A Christmas Cracker: The only festive romance to curl up with this Christmas!. Trisha Ashley

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      ‘No matter for tonight, for I’m sure I can find a tin of tuna in the cupboard, if he would like that, and I have lots of odd saucers he can use until you find his own crockery.’

      She made it sound as if he always travelled with a complete Minton dinner service, but I agreed that he would love tuna.

      ‘Did you say he was called Pie?’

      ‘Yes, but spelled P-Y-E, short for Pyewacket. It’s from an old film called Bell, Book and Candle, which my mother loved.’

      Too late, I thought that perhaps Quakers might not be that keen on films about witchcraft, but she said cheerfully enough, ‘Oh, I remember that one – hokum, but amusing. I used to be very fond of going to the cinema when I was a young thing. Now, come along with me, Pye, while Tabitha freshens up. Join us in the drawing room when you’re ready, dear. I’ll pop the nice hotpot I made earlier in a slow oven to reheat and we can have dinner as soon as these Tag People have been.’

      She made them sound like a tribe.

      When I arrived back at the drawing room, it was to find two strangers there and Mercy explaining to Silas what they were going to do.

      ‘I did tell you earlier, Silas,’ she pointed out. ‘I knew you weren’t listening.’

      ‘I’d have heard if you’d told me someone was going to come and put a tag on the new girl’s leg, as if she was a pigeon,’ he said testily. ‘Load of nonsense.’

      ‘It’s so they know if Tabitha has left the house at night,’ Mercy said.

      ‘Yes, I can’t leave between seven at night and seven in the morning, until the tag is removed in a couple of months – isn’t that right?’ I turned for corroboration from the newcomers, a man and a woman, and they said it was.

      The tagging was soon done, but the layout of the house gave them problems, it being very much wider than it was deep. My tag must allow me to walk from one end to the other – but then, it would also allow me to leave the house and walk a short way. But when Mercy pointed out that I still couldn’t get beyond the moat, they thought that would be acceptable.

      Mercy invited them to stay to dinner and seemed genuinely disappointed when they said they couldn’t, even waving them off from the front door as if they had been old friends she hadn’t wanted to part with. I deduced that she extended this amicable spirit to most people she met, because although the taggers (whose names I hadn’t managed to catch) were nice, they weren’t that nice. I mean, I’ve never indulged in an ankle bracelet because I think they’re naff, and now I had a super-naff semi-permanent plastic one.

      In our absence, Silas had hobbled through to the kitchen and was now seated at one end of the long pine table, with a checked napkin tucked into his blue lambswool jumper. Pye was sitting on a Windsor chair by the big Aga stove, though I noticed there was a utilitarian electric one nearby, too.

      It was a strangely homely meal. Mercy dished out bowls of rich brown casserole in which bobbed dumplings and chunks of beef and carrots, served along with a basket of warm and floury soft bread rolls, and we set to. I discovered I was hungry. I’d forgotten what that felt like.

      We followed that with cheese and biscuits and the remains of a big sherry trifle, into which I nearly slumped, since by then I was so dazed with food and exhaustion my backbone seemed to be wilting.

      ‘Here, take the coffee tray through to the drawing room, Tabby, and sit with Silas, while I pop everything in the dishwasher,’ Mercy suggested.

      ‘I’ll help you first,’ I said.

      ‘No, no, you’re too tired tonight. Go and pour the coffee and I’ll be with you in a minute. We keep early hours here, so you can get off to bed as soon as we’ve had it.’

      ‘I’ll be off to my bed straight after the coffee, too,’ Silas agreed.

      ‘I know you like to watch the news on the TV first,’ Mercy said, then explained to me, ‘I’m afraid Silas has the only TV in the house. I don’t bother, because I like to listen to the radio. But I could get a little one for your room, if you missed it.’

      ‘No, I don’t mind in the least. I like to read, or work on my papercuts, in the evening.’

      Pye came into the drawing room with us and continued to make much of Silas, who seemed to like him more than he did me, for he still glowered at me from time to time. But then, that might just be his natural expression. His nose and chin appeared to be attempting to join forces and his eyes were sunken under amazingly bushy eyebrows, which didn’t help.

      Silas went to his rooms the moment he had had his coffee, and I told Mercy I would, too.

      ‘Yes, do go, dear. I’ll lock up and follow suit. Of course, when I’m away Job makes sure that the house is secured for the night before he leaves, after serving Silas his dinner. Silas has those frozen ready meals delivered that you just heat up in the microwave – he loves them – but when I’m home I cook the dinner with a little preparation beforehand by Freda, Job’s wife, and we eat together. Then, in the morning, do help yourself to breakfast in the kitchen if I’m not there, and give Pye anything he wants.’

      I nodded, taking in only half of this through crashing tidal waves of tiredness. Mercy seemed to produce a running commentary to her life, but I thought perhaps if I missed something it would come round again … and probably again after that, too.

      ‘It will be such fun, showing you over the house and mill tomorrow!’ she said, before kissing me warmly and with such kindness to someone who was not only a stranger but, for all she knew, a criminal, that it brought tears to my eyes.

      ‘I hope you’ll be very happy here,’ she said. ‘Good night, my dear.’

      Pye, following me back into the kitchen wing, made brief use of the cat-flap again, before joining me in my quarters and watching with interest as I unpacked the basic necessities before getting into bed. It was soft, lavender-scented and warm, and felt as if it was undulating … perhaps it was and I was floating away on the moat among the quacking ducks …

      I half woke as four furry feet landed next to me with a heavy thump.

      ‘Good night, Pye,’ I said, wondering, as I fell asleep, at the astonishing turn my life had taken.

       Chapter 9: Rumbled

       Q: Who delivers presents to cats?

       A: Santa Paws!

      I’d slept deeply and dreamlessly and woke feeling the heaviness and warmth of Pye hogging most of the bed. For a moment I thought it was some kind of lovely dream and I was still in my room at the open prison. But then Pye rabbit-kicked me a couple of times with his back legs before leaping off the bed and I was wide awake, seeing the unfamiliar shapes of the furniture in the small room and remembering where I was. I could feel the tag around my ankle, too.

      I switched on the bedside lamp, for it was only just starting to get light, and looked at my watch. It was five and the rest of the house was, naturally, still silent.

      Pye СКАЧАТЬ