Wild Oats (11 page)

One day they’d gone to fit out a utility room in a beautiful Tudor manor, and Rod had been horrified by the appalling job they had done – not that anyone would know on the surface, but Rod knew that in six months’ time all the shortcuts would reveal themselves; the drawers would jam, the work surface would split, the plumbing would come unravelled. All night it had eaten away at him, and the next morning he woke up determined.

The lady of the house had been just that – a Lady – and she had been utterly charmed by Rod’s arrival on her doorstep. He’d explained his concerns, and told her it wouldn’t take him more than a couple of hours to put it all right. She’d been flummoxed when it finally emerged he was doing it off his own bat, and wouldn’t get paid; that he was giving up his own Saturday because he quite simply couldn’t bear the thought of their shoddy workmanship in her beautiful house.

Lady Pamela tried her very best not to sound patronizing when she asked if he would like to see the main kitchen. She ushered him in and he was
speechless; it was quite the most breathtaking room he had ever seen. He wandered round it in awe, stroking the smooth golden wood, pulling out the drawers that glided like silk, examining all the clever little cubbyholes, admiring the craftsmanship, the design, the thought that had gone into it. Pamela was fascinated by his enthusiasm. But then, he’d never seen a kitchen like this before. He didn’t move in those circles; didn’t buy those kinds of magazines. And now he’d seen what could be done, he knew that was what he wanted to do.

Two days later a huge parcel arrived at his house, containing a dozen brochures from top-notch kitchen companies and a note in Pamela’s distinctive italics. They were, she said, doing up the gardener’s cottage on the estate, and she wanted to give Rod first option on fitting the kitchen. He could have free rein with the design and she thought he might find inspiration in the enclosed.

He’d taken up the challenge eagerly. It took him three months to complete it, because he had to squeeze it in during his limited spare time, but Pamela had assured him there was no rush. The kitchen was only tiny, but he’d fitted it out using oak from the estate, and it was exquisite. He wasn’t foolish enough to be over-ambitious on his first and clearly most important solo project, so he’d stuck with plain and simple and square.

Pamela was delighted with the result. Not only did she pay Rod handsomely for his work, but she
nominated herself as his patron. She had an enormous circle of wealthy friends, to whom she trumpeted Rod’s skills, until he found himself inundated with enquiries. As well as that, she made him an appointment with her own bank manager, who painstakingly talked Rod through the perils and pitfalls of being self-employed. And she insisted on bankrolling his first few freelance commissions, until he had enough of a profit to stand on his own two feet. He repaid her financially as soon as he could, but he knew that as long as he lived he couldn’t repay her generosity of spirit. Lady Pamela, however, was sufficiently gratified by the fact that he was a resounding success, and that she had discovered him.

He had a lot to learn, of course. There was more to fitting a kitchen than making the cupboards match the wall-space. And at this end of the market you had to cater for every whim. Financing it was terrifying. Initially he couldn’t underwrite the enormously expensive appliances a lot of his customers wanted. He didn’t know you could spend three thousand pounds on a fridge. So at first, the customers paid for their appliances direct, which meant of course that he made nothing on them.

But gradually the business grew, until he was able to meet the overheads properly. He learned how to pick and choose clients – spot the ones who were going to be more trouble than they were worth and change things for the sake of it, and go with ones who were as enthusiastic as he was about the end product,
but who were happy to trust him and leave him to his own devices.

Now, ten years later, he was well established. He still worked from his parents’ farm, in the shed his father had once used to bring on turkeys and fatten them up for Christmas, until the EEC rules and regulations had become so prohibitive as to make him lose interest. It wasn’t a glamorous setting, and it was freezing in the winter, but he was able to lock the door and lose himself in his craft. He did about eight kitchens a year on average, working at his own pace. He could have taken on someone else, but he knew the trouble started when you bit off more than you could chew; when you were trying to run more than one job at a time. And he was a perfectionist. He would never be able to trust anyone to have his exacting standards. By doing it all himself, he could be sure both he and the customer were satisfied.

He was certainly reaping the rewards. He and his wife Bella had bought a tumbledown barn a couple of miles away, which they’d renovated and was now a luxurious home, Owl’s Nest (Rod was conscious that the name was a little bit twee, but Bella collected owls – or at least things in the shape of owls, like biscuit barrels and hot-water-bottle covers). And in it, they enjoyed their creature comforts, which his family couldn’t resist winding him up about. But, as he pointed out, the two of them both worked bloody hard for it.

This morning, he was putting the finishing touches
to a free-standing larder unit, with tiny zinc-lined spice drawers, sea-grass vegetable baskets, a wine-rack and even a shiny brass hook on which to hang strings of onions and garlic. He reminded himself to take a photo of it before it was finished. Now he had done one, the next would be easier, and he was charging a small fortune.

At eleven o’clock Nolly banged on the door with coffee and a bacon sandwich. To look at her now, you’d never realize that she had once been the belle of the county; her hair was iron grey and straggly, and despite the fact that she ran round after her family all day, she was very overweight. Rod worried about her laboured breathing and the cough she’d developed, but no matter how he nagged she wouldn’t give up her fags. The nicotine, she claimed, was holding her lungs together.

‘How are things?’

Rod knew exactly what that meant. He just gave a thin-lipped smile.

‘Oh, you know. Fingers crossed this month.’

She was the only person he’d spoken to about it. His brothers and sisters all thought he and Bella were enjoying their hedonistic existence too much to worry about children, that they would only cramp their style. They couldn’t be more wrong.

‘You should go and see someone. A specialist.’

‘I know. If it’s nothing doing this time…’

Nolly pressed her lips together. ‘You know what the problem is. She doesn’t eat enough.’

‘She eats, Mum. Honestly.’

She didn’t, of course. Not properly. Bella was the only person he knew who had no interest in food whatsoever.

‘Do you want me to do you some dinner? Lamb hotpot?’

Rod’s mouth watered at the thought – big chump chops, the meat falling off the bone, chunks of potato, sweet melting leeks. But he had an assignation this lunchtime, with Bella. A vital assignation that couldn’t be missed for all the hotpot in Shropshire.

Jamie awoke the next morning confused and disorientated. The dogs had long abandoned her, leaving a slightly hairy indentation on her bedcover. She pulled her curtains open, and smiled to see a jolly yellow sun hovering over the stable yard and the fields beyond – judging by its height it was almost midday. She padded down to the kitchen in her nightshirt. She was perturbed to see that, despite their assurances the night before as they’d urged her off to bed, neither Jack nor Olivier had done the washing-up from supper. The stout little brown teapot was still warm, so they’d managed to lever the kettle under the tap despite the dishes piled up in the sink.

She made a fresh pot of tea and sawed a chunk off the loaf she’d bought in the post office the day before. She spread it liberally with butter and jam, then stuck her feet into her hiking boots and went outside.

It was a glorious day, one which promised a gentle
heat to soothe her aching bones and brought out the scent of roses by the back door. The old cockerel stood on the water butt, crowing defiantly for the benefit of anyone who would listen. She headed down towards the stables, walking in through the archway topped by the clock whose hands had stopped years ago. She felt a tinge of sadness to see all the loose boxes now empty; the concrete was cracking and grass was growing through. It had once been immaculate, not a speck of dust or stray strand of straw across the cobbles, the stable doors always freshly creosoted where now they had faded to a silvery grey, many of them hanging off their hinges. The flower baskets that Louisa had put up every year were dry and empty; some of them sprouted weeds in a ghostly imitation of what they had once been.

The far side of the yard had a five-bar gate leading to the top paddock and the fields beyond. Jamie was puzzled to see that a large part of this area had been marked out with stakes and orange plastic tape. She wondered if perhaps Jack was arranging to have it all re-concreted. Maybe he had plans to renovate it? She thought for a moment that perhaps they could open a livery yard. It would make quite a nice little cash business – DIY liveries almost ran themselves if you were well organized. She felt cheered by the idea. Bucklebury Farm needed horses.

She wandered over to the old barn that made up the fourth side of the courtyard. Inside, Jack and Olivier were bent over the Bugatti. Jack was in the
driver’s seat, foot on the throttle, thraping the engine, while Olivier peered with a frown under the bonnet, ear cocked to one side, not quite liking what he heard. Though how he could discern anything through such a deafening roar was a mystery.

When the revs finally died down, Jamie ventured a greeting. The two men looked up absently. Jamie felt rather as a woman might on entering a gentlemen’s club, as waves of unspoken hostility told her she was stepping into forbidden territory. She received a somewhat cursory nod of acknowledgement from each of them. It was clearly a crucial moment. At a signal from Olivier, Jack turned off the engine. Olivier, hands black with oil, delved into the depths with a spanner and made a minor adjustment. Jack restarted the engine, and after listening carefully for a few moments the two men nodded at each other in satisfaction. Only then, and more out of politeness than because they wanted to, Jamie felt, did they turn their attention to her. She felt she had to justify her presence.

‘I wondered if you fancied coffee?’

The enthusiasm with which they greeted her offer made Jamie realize her first mistake. If she didn’t watch her step, she could easily become an unpaid skivvy. She’d do coffee this once, then things would have to change. She was about to turn and go when she remembered something.

‘By the way, what are all the stakes in the yard for? And the orange tape?’

Olivier and Jack exchanged a glance. Jamie detected guilt. She frowned.

‘What?’

Jack put down his spanner. ‘I need to talk to you about that.’

Olivier looked awkward.

‘I’ll go and make the coffee, shall I?’

He headed for the door. Jack panicked.

‘No. Stay. You can help me explain.’

‘Explain what?’ Somehow Jamie knew she’d hit upon the secret she felt had been kept from her ever since she’d arrived. The sense of exclusion, the paranoia she’d felt was not unfounded after all. So what was it all about? Was it police tape? Was there a body under the stable yard? Were teams of forensic officers about to start digging for bones?

Jack was looking uncharacteristically nervous.

‘I’m not going to beat about the bush, Jamie. I’m broke. I haven’t got a bean. I’ve got no income, no pensions, no capital… Nothing to live on. And nothing to fall back on.’ He paused awkwardly. ‘Except Bucklebury. That is my only asset.’

‘You’re not selling the farm? You can’t!’

‘Not exactly. No.’

‘What do you mean, not exactly? Either you are or you aren’t.’ Jamie hated it when her father prevaricated.

‘It would kill me to leave Bucklebury. There’s nowhere else I want to go. So I’ve come to a compromise.’

In Jamie’s experience, compromise meant something that nobody liked. She looked at Jack suspiciously.

‘What sort of compromise?’

She could see Jack was choosing his words carefully.

‘I’ve done a deal with a developer. He’s going to convert the stables and the barns into houses. I get to keep one of the barns, this workshop and the top paddock. And some cash – enough to see me out if I’m sensible with it.’ Jack had the grace to look a little shamefaced at this. It would be the first time in his life he had been sensible with money. ‘I can show you the plans. They’re very sympathetic –’

But Jamie was shaking her head.

‘You can’t! You just can’t! It would destroy the place.’

‘I’ve racked my brains to think of a better solution. And there isn’t one. If I stay here, the house is going to fall down around my ears.’ He paused for dramatic effect. ‘While I starve to death. At least this way I don’t actually have to leave. And I’ve got something to live on.’

Jamie sat down on a dusty old bale of hay, staring dully into the middle distance while she took in the implications. Jack exchanged glances with Olivier, who gave him a wry, sympathetic smile of support. Encouraged, Jack went and put a reassuring hand on Jamie’s shoulder.

‘I know this must come as a shock. But everyone
has to rationalize in their old age. Make changes they don’t necessarily like.’

She stared up at him accusingly.

‘Not people who’ve planned ahead. Not people who’ve put money aside all their life. Not people who save money when they make it, instead of blowing it on flash holidays and ridiculous get-rich-quick schemes that never bloody work –’

Jack put his hand up to stop the onslaught.

‘Please, Jamie. Think it through.’

‘I don’t need to think it through. It’s the most terrible idea I’ve ever heard.’ She paused a moment as something else occurred to her. ‘And who gets the house? The actual house?’

‘The developer. He’s keeping it for himself.’ Jamie looked grim.