop star! I thought it might be Cliff Richard, but Hebe says that’s daft.’

‘It is daft. Everyone would know if he’d taken holy orders,’ Felix pointed out.

‘Yes, but then who on earth could it be?’

‘I think one of the Communards got ordained,’ I offered.

‘I didn’t know that,’ Felix said.

‘You’ll have to come to church and see him when he arrives, whoever he is,’ Poppy suggested.

‘Come on, Poppy, you know I haven’t been inside a church in my life! Grumps would have forty fits, the earth would tremble and the spire crumble to dust.’

‘No, I’m sure it wouldn’t. Remember the angel in the churchyard?’ she reminded me. ‘I think she was trying to tell you something, so perhaps you
should
try it and see.’

‘What? Which angel?’ Felix demanded. ‘Have you two been keeping secrets from me?’

I hesitated. We’d never discussed the angel with anyone except Granny, and at this length of time it was hard to know how much of what we remembered was real and what imagined.

‘Oh,’ I said as lightly as I could, ‘it was something that happened when we were little girls. Poppy had come to stay for a couple of nights because Janey was in hospital and since
Mum was away too, we were in a bedroom in the main part of the house, near Granny. The window looks down over the wall into the old churchyard and the first night we both saw…well, we saw a white figure. With wings.’