A Winter’s Tale (45 page)

‘I also would have no objection to donning my costume for an hour or so on visitor days, and walking about the house and grounds with my courtiers.’ She bestowed a regal smile on Mr Yatton. ‘But I won’t have time for more than that—there is much too much to do in my garden and stillroom.’

‘That would certainly be an added attraction. Thanks, Aunt Hebe.’

‘You must be guest of honour at our next meeting, which will be in the New Year,’ Effie suggested. ‘Costume optional.’

‘Thank you, that would be lovely.’ I looked around the table. ‘Well, that was certainly a surprise—but a nice one.
I was already thinking of having quiet sixteenth-and early seventeenth-century music playing in the Great Hall, so to have everyone in period dress too will really add to the whole experience.’

‘If you don’t mind,
I’ll
stay as I am,’ Anya said.

‘Oh, yes, we don’t all need to dress up,’ I agreed. And it was just as well, because Seth in a doublet and hose could be an attraction to rival Aunt Hebe’s Gloriana—I mean, visitors could be killed in the rush.

We had thrashed out lots of details by the time Jonah popped his head around the door.

‘People are gathering on the drive, Sophy,’ he announced, ‘so I’m off to put me Father Christmas suit on.’

‘We’d better adjourn the meeting, then,’ Aunt Hebe said, getting up. ‘Have you mixed the punch, Jonah? Not too strong, I hope.’

‘Ottie’s doing it now—the usual mixture, that wouldn’t hurt a lamb.’

‘It had better not,’ she said. ‘Several of them are driving.’

We all went through to the Great Hall, which smelled of pine and looked magical, with the decorations, sparkling tree and the leaping flames from the fire in the enormous hearth. Anya and Lucy went to help with the food, and Seth came out of the kitchen door backwards, carrying an enormous punch bowl hung with little cups, followed by Ottie bearing a tray full of glasses and cloudy lemonade in a huge glass jug.

There were already big bottles of dandelion and burdock and Vimto at one end of the table, next to a stack of festive paper cups. I helped peel the cling film off the plates of sandwiches, party pies and sausage rolls, helping myself to one or two as I did so. It felt like a long time since breakfast.

‘Where’s Jack?’ Hebe asked. ‘He should be here!’

‘Perhaps he’s still asleep. Maybe someone should go and knock on his door?’ I suggested. ‘He’ll miss all the fun.’

‘No, I won’t—I’m here,’ he called from above, and ran lightly down the stairs, a vision in a silky, open-necked shirt, his golden hair attractively ruffled. ‘All ready to hand out alcohol and good cheer to the masses, as usual.’

Clearly his batteries were now fully recharged, which was just as well, for Aunt Hebe sent him straight back upstairs to switch on the CD player.

Good humour unabated, he returned to the sound of ‘Good King Wenceslas’ and started filling cups with punch for the Friends. Then Jonah appeared from the kitchen, unrecognisable in a totally bogus cotton-wool beard, red suit and black wellies. He arranged himself in the hooded chair while Grace, who had flitted in after him like a wizened Tinkerbell in silver stilettos and a spangly handkerchief-hem dress, prepared to assist in finding the right presents.

‘Ready, Miss Hebe,’ he said.

‘I can hear people crunching about on the gravel outside, Aunt Hebe,’ I said nervously, as we took up our positions in front of the door, ready to regally receive our visitors. ‘Why haven’t any of them knocked?’

‘They are waiting for the door to be opened, of course. Seth—could you do the honours?’

Seth, who had been leaning on the fireplace with one booted foot up on the fender, looking rather broodingly into the fire like a mislaid extra from a romantic drama, said, ‘Of course.’

Then he cast a handful of pine cones onto the flames, which changed colour like a magic trick. ‘Let the festivities commence!’

Chapter Thirty-one: Lord of Misrule

They have not let mee sleep these three days, so that I grow dizzy, and have little time alone in which to think—which I must suppose is their intention. I have ink and paper for letters, so may still write, but it becomes harder to conceal my book. I must ask them to send Joan to mee soon, and let her take it away.

From the journal of Alys Blezzard, 1582

By the time Aunt Hebe finally let me relinquish my place at the door, my hand had been shaken so many times it felt twice the size it usually did, and slightly numb.

The Great Hall was full, hot and noisy, and I didn’t remember seeing half the people there come in. Many of them were total strangers, but there were lots of familiar faces too, like Mike, off duty and in jeans and sweatshirt, talking to Anya, Milly from the mobile dog parlour, the tenant farmer, the gardeners, the Friends…
and
all their families right down to grandchildren and, for all I knew, great-grandchildren.

No wonder my Christmas gift list had been a long one!

And thank goodness I had wrapped up a few extra presents too, because an excited queue of children still waited for their turn with Santa. The adults had found their own (mainly food and drink) gifts on one of the trestles, and they also seemed to have found the punch bowl…

In fact, there must have been a run on it, because it looked as though Jack was mixing a fresh batch. As if feeling my gaze he looked up and smiled at me, then abandoned his post and brought me a glass over.

‘Drink this—you look as though you need it!’ he said, slipping a friendly arm around me and giving me a squeeze. ‘Enjoying your first Winter’s End party?’

‘Actually, I don’t think it
is
my first,’ I said, sipping the spicy mixture cautiously. Lady Betty had always mixed a mean bowl of punch, but although it caught at the back of my throat in a familiar way, this tasted nothing like it. ‘I vaguely remember them from when I was a small child, especially Santa. It’s odd how things keep coming back to me that I’d totally forgotten about.’

‘Ho, ho, ho!’ bellowed Santa suddenly, his eyes glittering and his cheeks flushed above the white beard. A small child burst into tears, snatched her present and scuttled off, and Jonah took a long drink out of a small tankard. I hoped it contained lemonade or something else entirely innocuous, but rather doubted it.

‘There’s hardly any alcohol in this punch, is there, Jack? Only Jonah looks a bit flushed and…well, lots of people seem to be getting very noisy and a bit excited.’

He shrugged. ‘That’s parties for you, darling—the punch is harmless, about one part brandy to a hundred of the other stuff.’

‘
Wassail!
’ yelled Bob in my ear, almost unrecognisable without his hat, clinked glasses with me and then ambled off, grinning. Someone had stuck a ‘this way up’ sticker on his back that I remembered from the hippo crate.

I took another, more suspicious, sip of my drink and rolled it around my tongue. My eyes watered. ‘Jack, I’m sure this—’ I began, when to my astonishment I spotted Mel Christopher making her way into the hall, supporting
a small, silver-haired woman with black eyebrows and red lipstick.

‘What’s
she
doing here?’ I exclaimed.

Jack turned and looked where I pointed. ‘Mel’s mother’s an old friend of Hebe’s but her health isn’t good, so I haven’t seen her about for quite a while.’

‘I think Mel’s got a damned cheek, showing her face here after booby-trapping my summerhouse!’

‘Well, even so, I don’t think you can very well throw her out without causing a scene, if Hebe invited her mother. But let’s not worry about
her
,’ he added, and I realised he had been quietly edging me into the darkest corner, near the pushed-back screens, without my noticing. ‘Now, darling, let’s talk about you and me and Barbados—’

‘Jack Lewis!’ said a voice pitched to shatter glass. ‘I’ve got a bone to pick with you!’

‘Er—hi, Mel,’ he said weakly, letting go of me suddenly. ‘Happy Christmas!’

Her eyes flashed with fury. ‘Balls to that! I’ve just discovered you’ve knocked my house down without even bothering to mention it to me—
and
without permission from the council either.’

He looked taken aback. ‘I told the boys to do it after Christmas when I was away! And I was
going
to tell you, Mel. We’re partners, remember?’

‘But there’ll be a swingeing fine for knocking it down without permission. I didn’t expect to be partners in
that
,’ she snapped.

‘The fine’s nothing, when you think how much we will make from selling the land for development,’ he assured her. ‘They can’t make us rebuild the house so we’re bound to get the planning permission eventually.’

‘And you were going to tell me this
when
, precisely?’

‘Before it happened, obviously, Mel.’ He tried out a
charming, placatory smile, but it didn’t seem to be having much effect.

Her cold brown eyes fell on me. ‘Something else seems to have slipped your mind too—like telling me you were off to Barbados with Ben’s crowd by private jet right after Christmas—and taking
her
with you.’

‘A private jet?’ I squeaked.

‘Of course. How else do you think I could get you on a flight at a moment’s notice?’ he said, glancing at me impatiently. ‘Now, look, Mel—’

‘Look nothing! I found out when I ran into Ben in London and he asked me too. He said I could take anyone I wanted with me.’ She looked around and gave a ravishing smile at Seth, who was standing nearby, his clouded jade eyes fixed sombrely on her lovely face. ‘Seth’s coming—so that’s going to be cosy, isn’t it? Love Island!’

I suddenly felt unbearably sad, which was probably due to having inadvertently drained the whole large glass of punch. I could feel it burning its way down into my innards. Innocuous, my foot!

‘Actually, it won’t be that cosy, Mel, because I won’t be going. I’ve got too much to do here,’ I said, ‘but I hope you three have a lovely time.’

Jack stopped being placatory and shot daggers at Mel. ‘Sophy, darling—’ he began, but I quickly put as many people between us as possible, though I hadn’t realised that Seth had followed me until he said, practically in my ear, ‘I wouldn’t have any more punch, if I were you. I think Jack’s spiked it.’

‘I thought as much and there’s practically none left now. But there’s loads of lemonade and other soft drinks, so perhaps they’ll drink that instead and it will dilute it.’ I looked up at him. ‘Shouldn’t you be at home, packing your Bermuda shorts and sun lotion?’

‘Shouldn’t you be restringing your bikini?’ he countered.

‘I haven’t got a bikini, and you must have heard me say I’m not going. I’d already told Jack when he first invited me, but nothing seems to get through his thick skull once he’s got an idea lodged in there. It didn’t sound like my idea of fun even if I hadn’t got too much to do here already—and I’ve only just got Lucy back again, so I couldn’t possibly go off right now.’

‘Neither could I,’ he agreed. ‘It’s not my scene either.’

‘Mel seems to think—’

‘Mel thinks I’m a dog that can be whistled up any time she likes. She hasn’t even asked me—that was the first I’d heard of it.’

‘Oh,’ I said, suddenly feeling a bit happier—but that was probably the effect of the glass of punch. Just as well I’d only had the one.

A strange figure emerged from behind the huge carved screen and did a bit of languid cavorting in a very take-it-or-leave-it way. ‘Is that Derek? Why is he wearing antlers and greenery?’

‘Because he’s the Lord of Misrule.’

‘The
what
?’

He shrugged. ‘Lord of Misrule. There’s always one and nowadays it’s usually Derek.’

He took the empty punchbowl back to the kitchen, while I sipped cold lemonade and watched Derek’s antics. They consisted mainly of jogging half-heartedly across the room from time to time and holding what looked like a mistletoe-draped bladder on a stick over the heads of some unlikely couple, until they kissed.

I found this quite amusing until Jack resurfaced, having managed to shed Mel, and Derek shambled across and held his stick over our heads. Jack grabbed me and tried to comply a little too enthusiastically, his aftershave almost
entirely extinguished by the smell of brandy—so not
all
of it had gone in the punch.

I was just thinking that it didn’t so much feel like being kissed as attacked by a leech, when a grave voice in my ear said, ‘Hello, Sophy.’

‘Guy!’ I exclaimed, repulsing Jack with more force than politeness, and hugged Guy warmly. ‘How lovely to see you.’

It was several months since I’d last set eyes on him and he was even more handsome than before—dark auburn hair and the same dark-ringed grey eyes as Anya.

He returned the hug. ‘There are six Morris dancers outside, Sophy, and they say you have to go and officially invite them in.’