Chapter Thirty-Two
Monday 19th December. Morning.
I don’t know if Haneen spoke to Evan about me, but early the next morning, he comes to find me on the kitchen.
“What are you doing now” he asks helping himself to coffee from the pot I made. Evan usually like a coffee in the morning. And if it’s made, then Llewellyn has some too.
I look up from my phone. “Just watching a video clip.” Actually, it’s several videos about sage and onion stuffing, but let’s not let on what an amateur is cooking the Christmas dinner. The plan which seemed optimistic when Raff was here to help me – and yes, give me confidence – now feels foolhardy.
“About Christmas…” Evan begins. “How many people are you inviting?”
A tendril of worry curls inside me. The numbers keep growing and it’s his house, after all. “Well…erm, everyone here, that’s you and your family,” – I count four on my fingers – “Alex, Llewellyn, the professor, Wyn since he can’t go home. Rhian because she says her mum is going to her nan’s and she’d rather stay here. That’s nine. And then the Squad from The Glyn which makes eighteen.”
He gives me a speculative look. “Are you okay cooking for so many?”
I nod. And give him a confident smile that hides my real worry. “Yes, cooking is the easy bit.”
“What’s the hard bit?” Evan has a very direct way of asking questions. No wonder he’s a computer programmer. In whatever binary code they use, there’s no room for extra words. It’s also the way he organises people. He can just look at a group of builders, volunteers and partners and work out the best way to divvy out the jobs. If he wasn’t so nice, he’d be in danger of being a robot.
“Nothing is hard, just time consuming and fiddly and potentially awkward. For a start, there’s setting the table and rounding up enough chairs. And…erm…if it’s okay with all of you, I was hoping someone might clear up the ballroom again because it’s a mess at the moment.”
“It’s a lot more than a mess. With the west wing and top floors cleared out, everything stored there had to be moved. So, everything’s gone into the ballroom. We’re also using it to stock-pile building material, cleaning products, pipes and coils of electric cables.”
My heart falls; that’s a problem I hadn’t even considered. Hiding in the kitchen I’d missed the logistics of what needs to happen.
I look around the kitchen. “We can eat here even if not very glamourous.” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I realise the kitchen won’t do. There are three steps which will be impossible for a wheelchair and anyone with mobility issues.
Mentally, I scroll through all the options. Llewellyn’s conference rooms? No, even if he agreed to move all the equipment, none of the conference rooms are big enough.
One dimple ghosts in and out of Evan’s cheek as if he was about to smile. As if he’s got an idea. “Come with me, I want to show you something.” He knocks back the last of his coffee and rinses the cup in the sink.
I drop my phone into my apron pocket and follow him out of the kitchen.
He leads me through the ballroom towards the back doors. This is one of the odd things about this house. The ballroom sits at the exact centre of the house, it’s the middle part of the X. The room itself is octagonal in shape, some of walls have large double doors, one door leading to each of the wings, a double door faces the entrance, and finally, at the back, under the galley, a door leads to the back of the house. I’ve never seen this part because it’s always been locked.
It's breathtaking. One wide room, maybe forty feet, it runs between the north and east wings and faces the garden.
There are old-fashioned tall arched windows that reach floor to ceiling. Light floods through and hits the dark oak floors in a hundred white squares of light.
“Wow!” I breathe, looking around. “What is this place?”
“They used to call it an orangery,” Evan says. “That’s Victorian speak for conservatory.” He walks to the first window and turns the handle. It opens out on to a wide terrace. “Beyond is the north garden.”
North garden my eye! It’s a mess of dead plants. “This is what Watson was supposed to work on?”
Evan’s derisive snort tells me what he thinks of Watson. “But we will get someone else, or several someones to deal with all the gardens. There’s too much land for one gardener. So, we’re splitting the land into three parts. East garden, north,” – he points ahead – “and the lands by the river.”
There’s a river, of course. I remember now when Haneen explained Kendric Park? “This place is enormous.”
“It doesn’t look like much, now,” he says scanning the endless wild tangle of bushes, brown and grey. “Try and imagine it all green and beautiful, it could be something very special.”
Did I compare him to a robot? Now he’s looking over the property, his wistful far away voice hides a deep passion. He might be a computer geek, but he really loves Kendrick Park.
“If I had the money, I’d spend it all on the gardens,” he says, sadly. “Unfortunately, we have to wait until someone else is willing to invest their own money into the restoration.”
“Isn’t this what you did with everyone else? I mean Llewellyn and Alex and…”
He nods, then changes the subject. “Maybe for Christmas we’ll have snow. Everyone says we’re getting a storm in the next couple of days.”
The icy wind makes me shiver, and Evan closes the glass door.
“Thank God I’ve arranged for all the shopping to be delivered in a couple of days, otherwise our Christmas dinner will just be bread and butter.”
Evan follows me around the huge room. “One of the best meals I ever had was Haneen’s bread and butter last Christmas.”
When he talks about her in this way, it’s impossible not to hear the love, the complete devotion he feels for his woman. It’s more than a little difficult for me not to grieve my Welsh Hagrid. Oh Raff, my darling, where are you now? What are you doing? Are you happy, warm, laughing about washing sand out of your hair?
Evan’s next words bring me back to reality. “What do you think about using this room for your Christmas dinner?”
Oh.
I look around with new eyes. The room needs cleaning but it’s not too bad. And the windows. The windows are incredible. Each is divided into a lot of squares except the top. The semi-circle under the arch is made of stained-glass. It makes colours the light streaming in warm shades of yellow, orange and pink.
“I think it’s a beautiful room. And if it snows, we’ll have the most amazing scenery.” I walk around, planning it in my head. “We can arrange the tables in one long line. And if we set up smaller stations behind for the serving dishes. I walk around my heels tapping on the wood floor. “Just imagine this mopped and maybe waxed so it shines. We need Christmas trees in both corners.”
“We can cut you a couple of cedars from Darling Wood. He points through the window towards the east to where the edge of a forest is just visible.
It could be an incredible view. “Why did they call the room, orangery?”
“It’s a sun trap. Back in the 19 th century, it was very fashionable to grow citrus trees and ornamental palms around elegant sofas.” He walks back to the window. “Can you imagine it with the restored garden, all green and beautiful in summer?”
I can, actually. As soon as he started talking about it, a picture started colouring itself in my head. Like biscuits baking and starting to smell divine. “I can understand why you feel so strongly about the restoration. And it will be beautiful.” I go to stand beside him and we both look out over the garden. “As soon as you get a gardener, it will be transformed, I’m just sorry I won’t be here to see it.”
“Leonie?” He turns to face me.
“Yes?”
“You understand how Kendric House works. I can’t restore anything, I don’t have a penny.”
“Yes. Hannen told me about this. That’s why everyone is a partner not an employee or tenant.”
“Partner yes, or profit-participants, although investor would be more accurate.”
I’m not stupid; it’s clear what he’s trying to tell me. And it’s not like it hasn’t occurred to me.
It’s a great idea.
“I’d love to open a café. Imagine spending my days here. Baking delicious biscuits and making people their favourite drinks. If I had any kind of money, I’d seriously consider it. This room is begging to be brought back to life.” I let my eyes roam around the orangery.
The magnificent windows, the stained-glass, the light, the light, the light!
“You know,” Evan’s voice cuts into my imaginings. “Raff and I have spoken about this.”
Instantly I’m alert. “About the orangery?”
“No, not the orangery, but about the restoration. He has some interesting ideas for fundraising. It might take time, but he was very enthusiastic.”
It’s the first I hear of this. But then Raff was busy most days working side by side on clearing out, redecorating, fixing. They’d have talked about the building the way men like to chat when they have hammers in their hands.
“Maybe you can talk to him and see if he can help.” Evan suggests.
Does he imagine Raff is still the same man, just a few hours away? Evan has no idea what it’s like on a film set. What a different world it is, a world where only the film exists, nothing else. You wake up before dawn to get your exercise done before you go into make-up, hair and wardrobe for hours. You’re surrounded by people all the time, all of them talking to you, moving you around…until someone removes your make-up and you can shower, eat and fall into bed. Kendric House must feel like a hundred light years away.
If funds have to be raised, I’d have to do it. And I have nothing. Not even an overdraft, because when I was eighteen and opened my bank account, I told them I didn’t want an overdraft facility.
It’s how I was raised. Dad never trusted loans. If he couldn’t afford something, he either worked overtime or went without When he wasn’t quoting the old saying, Cut your coat to suit your cloth, then he quoted Shakespeare.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be.
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
and borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
Evan leaves me in the orangery, the long room that opens out on a wide terrace with steps down to a garden.