The Red Book of Primrose House: A Potting Shed Mystery (Potting Shed Mystery series 2) (2 page)

The Duffys left and Pru watched as Ned walked Robbie to the house; after that, the old man would continue home to his own cottage, a mile farther down the lane. She and Ned had a reasonable working relationship, she thought. They had first met at the end of the day she interviewed for the post. While she stood waiting for her taxi back to the rail station, he had come round the corner of the house. She thought the interview had gone well, but Ned’s words, although delivered in a kind tone, had cut her to the quick. The Templetons had already offered the job to someone that morning, he said; too bad they didn’t tell her that. That hit her hard, and she pressed him for details, at which point he had seemed to back off slightly from his claim.

In the end, the Templetons offered her the job. Davina said nothing of anyone else, and Pru didn’t ask.

On her first workday at Primrose House, Ned had shaken her hand and said, “It’s very good to see you again, Pru. I look forward to working with you. I’m sure you’ll do fine.” She could’ve taken it as a condescending comment, but preferred to look at it as a reflection of his age and his knowledge about the area. Ned had lived around Bells Yew Green his whole life, treating events that had happened long before he was born as if they had occurred the previous week.

Pru got on fine with him, although they never mentioned what he had said to her that day. They had what she would call a serviceable relationship. Ned wasn’t a sparkling conversationalist, but there was enough talk with Liam and Fergal, and on Robbie’s days, the chat level ramped up considerably.

She checked on the tools. For all his lip, Liam was a good worker, and even though they often went round and round, she usually won the day, either because he thought her American accent authoritative or the fact she was twice as old as he was.

Now the spades, hoes, rakes, and a scythe were lined up on Fergal’s repaired wooden rack. On the shelf lay an ax, a hatchet, and three pairs of secateurs—Pru loved the use of the French word instead of calling them “bypass hand pruners,” as she had done in the States—cleaned of the rust and glistening slightly from the oiling the brothers had given them.

She left the shed and walked just inside the back entrance of the walled garden, surveying the one-acre scene. Two centuries ago, it had been primarily a kitchen garden, but over the years—as with so many other walled kitchen gardens—it had become a showplace, growing exotic and ornamental plants that thrived in the captured heat of the brick walls. Pru hoped to bring it back into both ornament and production, as she had seen happen at Grenadine Hall’s walled enclosed garden in the Cotswolds.

Her walled garden here at Primrose House had been in such a state of dereliction that for the first few weeks of work, it was hard to tell they’d even begun. But now, the main entrance to the garden sported a locally crafted wooden gate replete with decorated iron hinges and a scrolled handle set in an ornate plate. The two side gates and the back entrance awaited replacement.

Just inside the back gate and against the south wall a fine Victorian-style, lean-to greenhouse had been installed. She’d acquired a small paraffin oil heater for the greenhouse, but with no sustained freezes so far that winter, it was stored away in the shed.

Ivy and Robbie had gone for the day by the time Pru made it up to the “big house,” as Ned referred to it—not quite accustomed to that term, Pru still pictured a prison when she heard him use it. Davina and Bryan had left that morning for their Paris apartment to do some Christmas shopping. Since they had finished the house restoration, they were like doves let loose from a cage, often spending weekends and other short breaks elsewhere. “We’ve got you on the garden now, Pru,” Davina said, “and we know we have nothing to worry about.”

When she was on her own in the house, Pru confined herself most of the time to the enormous kitchen, kept warm by their large, ever-on Aga cookstove. Her temporary quarters were through a door on the far side of that room. She would shower first and spend a cozy evening with her paperwork—drawings, plans, the constantly expanding to-do lists, and accounts spread out before her on the farm table.

A note from Ivy lay on the tile counter:

Pru—I’ve left you dinner for the next three evenings until I’m back on Friday. There’s an almond cake for your afternoon tea—don’t let Liam eat it all—and eggs for your breakfast. Robbie says he dug five holes for you today, and he’s very happy. Thanks ever so. Love, Ivy.

What a dear Ivy was. She’d cottoned on to the fact that Pru didn’t cook, and, as a thanks for letting Robbie work in the garden, Ivy kept her well-fed.

Pru had been unprepared for Robbie. On her second day in the garden, Davina had walked around with her, chatting about their joint vision for the landscape and asking Pru what she thought they could do with the large oval space formed by the drive that circled in from and back out to the road.

“We don’t want to hide the house, of course, but wouldn’t it be lovely to have some stunning tree in the center, one of those stately conifers from America—perhaps something you grew in Texas—and we could…” She stopped and said under her breath, “Oh dear, I forgot.”

Pru followed Davina’s gaze and saw Ivy Fox, who cooked and cleaned for the Templetons, walking out toward them accompanied by a young man wearing a red fleece jacket. Ivy was about Pru’s age, but a few inches shorter and a lot thinner, as if she never had enough time to sit down and eat a proper meal. Her wispy, light brown hair, cut into a severe wedge just above her chin, was salted with gray. She was tugging at a curly end.

Without taking her eyes off the approaching figures, Davina began speaking again, but this time low and quickly, and Pru had difficulty following her. “…And Ivy is such a treasure, really I don’t know how we could do without her, and he is a lovely boy, but he’s slow…oh, is that the right thing to say?…and Ivy…well, we thought that perhaps he could be with you in the garden for a couple of days a week. It would be such a relief to her…”

Davina’s voice petered away to nothing as Ivy and the young man arrived in front of them. Pru had met Ivy briefly the day before, up in the kitchen as Pru’s workday in the garden and Ivy’s workday at Primrose House both ended about the same time, but she didn’t know that Ivy had a grown son.

Ivy had smiled at both women as she fiddled with her apron strings, which looked as if they wrapped around her waist two or three times before she tied them, she was that thin. “Mrs. Templeton.” She had nodded her head. “Pru, this is my son, Robbie.” Robbie, several inches taller than his mother, stood just behind her.

“Hello, Ivy. Hello, Robbie, I’m pleased to meet you,” Pru had said.

He had looked at the ground and didn’t speak until his mother prompted him: “Robbie.”

“Hello,” he had said. Ivy looked back at him. “How do you do, Ms. Parke,” he added as he took a step forward and smiled tentatively.

Davina had intervened. “Ivy, we were just talking about Robbie helping Pru out in the garden…”

For a split second, it seemed as if Ivy and Davina had held their collective breath as they both looked at Pru. What choice did she have? Wouldn’t she be the most disagreeable person in the universe to tell this eager young man that she wouldn’t let him near her garden? Pru smiled. “Robbie, I’d love to have you help us.” She had heard Ivy and Davina exhale. “Now, just how often…are you able to be here?”

“Oh, it’s just for two days.” Ivy’s words had rushed out, her face flushed and her smile widening. “If it’s all the same, Tuesdays and Fridays would suit, wouldn’t it, Robbie?” She had glanced at her son and then back to Pru. “He goes up to Tunbridge Wells on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday to a lovely care center where he can…”

“I go to Chaffinch’s, and sometimes they let me help in the garden,” Robbie had said with a sigh.

“They weren’t best pleased when you dug up all their brassicas last spring, Robbie,” his mother had said, reaching up to mess his thick brown hair and then smooth it down again. “You must be careful in the garden. Only do what Pru tells you.”

“Well,” Davina had said, “that’s all sorted now, isn’t it? That’s grand.”

In bed, Pru huddled under her duvet with two extra blankets on top, phone in hand, waiting for Christopher to ring. It had become a nightly ritual since she started work and they had no time to see each other.

The warm Aga on the far side of the kitchen couldn’t throw enough heat to make it in the door of her tiny room, situated on the north side of the house. It was a prime spot for the pantry—where food would stay cool—but as a bedroom, it kept Pru feeling like an ice cube. The heat from her hot shower had long since left her—she wished she could warm up.

Before the end of the first ring, she greeted him. “Good evening.”

“How are you, my darling?” Christopher asked. There now, that warmed her up.

“I’m under the covers wearing flannel pajamas and wool socks, and I’m exhausted.” She hoped he could tell from the tone of her voice what she really meant was that she had worked hard all day, accomplished great things, and missed him terribly.

“And did you get Liam to dig up the buddleia?”

“That boy would argue with a fence post,” she said in exasperation. “And the cheek of him. On Saturday, when I bent over to pick up a trowel, he pinched my bottom.”

Pru heard sputtering on the other end of the line. As this soon changed to coughing and laughing, she laughed along with him and asked, “Are you all right?”

“Yes,” he said, his choked voice cleared up. “I’m all right. The question is, how is Liam?”

“Oh, he’s fine,” she said with grim humor. “Although I’d say he wasn’t much good on the prowl at the pub that evening, judging from the yelp he gave when my elbow landed in a particular spot as I stood up.”

“Good God, remind me never to take such liberties.”

“Nonsense,” Pru said, “you’re allowed.”

Neither spoke. Any vague mention of intimacy remained a touchy subject given their current circumstances. One weekend together—one amazing weekend, Pru reminded herself—followed by these weeks of physical separation caused by her living situation and her new job, which ran seven days a week, left no time together.

“How’s the cottage coming?”

“They’ve finished the walls inside, work on the kitchen has commenced, and the front door will be hung tomorrow. Davina has the furniture for me when it’s time—I don’t think it’ll take too many pieces to fill up the place.” Her cottage sat on the other side of the walled garden from the house—near enough to work and the Templetons’, but far enough away to feel private.

“I’m flying back just after New Year’s,” he said. Christopher would accompany his son, Graham, to Dubai over Christmas to see him settled into a year-long internship with a UK engineering consultancy firm. Graham, in his early twenties and recently out of university, was ready to change the world.

She smiled under the covers. “I hope to be settled not long after that.”

“I’m sorry I won’t be around for Christmas,” he said.

“Yes.” She couldn’t help the disappointment. “I’ll be in Hampshire, and you’ll be very far away.” She would spend Christmas with Harry and Vernona Wilson—it was their Chelsea garden she had been hired to create. After the murder investigation, they had moved back to their old house near Romsey.

After they said good night, she settled in, fingering the necklace Christopher had given her and that she never took off. She drifted to sleep as she relived the events that took place after she did not move back to Texas—what she considered the official beginning of their relationship—when she met Graham, and the weekend she and Christopher spent together just before she began work at Primrose House. It was a memory she visited often.

She had waited on the Wilsons’ front step for Christopher to collect her for dinner. It was only a few days after the resolution of the case. The Wilsons were packing up to return to Greenoak, their home in Hampshire, and Pru would spend two more nights with them in London before she left to meet Christopher for the weekend away and then begin her job at Primrose House in Sussex. In the meantime, he had asked her to dinner at his flat—to meet his son, Graham, who was visiting. The way her stomach was feeling, she thought that meeting your date’s son might be scarier than meeting his parents.

The weather had turned cold, and a wind whipped down the street and through the branches of the plane trees of Chartsworth Square, scattering leaves over the road. But chilly weather was nothing to a gardener, so when she got in the car and Christopher said he would’ve been happy to park and come to the door if she’d given him the chance, she responded by kissing him and just barely slipping her tongue between his lips before saying, “We’d best be off.” He gave her a narrow look and smiled.

The atmosphere inside the car, as Christopher drove from Chelsea to Chiswick, was one of quiet joy and nervous anticipation—not just for meeting his son, but also for their upcoming weekend. Alone. The first time.

While stopped at a traffic light, he took one of her cold hands and began rubbing it vigorously. “Graham offered to cook for us. I believe we’re having shepherd’s pie.”

“Excellent. This Rioja I brought should go well.”

They parked in the garage, walked into his building, and pressed the button for the lift. She glanced at him and said, “I’m a little nervous about meeting him.”

As the lift doors closed, his fingers lightly caressed the back of her neck. “There’s no need for that.”

She looked up at him. “You’re a little nervous, too, aren’t you?”

He smiled and pressed his lips to her forehead. “Yes, a bit.”

But there was no need for nerves, because she and Graham, a talkative, engaging young man of twenty-two, got on famously. He stood several inches shorter than his father, and his hair, which just reached his collar, was blond like his mother’s—a woman Pru had met only once.

The three of them chatted about the countryside, gardens, and Graham’s recently finished course of study—environmental sciences. As the evening progressed, she began a long discussion with him about the quality of urban soils. Pru looked over at Christopher. They had taken their coffee in the living room after an apple crumble for dessert. He had leaned back in his chair and stretched out his legs; he had a smile on his face as he listened to them and a look of contentment such as she had not seen before.

When the evening was over, she insisted on taking a taxi back to the Wilsons’ instead of dragging Christopher out to drive again.

“I’m glad to have met you,” Graham said as Christopher helped her with her coat. “Dad was in a right state when he thought you were headed back to Texas. I wouldn’t be surprised if he bit off a few heads at the station.” He had that same smile playing about his lips as his father. “You don’t mind me saying that, do you, Dad?”

“No, son, I don’t mind.”

“Good night, Graham. It was a wonderful meal, thanks so much,” Pru said as she gave him a peck on the cheek. He blushed.

In the hall as they stood waiting for the lift, Graham stuck his head out of the door. “Oh, there you are. Pru, would you like me to email you that article on the depth of substrate needed for the new building codes?”

“I’d love to read it, yes, thanks. You’ll get my address from your dad.”

“Right, then. Well, carry on. Cheers.” He closed the door of the flat just as the lift doors slid open.

Pru laughed. “I don’t know what he thinks we’re going to get up to in a lift.”

Christopher raised his eyebrows. “You never know,” he said, and grabbed her around the waist.

“He’s a lovely young man. You should be very proud.”

“I didn’t have much to do with that.” Christopher had been divorced from Phyl, Graham’s mother, since the boy was, Pru thought, about seven.

“Of course you did,” she insisted. “I can see you in him. Such a sense of purpose, and a good sense of humor, too.”

He responded to that by pulling her closer. In the middle of a long and involved kiss, they didn’t notice the doors open until they heard a small cough. A well-dressed elderly woman with a cane smiled and said, “Hello, Christopher.”

They exchanged places with her, as Christopher, still holding Pru around the waist, smiled back. “Mrs. Miller, how was your evening?”

As the doors slid closed, she said, “It was lovely, but probably not as good as yours.”

They stood at the curb as he hailed a cab. He opened the door for her, and after she was settled, he leaned in and whispered in her ear, “I’ll see you at the weekend. I can’t wait to get you alone.”

Her face flushed, and she laughed as the cab pulled away. She was glad it was dark.

Most of Pru’s belongings—such as they were—had been sent down to Primrose House, and now, on her last day in London, her friend Jo had come round to say goodbye and help her throw the few remaining things in a weekend bag. Christopher had booked a country hotel for the weekend before she began her new job, and Pru would meet him there. But as she took stock of her wardrobe—one nice cardigan amid sturdy canvas trousers and woolly sweaters—she regretted not having something special to wear.

Jo riffled through Pru’s bag as if assessing its pitiful contents. Pru had never been much of a fashion statement, but Jo always looked put together—well-cut business suits, heels that lifted her just barely over the five-foot-high mark. Pru admired her fashion sense, but a gardener’s clothing requirements were different.

Jo pulled something from her own bag and held up a parcel wrapped in gold tissue paper and tied with red ribbon. “Wear it this evening,” she said with authority.

“Wear what?” Pru said with alarm, picturing a lacy black nightie inside the package.

“It’s a dress,” Jo said, laughing. “For dinner. I didn’t think you’d need help with anything else.”

Pru wasn’t sure which alarmed her more: the thought that the parcel contained a black nightie or that it held a dress. She blushed. “Thanks, Jo,” she said, and gave her a hug.

Pru drove her new-to-her Mini Cooper down the lanes to the hotel Christopher had booked for them in the Kent countryside. She passed the turnoff to Sissinghurst Castle and gardens and craned her neck to look down the lane. It was every gardener’s mecca, and she hoped to spend time there when it reopened in spring. Soon she turned into the long drive up to the expansive old hotel set in the middle of acres of neatly cut grass.

The lobby was huge but warm, with dark, polished wood paneling and pillars; she could see a fire going in an adjoining room. Christopher sat on a sofa in an alcove just to the side of the reception desk with a pot of tea on the low table in front of him. He had his eye on the door, and he was up and to her before she got halfway to him. They met just behind a large parlor palm.

Well, isn’t this silly,
she thought.
How can I feel nervous after we’ve spent the last few weeks unable to keep our hands off each other?
She set her bag down and gave him a small kiss. He stood close.

“Did you have a good drive?” he asked.

Pru nodded and glanced around the lobby. “This is lovely.”

He took hold of her left hand. “Would you like a drink?”

Her nervousness vanished, replaced with the desire to ravish him on the spot. She murmured, “Mmm, later.”

His fingers, barely touching the palm of her hand, began tracing a circle. “Would you like to have a look around the place?”

“Not right now,” she said, barely breathing.

She could see that ghost of a smile. “Are you hungry?”

She cut her eyes around the lobby, looked back at him, and whispered, “Yes.”

He squeezed her hand, picked up her bag, and said, “Come with me,” as he led her to the elevator.

“Covers,” she said, “I need covers.” Finally cooled off, she sat up to draw the duvet over them.

Christopher pulled her back down, put his arm around her, and buried his face in her neck. “I thought this would never happen.”

She snickered and said, “Yes, events did try to get the better of us—” but he stopped her with a kiss.

“That wasn’t what I meant.”

“I know it wasn’t,” she whispered, and nestled her head into his shoulder.

They were quiet for a moment. “I’ve booked a table for us at half past eight,” he said.

“Oh, somehow you knew I wouldn’t want an early dinner when I first arrived—how prescient of you.”

“I knew
I
wouldn’t want dinner when you first arrived.”

She sighed deeply, ran her finger down his arm, and closed her eyes for a moment. “What time is it now?”

He reached over her to the nightstand and picked up his phone. “It’s eight. I suppose we should be up and busy.”

Looking over at his phone, she said, “You won’t get anyone ringing you about a case this weekend, will you?”

Without replying, he switched it off. “I’ll get dressed and go down to check on our table.”

How chivalrous,
she thought. After he left, she got out of bed, repaired her hair and the dab of makeup she wore, and pulled out the package from Jo, which turned out to be a beautiful, long-sleeved, maroon dress of thin, soft wool with a very wide and deep neckline. She eyed the dress cautiously. It looked as if there would be no pushing up and creating cleavage, so that was a good thing. Still, dresses—let alone dresses with deep necklines—were not Pru’s usual forte.
But,
she thought as she pulled it on,
Jo said to wear it and so I will.

She looked in the mirror. The fit and the color were perfect, but the amount of exposed skin shocked her. She began tugging at the neckline, trying to pull it higher. “My God, what was Jo thinking?”

“You look beautiful.” Christopher had come in without her noticing, and stood across the room.

She whirled around, laughing, and put her hand on her chest. “I feel bare.” She needed another layer or she’d spend the night embarrassed. “I have a scarf—I can wear that over my shoulders.”

He smiled at her as he walked over and held out a flat, square leather box. “I have something for you. Maybe it will help.”

It took her breath away—a gold filigreed, fan-shaped pendant on a gold chain made of etched oval links. Her eyes filled with tears. “It’s gorgeous. Thank you. It looks old—sort of art deco.” She picked it up and let the gold chain slide through her fingers.

“It’s from the 1930s, so they told me.” He lifted her chin and watched her for a moment. “I don’t know the right time or place for this.”

“To give me a beautiful gift?” she asked.

“To tell you that I love you.”

“Oh,” she said, her breath taken away once again. In Texas, she had kept her relationships at an emotional arm’s length, unwilling to make a commitment that would tie her down to a place she didn’t want to call home. But now she found her heart as close to him as they were standing.

She laughed. “That’s amazing.”

“Is it?” he asked with a quizzical look on his face. He slipped his arms around her waist.

“Yes, because I love you,” she said, running her fingers through his short hair. She slipped her arms around his neck, and they gazed into each other’s eyes.

He kissed her and said, “Dinner.”

“Would you help me with my necklace?” She handed it to him, lifted up her hair, and turned around so that he could do the clasp.

He kissed her neck, and then she heard him patting his pockets. “Hang on a tick—I’ve left my glasses in my jacket.”

She needed no scarf, not with her necklace to show off. They sat quietly at dinner, stealing glances and sharing small smiles while the waiter described the specials for the evening, opened the wine, and served their first courses. They were so obnoxiously in love and still wrapped in that afterglow of sex that Pru wouldn’t have been surprised if the waiter had made fake gagging sounds when he walked back in the kitchen. She didn’t care.

It was breakfast before they had time to catch up with news.

“You’ll be living in the pantry at Primrose House?” Christopher asked, a forkful of scrambled eggs halfway to his mouth.

Pru sniggered. “Former pantry. Just until the cottage conversion is complete. It’s en suite.” They could put her up in the coat closet, as far as she was concerned; nothing could dampen her good spirits. “It’s where Davina and Bryan slept for five years during the house restoration, so I can hardly complain. And it’ll make my cottage seem huge.”

She effused on Humphry Repton and the Red Book, and told him about the small article in the
Courier
.

“It’s just as well that it didn’t mention my name,” she said. “I don’t really have anything to say about it.” He glanced up from buttering a piece of toast. “Right, well, at the moment I don’t have much to say.”

The weekend went by far too quickly, as they knew it would. They took a long walk on Saturday, following a path out the back of the hotel that ended in a patch of trees, mostly beeches with their leaves turning gold, and a few oaks warming up to mahogany. On the other side of the trees, the path opened to a meadow with tall, tawny brown grass, beginning to break down in the late-autumn weather. They stood without speaking, their breaths creating clouds of fog in the air. Pru contemplated the view to the east, but she noticed Christopher looking around the clearing. “What are you thinking about?” she asked.

“I’m wishing it was a warm summer’s day and we had a blanket.” He looked over at her and smiled. “I’m wishing you didn’t have so many clothes on.”

She burrowed her face inside the collar of his jacket until her cold nose touched his neck, and gave him a kiss. “Take me back to the room, and at least one of those wishes will come true.”

Too early for the Christmas trade, the hotel had few guests, and so they began to lay claim to the sofa in front of the fire. Typical of English country hotels, on Sunday after the midday meal was served, the kitchen closed, with only the bar remaining open and offering a few packaged snacks in the evening. Late in the afternoon as they read the Sunday
Guardian
in front of the fire, the barman approached.