Lucy sent Anna a text in answer to hers asking if she’d like her to come and fetch Freddie. She said the boys were playing happily together and invited her over for a cup of tea or a glass of wine.
Exhausted and unhappy with all that had happened Anna gratefully took her up on her invitation. She texted back that she was in the village having helped Mattie to pack for her stay in the castle, but now that Simon had taken over ferrying everyone who was going to stay there, she would love to come over, if that was all right.
Great. Go straight down the road beside my shop and after about a ten-minute walk, you’ll come to a large house, standing back from the road, green door.
Lucy texted back.
Anna went out into the dark. Strings of coloured Christmas lights shone out in the gloom, dancing on the black water covering the ground, adding a touch of magic to the sad destruction. She walked carefully through the water and passed Lucy’s cake shop. The door was open and she saw Colin going through some cupboards and packing bits up in a crate, and discarding those that were ruined in a sodden pile on the floor. She popped her head in, ‘How’s it going?’
He looked tired and strained and she wished she could do something to help. ‘Bad. I’m trying to protect what I can in case it floods again tonight, though there’s no more rain forecast and the river seems to have gone down a bit. At least our house is safe. It’s tragic for those whose cottages are flooded.’
‘It is. They smell terrible, a bit like wet dogs but worse. It’s a good thing you don’t have any carpets here. I’ve seen Mattie’s cottage; the downstairs is ruined,’ she told him.
Colin sighed, ‘I’m so sorry. Fortunately Julius has now been reached and is trying to get an earlier flight. He’s given Simon the go ahead to take whatever steps are needed. I don’t know how the insurance will react when they find half the village bedded down in the castle.’
‘Luckily not as many as that, but where else will those poor people go? Anyway, it makes sense, all those empty rooms going begging. I bet whoever once owned the castle would do the same.’ Anna, exhausted and upset by all that had happened to the lovely people she’d met here, felt irritated now by this man who seemed to hold so much power over them all. ‘What’s Julius like, anyway?’
‘He’s a decent man, but the weight of the responsibilities at the castle, its grounds and everything, bears heavily on him.’ Colin swept out a puddle lurking between two cupboards, chasing it into the street with his broom. ‘Lucy will have to run her business from home until all this is sorted.’ He straightened up, rubbing his back. ‘That’s how she started: first, baking birthday cakes for friends’ children, which grew into wedding cakes, christening cakes and then the cake shop. It’s going to be hard for everyone to get back to normal, but we’ll do it in the end,’ he sounded weary.
‘I’m sure you will, though it will be a long slog,’ Anna said with sympathy. ‘I’m going to your house now to pick up Freddie, can I take anything with me?’
‘If you could take her icing kit, I can stay on here on a bit longer. It’s not heavy.’ Colin picked up a bag on the side and held it out to her. ‘We’ve taken the boards and things, she wants to have everything she might need to hand for this wedding cake.’
Anna set off down the road, steering clear of the puddles, though there was far less water here than through the village. If you didn’t turn back you wouldn’t know about the flood at all. The river was on the other side of the village and she’d seen people working there putting up barriers and trying to divert the water in case the river overflowed again, though perhaps if they’d taken precautions before it wouldn’t have happened in the first place.
The sky was heavy, the winter light slowly leaching away. She passed some waterlogged fields and a lane going up to a farm. A clutch of small brick houses stood up ahead, each with their own garden, which looked saturated but not flooded like the village. There was more bare earth here to suck up the water than in the more residential side to the village. There were more decorations too, and, in pride of place on a roof, a Father Christmas, complete with a sledge and reindeers picked out in lights. Most houses had something – garlands of lights in trees or on a windowsill, shining out to passers-by.
She reached Lucy’s house, which stood back from the road. It was flanked by shrubs laced with blue and silver lights. She could see the name Wildwood House on the gate. She approached the front door, which had a large wreath hanging on the knocker, and rang the bell. She heard giggles and a scuffle inside before a pretty teenage girl opened the door.
‘Hi, come in, Mum’s in the kitchen,’ the girl smiled at her.
‘Who is it, Fleur?’ Another girl, obviously her sister, appeared. A flash of disappointment crossed her face before she smiled too. ‘Come in,’ she said, ‘the boys are playing upstairs.’
Lucy appeared, wiping her hands on her apron.’ Oh, Anna, good to see you. This is Fleur and Josie, Benny’s sisters. I think they hoped you were a certain young man,’ she teased them.
‘Oh, Mum, honestly,’ Fleur said.
‘Sorry, I’m not,’ Anna said with a laugh
‘Come into the kitchen. I don’t know how I’m going to cope with Christmas this year. My parents are coming tomorrow and my in-laws on Christmas Day, so we’ll be quite a party for Christmas Day lunch, but I need to find somewhere to ice the wedding cake and to make the Gateau des Rois. I’d leave them out this year, but I’ve so many orders and I feel I must keep going because I don’t want people to think this flood has made me close the shop for good.’
‘I know it could be a bit inconvenient but remember I said you could use the kitchen in the flat. It’s quite big and Freddie and I won’t be embarking on any great cooking just now. We are having Christmas lunch in the castle as the Partridge is flooded, so I haven’t got that to do,’ Anna said. ‘I can bake a few Gateaux des Rois too, if you give me the recipe,’ she added.
‘That would be such a help,’ Lucy said. ‘And with the Christmas meals to produce and us eating in the dining room, I won’t be able to leave the wedding cake out and work on it slowly as I normally do. After the layer of marzipan that I’m doing now, I put two thin layers of icing on and then decorate with flowers and such and it takes a few days to dry out properly between each stage.’ She sighed. ‘Oh, I bet you never thought you’d be in for all this and were looking forward to a quiet Christmas in beautiful surroundings.’
The thundering feet of the two boys tearing down the stairs interrupted them.
‘Hi, Mum,’ Freddie said as he rushed past, following Benny out into the now dark garden.
Lucy called them back in, ‘You’ve no coats on and if you get sick over Christmas it will be the last straw,’ she said, ‘and I’m sure Anna doesn’t want Freddie getting ill while they’re here, it’s bad enough being sick at home but far worse if you are away.’
‘I passed Colin trying to sort out the shop, he’s given me your cake decorating kit.’ Anna handed the bag to her, following Lucy into the kitchen. On a table in the middle of a large, bright kitchen stood two tiers of the wedding cake glistening with apricot jam waiting to be covered with marzipan.
‘Come through, I’m just about to start on the first bit of the cake. The wedding’s on the 5th, so about twelve days to go before it needs to be ready.’
‘Well, if you want to finish it off with us you’re welcome,’ Anna said.
‘Thanks, I might well take you up on that,’ Lucy said, ‘I want to free up this table to cook the turkey and all. So how’s it going in the town? Has everyone got a warm room to stay in now?’
‘Yes, Mattie and some others have been taken to the castle by Simon and Luke,’ Anna told her.
‘Rumour has it,’ Lucy said as she took out a lump of home-made marzipan from a bowl and laid it out on a board to flatten, ‘that Julius is coming back early, getting back tonight.’
‘Hopefully he’ll sort things out then.’ Anna said, feeling that Simon and indeed Luke had coped marvellously with the situation and she hoped this man would not blame them for the decisions Simon had made.
‘Apparently he’s furious about the lack of support from the council, though we are not the only people affected. The river’s flood defences haven’t been properly maintained, which he’s told them about before. Also the emergency services didn’t come up to scratch either, so he’s annoyed that people have had to sleep in the castle.’ Lucy thumped the marzipan into a better shape before she picked up her rolling pin and energetically flattened it.
‘But where else could they go at such short notice?’ Anna felt that her outrage with the flood was projected onto this man, though it was hardly his fault. She liked Luke and Simon and all the rest of the people she’d met so far, and everyone had gone out of their way to welcome her and Freddie and to help those who couldn’t stay in their homes, even if they couldn’t offer them a bed.
‘Well, I don’t know… perhaps Simon could have found rooms in a B&B or a hotel and paid for them out of castle funds just over Christmas. Although the nearest hotel is quite far away and most of the B&Bs only open over the summer.’ Lucy rolled out the marzipan to cover the first tier of the cake, moulding and shaping it to fit.
‘So he’s annoyed with Simon for putting them up in the castle?’ Anna asked, feeling fired up to support him if necessary.
‘Don’t worry; they’ll sort it out. Julius is a love really, but the trustees of this place, people who rarely appear but hold the purse strings for the whole estate, can turn nasty. They won’t speak to Simon even though he’s in charge while Julius is away as they see him only as a gardener.’
‘So they don’t know about the flood?’ Anna worried that somehow she had made it worse for suggesting – or rather encouraging Freddie’s suggestion, to put up those who had nowhere else to go in the castle.
‘They must do now, but with luck those stuffed shirts are spending Christmas miles away and won’t appear until after the New Year. No, it will all work out in the end. I heard that Simon and Luke are going to sleep in the castle to make sure all the valuable things are safe, not that anyone in the village would harm them. The castle and everything in it means too much to all of us.’ Lucy attacked another piece of marzipan. ‘I’m sorry this flood has happened while you’re here, Anna, and you can’t see us at our best.’ She went on, ‘It’s a terrible shock for us all. It’s never happened before that we know of and we’ve got records going back some time.’
‘It’s tragic for all of you. Freddie and I are fine in the flat, and I just wish there was more room to put people like Mattie up,’ Anna said.
‘There’s lots of room in the castle, so hopefully they can stay there at least until after Christmas. Anyway, I’m so glad you’re here.’ Lucy smiled at her. ‘And Freddie,’ she added, as the two boys appeared, looking hungry. ‘You can never have enough good friends.’ She smiled. ‘So have you taken time off work to come? What do you do?’ Lucy asked as she put some toast in for the boys.
‘I’m a part-time teacher in a Primary school, I teach four year olds and do private coaching for dyslexic children, which I started doing when Freddie was a baby. The timing all worked perfectly with the school holidays, though I’ll be a few days late back, but I’ve got cover for that,’ Anna explained. ‘Freddie and I often go to my brother near Bristol for Christmas, but this year he’s full up with our parents and his in-laws. We could have gone but I find his mother-in-law rather a bind.’ She grinned, ‘So we were planning to stay at home, but then this came up and it seemed new and exciting. Daisy, Philly’s niece and Freddie’s godmother, would have looked after the castle, but she had plans she didn’t want to miss.’ Anna wondered how that romance was going, Daisy and this man falling in love or not in their Victorian stately hotel. She’d ring her later, tell her about the flood, but then she didn’t want to disturb her if her love life had taken off, so perhaps she’d wait a day or two before contacting her.
‘Well, it’s great you could come. We were all getting worried about Philly and Sidney not being able to get away. It’s more difficult for them to take a holiday when the season gets underway. Of course, we’d all rally round and keep an eye on things, but someone reliable needs to be on site and, as they might have told you, they had a couple all set up to come, then the man had a dreadful accident, and by then everyone here who might have been able to do it had arranged other things,’ Lucy said.
‘I wanted to come,’ Freddie piped up.
Anna, fearing what he might say next, jumped in quickly, ‘Yes, you did and it’s so exciting being in a castle for Christmas, even with all of the palaver and drama so far.’
Armed with toast and honey, the boys went into the playroom to watch television.
Lucy worked on her cake and Anna sat in the kitchen drinking tea, they chatted of this and that and Lucy said, ‘If it’s not intruding, where is Freddie’s dad?’
‘He died, killed in a car crash – a drunk taxi driver – while with his mates on a stag do in Ibiza. The others were badly hurt, but Gary didn’t make it. Neither of us knew I was pregnant, we’d decided to wait a while before starting a family.’ Anna did not look at Lucy, she’d heard her quick intake of breath, people were always shocked and upset for her when she told them, and she found it difficult to cope with. It was tragic, absolutely tragic, but she and Freddie had to live with it as best they could.
‘I’m so, so sorry, love.’ Lucy came over and hugged her. ‘So Freddie never knew him?’
‘No, but I’m so lucky to have him. As I said, we weren’t planning to have children so soon, I slipped up one weekend when I thought it was safe.’
‘I did that with Benny, but I wouldn’t be without him for the world,’ Lucy said.
‘Gary’s father gave us a flat for a wedding present and every so often he gives me some money to buy something for Freddie. And with my work, I have the holidays free to spend with Freddie, though the children I teach privately do come to the house sometimes in the holidays, but we get by,’ she said, wondering whether she should say anything about Freddie wanting a dad for Christmas, afraid he might have said something already.
She was about to say more when the front door opened and Colin came in and said he didn’t want to chase Anna away but as he had the car ready would she like him to drop them back at the castle.
Anna would have protested, saying they could easily walk it, but it was so dark and cold now and it was quite a long uphill walk. ‘That’s so kind, but you must be exhausted and longing to sit down in the warm,’ she said.
‘I will after I’ve taken you home,’ he said, and she called Freddie to put on his coat.
Lucy hugged Anna, ‘I’ll see you tomorrow if you come to the carol service. I’d almost forgotten tomorrow is Christmas Eve with all the dreadful goings-on we’ve had. Most of the village go and there’s a drink afterwards in the church hall, and we’d love you both to come back here and have supper with us. There’s also a midnight service, or one at ten tomorrow, if you want to go,’ she said.
‘Thanks, we’d like to come to the carols and supper if it’s not too much,’ Anna said, thinking of all the cakes Lucy had to make.
‘Great,’ Lucy said, ‘see you both then.’
Freddie, exhausted from running round with his new friend, fell asleep in the back of the car and Colin carried him in to the flat and laid him on his bed.
Anna stood a moment in the doorway watching him drive away, his taillights disappearing down the hill in the darkness. She was stabbed with sudden loneliness after the cheerful, noisy time she’d had at Lucy’s house and the intimate talk they’d had about Gary. She wished she were in her brother’s house surrounded by all the noise and excitement of a family and felt a pang of pain about not being with him and her parents for Christmas.
If only Gary hadn’t died, it was hard to cope without him at family times like this, but it was no good thinking that; stuff happened and you had to get on with it.
Before she could shut the front door a black Labrador wandered into the hall, sniffed at her dismissively and went through to the kitchen.
‘Whoever are you?’ she said, shutting the door to keep out the cold and following him. She snapped on the lights in the kitchen, the dog looked up hopefully, then away as if disappointed. He passed her and went into the living room and she was afraid he might go into Freddie’s room and frighten him. Who did he belong to? Had he come in for shelter or, more likely, was he looking for Philly and Sidney? She knew they didn’t have a dog, Daisy had told her their much-loved terrier had recently died of old age and they would decide whether to get another one or not when they returned from their trip.
The bell went and, with relief, she crossed the hall to answer it. Someone must have been walking the dog and seeing the light on he’d come in thinking Philly and Sidney were here.
She opened the door with a smile.
A man stood there under the light outside the door, his face bronzed from the sun. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘but did my dog come in here?’
The dog hearing his master’s voice appeared.
‘There you are, Felix, Philly and Sidney are away, and you’re trespassing.’ He faced Anna. ‘I’m Julius Vaughan and you must be Anna. Please could I come in for a moment?’