Chapter 14 Finn
FINN
Jess and Poll run ahead down the stairs, keen to find Flora. I push open the kitchen door, but there’s no sign of the hound, or of Tilda. There’s a mug upturned on the drainer, and the milk is sitting out on the table.
I take a coffee out into the courtyard, releasing the dogs to have a pee and a sniff around the devastation left by last night’s storm. It’s the last thing we needed, time is pressing in on us, and I’m all too aware that Jennifer or one of her cronies could descend at any moment.
I head round to the front of the house to survey the damage, where I’m greeted by the unexpected sight of Tilda in a green and white striped sweater and jeans, her hair knotted up in an untidy bun.
The sweater clings to her curves as she bends to grip the wheelbarrow handles.
She’s wheeling a barrow of branches with a frown that means business, but there’s something about seeing her like this – sleeves pushed up, completely absorbed in her work – that makes me forget about the storm damage.
“Morning.”
She looks up, and there’s a split second where I wonder if last night’s fight is going to carry on into a pitched battle, but she gives an upside-down smile and looks at her watch, brows raised.
“Afternoon,” she says, making me laugh.
I check my watch. “It’s eight thirty.”
“Time waits for no woman.”
The corner of my mouth betrays me before I can stop it.
Tilda watches with a smile as the dogs hare around in circles on the lawn.
“I’ve got into a habit of waking up with the sunrise because the bedroom at the cottage looks east. I think my body clock thinks it’s normal now, so I thought I might as well get up and get started.” She lifts a shoulder.
“It’s Sunday.”
“I know. But this is going to be waiting for me tomorrow, and I’m trapped here anyway. I can’t get back unless you give me a lift, and the cottage is going to be soaking wet.”
“I’ll give Kenny, the roofer, a shout in a moment. I’m sure he’s up and about already, somehow.”
“Thanks.” She lifts the handles of the barrow. “I’ll get on with this in the meantime.”
“I’m making some breakfast, if you’d—”
“I’d love that.” Her face brightens in a smile. “I’ve been working since half six. I’m ravenous.”
“Scrambled eggs and pasta?” I can’t resist teasing her.
“My favourite.”
Her temper from last night seems to have blown away with the storm.
I touched a raw nerve, and I’m not going to risk blowing it up again by poking at it.
So, I keep things easy and calm. If there’s one thing I learned growing up with a father as mercurial as mine, it was when to keep my head down, so I give her a nod. “I’ll get on it.”
I watch as she walks away with the barrow laden with fallen wood, her shoulders set in determination. She throws herself into her work, mud-streaked and resolute. She’s as passionate about her gardens as I am about whisky, and I like it.
The sky behind the trees is bright blue, the air crackling fresh in that way it always is after a storm. I swing around, realising as I do, that what looked like Tilda’s chaotic approach to the garden clearing has started to make a sort of sense.
There are rose arches and structures, where before there was a knot of tangles, and the shrubs and bushes form a backdrop to the lawn that sweeps down from the house, drawing your eye towards the little stone folly under the oak tree.
It’s not neat, but it’s not careless – there’s an instinct to it.
And she’s revealing the bones of the place like she promised.
It’s not my kind of order – there’s no symmetry, no straight lines. But it’s an order, nonetheless.
I make breakfast – no scrambled eggs, but bacon sandwiches and more coffee – and we eat it at the kitchen table again with the dogs hovering hopefully at our feet.
I don’t mention her father, or the conversation we had last night, and neither does she.
We keep the conversation neutral, speculating on when or if Jennifer might turn up, and what damage might have been done to Glen Mhor in the storm.
“Maybe the whole place will have blown into the sea,” Tilda says, laughing as she wipes her chin.
“That would solve several problems.” I drop a piece of bacon into Flora’s waiting mouth.
“Are you feeding my dog?” Her mouth turns up in a teasing smile.
“I’m trying to buy her affection,” I say, and she gives me an odd look, her brows gathering as she narrows her eyes in confusion.
“I suppose I should be grateful you’re not disapproving of her for once.”
I reach down and run a hand down her back. Flora wags her tail and looks up at me from under her long lashes. “She’s growing on me.”
“Wonders will never cease.” Tilda pushes her chair back. “Right, I’m going to leave Flora here and go and uncover all the planters we protected last night. They’ll be sweltering in the sun under those tarps.”
I watch her leave and then drain my coffee before heading down to the warehouse. The spaniels are at my heels, ready to go. Flora follows behind, plopping her bottom down on the mat and looking up at me with her expressive eyes.
“Oh, come on then,” I say against my better judgement. “I can’t leave you here on your own.”
She trots along by my side, tail swinging in time with her step. My phone rings on the way down the lane to the distillery buildings.
“Just checking you haven’t been blown away.” Rory laughs.
“No such luck.” I bend to pick up a slate that’s blown off the roof of the old stables. “How’s it going in the dukedom?”
“Knock it off.” But I can hear the smile in his voice. “I’m calling because Edie’s been harassing me, wanting to know if you’ll be over at the same time as Annabel. She wants to do dinner for everyone.”
I give a snort of laughter. “Has she been taking cooking lessons from Gregor?”
My sister in law’s cooking is on a par with Tilda’s pasta-with-everything repertoire.
“When I say do dinner, I mean tell Gregor what she wants him to cook.”
“Nice to have a private chef,” I say, teasing. There’s a groan down the phone line.
“I’m more than capable of cooking,” Rory protests.
“I know you are. I notice you’re not volunteering, though. Yep, I’ll be there. Mind if I bring someone along?” I say, keeping my tone casual.
“What kind of someone?” His response is sharp. I can picture him now, eyes narrowing as he gives me a shrewd look.
“My gardener.”
There’s a long silence. “Your… what?”
“Long story.” I play it down, knowing that Rory will be straight back to Edie with the news.
“She’s working on the grounds in the hope I can charm that witch from the tourist board and get them on side.
” I shrug, as if the gesture might somehow make it through the airwaves.
“Turns out she’s interested in your rewilding project, so I thought I might bring her along for the ride. ”
“Sure,” Rory agrees. “Jake can give her the guided tour of the gardens, too. He’ll be delighted to have someone to talk to who can make sense of all the work he’s been doing. You know what we’re like, completely clueless when it comes to gardens.”
I laugh, then glance up to see the spaniels trotting along ahead, quartering back and forth as they take in the fresh scents left over by the storm. There’s no sign of Flora anywhere.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. I need to go. Something’s come up.” I don’t want to admit that I’m hanging up to search for an errant basset hound. “See you Thursday.”
I shove the phone in my pocket and spin around on my heel. The path behind me is deserted.
“Flora!” I try and shout without drawing attention to myself but a second later, Tilda appears from the side of my office followed by an unrepentant hound.
“Is this what you’re looking for?”
“I thought I’d take her while I checked the warehouse.”
“She won’t go far,” Tilda says, bending down to give her a pat. “But she does tend to take herself for a walk if she smells anything interesting. I’m going back to the house, do you want me to take her up?”
“She’s not going to wait outside the warehouse while I check it over, is she?”
Tilda shakes her head, dark curls flying. “Unlikely.”
I nip into the office, leaving my well-behaved dogs waiting outside. By the time I’m done, Tilda is walking back down with a trowel in one hand and some jute sacks in the other.
She looks up, wiping her forehead with the back of her wrist.
“What are you doing next?”
“Need to check the casks without Malcolm noticing.”
She tilts her head in question.
“He prides himself in having the place weathertight, but that was quite a storm.”
“D’you want a hand? I can keep watch.”
I give her a once-over. She’s got mud on her knees and halfway up her bare arms. Her hair is flying everywhere, and she’s got soil under her nails. Normally I wouldn’t let a person in that state near my casks. And yet—
“Go on then,” I say, for the second time this morning. I must be going soft.
Inside the warehouse is cool and half-lit. The familiar smells of spirit and damp stone fill the air, and the barrels stretch away in neat rows, as silent as a church.
“I’ll whistle if I spot him,” says Tilda, putting a finger to her lips.
I walk the rows, checking for any signs of weather damage, but the place has held tight against the storm.
The funnel is waiting on the table. I was going to pull a sample from the cask later in the week, but something prompts me to do it today instead.
“Can you give me a hand?”
Tilda has been waiting on the doorway, hovering as if crossing the threshold might somehow break a rule.
“Inside?” She looks hesitant and the words from last night sting once again.
“If you think you can bear it.”
Tossing her head, she squares her shoulders. “Of course I can.”
Then she marches towards me with a defiant expression. “What do you want me to do?”
I pass her a glass. “Hold that for me.”
She hesitates, nose wrinkling. “I’m not drinking it.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
Her shoulders drop slightly. “This stuff ruins lives, you know.”
“Not always.” I want to ask her what the story is, because it’s clear that what she knows about her dad and the man I thought I knew are miles apart. But now isn’t the time.
“It also pays the bills,” I say. “Now, unless you want me to grow an extra pair of arms, hold the bloody glass.”
She does it, arms rigid, and a look of distaste scrunching up her pretty features. The whisky gurgles in the funnel and the fumes catch in her throat, making her cough.
“Smells like varnish.” She grimaces.
“Give it ten years and you’ll be telling me it’s velvet.”
“I will not.”
“Okay, not you. But hopefully someone will.”
The side door creaks and Malcolm appears. If he’s surprised, he doesn’t show it.
“Roof’s held,” he says proudly. “Couple of slates missing from the stables, I noticed. And the garden” – he jerks a thumb in the direction of the house – “storm’s done you a favour by the look of it, lass. It’s stripped it back a wee bit.”
Tilda brightens. “Do you think so?”
He gives a brief nod. “Aye, you’re doing a good job there, lass.” And then as if he hadn’t thought about it, the words slip out. “Your dad would be proud.”
She flinches and the glass almost slips.
I catch it, our hands locking for a heartbeat.
The warmth of her skin jolts straight through me as we stand close enough that I can smell the faint scent of her shampoo mixed with fresh air and earth.
She looks up at me, and I can’t read the expression on her face, but I’m acutely aware of how her lips are slightly parted, and her breathing has quickened.
I take the glass and put it down on the table.
“Right,” says Malcolm briskly. “I’ll check the stillroom.”
He leaves us standing there alone, facing each other.
I can’t find the words. She looks at me, eyes wary. I want to know what the hell is going on, but I’m not going to get the answers out of her by cornering her in a place like this where she’s so patently uncomfortable.
There are a dozen questions I want to know the answer to, but now isn’t the place.
“Come on,” I say, heading for the door. “That’s enough for today.”
She follows me without argument which surprises me. At the door she pauses, turning back to look at the warehouse one more time.
“It’s not all bad, you know,” I say quietly. “What we do here. I’m doing this because it keeps money here on the island.”
She doesn’t answer but something in her expression shifts slightly before she walks out into the sunlight.
It’s not agreement, but it’s not the wall I hit last night, either.
I’ll take it.