Spring, The Sweet Spring

17

Spring, The Sweet Spring

    Wednesday so far had been flat out, and the rest of the week wasn’t looking better. There was a full-scale Chipping Abbas Conversion Project Progress Report Meeting at Boddiford Hall scheduled for Friday and the weekend. The rest of today was going to be consecrated to a consultation with the swimming-pool engineers, the chief contractor for the pool construction and the bathhouse’s plumbing, and YDI’s Chief Drainage Engineer: now, at Hill’s suggestion, a permanent position within Development.

    Tomorrow was looking even worse: the bare interiors of the two flats were now complete and Hill was scheduled to meet with the martyred sub-contractor who was going to plumb in their bathroom fixtures, kitchen sinks, and the laundry tubs. YDI had a wide range of standard styles for ensuites, all of which they could offer at cost, so Harriet had changed her mind five times about the style she wanted in her bathroom, twice about the style for the boys’ bathroom, and three times about the guest bathroom.

    The down-market motel chain YDI operated under a different trading name featured kitchenettes, so they could also fit the kitchen out very reasonably: seven almost-decisions had resulted in Will’s putting his foot down, so it was going to be the industrial-look sink, to match the style of fridge she’d admired on a window-shopping expedition in London—and if it was gonna cost that much, it’d be YDI’s genuine industrial version of it, thanks. And whatever standard cupboards they used: the plainest ones. And since she’d been moaning a while back about painting their existing kitchen white and putting in bright red floor-tiles, that was what it was gonna be. That or a divorce. Surprisingly, Harriet had given in.

    No-one had expected she wouldn’t change her mind about the colour and style of tub she wanted in the laundry, so they weren’t disappointed. It had to tone with the floor- and wall-tiles, and she couldn’t make her mind up about those, either. Hill had finally told her the tilers would be in on such and such a date and if she hadn’t made her mind up two weeks before that she could do without tiles. This had worked, though not without a burst of tears. The laundry was going to be pale pink because Harriet hated blue laundries, they were so cold, and white ones were chilling to the soul and yellow ones were ordinary. Hill had taken Will out for a very stiff drink after that decision and revealed to him that the pink tiling she’d selected from their colour chart was the colour they installed in the ponciest ensuites intended for visiting Arab sheikhs and their harems. At which his brother-in-law had cheered up immensely and insisted on standing him a single malt.

    The sub-contractor in question was a local man whom they hadn’t used before and one of Hill’s tasks was to put the fear of God into the man so as to ensure the job would be done in the scheduled time-frame. And to impress upon him that YDI had set parameters for allowable breakage, whatever his other employers might have let him get away with in the past. And that he had signed a contract acknowledging that X plus N tiles would be delivered and that if he broke N plus 1, the cost of the 1 would be deducted from his cheque. The “broke” was of course in quotes but Hill normally didn’t let this show, it didn’t do to indicate that you expected your sub-contractors or their boys to rip you off.

    The rest of tomorrow was going to be spent narrowly inspecting the site, awarding praise where praise was due, collecting up progress reports that hadn’t yet been handed in by such persons as Red Watkins, and sorting out the inevitable complaints and grudges.

    On Friday morning he had a meeting with some representatives of the Chipping Ditter and District Historic Site Preservation Society, who had evidently just woken up to the fact that Chipping Abbas and Abbot’s Halt might be considered to fall within their purlieu, followed by a lunch with the Mayor of Ditterminster. With a bit of luck this might be over by three-thirty, at which time he was due to meet Julia and one of their architects to look closely at selected shops of Chipping Ditter and discuss ideas for Abbot’s Halt. Any idea of just tottering back to the hotel and falling into an exhausted stupor after that was, however, out: all attendees had to sign in and collect their conference folders by no later than six-thirty in Conference Meeting-Room Number Whatever. Or what, not specified. Not that Ms Amanda Peel from Human Resources would leap on you and tear you limb from limb, ’cos she did that anyway, didn’t she? The one consolation was that no representatives of the bloody Gano Group had volunteered themselves for this meeting.

    Hill, YDI’s Chief Drainage Engineer, two very young swimming-pool engineers, and the chief plumbing contractor for the pool and the bathhouse were looking at the embryo swimming-pool when a very familiar voice said with a laugh in it: “Hullo! What a big ’ole!”

    Hill swung round in astonishment. “What in God’s name are you doing here?”

    Colin Haworth grinned at him. “Come to see those fancy bew-teeks you told me about, and steal some ideas from you!”

    Colin was now living in a cottage belonging to John Haworth in deepest rural Hampshire, and had recently plunged himself into some sort of daft crafts centre enterprise. Planning to do up a whole row of broken-down cottages on the old green, which according to his own admission was a large square of alternately cracked and waterlogged clay. A young business couple who lived in the village but worked over in Portsmouth were in it with him. Well, it was his business what he did with his capital, not to say his life, but in Hill’s expressed opinion he could hardly have found anything more risky. There were quite a few craftspeople living in the trendily restored cottages of the village, true, but as to where the customers were going to come from…

    Feebly he replied: “The bew-teeks are over in Chipping Ditter, Colin, but we are thinking about doing something in the village here. Well—promotion and some assistance, not a whole row of cottage industries. Found a smith yet?”

    “Yeah,” said Colin, grinning all over his face. “A smith and a half!”

    “And he actually wants to come and work in that dump?”

    “She,” said Colin, grinning all over his face. “Yeah.”

    Right. Goddit. Undoubtedly the only lady blacksmith in England, but it was inevitable that Colin would’ve got her.

    “No,” said Colin to the thought rays, grinning broadly.

    Not yet, he meant. “I see,” said Hill drily.

    “Don’t let me interrupt,” he said nicely. “I’ll just watch and learn.”

    Possibly he might learn something about the engineering of swimming-pools, yes, but there was nothing else going on here that could possibly have taught Colin Haworth anything. He was born knowing how to handle men. As well as women—yes. Hill didn’t know that he was terribly keen to demonstrate his own fumbling efforts in front of him, but he got on with it.

    After some time Colin wandered off round the outside of the gigantic blue plastic tent, at the moment partly folded back, that had been supposed to keep the worst of the weather out of the big hole that had optimistically been dug last autumn when the pipes were being laid. He wandered back looking mild.

    “Go on, don’t spare us,” said Hill grimly.

    “Mm? Oh—nothing much, really. Had a similar problem—similar in kind, not in specifics,” he said with a smile, “in the desert. Seepage, mm? In our case, sand, of course.”

    The junior of the two young pool engineers burst into speech. Very complicated, it was, but the gist of it was that the water had seeped through the walls of the hole.

    “Mm, got that,” agreed Colin mildly.

    “Go on, how did you solve it?” asked Hill as it became obvious that the idiots who worked for him weren’t going to.

    Colin scratched the short wisps of red-gold curls on his cheeks. He had a bloody good jaw-line which he didn’t need to conceal and as a matter of fact this manly artefact didn’t do that. The beard hadn’t got any longer since he’d started it last September and as, strong-minded though he was, he wasn’t actually omnipotent, Hill had given in and asked. The local hairdresser. Pauline. Fell all over herself to do it, actually, old boy. (Fancy that.) Mm? Well, nominally offered a service to both ladies and gents, but— Uh, quite an audience, ’s matter of fact, mm. Disconcerting, just at first. Him? Disconcerted? Right, and Hill was a Hollander in his clogs!

    “Um, well, actually, we sprayed a lot of foam around. Quick-setting plastic stuff. Got it off the Yanks,” said Colin in an apologetic voice.

    There was a short silence. Then Bill Fletcher, YDI’s Chief Drainage Engineer, who was a good deal older than the two swimming-pool engineers, said: “Did it work?”

    “Worked for our purposes, mm. Got the ruddy great ’ole to hold its shape and our chaps were able to shove the stuff into it.”

    “Don’t ask what stuff,” warned Hill.

    “I’m not that daft, Hill,” replied Bill calmly. The younger swimming-pool engineering consultant, who had opened his mouth, shut it again.

    “Dunno that that’s what you’d need, though,” said Colin mildly. “You’d get water build-up behind it.”

    “I was just gonna say that!” cried the slightly older of the two pool engineers.

    “Well, yeah,” agreed Bill Fletcher thoughtfully.

    “Yer can’t pour concrete on top of foam,” noted the stolid plumbing contractor.

    “No, that’s right,” agreed Colin at his mildest.

    “Hang on, though!” cried the older pool engineer.

    “You can’t have the whole structure resting on foam, Frank!” cried his fellow.

    “No,” agreed Bill Fletcher, “but the immediate problem’s drainage. Say we used the foam idea, then at least we could pump the surface water off, no problem.”

    “Yes, but— No, hang on, we could maybe—” cried the one.

    “What if we used the foam to—” cried the other.

    Hill sagged as the three of them plunged into engineering talk. He personally didn’t give a damn if they used Yank-inspired plastic foam or pink spun sugar to solve their problems, or found the whole concept completely irrelevant: at least the three of them were talking!

    The middle-aged plumbing contractor caught his eye. His face was expressionless, but he winked.

    Quite some time later, when Hill and the plumber tottered in Colin’s company into the Horse & Hounds, the least trendy of Chipping Ditter’s frightful pubs, Hill groaned: “Have anything you like, Colin, on me. Have a magnum of champagne, if you fancy it. A hundred-year-old Napoleon. Anything! You got those three engineering idiots talking!”

    “No, on me!” said the stout plumber with a laugh. “Thought we were gonna be stuck there till Christmas, didn’t we, Hill?”

    Hill nodded feelingly, but protested about the round, only to be shouted down.

    “Haven’t you used those pool engineers before?” Colin asked as the stolid Rog Barnett went off to get them in.

    “No,” admitted Hill with a sigh. “Bright young engineering whizz-kids. Their firm’s quote was the best by miles—Bill Fletcher vetted it himself—plus they didn’t argue about the fucking la-de-da concept our architects had come up with—but ye gods! Talk about insecure! Well, full of themselves plus insecure. Bless you!” he said fervently.

    “Any time,” returned Colin mildly. “So what’s poor old Rog’s rôle?”

    “He’s a plumber by trade. In charge of laying the pipes to and from, in the places the whizz-kids have decreed they’ve got to go and to the specifications the whizz-kids have written down, and when and if the ’ole’s got a concrete pool lining in it, in charge of seeing the drains and filters are actually connected up and that it gets covered in the gazillion little coloured tiles the architects want, in the formal pattern of gambolling dolphins they’ve decreed shall be done—don’t ask about that one, please, the arguments raged for weeks—to stylistically match the drooping Aphrodite at the Waterhole that some of us had thought Chipping Abbas was only gonna have one of, that shall be standing around Greekly.”

    “Pouring from ’er urn?” asked Colin with interest.

    “Pouring from ’er urn as ever was,” said Hill with a shudder as Rog returned.

    “Daft,” he agreed stolidly. “Still, ours not to reason why. Cheers!”

    “Cheers, and perdition to all engineers and architects,” returned Hill, drinking.

    “Cheers!” agreed Colin. “Is this Aphrodite solid marble, Rog?”

    Rog winked. “Nope. See, Hill’s found a firm that’ll do yer a real nice of copy of anything yer fancy, looks like as nothing to marble, too.”

    “Concrete?” suggested Colin, grinning.

    “Aah! –Guess again,” he invited, wiping the back of his band across his mouth and setting his trendy tankard down.

    Colin looked from one to the other of them in horrid fascination. “The mind boggles.”

    “Plastic foam,” said Hill primly. He and Rog collapsed in agonised splutters.

    “Get out of here!”

    “No, true,” said Rog, wiping his eyes. “Some kind of polystyrene. They extrude it in the moulds, yer see, mixed with this muck that they’ve patented. Mainly cement mixed with a bit of ground-up marble, ’ud be my bet. Or maybe recycled terrazzo: the wife was saying just the other day where’s it all gone, yer never see it these days. Our first house had a sink-bench of it: the ruddy stuff scratched like buggery. Anyway, looks as realistic as anything and it’s real light to handle!” He winked. “Not to say, bore holes through for the plumbing!”

    Grinning, Hill agreed, and related the sagas of the Mars and the genuine Aphrodite being hoisted up onto the balcony. Then, as Colin seemed interested, Rog kindly explained that Red and the men, including the tilers, were sub-contractors, they weren’t his permanent employees, but of course he used his own men for the actual plumbing— Etcetera.

    “Sorry about that,” said Hill when Mr Barnett, who lived on the outskirts of Newbury, had remembered his wife was giving a dinner party tonight and rushed off to be late for it.

    “No,” replied Colin, smiling: “it’s fascinating seeing it all on a larger scale. My plumber, tiler, builder and roofing contractor is one body!” He looked wry. “Very good chap. Self-employed, never had more than a couple of lads working for him, used to doing things his own way.”

    “You really are into digging your own grave, aren’t you?” said his former subordinate in awe.

    “We’ll manage. He’ll be kept to the letter of his contract.” He smiled a little. “Within a certain amount of leeway but not too much.”

    “Good luck! This contract’ll have a clause about so-called breakage, will it?”

    “Mm. Robert, one of my partners, is a quantity surveyor by trade.”

    Hill sagged. “Trust you,” he croaked.

    “Dunno why everyone assumes that just because I fell orf the back of a truck and bashed me bonce on a hard bit of Iraq I’ve lost my marbles,” replied Colin mildly. “’Nother one?”

    “Uh—hang on, what is today?”

    “Still Wednesday.”

    “Jesus,” he muttered. “Feels like Thursday of the fortnight after next. Uh—well, there’s that meeting with the other plumber—chap who does domestic stuff—tomorrow, bright and early, but nothing on this evening, thank Christ. Make it a beer, thanks, and we can think about whether you’d like to stagger over to the hotel for dinner or suss out the trendy chop-houses of Chipping Ditter.”

    “My vote’d be for the trendy chop-houses: we want to open one down in Bellingford.”

    A trendy restaurant as well? Jesus, that bash on the bonce had bloody well affected him!

    “Melanie’s,” read Colin dubiously a little later, peering at the flowing gold script on the window of the trendy Chipping Ditter chop-house.

    “Look again,” said Hill heavily.

    “It’s quite hard to read this gold writing against that gold and brown flowery gathered curtain thing on that brass rod, I stand corrected, gathered between them two brass rods!” replied Colin with some vigour. The trendiest parts of Chipping Ditter were illuminated, not the word, by fake Victorian gas-lamps. “Nell—what?”

    “That is an M,” conceded Hill heavily.

    “Mel—Melonie’s?” he groped. “With an O?”

    “Got it in fourteen,” replied Hill heavily.

    “Hang on. Me-loh-nie’s. No, can’t be.”

    “Melonie’s with an O,” confirmed Hill, sighing.

    “Well, why the fuck hasn’t Melonie put her menu in her window?” replied Colin with some vigour.

    “Too nayce to do so, old man,” said Hill heavily.

    “Then why the Hell are we considering her, Hill?” he said with a laugh in his voice.

    “Thought you wanted terribly, terribly nayce—trendy but nayce—for Bellingford?”

    “We want edible nosh, though!”

    “Don’t think there’s any of that around. Um, The Lobster Pot?”

    “We’re about as far from the sea as it’s possible to get within the shores of Britain!”

    “You’re right. Well: frozen scampi, frozen lobster tails from, if the scuttlebutt from the hotel’s kitchen is correct, New Zealand— No? In a luverly Mornay sauce.”

    “Ugh! No!”

    “Okay, then, no.”

    They strolled on. Colin was limping—bugger. He’d long since given up the walking-stick he’d had for a while, but— Too much standing around looking at big ’oles filled with dirty water: quite.

    “The Dish and Spoon?” offered Hill weakly. “Specialises in Lancashire hot-pot.”

    “We’re not in Lancashire,” Colin replied on a neutral note.

    “How true. But it’s not real hot-pot, either.”

    “Then no, ta all the same.”

    They strolled on…

    Outside The Poor Knights of Windsor Colin began: “We’re not in—”

    “It’s a pudding, old chap,” said Hill soothingly.

    “On the menu?”

    “Mm. Eggy bread to such and you and me.”

    “For pudding? God!” he cried unguardedly.

    “Said to be a traditional old-ee English—no, okay. The lamb’s too pink and the beef’s not pink enough, anyway.”

    The Lardy Cake was closed: it was only a tea shop. It did serve something called Wiltshire lardy cake, yes. Not fresh from the oven, no. Warmed in the microwave. Colin gave him a desperate look.

    “Well, you would insist on sussing ’em out, old chap.”

    “Is there anywhere in Chipping Ditter that does serve real lardy cake?”

    “Well, no, it’s full of lard, the customers don’t want it, these days. Chef at the hotel makes it for special occasions: when the Mayor of Ditterminster’s requested a banquet with local overtones, that sort of thing.”

    “I see.” They strolled on…

    “Haven’t we seen The Hot-Pot?” said Colin in confusion outside it.

    “Uh—no. Hot-pot at The Dish and Spoon and The Lobster Pot.”

    “Well, is this one’s hot-pot any good?”

    “No. But it doesn’t serve it at this time of year, only at Christmas.”

    “I won’t ask why!”

    “No, don’t,” said Hill gratefully.

    “Um, Grayling’s?” said Colin, peering at it across the road. “Or am I only imagining it?”

    “No, ’tis its name. Very small portions, very delicately presented. Not of grayling, naturally!” he said quickly.

    “Of what?”

    “Um, hard to say. Always set on swirls of pastel sauces. Very minceur.”—Colin closed his eyes.—“Um, well, um, thinnish slices of um, like baked mousses, really. Slices.”

    “Set on pastel swirls,” agreed Colin, still with his eyes closed. “The Dish and Spoon’s bad hot-pot is beginning to sound more and more enticing!”

    “Its gravy’s like slime,” said Hill sadly.

    Colin opened his eyes. “Jesus, Hill!”

    “Well, it’s trendy nosh for trendy morons with over-renovated cottages! Their idea of hot-pot is three tiny pieces of unidentifiable protein sitting in slime and dotted with a piece of puff pastry made with marg!”

    “S’pose I needn’t ask about the pub meals?”

    Hill shuddered. “In 21st-century trendy Chipping Ditter?”

    “Right: the hotel it is, then!” he said with a laugh.

    “Yeah.” Hill looked around them. “Look, you pop into The Laughing Parrot—avoid the beer but the whisky’s all right—and I’ll fetch the car.”

    “Balls,” said Colin amiably, beginning to stroll back in the direction of the car.

    Hill sighed but didn’t argue with him. There was no point in it at all.

    At the hotel he steered Colin gently away from the main dining-room and into the little one that called itself The Huntsman’s Repose, advising him to ignore that fact. There was absolutely no question about what to have, because Chef himself came in beaming and told them the Stewed Sussex Steak was on tonight. There were field mushrooms and a choice of new or mashed potatoes; and would Hill care for a curly endive salad after it? He would, indeed, and advised Colin to do likewise. And something light to start with, Chef? There was some very nice smoked cod’s roe. Rubbing his hands, Hill opted for that. A trifle dubiously Colin followed suit, confessing when Chef had toddled off, beaming, “I don’t care all that much for English taramasalata, old man.”

    “It won’t be that!” said Hill confidently. “He’s not above serving it in the main dining-room, mind you, especially for banquets—though his version’s not bad, he uses just enough garlic and plenty of lemon, if he does thin the stuff out with potato and yoghurt”—Colin gulped—“but you wait!”

    “Yeah. Um, wine?” he said dubiously.

    Hill shook his head. “Leave all that to Marcel.”

    “You’re the boss,” he said limply.

    “His real name’s Mike and he comes from Bognor Regis but there is nothing he doesn’t know about wine. Brought him a couple of bottles from old man Tarlington’s cellar and he nearly cried!” said Hill with a laugh.

    “Promising,” he acknowledged. “Um, no soup?” he murmured.

    “Not if Chef hasn’t suggested it, no. We’ll probably get a pound and a half of rump each.”

    Colin smiled feebly. “I get it.”

    The smoked roe was superb: thick slices with warm, soft brown buttered toast, and lemon wedges. Marcel produced a dry Riesling which he thought they might like to try with it.

    “My God,” said Colin reverently.

    Hill looked smug. “See? Simple but good.”

    The beef, even though they were not in Sussex and, as Hill was perfectly well aware, Colin preferred beef to be rare, was incredible. Melt-in-the-mouth, the stewing having been done with port and stout and something secret and delicious. Onions? If so, all melted into the sauce. Gosh. The Châteauneuf du pape wasn’t half bad, either.

    “There’s something definitely wrong here!” said Colin with a laugh. “These mushrooms taste like mushrooms!”

    “Yes,” agreed Hill. “Field mushrooms.”

    “Uh—mushrooms grow in amongst rapeseed plants?”

    “You may well sneer,” returned Hill on a weak note. “Well, I dunno where Chef gets them from, and I have to say it, we’ve really lucked out, he bloody rarely does get ’em, but these are real field mushrooms. He wouldn’t have told us they were if they weren’t.”

    “Unique amongst chefs,” said Colin groggily.

    Hill cleared his throat. “Employee to employee, old chap.”

    “So it’s true hotel staff eat better than the guests!”

    “Ssh! –Fathead,” he said, grinning at him. “Those Chef likes, yeah.”

    “How does he put it through the books?” he asked faintly.

    Hill thought of Viv’s immaculate supply-chain system. His shoulders shook. “Breakage!”

    “Got it,” acknowledged Colin drily.

    “Something wrong?” said Hill as his old commanding officer paused over the salade de frisée with his fork suspended and his mouth slightly open.

    Colin shut his mouth, chewed and swallowed. “Wrong? No! I have never had a salad like this in England!”

    “No,” agreed Hill. “Had one just like it in France. Chef told me he eats ’em all the time himself but the clients don’t like curly endive. Always asks me if I’d like one, now.”

    “What in God’s name does he put in the vinaigrette?” he croaked,

    “Nothing. I mean, it’s a vinaigrette. I grant you half our clients ask for something sicky with balsamic vinegar and the Yanks ask for Thousand Island sicky something—but nevertheless.”

    Colin sighed blissfully. “Can it get better?”

    “Only if you like Stilton,” conceded Hill, grinning.

    Take it for all in all the meal was so good that Hill was almost able to face the prospect of Harriet’s plumbing on the morrow with equanimity.

    Like death and taxes the morrow rolled round. Colin didn’t seem in any hurry to get back to rural Hampshire, and accompanied him happily to Chipping Abbas. Inside the house chaps were still up on ladders and dropping heavy weights here and there, so as he wanted to look round Hill gave him a hard hat, ordering briefly: “Wear it.”

    “Yes, sir!” replied Colin, saluting. However, he obediently put the hat on before wandering off on a tour of inspection.

    Heaven was not merciful and after Hill and the local plumber had had a very satisfactory confab Harriet did turn up as threatened. She’d been looking at these lovely friezes—No.—It was only one row of tiles—No.—But it would be really easy for Mr Porter to—No. The plans were finalized, Harriet, and out here—gripping his sister’s arm in grip of steel—see these pallets? These were the tiles. Mr Porter had a definite contract to lay these tiles and no others, didn’t you, George? Poor George cleared his throat and agreed that was right.

    “Like, see, they charge us for excess breakage, Mrs Blaiklock. Like, um, they’ve counted the number of tiles we’re gonna need and given us a few spares—”

    “But then there’ll be some left over, that’ll save you money!”

    “Harriet, we won’t go into the varied sizes and shapes that frieze tiles come in and the ninety-nine percent likelihood of complete incompatibility with your wall-tiles,”—his sister glared bitterly—“we’ll just say that laying friezes is not the job George has contracted for and if he has to pay his boys for fiddling round with friezes he’ll be out of pocket!”

    Mr Porter cleared his throat. “That’s about right, Mrs Blaiklock.”

    “But we could pay you extra! And it’s just one row!”

    “It is not just one row,” said Hill grimly, “it’s cutting the wall-tiles to size to fit round this extra bloody row that has not been calculated for. Added to which, have you discussed this frieze notion with Will?”

    “No, but— You men are all alike!” she said bitterly.

    “Yes,” he agreed succinctly.

    Pouting, his sister demanded: “Well, how much extra would it be?”

    Giving Mr Porter a warning look, Hill named a sum. Harriet was unable to restrain a gasp. “That’s excluding the cost of the tiles,” he noted.

    Mr Porter cleared his throat. “Well, yes. More or less, Mrs Blaiklock,” he muttered. “Labour costs, see. Overtime, most like. We got a contract to finish this job in a certain time.”

    “Yes. Everything is agreed, Harriet, and that’s that,” said Hill flatly.

    Very red, Harriet marched off to inspect another room.

    “Sorry, George,” said Hill glumly to his contractor.

    “They’re all like that,” replied the experienced Mr Porter.

    “Yeah, but you don’t expect ’em on this kind of project!” he admitted, patting him on the shoulder. “Come on, better stop her before she decides on a gold-plated bidet for the boys’ bathroom.”

    Grinning feebly, Mr Porter trudged in his wake.

    The sink was gonna go where they had previously decided—after a very great deal of discussion—that it should go and the outside pipes were already in, Harriet. Mr Porter thought it would be easy enough to put the dishwasher over here if she really— No. Because the kitchen cupboards had already been cut to size. And she supposed correctly that that was all stupid contracts, too. Likewise the laundry tub was gonna go in X spot as per the plan. She was now very, very flushed but the experienced Mr Porter attacked a pallet, whipped out a couple of the laundry’s Goddawful pink tiles and held them up to show her how nice they’d look.

    “See, and the morning sun’ll come in through that little window, and you can see the trees and all!” he encouraged her.

    Her eyes lit up. “I’ll have African violets on the sill!”

    Hill gulped but Mr Porter replied with every evidence of sincerity: “Real pretty, that’ll look, and they should do real good there.”

    “African violets!” said a familiar voice with a laugh in it. “Lovely!” And Colin stuck his hard-hatted head round the laundry door, grinning. “Hullo, can I take me ’at off now?” he said meekly.

    “Colin!” gasped Harriet, turning all colours of the rainbow. “What are you doing here? Don’t say he’s got you working on his daft conversion!”

    “No, this is a visitor’s ’ard ’at,” said Colin solemnly, removing it. “Came down to see how he’s getting on.” He came and pecked her cheek. “It’s really lovely to see you again, Harriet.”

    “Yes, you, too. You’re looking very well. When did you start the beard?” she croaked.

    “Oh—in ’orspital. Bored stiff, nothing to do, had to lie still.”

    “It really suits you!” she decided, beaming.

    After that it was all plain sailing, really. Harriet showed Colin every detail of the flat, and he appeared thrilled by it all. The gold taps for the guest bathroom which at one point had hovered ominously on the horizon weren’t even mentioned. And the Ladies’ Lawn with its daffodils and jonquils was greatly admired—Hill meanwhile sending up a prayer of thanks that he’d remembered in time to tell Red to get one of the chaps to get all those dead leaves and muck off it.

    Those who had thought that Hill might get rid of his sister by lunchtime were wrong. “What do you usually do for lunch?” she beamed, having waved the lucky Mr Porter off under the interested gaze of half Red’s chaps.

    “Grab a sandwich on the site.”

    “You can’t do that with Colin here!” she cried in shocked tones.

    “Growing boys need their lunch,” explained Colin primly.

    “You certainly do, after a stint in hospital like you’ve had! And you don’t need to be standing around all day! I suppose your flat’s kitchen’s not ready, is it, Hilly?”

    “No, uh, same stage as yours,” he muttered.

    “Your flat?” said Colin, grinning.

    “Don’t tell me he hasn’t shown it to you!”

    “Harriet, I’m not even sure yet that I’m going to use—”

    Ignoring this entirely, his sister led them off inexorably to it. “See, you can go in through the house, but they’ve put in this lovely flight of steps for him—that’s the east terrace, don’t ask me what those silly men are doing to it, it looked perfectly all right to me!”

    “Drainage. French doors. Rotted frames,” said Hill feebly.

    Harriet sniffed, but didn’t pursue it. “We go up here, this is his balcony—that’s a nymph,” she said firmly as Colin’s eyes bulged.

    “Right,” he croaked. “Oh! Yes, Hill mentioned…”

    “Chappie at the other end’s the Mars,” said Hill neutrally.

    Colin coughed. “Mm.”

    “Now, out here,” said Harriet briskly, “he’ll be able to have a really nice set of patio furniture!” Briskly she wrested Hill’s keys off him and, pointing out in passing the loveliness of the new French windows up here, led them in through the very fake Georgian front door.

    “I see, first and second floors,” said Colin nicely.

    Briskly Harriet agreed: “Yes. Well, the second floor was only the attics in this part of the house, but quite spacious!”

    “Ooh, this is nice,” said Colin in what according to Harriet was Hill’s new bedroom. It was a long room, with, pace Harriet’s “spacious,” a noticeably low ceiling.

    “Studio-style,” said Harriet with satisfaction. “Room for a nice big bed, you see!”

    Bloody Colin took this completely in his stride.

    “So glad it meets with your approval,” said Hill on a sardonic note as Harriet re-inspected the ensuite.

    “It does,” he said with a smile. “What was all that about 18th-century wallpaper?”

    “It’s Goddawful: yellowed and nasty. They found it underneath something else in the fearsome reception room that was on the first floor. Harriet’s convinced that it’s just what my bedroom needs. –It ain’t a-gonna happen,” he assured him as Harriet came back in, rather flushed.

    “Your toilet’s not in yet, either!”

    “Eh? No, George is about to do them, Harriet,” he said patiently.

    “But where do you all go?”

    “The chaps have got Portaloos.”

    Colin looked at Harriet’s face. He went over to her and put his arm lightly round her shoulders. “Give over, you bloody birk,” he said mildly to Major Tarlington.

    “Um, sorry, Harriet, didn’t think,” said Hill feebly.

    “What about the bathroom we used last summer?”

    “Edwardian plumbing all the way down, had to be ripped out,” said Hill, biting his lip. “The fixtures will go back, with a bit of tarting up, but— Sorry. Well, uh, head for the village?”

    They did that. Unfortunately the terrifying parakeet’s cottage was the nearest one with a body home. Mrs Everton was only too thrilled to see Sir Hilliard and Mrs Blaiklock again and only too thrilled to let Harriet use her lavatory. Ditto to meet Colin, asking him coyly whether he by any chance was an Army chum of Sir Hilliard’s and giving a delighted crow—or possibly a psittacine cackle—when he admitted he was. Then disclosing coyly that she had noticed the limp and blah, blah, blah… He took all this in his stride, as well.

    “You’ll like Chipping Ditter,” Harriet promised Colin happily as they piled back into the Range Rover. “It’s got some lovely little cafés!”

    That was it, then. I, T. And, sure enough, she headed straight for The Lardy Cake like a homing pigeon.

    Back at Chipping Abbas a good deal later than Hill had intended Harriet regretfully collected her car and headed for home.

    “Just be thankful they live far enough away for it to be a really foul drive if one leaves it any later,” said Hill grimly as Colin waved vigorously, smiling. He led the way at a fast pace towards the site of the formal rose garden down below the west terrace.

    “Slow down a bit,” said Colin without heat.

    Hill slowed down abruptly. “Hell. Sorry. Are you okay?”

    “Yes. Have to be a bit careful of the ankle on a slope, that’s all. Take that look off your face, I’m not a crock. Just can’t use the ankle as a brake.”

    “Yeah. Um—sorry,” said Hill lamely as they reached their destination.

    Colin was gaping at the chaos. “You might well be! Are these chaps gardeners?”

    “Uh—helpers. Couple of chaps telling ’em what to do. Uh—no, meant for today. Hellishly boring for you—sorry.”

    Colin looked at him in surprise. “I enjoyed every minute of it, you ass! The stout George desperately managing Harriet, Harriet’s pink tiles and chronic mind-changing, the design for her kitchen—sounds lovely, actually, wouldn’t have thought of bright red tiles and white cupboards, myself, must tell Terri about it—the Ladies’ Lawn, the saga of Henrietta Tarlington’s little sitting-room, your balcony with that frightening Aphrodite at the Waterhole, even the lardy cakes and that excruciatingly ladylike waitress!” He laughed. “Slices of life!”

    “Oh,” said Hill feebly. “Good show.” Terri was Colin’s au pair and all he knew of her was that she was half Colin’s age, half Spanish and some sort of connection of Rosie Haworth’s. And a marvellous cook. “How is Terri?”

    “Don’t look at me like that, you know perfectly well she’s young enough to be my daughter—and as a matter of fact, I wish she was my daughter, bless her. –Fallen badly for one of Rosie’s more glamorous actor friends,” he explained. “The chap’s just about woken up to the fact of her existence, so Rosie and I are keeping our fingers crossed!”

    “Oh,” he said numbly. “Wouldn’t have put you down as a matchmaker.”

    “You’ve got me all wrong, in that case,” replied Colin with the utmost tranquillity. “Look, does that chap over there with the bulldozer know what he’s doing?”

    “No,” decided Hill heavily. He strode off, yelling: “OY! SEAN! What the fuck’s going on? Where’s Red?”

    Colin propped himself on a handy plinth—stone: badly chipped, minus any urn it might have been designed to support—and watched, smiling a little.

    Hill’s Friday morning of course was consecrated to the meeting with the representatives of the Chipping Ditter and District Historic Site Preservation Society. Colin passed on that one, as likewise the mayoral luncheon. But he was up for touring the bew-teeks of Chipping Ditter with Julia and the architect in the afternoon. Hill managed to squash his “Who is Julia, what is she?” with the remark that he was misquoting, as likewise his tender enquiry as to whether her leg was dainty as a h’egg. Though unable to stop himself choking slightly over the latter. Workmate only. And yes, she did think so, too!

    It was of course perfectly apparent to Colin Haworth when they met that Julia Weekes thought rather more than this, but nothing in his voice or manner indicated he’d realized it.

    “Mm,” he said slowly, as they emerged from Raggedy Ann’s.

    “We’ve got makers of squashed-faced, leering dolls over at Abbot’s Halt, too,” noted Hill.

    “Eh? Mm. That was crocheted lace, was it, Julia?”

    Eagerly Julia assured him that it was, but very fine. Adding regretfully: “We haven’t got a lacemaker in the district.”

    “We have,” said Colin with a little smile.

    “Really?” she gasped. “Ooh, she’d be a real draw, Colin! She could sit in the sun with—”

    “Her cushion on her knee!” he chimed in, laughing. “My thoughts exactly!”

    After that she ate out of his hand—not that she hadn’t pretty much been, all along. Their age and marital status was irrelevant: they all fell for Colin like ninepins. Gordy Fanshaw, the young architect, didn’t seem unimpressed, either, and this wasn’t because he was gay, though he was, it was because people nearly always liked Colin.

    By the time they’d done the rounds, with Julia and Gordy both making copious notes and taking snaps, it was definitely time for tea and as of course YDI’s employees were used to the hotel’s Solarium Colin urged Julia and Gordy nicely to choose a place in the village. Gordy thought that while of course Grayling’s was lovely for dinner, either The Lardy Cake or The Pippin & Pipe would be best for tea, so as Colin had already tried the former they chose the latter, Julia having been assured that no, of course smoking wasn’t allowed inside.

    Inside the Restorationised interior Colin looked around, bright-eyed.

    “Just mind yer ’ead on the beams,” warned Hill grimly.

    Hurriedly Gordy explained that the beams were all at least six-foot-six off the ground, he knew the architects—well, no, not those ones bracing them in the corners, but then, one wasn’t expected to walk there!

    “So it’s all restored, is it, Gordy?” asked Colin nicely.

    Eagerly Gordy explained that the inspiration had been a genuine little 17th-century cottage, and there had originally been one on the site… Hill just sat back and let Colin cope with it, after all he’d begged for it, and wondered dreamily if the punters were supposed actually to believe that the rather patina-ed, slightly cracked portraits in their wide oaken frames did represent Mr Pepys with his pipe and Nell Gwynne with her oranges. ’Cos he could almost believe the former in spite of the overtones of The Laughing Cavalier, but the latter was very definitely Lily Rose Rayne.

    “Good, isn’t it?” said Colin with a grin, sitting back and letting Gordy and Julia confer over the menu. “See that painting over there? That’s Rosie!”

    Quite. “One wonders why,” he murmured.

    “Er—the ones with ’ormones don’t, old man.”

    “Not that, you ass!”

    “No, well, the thing is,” said Colin, grinning, “Rosie made the mistake of coming in here for tea when she was down here for some festival in her Lily Rose Rayne persona and saying how Restoration it was and mentioning that she’d once played Nell—”

    “Don’t go on,” he sighed.

    “Ooh, do you know Lily Rose, Colin?” cried Julia.

    As his fellow YDI employees were now both looking at Colin with shining eyes, Hill just sat back and let it wash over him with the rest…

    Perhaps fortunately Julia and Gordy had come together in a hire-car so he was able to groan as he and Colin followed them to Abbot’s Halt in the Range Rover: “The Duchesse de Mazarin’s cates?”

    Colin dissolved in sniggers, though finally able to gasp: “That perfect menu did say she died in Chelsea in 1699, old boy!”

    “That would explain the Chelsea buns, no doubt.”

    “Hill, it was a scream! And the cakes were all delicious, however spelled!”

    “Well, yes, but ye gods! Could they have got more ersatz if they’d tried? And did you have to embarrass us all by asking the woman for the recipe for those fucking Mazarines?”

    Of course he had, it was for Terri! And he sat back smugly and bored on and on and on about the luscious and extremely fattening fare she produced for him. At the end of it Hill was barely capable of responding: “It’s a wonder you’re not as fat as butter.”

    “Yes, isn’t it?” he replied smugly, so Hill gave him up as a bad job.

    Gordy was horrified by Abbot’s Halt and only slightly mollified by Hill’s pointing out that at least there were no buildings hereabouts dating any later than 1900. Or, in the case of the garage, 1790: it was an old barn.

    He looked at dispiritedly at the Superette.

    “The woman who owns it said it used to be a different colour,” offered Julia valiantly.

    “I like the yellow,” protested Colin. “It’s bright—cheery.”

    “Colin, it’s hideous!” cried Gordy. “I suppose the building itself isn’t entirely impossible.”

    Julia stepped back and tipped her head back. “It’s a funny sort of layout, isn’t it?”

    It was that, all right. Possibly originally two largely brick cottages, possibly semidetached, but a top storey had been added over the right-hand one and half of the left-hand one. Then, possibly later, a lower bit had been added on top of the left-hand one. Or possibly earlier. The upper right section seemed to have been plastered. At any rate what was under the yellow looked relatively smooth. To either side of the front door the walls were defaced by, well, not large plate-glass windows, no. Largish.

    “I think most of the interior walls would have been ripped out long since,” offered Hill.

    Grimly Gordy went in to see.

    Miriam was busy with two women customers at the counter; possibly just as well. YDI’s architect’s reaction to the interior was not exactly enthusiastic. In fact he came up to where Hill and Colin were pretending to look at the tinned peas and said bitterly: “Not an original interior wall in the place!”

    “Um, that one?” said Hill feebly, pointing to their left.

    “Partition,” he said grimly.

    “What about the floor, Gordy?” offered Julia on what for Julia was definitely a weak note.

    “See for yourself.” He led her over to a convenient corner, and lifted the vinyl with his penknife. Everyone came and peered. Under the vinyl was a grey underlay. Under the underlay was grey concrete.

    “Back there,” he said, giving the bead-curtained entrance to the back regions a sour look, “it is wood, but what use is that? And the shelves aren’t even original!”

    That was horridly self-evident. The ones against the walls were industrial metal shelving and the free-standing ones were lighter weight but equally metal.

    “There’s a nice sideboard behind the counter,” offered Julia. “Over to the side.”

    “One sideboard,” he said sourly.

    At this point Miriam’s voice said loudly and crossly: “Can I help you?” and it dawned that her customers had vanished.

    “Hullo, Miriam, how are you?” replied Hill with his nicest smile, strolling up to the counter.

    “Much the same as I was the other day, thanks,” returned Miriam evilly. “Did you want anything or are you all just gonna stand there criticising my shop?”

    Colin came quickly up to Hill’s elbow. “Don’t take any notice, they’re being terrifically architectural today. Personally I think it’s a lovely shop! You’ve got really a good layout. You can hardly move in my local shop, let alone see what’s on the bottom shelves.”

    Looking slightly mollified, Miriam replied: “Those sloping modules are good for shops. They’re old, of course, but I’ve kept them because they’re so convenient.”

    “Of course! I say, you wouldn’t have any packets of loose tea, would you?”

    Hill at this barely repressed a gulp. Two minutes since the bugger had been standing right in front of the loose tea! But sure enough, Miriam beamed, came out from behind the counter and led him over to the tea, talking nineteen to the dozen. Not everyone liked teabags and there was still quite a demand, and it tasted so much fresher— Bloody Colin agreed with her every word.

    Oblivious to the niceties of intra-village relations, Gordy and Julia were still conferring. Finally he came up to the counter and said without preamble: “Could I have a closer look at that sideboard?”

    Miriam glared. “You’re the architect, I presume?”

    “He is, but he can’t help it!” said Colin with a laugh, patting his shoulder. “Come on, Hill, old man, introduce us all!”

    Apologising feebly, Hill performed introductions.

    “I’m just a friend, Miriam, come down to see what Hill’s up to,” said Colin meekly. “Have you been up to Chipping Abbas lately? No? Frightful mess! ’Orrible great ’ole over to the right of the house with five feet of muddy water in it, chaps with bulldozers and similar giant ingins tearing out the shrubs, ’uge ditches with gigantic pipes in them leading every which way, mud to the eyebrows!”

    “Help!” said Miriam with a giggle. “I must say, the men who come in here for provisions do tend to be rather muddy, but I didn’t think it was that bad!”

    “Worse,” said Colin solemnly.

    Why this should have reduced Miriam to a helpless, shaking jelly God only knew, but it did. At any rate she let Gordy poke his penknife into her sideboard without argument, even imparting the information that she thought it had always been in the shop and of course this hadn’t been where she lived when she was a kid.

    “Solid oak,” he reported with a deep sigh. “Possibly Queen Anne, or slightly earlier.”

    “Queen Anne?” said Miriam with a laugh. “It can’t be, it hasn’t even got nice curved legs!”

    Gordy rose from his squatting position, carefully shutting the cupboard. “Yes. Cottage ware, of course. Look, Julia, it’s got the original latches!”

    “Those stupid handle things?” said Miriam. “They’re a real nuisance. One fell off the other day. I was gonna buy a proper handle in Ditterminster but Ted Prosser went and fixed it. Well, if you’re interested, there’s another one out the back and some other stuff, cupboards and that, in the spare bedroom—I had them all moved in there, I don’t use it.”

    Needing no further invitation, Gordy rushed off eagerly, and Julia, entering notes madly into her laptop, rushed off in his wake.

    “They’re really inconvenient, they wouldn’t do in a shop,” said Miriam firmly to Hill and Colin.

    “Not practical, no,” agreed Colin sycophantically, “but if they’re anything like this super sideboard they would look lovely standing around. We’ve spent the afternoon looking at the way the shops in Chipping Ditter have been done up. Do you know The Pippin & Pipe? Lovely teas!” he said as Miriam explained she’d never been in there, the name was sort of off-putting. “No, there’s no smoking, the only pipe’s in a picture on the wall. It’s very Restoration in style: they’ve got a picture of Nell Gwynne, too,” he said without a flicker, “but frankly, they haven’t got anything half as interesting as your antique sideboard!”

    This went down very well indeed and after Colin and Miriam had had a rapturous conversation about lovely teas, whether The Pippin & Pipe’s, The Lardy Cake’s or the Boddiford Hall Park Royal Solarium’s, she was softened up enough to look at Gordy’s rapid sketch and say with a giggle: “Help! This place could never look like that!”

    Smoothly Julia intervened with: “Of course it could, with remarkably little effort. Now, as we see it—” Using the adjoining room for the larger bins and the coffee roaster, genuine old reproduction Willow Pattern against the oak shelving—the blue was nice, of course, but there were some lovely pink versions, too—mixture of wooden bins and big china ones, and at least one set of those lovely little drawers—they were all in there. Miriam just stared with her mouth slightly open as it went on and on and on.

    “Buh-but my customers just want ordinary things,” she faltered at last.

    Colin gave Hill a warning glance. “Of course they do! As a matter of fact, Miriam, if this old furniture of yours is as authentic as these experts seem to think, you should probably consider selling it.” He ignored the horrified gasps from Gordy and Julia and smiled at her. “One of the big arts and antiques auction houses would probably get you several thousand for each piece.”

    “Several thousand? That old stuff?’ she croaked.

    “Well, yes,” admitted Gordy sadly, under Colin’s hard stare. “It’s in very good condition.”

    “There you are!” said Colin with a lovely smile.

    “Yes. Some money would be nice, I have to admit. I—I was thinking of something more cottagey, for the shop. Um, with pretty print curtains,” she faltered.

    “Exactly! More like a pretty little shop of the Thirties, mm? Lots of cream paint, bright print curtains, a nice reproduction linoleum on the floor to tone!”

    “Congoleum, and it was horrid, usually,” said Gordy with a frown.

    “Miriam’s shop would not have anything ’orrid!” returned Colin with a laugh.

    “No. Um, cream could be nice,” she agreed. “Not too dark.”

    “Exactly! You think about it, Miriam, and don’t let this lot talk you into anything you don’t fancy! –Come on, you ’orrible conversion project people, wasn’t there a rumour that you’ve got a project management conference this evening?”

    “Oh, help, yes!” gasped Julia.

    And with that, thanking Miriam nicely for the packet of tea, Colin shepherded them all out of the Superette. “You pack of conversion project clots!” he said with a laugh as they reached the cars. “Couldn’t you see it was all too much for the poor little woman? And for God’s sake, doing up her entire place as a Queen Anne hole in the wall? What were you gonna call it? The Pitch-Dark Poky Epicerie?”

    “It’d be a crime to let those pieces go to auction!” cried Gordy in anguish.

    “All right, buy ’em—or make the firm buy ’em, dare say you can use ’em somewhere.”

    Hill cleared his throat. “Yeah. Colin’s right: something bright and pretty. Dare say if she agrees to cream paint we can talk her into some Thirties-look cupboards. –I don’t think she’d mind if we did the outside up, Gordy,” he said as the young architect lodged his complaint, “but try not to blind her with science, okay?”

    “Bow windows would be nice,” said Julia thoughtfully. “With little panes.”

    That was undoubtedly It, then. “Exactly: very popular in the Thirties, bow windows were,” said Hill firmly, ignoring Gordy’s horrified gasp.

    … “Ta ever so, Colonel, sir,” he said feebly as he drove Colin to Ditterminster station.

    “Sorry!” replied Colin cheerfully. “Didn’t mean to muscle in on your show!”

    “Thank God you did! I thought Miriam was going to pass out at one stage.”

    “Mm,” he said thoughtfully. “Seemed ratty when we went in, too, did you notice? Think you, or possibly YDI, might’ve done something to get up her nose.”

    “But she seemed really keen on us helping her do up the shop when I first broached it.”

    “Uh-huh. How far back was that?”

    “What? I don’t know, Colin! A fair while back, I suppose. I dare say I haven’t mentioned it to her since, but the firm sent her some legal bumf to look at just the other week.”

    “Mm. Tactical error. It sounds as if you left it too long, the poor woman probably thought you’d changed your mind. And legal bumf isn’t usually a terribly good move without the personal touch as well. A rational human being wouldn’t react that way, of course. But—aside from thee and me—how many of those have you actually met?”

    Hill opened his mouth. He shut it again.

    “Bit of a besetting sin, actually, old man,” he said apologetically “Y’do tend to assume people are going to be as rational as you are, and to—well, see things in black and white. Instead of shades of ’orrible creeping grey!” he added with a little laugh.

    “Thanks, Colin, that’s very clear.”

    “Have you managed to see Hattie again?” asked Colin cautiously.

    “NO!” he shouted.

    “Mm. Er—well, God knows with my track record I’ve no right to offer advice, but, uh, a relationship needs even more work than a project, Hill, old chap. I’d keep plugging on.”

    Hill retorted crossly: “I know that! I’m doing my best to!”

    “Mm. Good,” replied Colonel Haworth calmly.