Christmas Cheer

28

Christmas Cheer

    “They’ll be home for Christmas,” stated Miriam confidently.

    “Who will?” replied Ted dully.

    “Hattie and the boys, of course!”

    Funnily enough he’d thought she’d meant them. “Thought she had three more months to go on this job in Japan?”

    “Yes, but they’re coming home for Christmas,” she explained.

    Yeah, yeah. Ted just leaned against the counter and let her babble on.

    “And guess what!”

    Ted jumped slightly. “What?” he managed.

    “Kenny’s father’s coming with them and he’s thinking of buying a cottage here!”

    Where in God’s name did she get this crap from? “Balls.”

    “He is! Harriet Blaiklock told me all about it! Joanna told her: Hattie rang her up specially to tell her, she’s very pleased about it.”

    Right. Would Tarlington be so bloody pleased about it? Ted just leaned against the counter and let her babble on…

    He opened his door on a drizzling, miserable December day to find June standing on the doorstep in her best black coat and good navy hat, holding the new brolly she’d got in Ditterminster: red, navy and green.

    “The door’s not locked: why did you knock?” he said dully.

    “I’m coming with you,” replied June firmly.

    Ted bit his lip. “Uh—ta, June. Come in.”

    June shook the brolly briskly, closed it, and came in. She went straight over to the battered sideboard he kept his liquor in and, for once not remarking that this could be a nice old piece of furniture if it ever saw a lick of polish from one year’s end to the next, got out the whisky. “Come on, we’ll both ’ave a belt.”

    “I’m driving,” said Ted weakly.

    “Right, and them wankers’ll be sitting in their pleece car on the road to Abbot’s ’Alt in the freezing cold ready to breathalyse you, not stuffing their faces over to the pizza parlour in Dittersford like usual!” she retorted smartly. “Come on, Ted, love, just a swallow.”

    Ted got it down him. To his relief she didn’t ask if he felt better, just said: “Right. Get yer coat. And oy, if you ’aven’t ’ad a piss, ’ave one now.”

    “It won’t be a long service, June,” said Ted limply.

    “Dessay. Go on.”

    Ted went. Then he got into his heavy broadcloth overcoat, that he hadn’t worn since before the firm went broke, and drove them over to Ned Cummins’s funeral.

    “Never thought them Ditterminster Cummins lot’d turn up, nor old Cummins from Chipping Ditter, neither,” said June after the unofficial wake in the Hammond Arms was over and they were heading slowly home.

    “No. Well, I did put a notice in the paper,” he said dully.

    “Yeah. Dessay no-one from Abbot’s ’Alt saw it,” she said kindly. “Still about as literate as what they were when I was a kid. Racing news and the odd juicy ’eadline.”

    Ted seemed to remember that a lot of the old-timers had also read the Births, Deaths and Marriages with avid regularity, but he just said: “Uh-huh.”

    June stared out of her window as the unenticing view of the Daynesford forestry plantations gave way to the unenticing view of the rape fields in winter. “End of an era, really, innit?” she concluded.

    “It is for poor bloody Ned, yes!” said Ted with suppressed violence.

    “Not that, really, lovey. All them bright kids from your generation. All scattered and gone now. ’Member Susan Jukes? Um, second cousin or something of George’s, she’d of been.”

    “First cousin once removed. What about her?”

    “Bright lass, she were. Won a scholarship to Oxford.”

    “I know. What about her?” said Ted with a sigh.

    “She’s a professor in Canada, now: that Nancy Cummins—’er mum was a Jukes, see—she was telling me they ’ad a letter from ’er mum not long since. Ever hear of a place called McGill?”

    “Uh—the university? Yes.”

    “Thought you might of. That’s where she’s working.”

    “Good for Susan.”

    They drove on. More acres of dank rape fields fled by.

    “Nothing to keep you ’ere, now, Ted,” said June.

    “How true. Maybe Kenny Perkins’s Japanese dad’d like to buy my cottage.”

    “Dare say ’e might, yeah,” she agreed placidly.

    Ted sighed.

    “Go out to New Zealand, lovey. See your friend Bert Pringle, eh?”

    “June, I might just manage the fare, but I’m broke, I can’t afford a ruddy holiday in the Antipodes!”

    “Antipodes, eh?” said June with a certain relish. “Dessay Bert could find you a job. And you might not fancy the idea of going cap-in-’and to Hill Tarlington—“

    “You’re right, there!” he said with feeling.

    “No,” she said, patting his knee. “But it wouldn’t be ’im, see, it’d be the chap what runs the New Zealand end for the firm. Sounds really nice.”

    She could only possibly have got that off Hill himself! Ted sighed.

    “Or if you fancied it, just bum around the country working as a brickie’s labourer, that kind of thing. God knows yer know the construction business inside out. It’s their summer now, be nice.”

    Ted swallowed. “Go now?”

    “Why not?” replied June placidly.

     Uh—gee, if he did that he’d miss Miriam’s moans about the locals all buying their Christmas provender over to Ditterminster, Miriam’s warm invitation to Christmas dinner with her and her gaga aunt and uncle, bloody Lambie Heather’s warm invitation to have it with her—she meant well, but a man could only take so much sympathetic gushing—the inevitable storm that would flood the dip in the road and ten to one take out the bridge as well, Ma Everton’s notion of lovely traditional Christmas waits, Ma Everton’s notion of a lovely village Christmas concert—

    “You’d miss the concert,” said June, reading his mind.

    “Too bloody right! Why the Hell not?” said Ted with sudden fervour.

    June just patted his knee and didn’t point out that he’d also miss Hattie’s return to the village.

    “That one!” screamed Gordon, jumping.

    The hand-written ad for real Christmas trees in Miriam’s window had led them to a back yard in Lower Dittersford, not to a commercial establishment. Nicked from the forestry—exactly. Most of them were just large branches but there were one or two whole trees. It was one of these that was Gordon’s choice. Not a small one.

    The argument that Number 7 Old Mill Lane didn’t really need its own tree, since they were going to have Christmas dinner with the Blaiklocks up at Chipping Abbas and they had a tree, had singularly failed of its effect. As likewise the point that Amanda had never had a tree. –She couldn’t have had, the flat wasn’t big enough for all of them plus the notorious sun-bed and all her other equipment plus a tree.

    “Gordon,” said Hattie limply, “that tree’ll never fit in our front room.”

    “It will!”

    “It will be too tall for the cottage’s ceiling, Gordon,” said Ken Yamamoto kindly.

    Gordon glared pugnaciously. “It won’t!”

    “Yeah, it will, ya nit,” said Kenny on a note of tolerant scorn.

    “Kenny, that isn’t helpful,” said his father mildly. “Look hard at the tree, Gordon.”—Gordon already was. He scowled.—“Now think of the height of the walls in your fuh-ront loom.”

    “Front room, Dad,” said Kenny tolerantly.

    “Thank you, Kenny,” replied his father politely. “Concentrate, Gordon. Can you see?”

    Hattie swallowed hard. She’d suddenly been visited by a memory of the time at the fête when she hadn’t been able to get Gordon to see that the quoits wouldn’t go over the prizes: the time Hill had won those two jugs and Gordon’s knife. “I wish Hill was here,” she said faintly.

    “You said before it was just as well he wasn’t, ’cos he’d take the whole thing over,” Kenny pointed out.

    “Kenny, that will do,” said his father mildly. “You will have to take our words for it, Gordon. That tree’s much too big for your fuh-ront loom. Look for another one.”

    “Smaller,” said Kenny helpfully. “Like that.” He pointed.

    Hattie gulped. It was in a pot, true. It was also about knee-high.

    “Be serious, please, Kenny,” said his father severely.

    “Come on, Dad, it’s Christmas!”

    “’Member that Christmas in Sydney?” said Hattie dreamily.

    “Which?” replied Kenny tolerantly.

    “You wouldn’t remember. When Ken was living with us. Katie and Kieran had a fight over the tree.”

    “They would,” admitted the twins’ half-brother. “So whose didja choose?”

    “Neither!” said Ken with a sudden laugh. “Your mother was very angry and told them that if they went on like that they wouldn’t get a tree at all. So I chose one.”

    “Before it could get any worse!” explained Hattie with a laugh.

    “Ya better choose one now, then, Dad,” said Kenny tolerantly.

    “No!” screamed Gordon. “I’m choosing it!”

    “Then choose one that’s a sensible size, Gordon.” replied Ken mildly.

    “Yeah, like one that’ll fit on Dad’s roof-rack,” noted Kenny tolerantly. “Hey, ’member that Christmas movie—was it the one with Tim the Toolman? Uh—dunno,” he answered himself, “Anyway, there were these elves, ya see, and they wrapped the baddies up in this Christmas tree plastic mesh stuff, it was ace!”

    “Oh, yes,” agreed Hattie. “—I thought he made a horrid Santa, actually. Cross.”

    “Ye-ah… He wasn’t that bad. When ya think about it, Santa woulda looked like a grumpy ole man, eh?” he said thoughtfully.

    “No! I mean, most old men are grumpy, but Santa wouldn’t be, that’s the point of him. I have seen one really smiley Santa. One of those movies they used to screen on Seven during the day. I can’t remember anything else about it.”

    “You’re not concentrating!” shouted Gordon.

    The Perkins half-siblings jumped. “Um, well, that’s a nice one,” said Hattie feebly.

    Gordon stared at it with narrowed eyes. “Would it go in our front room, though?”

    It was only about as tall as Kenny. Hattie looked fearfully at Ken but to her tremendous relief he just smiled nicely and said: “Yes, it’d be an excerrent fit.” Also to her relief, this time Kenny didn’t correct his pronunciation.

    So after a terrific lot of walking up and down and checking by Gordon, they bought it. It didn’t have a base but Kenny declared his intention of sticking it in an old bucket and pouring concrete round it.

    “Tree murder,” said Hattie faintly.

    “We could try putting it in water but I think it’d fall over,” replied her brother seriously.

    “I’m sure it’d fall over!” she said with feeling.

    Concrete it was, then. George Jukes was sure to have some.

     Hill tapped humbly at the cottage’s door at around six-thirty.

    It was opened by Kenny. “Thought you were in London.”

    “Gave it away. How’s the tree?”

    “The concrete’s setting,” he replied tersely.

    As Gordon had already rung him on his mobile and given him a full report, Hill was quite up with the play. He hadn’t reproved him for ringing him in the middle of the day—in fact in the middle of a meeting—he’d just been so bloody pleased that the kid had wanted to and that Hattie hadn’t stopped him from including, him, Hill, in the family concerns.

    He came into the narrow passage and closed the door. “Good show. I won’t disturb it, but it did occur that if all Gordon’s and Hattie’s stuff was burnt in the great sun-bed fire, you might not have many tree ornaments.” –He knew that they’d had a very small tree last Christmas, bought out of the back of some enterprising merchant’s station-waggon, and that the year before Lambie had had them over, so they’d put their presents under her tree.

    “We’ve got a few. Hattie’s making us string popcorn for it,” Kenny revealed glumly. “And she’s making some gingerbread men for it only she won’t let us eat them.”

    “Got it,” acknowledged Hill, grinning. “In that case these might help.” He handed him his shopping carrier.

    “Thanks. Didja get any of that fuzzy silver stuff?” asked Kenny, peering into it.

    “Er—no. Sorry. Want a hand with stringing the popcorn?”

    “You think that’s a joke,” warned Kenny, marching into the front room.

    Meekly Hill followed him. The room was rather full. On the big old sofa Ken, June and Lambie were all diligently stringing popcorn. In one of the mismatched armchairs Gordon was engaged in laborious scissor-work, the scowl in place and the lips moving silently. Kath Benson was sitting on the floor sprinkling glittery stuff on misshapen objects laid out on a newspaper. And in the other mismatched armchair—

    “Ma!” he said numbly. “What are you doing here?”

    “Hullo, Hilly, darling,” replied Marina calmly. “Helping decorate the tree, of course.”

    “She makes good lanterns!” Gordon informed him.

    “Er—yes. Does she? Good show.” Ma was hopeless at handwork. Hill eyed the coloured paper objects on her lap dubiously.

    “My one skill,” said his mother, holding a bright red one up.

     Er—yeah. It was something under three inches high, cylindrical, with slots cut in the middle section. Vertical slots. “How are you going to hang them?” he said feebly.

    “You stick handles on them,” explained Kenny tolerantly. “Show him a finished one, Granny.”

    Marina held up a bright green one. Could it get more fiddly? Little strip of the— Granny?

    Ken must have noticed he was gob-smacked because he said quickly: “Good evening, Hill. We thought that ‘Granny’ would be simpler for Kenny and Gordon, since Harriet’s and Allan’s children use it.”

    And Hattie was letting them? “Yes. Good show,” he said feebly. Lambie and Kath were both beaming and nodding at him, so he greeted them feebly.

    “Look, he’s brought us some proper ornaments!” reported Kenny happily, diving into the carrier-bag.

    “Was that a tactical error?” said Hill feebly to his ma. “Don’t think I’ve gone overboard.”

    “No, dear, a tree’s always got room for a few more ornaments.”

    “Yeah. Why are you here?”

    “Harriet and Will have got those rather awful Parkinson people coming to dinner tonight, so I just popped down,” explained his mother calmly.

    Presumably that was as clear as it was gonna get. Hill tottered out to the kitchen. The two feline monsters were as usual sitting by the fridge. Hattie was sitting at the yellow table, icing thousands of gingerbread men. Er—some were stars and those ones were possibly reindeer, but— Yeah.

    “Hullo,” he said feebly.

    “Hullo, Hill,” replied his beloved. “Can you grab the kettle?” Hill grabbed the kettle. He watched numbly as she poured about three drops from it into one of the bowls on the table, and stirred briskly. “It was drying out.”

    “Uh-huh. Enlighten my ignorance, if you will: how does one hang gingerbread men on the tree?”

    “There’s several ways. Lambie gave me a whole lot of gold string so I’m just gonna stick loops on their backs with stiff icing.”

    Boy, that was telling him. Hill sat down limply on the heart-shaped chair. “You do know the boys seem to be calling Ma Granny, do you?”

    “Yes; wasn’t that all right?” she said, looking at him in mild surprise.

    Hill bit his lip. “Mm. Very all right.”

    “Is anything the matter?” asked Hattie cautiously.

    “No,” he said, blinking hard. “Could I just put my head in your lap or is that verboten at the courting stage?”

    “Um, no, go on,” she said uncertainly.

    Hill knelt on the floor in his good overcoat, regardless of what else was down there in the wake of a day spent making gingerbread and popcorn, and buried his head in her lap. He had time to get a sinking feeling in his middle and then she put a hand cautiously on his head.

    “I love you,” he said in a muffled voice.

    “Me, too,” replied Hattie hoarsely.

    After quite some time he managed to kook up and say: “This doesn’t mean I’m gonna string fucking popcorn all evening, mind!”

    “You’ve gotta have some excuse,” replied Hattie with a lurking twinkle.

    “Uh—why?” he croaked. “For what?”

    “Not being a wait for Mrs Everton.”

    “Jesus, is that tonight? I’ll string popcorn!”

   “Thoughtcha might, yeah,” replied his beloved placidly.

    “Deck the halls with—” Will shot over to the Blaiklock flat’s kitchen window and closed it.

    “That’s a bit off, isn’t it?” said Hill feebly. “I mean, they must’ve come round the back specially for you: can’t be for the hotel guests.”

    “I’m up for offering them a glass of punch when it’s over, but that doesn’t mean I’m gonna listen to them,” replied his brother-in-law calmly, returning to the stove.

    “Right,” said Hill feebly. He came up to Will’s elbow and looked dubiously at the steaming muck in the giant pot. “Will, have you let this muck boil?”

    “Think so, yeah. Why?”

    “Because it boils the alcohol off, you fool! That what just drifted out the window you just closed was the stuff’s alcoholic content!”

    “Better bung some more in, then,” he said unemotionally. He grabbed a bottle. He poured.

    “A quart of rum,” said Hill feebly.

    “Yeah; be a bit weak, come to think of it.” He emptied another bottle of rum and a bottle of vodka into the mixture. “Those bloody punch glasses that Harriet insisted on chucking away my hard-earned on at Harrods or some similar emporium of take-your-hard-earned are bloody small, old man,” he explained kindly.

    “Right.” Hill looked round cautiously but as Will had ordered the females and the kids to stay out of the kitchen, there was no sign of anyone. “Um, listen, Will.”

    Will listened. “I can’t hear anything except cats being strangled,” he noted.

    “Eh? Uh—yeah.” He swallowed hard. “Ma.”

    “Oh. That,” said Will feebly. He smiled feebly. “Alec Guinness.”

    “What?” replied Hill dangerously.

    “Uh—yeah,” he said, smiling feebly. “Old film. Pretty bad, it was. Who was the female, again? –Forget. She went on a cruise, and there was this little Jap. Not that he was little, that’s what I’m saying: he was Alec Guinness in the worst make-up job to hit the silver screen up and until they cast the Mighty Quinn as an Arab in that fucking Lawrence of—”

    “Will!”

    “It was a middle-aged romance, you see,” explained Will on an apologetic note.

    Hill swallowed again. “So you do think Ma and Ken have fallen for each other?”

    “Wouldn’t go that far, old man. Seem keenish, though. He isn’t interested in the dame with the boots, that’s for sure.”

    Hill had already gathered that, though she’d had a lovely time in Japan, there was nothing at all of a romantic nature between Kath Benson and Ken Yamamoto. “No,” he said feebly.

    “Uh—not annoyed, are you, Hill?” asked his brother-in-law cautiously.

    “Not annoyed, no. Flabbergasted—yes.”

    “He seems a decent type,” ventured Will.

    “He’s a very decent type, yes. I suppose one doesn’t see one’s Aged P. as— Never mind. Good luck to them!” said Hill with a weak laugh.

    “Yeah. Harriet hasn’t noticed anything,” said Will cautiously.

    “No; goes with her dislike of change, old man. It’ll burst on her like a thunderclap if it does come to anything, so be warned.”

    Shuddering, Will tasted his brew.

    Hill eyed the subsequent gasping and coughing drily. “Strong enough?”

    “Just about!” he gasped.

    “Good. Let’s not waste it all on the waits, then.” He opened a cupboard, found a good-sized teacup and filled it. “Here’s to it!”

    Will filled his ladle. “To what?” he said cautiously.

    “Ma’s middle aged romance with the little Jap!” replied Hill with a laugh.

    Will’s knees had already gone saggy with relief so all he had to do was say: “I’ll drink to that!” And drink. Which he did.

    The terrifying parakeet was gleaming in purple and gold, Lambie Heather was gleaming all over with special shiny, dangly bits hanging off the ears, wrists and neck, Harriet was glorious in something Christmassy that had done serious damage to Will’s wallet, and even June Biggs, since she’d had a special gold-engraved invitation signed by Maurice Bishop himself—well, forged by Julian, his PA, but same diff’—was here in her best puce silk dress, terrifyingly draped over the bust and featuring giant shoulder-pads. Someone’s wedding, back in the Eighties—quite. The First Chipping Abbas Park Royal Christmas Eve Dinner & Dance, was wot.

    Hill circled numbly on the floor with Hattie in his feverish grasp. She’d agreed to come without having to be talked into it, she’d asked him what she oughta wear and, ultimate miracle, she was in it! The result of a shopping expedition in Tokyo with Ken’s nieces, on whom all blessings fall. Very dark crimson, it was—the shade looked glorious on her. Tiny shoe-string straps, it had. Very low vee at the front, it had. Tight enough to really show off the tits, it was, and into the bargain extremely strokeable over the bum, the thighs and the tummy. Ooh-er, in fact. He hadn’t rushed off and bought her a giant ruby engagement ring on the strength of it but he’d felt bloody like it.

    “This is nice,” she murmured.

    “I’ll say!” replied Hill with fervour.

    “So was the Opening as posh as this?”

    The Chipping Abbas Park Royal had had its official Opening back in October, not long after Hill had got back from the Antipodes. “Mm? Oh—that. A real shocker. You were bloody lucky to be utterly elsewhere. Maurice didn’t go quite so far as to invite H.R.H., but only because he was sure he wouldn’t come. –Too commercial, you see. No, well, they did have a giant dinner and dance, but the opening ceremony was down on the west lawn, with a giant awninged dais and five separate and quite distinct marquees ringing the rose garden, and as a climax to the thing, a glorious view of the local hunt blowing tallyhos and sprinting across the parkland on the western boundary.”

    “You’re joking.”

    “No, I am not!” said Hill with feeling. “The theme was autumnal, see? Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness and fake fox-hunting.”

    “But Hill, we haven’t got a local hunt.”

    “Uh—oh! The cretins from over Chipping Ditter way, darling. The ones that held that wedding the day you interpreted for the Arabs and Watanabe was sure it was all a gigantic conspiracy.”

    “I think it was,” said Hattie drily. “Or at least a preliminary scouting expedition. Mr Al-Abbadi turned up for talks in Tokyo the week before we left.”

    Hill choked, and went into a helpless wheezing, shaking fit. So much so that Hattie said: “You’d better sit down,” and led him off the floor.

    “Are you okay?” she said anxiously.

    “Yes!” he gasped, mopping his eyes. “Are we gonna be taken over by the Arabs after all?” he said feebly.

    “I don’t think so. It’s nothing to do with the hotels: something else the Gano Group’s into.”

    “Don’t tell me!” he said hurriedly.

    “No, I wasn't going to,” replied his beloved serenely.

    Hill picked up her hand and kissed it gently. She went bright pink but she didn’t pull it away: well, that was encouraging! “Should I buy you an engagement ring, do you think?” he said on a glum mote.

    “Um, like, not a Christmas present?” replied Hattie dubiously.

    He blinked. “No. Separate and quite distinct.”

    “Um, well, that’d be nice, if you want to,” she said in a strangled voice, going pinker than ever.

    Gosh. “Really?” he croaked.

    “Only if you don’t think it’s a waste of money, Hill.”

    “Of course I don’t think it’s a waste of money! Um, should it be your birthstone?”

    “That’s a popular myth,” replied Hattie calmly.

    “Uh—yes, but is it one you subscribe to, darling?”

    “No. Anyway, I haven’t a clue what my birthstone is.”

    “Uh-huh. Next question. Do you want to choose it together?”

    “I suppose people do,” replied Hattie dubiously.

    “Uh-huh. I’m told the correct procedure is to lead the captive male by the nose to the appropriate shop, point to the largest diamond in the place, and say ‘That.’”

    “I don’t really like diamonds.”

    “Um, well,” said Hill, clearing his throat, “nice red stone? ’Bout the colour of this lovely dress?”

    “That’d be nice. Would you like to choose it? I haven’t got any taste. And I don’t know anything about jewellery. I’d rather leave it up to you.”

    It was just as well he was sitting down, wasn’t it? “Yes,” he said weakly. “I would like to choose it, very much. If you’re sure?”

    “Yes. It seems only fair, since you’re the one that’s paying for it.”

    Hill didn’t chance his luck, he just put his arm tightly round her shoulders and murmured: “Mm.”

    After quite some time of just sitting there smiling dopily—at least, he was, and she was certainly smiling—she said: “Shall we go home?”

    “The cottage?”

    “Mm.”

    “Stay the night?”

    “Mm.”

    He didn’t point out that the cottage had Ken in the downstairs room that had been Joanna’s, he just got up and said: “Lead me to it.”

    “The boys’ll be up around five,” she warned, as they got into the car.

    “Uh—God, I suppose they will. Well, uh, make it a quickie, eh?”

    “Mm,” agreed Hattie with a smile in her voice.

    Well, merry Christmas after all!

    The feasting was over, Harriet’s turkey in the new oven had turned out fine, no-one had pointed out that the pudding and Christmas cake were both courtesy of Fortnum’s, and Hattie’s contribution had been much appreciated. A magnificent so-called pecan pie—loads of pecans, yes, but they were sitting in a sort of glorious soft toffee mixture, so sweet that even Will had only been able to manage a small slice. Smallish. There was still plenty of stuff left in old Tarlington’s cellar and Maurice Bishop had not been presented with the key, so they broached one or two. Will was apparently relieved to discover that Ken did drink but why he’d imagined he might not— Forget it. Harriet didn’t seem to find it odd that Ken presented Ma with a delightful kimono for Christmas, nor that she gave him a book on English cottage gardens, nor yet that he proposed buying the property on the other side of Hattie’s cottage from the one Hill had bought. Jolly good: sufficient unto the day.

    Hill had had vague plans for Boxing Day, which had included getting Hattie alone in his flat at Chipping Abbas, but these were circumvented by Ken’s taking Ma for a drive and the need for some adult to referee the fight between the boys as to whether Kenny’s new DVD player would be plugged into Hattie’s new telly so as he could watch his new complete collection of Star Wars or Gordon would watch something else. Or alternatively the two of ’em could just be left to kill each other— No, quite.

    Lambie had given Hattie a mah-jong set for Christmas so Hill and she simply shut the sitting-room door on Kenny, checked that Gordon was okay upstairs—he was plugged into his new electronic thing but he wasn’t in a temper because it was too hard, so they left him to it—and sat down in the kitchen with the new set.

    “This is hopeless!” she admitted some time later, very flushed.

    Correct. “Never mind, darling. Nice game of Snakes and Ladders?”

    “I always go the wrong way.”

    Uh—God. “Ludo?”

    “I go the wrong way in that, too. Um, well, you’ll have to correct me.”

    They tried. It got to the point where she burst into tears, alas. Okay, she had no games sense at all. Not to say a complete lack of the killer instinct or even a sense of competitiveness. Hadn’t Colin once pointed out something vaguely associated with this topic? Hill apologised abjectly for playing the game “fiercely”—he’d been under the impression he’d been playing it normally—made her a nice cuppa, and sought desperately for an alternative that required the minimum of skill. Uh… “Monopoly?” He looked at her face. “Okay, darling, nice game of Snap.”

    They played Snap. He ended up having to let her win: she was hopeless at it, too!

    You could have said she had her revenge later that afternoon, as Hill’s attempt under her tutelage to make her very easy potato bake was a dismal failure, but as it had now dawned, Hattie was the sort of person who wasn’t into revenge at all. In fact she was quite dismayed when it turned out really putrid.

    He got his arms round her aproned form and hugged her tight. “Never mind, Henrietta Tarlington, I’ll never be a cook but I love you,” he said in her ear.

    “Yes, me too!” gasped Hattie. So that was all right!