The Unorthodox Arrival of Pumpkin Allan (7 page)

By the time Lois woke up, Tom had drifted back to sleep. She went downstairs to find a note on the kitchen table from Annie, saying she had taken the dogs for a walk and for Lois and Tom to help themselves to whatever they fancied. She’d left all that they needed for a perfect breakfast on the kitchen table. Lois made tea and fresh, granary toast with ‘real’ butter and Marmite for her and Tom, and carried it upstairs. Tom took it from her sleepily. The toast tasted fantastic. He told Lois all about the kites he’d seen earlier. Lois couldn’t think of the last time she had seen him looking so relaxed and happy. “I’ve got a feeling I’m going to love this place Lo!” he said. Lois snuggled up to him and started to feel the anxieties conjured up in the first days at the house, beginning to ebb away.

It was a beautiful sunny day. When Annie and Dave got back, the four of them sat out in the garden and had coffee and biscuits.

“That’ll set Pumpkin up for the day,” said Lois, gently rubbing her bulging tummy, “he loves a good, strong cup of coffee!” Dave looked a little bewildered.

“Ah yes, he, or she, started off as Peanut, then Orange, Melon and now Pumpkin and since pumpkins can get quite large, I think we’ll be able to stop there. Until we actually meet him or her!” laughed Tom. “Actually,” he said thoughtfully, “it’s not a bad name.”

“NO!” cried Lois and Annie in unison, before he had time to give the idea any more thought.

Lois and Annie started discussing babies. Tom and Dave talked about business. Dave told Tom about their plans to sell the paddock and convert the garage loft to enable them to rent it out. They went and looked at the loft and discussed possible designs that would make best use of the space. Tom told Dave about a computer program that a friend of his had used to plan his extension, avoiding the use of an architect to get planning permission. That conversation led Tom and Dave to the computer to start researching architectural design programs.

Over a snack lunch, Tom told, for the first time in front of Lois, what had happened on his cycling trip the previous weekend. Lois, much to his amazement, found the story incredibly funny. When Tom got to the bit about him trying to eat his roast meal with his hands, Lois rushed off to the loo for fear of wetting herself.

Seeing how much pain Tom was in when he laughed, Dave said, “One of the neighbours, Richard, is a GP who practices alternative therapies. He’s about to set up a private practice at home for acupuncture and homeopathy patients. He may be able to help you make a speedy recovery Tom. He’s a really nice bloke. Would you like me to give him a ring and see if he’d see you later?”

“That would be great!” said Tom emphatically. He had a very busy week ahead work-wise and was eager to get as much help as possible to enable him to cope.

Dave returned from making the call. “Richard would be delighted to see you Tom,” he said, “he’s eager to test the sharpness of his new acupuncture needles!” Neither Tom nor Lois was sure who had the sense of humour, Richard, Dave, or both.

After lunch, Dave took Tom up the lane to Richard’s, Annie went shopping for the dinner she was to prepare that evening, and Lois, who was completely exhausted by the week’s events, fell asleep on the sofa.

She was awoken some hours later; by Tom giving her a gentle kiss on the cheek and telling her there was a cup of tea for her. She sat up sleepily and asked Tom how he had got on with Richard.

“Yeah, nice guy,” said Tom, “his wife seams very likeable too, maybe a bit scatty? I bet you’ll get on with her.”

“Are you insinuating that I’m a bit scatty?” laughed Lois.

“A bit? No, not at all Petal. Anyway, he gave me a thorough examination and an acupuncture treatment around my spine, apparently where the nerves to the ribs run, and funnily enough I’m feeling remarkably good, considering it is almost time for my painkillers. He also gave me a couple of homeopathic remedies to take, to help the bones to heal fast, oh and something for the bruising. I’ll be really interested to see what a difference it makes. He didn’t even charge me.”

“Wow, that’s generous of him!”

“He said it was all part of the Harewood Park Welcoming Committee’s policy. As soon as we’re sufficiently settled I’d like to invite Richard and Debbie for dinner, what do you think?”

“That would be great and Annie and Dave, and Adam and Sicily.”

“Sounds good to me, even though I’ve no idea who Adam and Sicily are.”

Lois went on to tell Tom what she knew about Adam and Sicily, explaining that Adam was the one whom Mel fancied and that they were both coming to dinner at Annie and Dave’s that evening.

“You know I’ve been thinking, I’m not sure I want to wait until the house is done-up to move in. I know we’ve got to pay the rent on the flat for the next couple of months, but we don’t have to live there if we don’t want to, we could consider it a sunk cost. How would you feel about moving in a couple of weeks, when I’m feeling a bit better?”

Lois was delighted with the idea. “We’d have to get movers to pack for us, we’ll both be working and we’re usually pooped in the evenings. Actually, would it be better to wait ‘till I’ve worked out my notice?”

“Oh yes, I’ve been thinking about that too. You must be owed some annual leave which would shorten your period of notice.”

Lois considered this idea for a moment as she sipped her tea. “Gosh Tom, you’re right, I am. I’ll have to look it up, but yes, I might even be owed two weeks. Maybe even more, I’ve only taken two days this year and I think I may be owed some from last year. Oh that’s really exciting, that would mean we could move in, what? Two weeks time? Dean the decorator said he’d start work on Monday. If we got him to sort the bathroom out first, and get the electricians in, that would all be done before we moved.”

“Dean the decorator, don’t we need a plumber for the bathroom?”

“Oh he can do it all, except the electrics, he calls himself a “jobbing builder”, whatever that means. I just thought Dean the decorator scanned rather well!”

“Come on, finish your tea, let’s go next door and start making to-do lists.”

Lois checked with Annie that she didn’t need help with preparing dinner. Annie said she was fine, it wasn’t going to be a complicated meal, that they should enjoy investigating their new home and to say hello to the remaining glis glis for her.

“Ah, talking of glis glis,” said Dave, who had been drinking his cup of tea at the kitchen table, while leafing through the DIY catalogue, trying to put together an estimate for converting the garage loft, “I’ve got a couple of ‘humane’ rat traps in the garage Tom, I’ll put them up in your loft for you if you like. Put in a bit of fruit. If you leave me with a key to the house, I can check them each day for you and then having humanely trapped them, I’ll drown the little buggers!” Dave laughed to himself.

“Oh yuck,” said Lois.

“That would be great, thanks,” said Tom.

Dave brought the traps round to the house, along with a small stepladder. The access hatch to the loft was so small, about half the width of a standard one, that there was no way that Dave would have got his belly through it. Fortunately he didn’t need to get right into the loft, he set the traps close to the door, so they were easily accessible to check and retrieve when they had successfully caught a glis glis.

Meanwhile Tom and Lois got on with writing a to-do list. “We’re going to have to choose and order the new bathroom pretty quickly if we want Dean to do that as one of his first jobs. Perhaps we’d better go DIY store visiting tomorrow,” said Lois.

“I know how to help solve the time problem,” said Tom, smiling, “Where’s your diary. Lets see how much leave you’re owed, I’ve got a feeling it’s quite a lot.”

As soon as they’d found out she was pregnant, Tom and Lois had decided to save up her holiday entitlement, to extend the maternity leave period. Justin had been very pleased, as Lois was in the middle of a major project with an important client, and her not taking leave would wrap that up all the sooner. The HR department quibbled with Justin over her carrying leave over from one financial year to the next, but eventually they’d agreed to it.

Lois and Tom calculated that Lois had enough annual leave outstanding, to practically cover her notice period. “That’s great,” beamed Lois, “that means I only really need to go in for a day to hand over! Wow, how exciting!”

“So, have Monday off to organize what’s going on here, as you’d planned and you’d better call work and let them know. Best ask Annie and Dave how they would feel about having one or two house guests for the occasional night over the next two weeks?” Tom whispered to Lois as Dave started walking down the stairs.

“Incidentally how were you planning for Dean the Decorator to get into the house on Monday? Did he take a template of your giant key to craft over the weekend?” said Tom, smirking.

“Oh ha ha!” Lois said, sarcastically, “if you’re not careful I’ll tickle you!” she reached across towards his ribs.

“Actually my ribs are feeling quite a lot better.”

“Well that’s good. Tomorrow we’ll pull the rest of these lovely carpets out of the house then shall we?”

“I doubt we’ll have time for that Lois. Not if we’ve got to choose a new bathroom suite, that’ll probably take all day.”

“Well if you do have time and need a hand let me know,” offered Dave, “I’m going to need help, at some point, with some of the heavy work in the garage loft. We’re all for helping each other out around here. Well most of us are anyway!” Dave winked at Lois, said he’d best get home and give Annie a hand and disappeared.

Tom and Lois spent another hour at the house, extending their original list, then making a couple more. One for the DIY store the next day and another for what Tom needed to order on-line when he was at work on Monday. The first item on Lois’s list was to get the landline reconnected and a broadband connection up and running as soon as possible. Their mobile signal was more ‘miss’ than ‘hit’ in the house and Lois would be reliant on the Internet to source materials economically.

Just as they were drawing their list composing to a close, a face appeared at the living room window, nose pressed up against the glass. It was Mel. “Hey, cracking door!” she laughed as they let her in. “Good God Tom, look at the state of you!” Mel blew him a kiss, not wanting to get close to any of his injuries. The look of him sent shivers down her spine. She gave Lois a brief hug. “Come on, no time to waste. We need to be next door celebrating your arrival!”

Lois returned to Annie and Dave’s with Tom and Mel. She quickly got changed, then, having checked with Annie that no help was required in the kitchen, dragged Mel out into the garden, to bring her up to speed on the goings on of the previous two days. Mel was astonished by Lois’s decision to stop working. She had never pictured Lois as a housewife or stay-at-home mum type. She’d always been so dynamic at work. Harewood Park was apparently having quite an effect.

Mel found the story of Adrienne and ‘the finger in the dyke’ hysterically funny, her laughter luring the rest of the party outside. Mel blushed slightly as Adam came up and gave her a kiss on both cheeks and Lois found herself repeating the story again.

Tom opened the bottle of champagne, which the estate agent had given them in their good luck hamper and poured it into six glasses. “Just enough for a toast,” announced Dave, “To happiness in Harewood Park!”

“To happiness in Harewood Park!” everyone repeated.

The next topic of conversation was Tom’s injuries, difficult to ignore as they were. Lois noticed that the description of his accident was somewhat elaborated on re-telling, but it provided good entertainment.

Before long Annie beckoned the group in through the French windows, across the lounge and into the dining room. As Lois made her way to her seat, she was slightly taken aback to see three stuffed animals sitting in a row on the windowsill. A stoat or a weasel, Lois wasn’t sure, an owl and a green woodpecker.

Annie saw the expression on Lois’s face and jumped straight in to a slightly embarrassed explanation. “They’re there for diplomatic reasons,” she said. “They were gifts, from Richard. You know, Tom went for a treatment with him this afternoon? It’s his hobby. He’s an amateur taxidermist.”

Tom, who was taking a sip of his champagne almost choked on hearing this news. “He’s a what?”

“An amateur taxidermist,” said Dave, “Really, it’s no joke. He picks up road kill, takes it home and stores it in the freezer. Then, when he has a bit of spare time on his hands, he thaws it out and, well, stuffs it, in his garage. Debbie won’t let him do it in the kitchen.” There was raucous laughter from around the room.

“That’s gross!” laughed Lois. “Remind me never to go to dinner at their house.”

“Yes, good plan,” said Dave, “never have been too sure what I’ve been eating at theirs.”

“Don’t be daft!” said Annie. “They’re lovely people and I’m sure they’ve never served us anything out of the ordinary. Anyway, what he does once he’s taxidermed them is give them to people as presents, birthday, Christmas, house warming, he’s probably working on yours right now!”

There was more laughter. “I can hardly wait! Do you think telling him I’m a vegetarian would help to put him off?” asked Lois.

“He’ll find out soon enough that you’re lying,” said Annie. Lois put her hand to her mouth and went bright pink with embarrassment.

“Oh my God, I forgot to tell you, didn’t I? I’m always doing that. I’m so sorry Annie!” Tom stood shaking his head in an, ‘Oh Lois, you’ve let me down again!’ sort of a way. “I do eat fish though, if that’s any help?” Lois offered in a vague attempt to worm her way back into favour.

“Thank the Lord for that, we’ll pretend the steak is salmon and we’ll be laughing!” said Annie, looking alarmingly annoyed. The memory of Annie’s hideous outburst of Wednesday and the thought of Annie throwing a stuffed animal at her flashed through Lois’s mind. “No, just joking, can’t afford steak at the moment, it’s a simple pasta bake, with tuna. Lucky!”

Lois breathed a sigh of relief and reprimanded herself inwardly. ‘Must remember to share non-meat-eating habits with hosts in future.’

“What is that creature anyway?” asked Tom, pointing to the weasely thing.

“Oh, you’ve got so much to learn about the country Tom,” said Adam, “it’s a stoat.”

“No, it’s a weasel,” said Annie.

“What’s the difference?” asked Mel.

“Well,” came back Annie and Dave, in unison, “weasels are weasely wecognised and stoats are stoataly different!” Champagne induced laughter erupted around the table.

As they sat down to enjoy their first course, Lois announced that this must surely be the point at which Annie, Dave and Adam give the low-down on the Park’s other residents. She was determined to get more information on the neighbours that she hadn’t yet met.

“Do you know what?” said Dave, “I reckon you should find out about the rest of the neighbours yourselves. It’s not good to be influenced by other peoples impressions, especially Annie’s.”

“Thanks for that, Darling.”

“Not at all Annie, not at all.” Dave swallowed another spoonful of soup, before adding, “It has to be said, there are some, how should I say?”

“Unusual?” offered Adam.

“Yes, unusual, that’ll do, unusual characters living in the park.”

“Oh gosh, now you’re making me nervous,” said Lois, frowning. “Unusual in what way?”

“Mmm, let’s think.” Dave tore off a lump from his chunk of bread and dunked it in the soup, then ate it slowly and thoughtfully. “So many ways. I think we should leave it at that really, I wouldn’t know where to start. You’ll have an interesting time meeting them all though.”

“So, that’s it, you’re not even going to give us an inkling?” Lois whined, somewhat taken aback.

“An inkling might be the worst thing to give you,” said Adam smiling.

“He’s right,” agreed Annie, “it’s always best to meet people with a blank slate and remember, never judge a book by its cover!”

“Yes, exactly,” added Adam, “Always look beyond the cover. That’s all you have to remember.”

“Yes, yes,” said Lois, still feeling slightly affronted that nobody was willing to give her any more information. “Beyond the cover, look beyond the cover. I think I can remember that.”

“They are all, how should I put it? Safe though, are they?” asked Tom, starting to feel slightly concerned for Lois’s welfare.

“Oh yes,” said Annie reassuringly, “they’re all safe enough. Well, none of them worry me anyway.”

“Well that’s very comforting Annie, thanks for that,” said Lois, sarcastically. “Anyway, Mr. Black. I’m not going to knock on his door. I’ve had enough of him already and I’ve only met him once.”

“Oh come on, you’ve got to tell me what’s wrong with this Black character, what’s he said to upset you?” Tom asked Lois.

“He came and introduced himself just after Lois had smashed down the front door,” said Mel, “and started laying down the law, as it were. Gave the impression of being a right miserable, grumpy old sod.”

“Okay,” said Annie, “we’ll fill you in a bit on Black. I wouldn’t expect anyone to go and talk to him voluntarily; maybe with a gun to their head!” Annie cleared the starter plates and went to get the main course.

“So,” said Dave, as he circled the table, topping up wine glasses,  “dear old Charles Black. Brought up in the house he now lives in. Moved off to Windsor I think, to live and work. He was a planning officer. Married Gill; she wasn’t the friendliest of souls either, although her demeanour could have been induced by him I suppose. Never had any children, thank God.”

“Maybe that’s why they’re so miserable?” offered Mel.

Dave looked sceptical. “Anyway, Charles’s parents both died within a few years of each other, that must have been twent
y
-
-odd years ago. They left the house to Charles and his sister, who had cared for them during their illnesses. Charles decided to buy Emily out of her half of the house and move in. Allegedly, he bribed a couple of estate agents to give low valuations, enabling him to give Emily considerably less than her half share was worth.”

There were rumblings of distaste from around the table.

Annie continued with the story as she served out the main course, Dave disappearing to fetch more wine. “Having carried out this devious ploy, he and Gill came to live in Harewood Park, just as he was promoted to chief planning officer.”

“What do they do that’s so unpleasant?” asked Tom.

“Oh it’s not ‘they’ any more Tom. She left him about four years ago. It’s just him now. He’s always got his nose in everybody’s business,” Annie grumbled.

“Yes,” said Dave, “you can hardly take a shit without him taking out a tape measure to check it for size.”

“Dave!” said Annie, smiling.

“Well it’s true.”

“Anyway,” said Adam, “he’s a busybody who regularly puts in complaints to the council. Dave, do you remember when Richard built a tree house for the kids.”

“Oh yes,” smirked Dave. Annie laughed and nodded knowingly.

“Can you believe, they had a knock on the door one afternoon. It was a planning officer, come to inspect the tree house as a neighbour had reported that an illegal structure had been built and they had no record of planning consent.”

“You’re kidding!” said Lois, “planning permission, for a tree house? And why the hell would he complain about a tree house?”

“Nothing better to do with his time,” said Annie, “anyway, Richard got the planning permission, even though the kids were hardly ever playing in it, on principle. He quite often goes up there himself and reads, just to annoy Black. He even takes a telescope up sometimes and pretends to be peering into the back of Black’s house. He’s almost as bad as Bill!” 

“What’s the story with him and Bill? They really don’t like each other do they?” said Mel.

Lois turned to Tom. “Bill is Sicily’s dad, lives at Willow Farm, at the end of the track.” Tom nodded.

“All to do with planning again.” Annie continued, “Bill feels it is his God given right to build what he wants on his land, it is his land after all. Last time Bill started building more stables at his farm, Charles, being a stickler for precision must have climbed over the locked gate in the middle of the night, with Gill in tow, to measure the footings, which had already been laid for the new stable block. Unaware that the Alsatian guard dog roamed loose in the yard at night, he got his measurement, but lost a shoe and a piece of his trouser-leg, trying to escape over the gate. He probably disturbed it when giving a little whoop of joy having thought he’d accomplished his mission!”

Annie stood and started to clear away the plates to compliments from around the table. Adam joined her and as they went out to the kitchen to collect the dessert, Dave continued the tale; “So, Bill found the shoe and the piece of trouser leg the next day. Had his suspicions as to who owned them and as it was winter, was able to find a socked footprint in some damp mud outside Charles’s house. I saw him taking photos and measurements of it. He even made a plaster cast and of course he made plenty of noise to ensure that Charles looked out of the window and saw what he was doing, just to give him a good fright. Bill never took the matter any further, but carried on building his stables and never heard anything from the council. So now, Bill and Charles have this sort of love, hate relationship. Well, hate actually. Several days a week, Bill goes and sits in his tractor outside Charles’s house and tries to intimidate him.”

“So that’s what he’s doing. That’s so nuts!” said Lois, “They’re both behaving like children aren’t they?”

“Oh yes,” said Annie, sitting back down to serve out dessert, “they are ridiculous.”

Annie picked up on the story again, “Bert’s told me some pretty strange things that Gill did when she lived here too.”

“Bert, who’s Bert?” asked Tom.

“Bert and Betty,” replied Adam. “they’re a dear old couple, live in the cottage between me and Jack and Doreen. You must call in Lois, they’d be delighted to meet you.” Adam winked at Annie, “Just don’t have milk in your tea when you go. That’s all I’m saying.” Adam ‘zipped up his mouth’, to emphasise that he would give nothing else away about those particular residents.

“Anyway,” said Annie smiling, “as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, Tom,”

“Begging yer pardon Ma’am.”

“Gill, ex-wife of Old Man Black used to complain about Bert and Betty’s cat going into her garden. Bert apologized and said that he really couldn’t control where the cat went. When it disappeared for twenty-four hours, Bert went to look for it and heard a loud meowing coming from the Black’s garden. She had trapped the cat in a cage and left it in there without food and water. Whether her plan was to leave it there ‘till it died, who knows? Bert was so angry he called the police, who came and issued her a formal warning. After that, she started collecting up dog mess and throwing it into Bert and Betty’s garden, as a sort of revenge I suppose.”

“Yuck, that’s disgusting!” said Lois.

“So,” continued Annie, “the years went by and then she disappeared! That’s Gill, not the cat. One day she was here and then no one saw her again. Charles got a skip, threw all her belongings into it and that was that. One day Richard plucked up the courage to ask Charles where she was and he said he would rather not talk about it.”

“Adam, you said you thought she’d run off with some fancy man from her aerobics class, didn’t you?” asked Mel.

“I did, yes. That’s the rumour, but I don’t know where it came from.”

“I think he murdered her!” said Dave, in a determined voice. “I think he murdered her and buried her in the footings of Richard and Debbie’s extension and that’s why he never objected to their planning application. I think he suffocated her, dragged her to the shed, chopped her up into little bits and put the bits into bin liners.”