Chapter 5 Tilda
TILDA
So, that went well. Not only have I made a complete arse of myself, but my new boss thinks I’m clueless.
At least I have the qualification to prove I know what I’m talking about, not that this place needs an expert.
I throw a strand of ivy onto the gravel and fold my arms, feeling murderous.
I’ll show him. I am over men, especially the kind that think they know it all.
Even if he is taller than I remembered, looks unfairly like a hot Scottish lumberjack in a plaid shirt and work boots, and has shoulders broad enough to carry around a chip the size of Ben Nevis. Oh, and his bloody dogs are perfectly trained. What an arsehole.
I watch as he strides off towards the courtyard with Jess and Poll trotting by his heels without so much as a glance back in our direction.
Of course, that’s the sort of sensible working-spaniel names his dogs would have.
Flora, currently more mud than hound, shakes the worst of it off on me and lets out a mournful howl of despair at being abandoned by her new playmates.
“Shh,” I say, pointing a finger at her snout. “We don’t fraternize with the enemy.”
My new boss disappears out of sight, and I turn to look at Georgia, who is standing with a completely non-plussed expression on her face as if she can’t quite work out if she’s being pranked.
“That went well, I think,” she echoes me, and there’s something about her tone that makes me start to laugh. She joins in, and as we’re both doubled up with laughter Flora – never one to miss an opportunity – joins in with a little bay to celebrate.
“You didn’t tell me you’d met Finn before.”
“I didn’t realise I had.” I rub my nose and then pull my hair free, shaking out my curls before tying it back in another attempt at a bun. “I thought he was just some seal-rescuing knobhead I bumped into on the beach.”
“Oh, he’s that as well,” says Georgia, then puts a hand to her mouth and laughs. “I mean, not the knobhead bit, the seal rescuing bit.”
I raise a brow slightly.
Georgia continues. “To be fair, he can be the knobhead bit, as well. Finn’s an… acquired taste. Like olives.”
“Or Marmite.”
“Definitely. Once you realise his bark’s way worse than his bite, it’s fine. The trouble is he’s got a habit of rubbing people up the wrong way but his heart’s in the right place.”
I think my face probably says it all.
“Luckily, I won’t have much to do with him. I’ll get on with clearing the garden.”
“Talking of which, have you found everything you needed in the shed? I think we’ve got pretty much everything you could want.”
I nod. “I was having a wander around to try and find my bearings when you found me. I got a bit distracted, which is why I was trying to pull out that thistle.”
Georgia shrugs airily. “I have literally no clue about gardens, so you could have been doing cartwheels in the orchard, and I’d have assumed it was part of the job.
Luckily for us, you’re fully qualified” – she makes a face in the direction that Finn departed in – “so I can leave it in your capable hands. Shall we have a proper look around then have a coffee before you get stuck in?”
She leads me round the side of the house and I almost trip over as my boots snag in a vine that’s snaking across the stone pathway.
The garden is vast and choked everywhere we look with season upon seasons worth of weeds.
Brambles snake through a crumbling stone wall, and over what was once a rose arbour.
“I’m sorry, it’s a jungle, isn’t it? I have no idea where you’re supposed to start.”
“Don’t worry,” I say confidently, “I do.”
I can read the garden already. Beneath the chaos there’s a structure – a folly half hidden by ivy here, a stone patio cut into the grass to catch the morning sunlight there, and an old sundial sits drunkenly to one side. Gardens have stories to tell if you listen, and this one is calling for help.
“If we can make this place halfway respectable,” Georgia says, “the visitors will lap this place up. And photos, too. Everyone loves a before-and-after.”
I crouch down in the long grass, pushing it aside to see the green shoots of an allium fighting for space. I can already imagine a long lavender hedge here, and a tiny snake’s head fritillaries in the shade under the oak tree.
“So, you’re planning to open the house to the public?” I turn back to look at the house, four square and solid, but undeniably more shabby than chic. It’s going to take more than a bit of paint to get it anywhere near a stately home level of respectability.
“Not exactly.” Georgia leans down to pat Flora, running her silky ears through her fingers.
“The house has history, though. Charles Fairfax, the previous owner, threw all sorts of parties here in the eighties. There were models, pop stars, politicians, all sorts of people. They used to come here in summer to escape because it was so far from London. Half the island still dines out on the stories of the things that happened here. It’s a shame it all went to ruin. ”
I look around, imagining ghosts in the weed-choked corners and the smell of spilled whisky, and perfume in the air. It makes me shiver. “You could make something beautiful here again,” I say, trying to shake the image from my mind.
“That’s the idea.” She straightens up and wipes some of Flora’s mud off her hands onto her jeans.
“We’ve got six weeks before the tourist office makes a final decision.
Somehow, we have to make it look welcoming and inviting.
Right now, it looks more like Rapunzel’s tower.
We don’t want visitors to think they’re going to be swallowed up by the rose bushes. ”
“We can do it.”
“You sure?”
I nod. “I’ve cleared far worse places than this.”
“Perfect.” Georgia surprises me with a high-five. “We’ll have this garden full of visitors taking photos between tastings before we know it.”
I frown in confusion. “Tastings? Of what?”
“Whisky, of course.” She laughs and shakes her head as if she’s stating the obvious.
I take a half step backwards and stare at her. My lips part, but no sound comes out.
“You’re joking?” I manage eventually.
“Benruar Single Malt,” Georgia says, pulling out a budding tulip by the roots and handing it to me, in what she clearly thinks is a helpful gesture. I grimace and cradle it to my chest to replant later.
“That’s why we need you. Tourists don’t want to sip a dram of the island’s finest surrounded by a sea of weeds.”
First, I think I’ve found the perfect stop-gap job with no complications. Then I find out that the man who pays my wages thinks I’m a complete waste of space and my dog’s an eco-terrorist.
And now…
“Are you okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Georgia puts a hand on my arm.
For one ridiculous second, I’d thought I was here to rescue a faded old garden, and coax life out of broken stone and tangled roses.
But no, it had to be whisky. The one thing that defined my father’s worst and best moods.
The one smell that clings to every memory I have of him.
I had it drummed into me the whole time I was growing up – whisky was the ruin of my father, and the thing he chose over me.
The very last place I would choose to be is a distillery, but right now, I don’t have any choice.
Knowing that man is running the place adds an extra depth to my ire.
I clench my jaw to hold back the words that want to spill out.
“I’ll take you down to the distillery buildings later,” Georgia says brightly, “show you how it all works. Unless you want to come now? I’ve got a meeting with Finn in a moment.”
“No,” I say a little too sharply, then add, “thanks but I’ll get on with some work now and you can show me later?”
I’ve never been very good at hiding how I feel, but I need this job. I don’t have to like the boss and I sure as hell don’t have to like his whisky.