Chapter Seven
Was he sincere? Gah, since when had she second guessed everything and decided never to take anything or anyone—except it seemed, Maddie—at face value? Slightly ahead of them, Mop weaved from one side of the path to the other, woofed a few times, and barked in delight as he flushed a starling out of a bush. A couple of seagulls dive bombed him half-heartedly, and he almost did a somersault as he did his best to catch them. The look of doggy surprise on his face as he landed on his rear was comical. Dario snorted.
‘Not a lot more sense than Merlin.’
Loyalty wanted Bryony to disagree, honesty kept her mouth shut. He was correct even if it did smart to hear her beloved dog known as a nitwit. She smiled, counted to ten, and bit her lip, before she asked an innocuous question about the stones of the cliff and the natural caves in them. That way they managed it back to where the cliff path met the lane next to the church with polite, non-consequential chit chat, and no more deep and angst filled revelations. Dario looked at her and smiled slowly, as he handed Mop over. ‘I enjoyed that. You are the perfect companion. Restful, and you don’t ask too many questions or talk non-stop.’
She didn’t say, what was the point of queries when they didn’t get answered. ‘I enjoyed it too. My aim is to please, on occasion,’ she said lightly. ‘This must have been one of them.’
‘Can you manage from here? I’ve things to… oh f…flipping Nora. Here’s one of them. Hold on to your hat, and duck when necessary. Remember it’s nothing to do with you and I mean that in the nicest possible way.’
Duck when what?
Bryony swung around to watch the female version of the bloke beside her sashay—that was the word she decided, nothing else would do—across the village green towards them.
Bloody Lottie Monk again. This time she was dressed more for a visit to Ascot than Little Brindish. Flowing, flowery voile, strappy sandals, now sinking into the grass, and a florists shop on her head that even the most generous couldn’t call a sun hat. It only need a pineapple and a steel band in attendance for anyone to think they’d been transported to the sunny Caribbean. What on earth did she think she looked like? Combined with a shoulder bag that shrieked designer, and a necklace that could cancel the national debt, the effect was the weirdest thing Bryony had seen in days. Was she hallucinating? Surely Mrs Cherry’s mushrooms weren’t of the magic variety? Plus, the woman had the most petulant and suspicious expression Bryony had ever seen on someone over the age of fifteen. Most of it directed at her.
‘Dario, where have you been? I’ve been looking everywhere for you. You must have realised I’d be over, what with Maddie’s stupid ideas about the author talk. She just wants you to pander to some stupid woman who writes filth and let her take the glory.’ She glared at Bryony and then ignored her, as if she was rubbish collecting around the bin and beneath her notice.
What? Filth, oh dear. Oh, oh blooming dear. What is she like? Bryony kept her expression impassive…she hoped. It was so very hard not to roll her eyes or yawn.
‘ Why do you let her get away with it?’ Lottie demanded.
Lordy, is she going to stamp her feet next? She’ll either break her heel or get it stuck fast in the ground. That would be interesting. Bryony almost wished it would happen, just to see what would no doubt be the resulting tantrum.
‘You’re not a couple, so why does she think you’ll bend to do her bidding? Honestly, it’s ridiculous. I mean, what is that woman thinking of? She…’
‘Lottie.’ His voice was harsh and cut her off mid-sentence. Warning his sister of something? Bryony wasn’t sure. However, Lottie shut her mouth with an audible snap and glowered at Bryony. Bryony was darned sure she wasn’t going to be cast as the baddy here. She smiled, shifted her backpack out of the way, and held out her hand.
‘Hello, Lottie. We meet again. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m Bryony.’ The hand was ignored. Okay then . All politeness fled out of her mind. She could be as bolshie as the next person when pressed, and it looked like this was one of those times. Her patience was about gone. She made one last try to be friendly, or at least neighbourly . ‘Pleased to meet you.’ S he left the ‘again’ unsaid but intimated.
Lottie glowered and, deliberately it seemed, turned so Bryony was presented with one voile covered shoulder.
‘You again.’ The venom was obvious. ‘Why don’t you get the fact you’re not wanted here?’
That was it. Rude cow.
‘Don’t speak to me like that.’ Bryony replied, in an even tone. She didn’t even know she had such politeness in her. Good Lord I must be getting old. ‘Or not look, whatever. I don’t need the cold shoulder—or the more suited to Ascot covered one.’ That was more like her. ‘I’m no corrupter of your brother. I’m sure he can do that all by himself.’
Lottie turned and stared at Bryony as if she was naked and doing a war dance with a spear and a shrunken head in her hands. Had no one ever spoken back to her?
‘How dare you? Just because I choose to look presentable not like…like someone who gets their clothes from a rubbish tip.’
Ouch. Bryony didn’t think she looked that bad. She shrugged. ‘Each to their own.’
‘Who the hell do you think you are?’ Lottie burst out angrily, as she brushed away Dario’s restraining hand. ‘Just because he’s trying to be a good neighbour don’t you think you’ll get him in your knickers. And no way…’
That was it. Bryony didn’t even bother to count to one, let alone ten before she waded in. If she hadn’t moved her backpack she would have been tempted to swing it and ‘accidentally’ hit the stupid woman. As she couldn’t, she would have to resort to words, not weighty objects. ‘Don’t you worry your pretty little head about my underwear,’ she drawled in her best southern gal voice. The one she used to great effect in a school production of Oklahoma. ‘I’m very selective who gets in my knickers, honey,’ Bryony watched Lottie glower and then winked at the other woman. ‘When I wear any.’
Lottie gasped. Dario chuckled.
All of a sudden Bryony had enough. She was unrepentant, but surely she should be above such playground taunts? Just one last little one. She made sure she essayed a sickly sweet smile. The sort that, if someone gave it to her, she’d put her finger down her throat and gag. ‘Now as this conversation is boring me, I’m off.’
Ouch . If looks could kill she’d be pushing up daisies and her mum choosing the hymns. Bryony didn’t care. The woman—Lottie, not Bryony’s mum—was poison on legs. As for Dario? He was about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. He stood, with an enigmatic smile on his face and said nothing.
Sod it . Bryony decided she’d had enough of Monks and their habits. Thank god Maddie was only an ex-Monk.
Reverted. Struck off.
‘I’m away now.’ She made sure her expression was now as frosty as she could make it. ‘Nice to meet you.’
Liar, liar, pants —when she had some on— on fire .
Her mum would tell her to wash her mouth out with all the untruths she’d told. But grief, the woman would be enough to make a saint cuss and lie, let alone an out and out sinner like she was. At the last moment Bryony remembered to make sure Mop was with her and set off towards the lane home. Mop must have sensed her mood, because he walked sedately beside her.
Did she really hear Dario whisper, ‘chicken’ as she left?
So what if she was? Bryony was all for a good cat fight if the occasion warranted it. This didn’t.
She made bread, gluten free, from scratch—no packets or mixes—the following morning. Something therapeutic, even if it would all be a bit hit and miss as to whether it was edible or not. If it was a not, the birds would get a party. Without making a special point to look out for it, she watched the green van go by and couldn’t be bothered to even try to see who might be driving it. If whoever it was enjoyed ruining their springs or whatever vehicles had, by going up and down so many times that was up to them. She’d already decided that Millie the sports car would either have to go or be housed up the lane. She’d noticed a ‘garage to rent’ advert pinned to the notice board on the green and vowed to go up and write down the phone number given. The poor car had begun to make alarming creaks and wheezes with a nasty knocking noise every few moments. Mind you, a van was different, she supposed. It was supposed to be rugged and used to bumps and lumps. Sports cars of whatever vintage were not. At least she could afford a car more suited to her surroundings these days. A visit to the nearest large town, with its ubiquitous ‘motor mile’ was on the cards in the near future.
She kneaded the dough and let her mind wander. What make and colour? New or second hand? Who could she ask to go with her and give her a second opinion? Dario flashed into her mind. No doubt if he said yes, and Lottie heard about it, she’d have something to say. Bryony had half wondered if Dario would appear and apologise or something but after she’d walked away - and sneaked a quick look back just as she turned the corner - there had been nothing. Her last view was of Lottie standing and staring after Dario, who was marching off in the opposite direction. Where did he live? He’d never actually said. She must remember to ask Maddie when she next saw her. Mop’s head appeared over the edge of the counter and Bryony yelped.
‘How did you get in here? Damned dog, you need to learn your place.’
Mop of course never shared his secrets.
‘I let him in.’
Dario stood on the doorstep with the mangiest bouquet of flowers she’d ever seen. He looked at it ruefully. ‘It was nice until I met with Mop the magnificent as he made his getaway towards the village. I thought you were going to sort out a run for him?’
‘I am,’ Bryony said defensively, as Dario thrust the flowers at her. ‘I’m waiting for the wire I ordered. Thank you. Um, is there a reason?’
‘A Lottie sized one. My apologies for my bloody sister. Ever since our mother died, just after Mads and I divorced, she seems to think I’ll make, in her words, another disastrous mistake. She intends I don’t.’
‘Leave all your hard earned cash to her and hers?’
He smiled ruefully. ‘Something like that.’
‘I didn’t think estate agents made that sort of money?’ It all smelt very fishy to her.
‘They don’t, not round here and anyway I was only a stand in. Lottie is trying to push me into using my degree and working in the city, or something. I’m not sure what she thinks I could do, however, that’s Lottie for you. Standing and prestige is everything. Happiness and contentment is well down the list. I told her to dream on. That apart, she’s a bloody nuisance, and I told her that as well. The upshot is now she’s not speaking to me, you or Mads. Maddie, of course, high fived and asked if I could be sure the status quo remained ever thus. She wishes; although at this rate Lottie will only have the postman to converse with, and even there it’s doubtful. He, according to her, drives over her grass on purpose.’
‘Has she upset him that much?’
‘Oh, he doesn’t. Once on the snow when he couldn’t see the drive, about five years ago, one wheel got onto her beloved lawn. But Lottie has an elephant memory for perceived slights. No idea how Donald puts up with her.’
‘Donald?’
‘Her long suffering husband. They live over in Great Brindish.’
‘But she’s Monk, so she doesn’t use her married name?’
Dario raised one eyebrow. ‘Ah yeah, well would you want to be Lottie Botte?’ He elongated the name to Bottie, just as Maddie had. ‘Especially when sadly your nickname at school was spotty Lottie. Not a favourite amongst her peers, my sis.’
Bryony spluttered. Spotty Lottie Bottie? She loved it. ‘Good Lord, no.’
‘I hear you had another run in with unlovely Lottie the leech,’ Maddie said, as she jogged into Bryony’s shed, ostensibly to beg a coffee. In honesty, as she said, to not only beg the coffee, but also get the gen on the handbags at twelve meeting, and be one step ahead of everyone else in the village because Lottie was well known for her possessive attitude towards Dario. The story went that one day she’d blackened one of his girlfriend’s eyes because she objected to Lottie telling her she couldn’t wear green because it was Lottie and Dario’s colour not the girlfriend’s.
The story of the recent meeting was becoming ridiculous, so Maddie announced she was determined to know the real deal. ‘Did she really have a water pistol and shoot at you with Evian?’
Bryony spluttered and then laughed until she cried. ‘You wh…a…t?’
‘Thought not. She wouldn’t waste the Evian. But boy, it seems you are so not her flavour of the year. Keep your eyes open for low flying unexpected objects.’
Has the woman got a serious fixation that she needed counselling for? ‘Do I need to hold on to some garlic and waft it in her direction, or wear a placard stating my intentions. You know ‘I hereby say Dario Monk is not mine’ sort of stuff?’
Maddie laughed. ‘Nah, she just needs more to do, and a realisation the world doesn’t go around according to the rules of Lottie. She was a spoiled brat, and her attitude thinking it is her right that everything is done as she wants has never changed. At least it makes more people sympathetic to you, so in a perverse way she’s doing you a favour with her “everything her way or else”, rubbish.’ Maddie snorted in the way she did. ‘Now I know it should run on my ideas.’ She rolled her eyes as Bryony sniggered.
‘Yeah, I know, it doesn’t, more’s the pity. I reckon if I’d have got more exams and actually studied at uni, instead of doing what dear Lottie once told me in a scandalous voice was how I spent my time. ‘As in, her words, not mine “indulging in carnal activities, and paying more attention to Dario’s body than my text books.” Very true, and goodness knew I damned well enjoyed it.’ She paused and obviously went over her words in her mind because she rolled her eyes and groaned. ‘And bloody hell that doesn’t make sense. I mean to say, if I’d done what I should have, not what I did, I could have run this village with my eyes closed and told Lottie where to get off. As it is, I bite my tongue.’
Bryony snorted.
‘Okay I try to bite my tongue, and not overrule everyone in the village all the time.’
In Bryony’s mind Maddie was three quarters of the way there anyway. ‘Is she really as bad as you’re making out?’ Even though she’d seen the best...or was that the worst...of Lottie-dom, it might be as well to know what she was really up against. If she was that bad, Bryony wasn’t sure to feel sorry for Lottie or the rest of the world. ‘She must be really unhappy.’
‘Well if she is, it’s misery attracting misery. Oh okay, I know I’m a bitch, but seriously she seems to enjoy her “woe is me I should be queen attitude”. Minions take heed,’ Maddie said, in a sepulchral tone. ‘If she wasn’t so spiteful as well, I reckon most people would go half way towards being pleasant to her, but she leaves herself wide open. Her attitude to anything that’s not what she wants is tantrum central, and sulks. Then she gets spiteful. You know, you’ve seen her in action a fair few times. She’s getting worse. Some people must have a spite and bite gene, and she’s one of them. Ah well, I ignore her best as I can and smile sweetly and pay no attention when I can't.’
‘So apart from trying to run Dario’s life and be negative,’ Bryony chose not to say bitchy—that was descending to the woman’s level. ‘What else does she do?’
‘Shout at Don and…okay I’ll stop being bitchy myself. She doesn’t really do much, and I think that’s half the problem. If she used her brain, and she does have one - she was going to be an accountant before she met Donald and decided to be a wife - she’d be happier. She’s bored so we all don’t benefit.’
‘Does he not want her to work? That’s a bit archaic isn’t it?’
‘I don’t think he’d mind. Lottie decided she needed to be around, I think. But they don’t have kids, and she’s got a cleaner and gardener and too much time on her hands. Ah well…People have offered her jobs, both paid and voluntarily, but she blows them off.’
‘Nothing anyone can do then.’ Except wonder why.
‘True.’ Maddie looked from Bryony to the piles of boxes that filled the building, most still sealed with tape and blinked theatrically. ‘God almighty, will you ever get these sorted?’
‘Of course I will,’ Bryony said robustly, and not altogether truthfully. ‘One day. Anyway, I meant to ask before we got side-tracked. How do you know about Lottie? There was no one around.’
‘Ostensibly, but this is the country, sweetie. Even walls have eyes and ears, or so you would think. The world and his wife, well, Mrs Cherry and Joe the postman anyway are full of it. Evidently, she, Lottie not Mrs C, put her hand on Dario’s arm, he shook her off, she stamped her foot; he shrugged. She burst into tears and he walked away. She ran after him, they went out of sight, much to Mrs C’s disgust, and five minutes later Lottie stomped theatrically, Joe’s expression not mine, up the road, got into her Chelsea tractor and drove off, knocking over one plant pot and scraping the rubbish bin leaving a large swathe of green paint on its grey painted side. Dario didn’t reappear and now the village is agog to discover what it was all about. The general assumption is you.’
‘Me? Why? I was an innocent bystander.’
‘You might think so, but the grapevine begs to differ. L the L doesn’t like competition when it comes to my beloved ex’s attention. Don’t worry though, she hates me as well,’ Maddie finished and took a swig of water from the bottle tucked into a pouch at her waist. ‘Like I sort of said in my meanderings, Lottie hates with impartiality.’
Maddie still looked elegant, even sweaty and in running leggings with holes in the knees, a ladder running up to the crotch, and a top that outlined every tiny curve and bump. Bryony glanced at her own attire. Long strappy sun top and old worn shorts made from a pair of jeans that if she remembered rightly, had belonged to Maisie, and grinned. Chalk and cheese. No wonder they said opposite attract. She and Maddie had become firm friends over the few weeks they had known each other. Maddie swore she’d get Bryony riding, jogging and into shape. Bryony had grinned, bent and touched her toes, and offered her friend a glass of wine. ‘I’m not out of shape,’ she said. ‘Just out of inclination.’
‘Good Lord, what have you got here?’ Maddie flopped down onto a pile of curtains and flapped her hands at the dust that floated upwards. ‘You could stock the local charity shop twice over and still have stuff left.’ She coughed and began to flick through the pages of a five year old copy of Cosmo. ‘Blimey, just look at that dress, enough to give you migraines.’
‘Yes, I could, and I intend to when I decide what goes where. News travels fast, to be honest I’ve no idea what’s going on and I agree re dress. No, I didn’t wear one and God knows why I have that mag. Probably had a book recommendation or sommat. As for the boxes and stuff? I hope it’s my stove top coffee maker, three mixing bowls, Mop’s first aid kit, the juniper berries and my summer weight duvet. And any other stuff I haven’t realised I haven’t found yet. I swear even if it bankrupts me, if I ever move again, I’m getting packers.’ Not that it would even make a dent in her coffers. According to the whizz kid financial advisor the solicitors had recommended she was set up nice and tight, and even a stock market crash wouldn’t leave her penniless. She hadn’t retorted ‘damn right, I’ve sorted out and put in place some money decisions of my own’. That was for her to know and no one else to need to, but it was the principle that counted.
‘Ah, sweetie, so not pc.’ Maddie blinked. ‘God almighty I sound like Spotty Botte, Lottie the leech. Okay, I’ll try not to think of her in those terms, promise. Not easy though when she rolls up in her designer clothes and brand new gas guzzler and tells me I need to go back to basics, stop spending and apply my brain—‘you must have some sense in there somewhere my dear’— to putting my house in order. I upset her when I told her basics was Harrods food hall and Mulberry.’ She snorted. ‘No idea why. And really, my Mulberry is about to become a new bathroom, and Harrods food hall is but a fond and distant memory. It’s down to the local supermarket these days, and why not. But dear Lottie is so easy to wind up.’ She put down the magazine and swiped her hands on her leggings. The long dusty streaks just added to her general, oh so casual look. The sort only someone with supreme confidence could carry off.
‘Maddie, you’re wicked.’
Maddie nodded. ‘I do hope so. Anyway, I only popped in to say that someone will be along on Monday to check out the venue. We’ve only got three weeks, and I’m beginning to wonder if I’ve bitten off more than I can chew. Plenty of time to find the coffee maker. If not, I’ve got a spare one. I have at least two of everything, what with my parents’ belongings, what Dex had - though I try not to find those too often. I swear that man had weird tastes before he met me - and what Dario and I divvied up between us. So, most things you can’t find, I can offer.’ She’d heard the tale of the cracked cafetiere jug and knew Bryony hadn’t bothered to buy a new one, saying the plunger just about fit into one of her mugs, and what were a few bean grounds between friends.
‘Cheers, I might need to take you up on that if I can’t find my scales for baking those damned scones. I best not use my habitual a bit of this and a dash of that method.’
‘Hey whatever works. Right I best move myself, before I get riggwelted.’
‘Pardon?’ Maddie didn’t half come out with some weird expressions at times.
‘Oh, my other gran’s expression. Like a sheep stuck on its back that can’t move. I do love these unusual sayings. Monday at eleven to check the barn over. I’ll make sure Dario is here as well. Don’t forget.’
As if she could forget. ‘Next time you ask me to do anything I’m running for the hills. You are a menace.’
‘I am, aren’t I?’ Maddie said complacently. ‘That’s the nicest thing you could have said to me.’
‘Well, the nicest thing you could say to me is who Mandi Rook is, and when I’ll meet her. I mean I have to talk to her sometime, surely? Even just to discover if she wants tea or coffee, whether I have to buy sugar or goats milk and if she’s one of those temperamental artistes who only use Evian or need a purple cushion to lean on.’
‘Ah, coffee, no sugar, red top not goats, prefers home grown tap, and never purple. Evidently it makes one look old if one doesn’t have the skin tones for it. I’m quoting some article or other there, not our Mandi.’
‘So, if you know that, and know her, why can’t I?’ Bryony demanded. ‘Is it you?’
‘Me?’ Maddie snorted. ‘Not in a million years. I got a ‘did not pass’ for my English exam the first time, and only just scraped it well enough for uni the second. I’m okay at horses, crap at words.’ She sobered. ‘Look, give me a day or so and let me see if Mandi is cooperative.’
‘Well, she’s got to be at some point if you want this blasted talk or whatever it is to happen.’ The elusive Mandi was beginning to get on Bryony’s nerves. She didn’t want the woman’s life history, just enough information to know what was likely to happen. If she was having goodness knows however many people wandering around her property—okay her barn on the edge of the lane—having to be polite and chatty, sell books, and do all the things she thought she’d left behind in London, the minimum information she needed was who she was to build up and what was expected. ‘Seriously, if she’s not going to meet me at last half way, my barn is off limits, tickets sold or not. I mean cooperation is a two way street, and at the moment this is one way only.’
Maddie patted her shoulder. ‘You sound like my Dex when he’s had a run in with someone who thinks they know more than him about Etruscan pottery or something, and want Dex to share his knowledge and not be given anything back.’
Having met Dex, Bryony could picture the scene. A mild man who she surmised took a long while to get riled but when he did, everyone ducked. ‘I feel like him. And I’ve reached the end of my tether. No conversation, plus out here, no tap water, and no access to a loo. Actually, no bookshop and sorry, Village People. There’s only so much a girl can do.’
‘Argh, I forgot about a loo down here.’ Maddie fished her phone out from under her top and made notes on it. She ignored Bryony’s no bookshop comment. ‘I’ll get one put up by the barn. Er… it is empty I hope?’ she asked dubiously. ‘The barn, not the loo, that will be of course. I mean, you did say you had a lot of stuff to sort out and well if this is anything to go by…’ her voice trailed off. ‘Not that I don’t trust you, sweetie, but can you cope? Do I send Dario to help? Now there’s only around three weeks to go.’
Bryony counted to ten and watched Maddie’s expression become that bit more anxious. ‘So you said.’ It wasn’t fair to tease her, and after all she had thought of an answer to the lack of a loo, something Bryony hadn’t. At least it would stop people asking to use hers. If anyone turned up. ‘Nope, it’s all under control, the empty barn is the other one, if you get my drift. I’ve even got some of the books sorted.’ Maddie’s Dex had driven down three evenings on the trot with several van loads of new and used books. A red van; not the now you see it now you don’t green one. If she sold even a tenth of them at a pound each, they’d be quids in. There’d be money for caviar at the village kids Christmas party as well as presents. ‘Come and see for yourself. Although, I meant it about Ms Who on earth is she Rook.’
‘I promise,’ Maddie said, soberly. ‘Oh, and you will be at church a week on Sunday, won’t you?’ It wasn’t a question. ‘You really ought to go, even if after that week it’s only on high days and holidays.’
‘Must I?’ It was the first time church had been mentioned. The pretty, old, grey building on the edge of the green, with a tower it was said built tall enough to act as a navigation aid to help ships find the mouth of the nearby river, was on her list of places to visit, but so far, she hadn’t, along with a lot of other places, managed to fit a visit to. Once she got this dratted arts weekend over and found her stove top coffee maker, she was having away days.
‘Why?’ She’d earmarked the next two weekends for lazy reading sessions. Maybe a long leisurely bubble bath with chill out music on in the background, scented candles and a glass of wine followed by her favourite curry on one night, and a gluten free pizza on the other. ‘Why that weekend, not last, or the one after?’
‘Oh, I just think you should,’ Maddie said in what, for her, was a very evasive manner. ‘The old vicar left a few months ago. We’ve had a stand in and now that one has waved farewell and hightailed it to Prudhoe or somewhere up north, it’s a lay reader that week. Evidently well worth going to church for if you’re not a regular. And there will be tea coffee and non communion wine after. A great chance to meet some more people and put faces to names. You can sit in the big house pew with me and the kids. Dex will be away. Or so he says. Not very churchy, is my beloved.’
‘Nor am I,’ Bryony said, honestly. ‘But I guess, I’ll do it for you. Won’t it look weird though? I mean going that week, when it’s neither the new vicar nor the old.’
‘Oh no, not at all,’ Maddie said mysteriously. ‘Do you want me to come and get you? So you don’t lose your way?’
‘You mean so I don’t renege?’
Maddie guffawed. ‘And that. But you said you will and I know you won’t go back on your word.’
Sadly, Bryony thought, that was oh so true. ‘I will if I get the dreaded lurgy,’ she said. ‘I might discover I’m allergic to old buildings.’
‘No lurgies allowed. And you live here, and this is pretty old, so sorry, that excuse won’t work.’
‘I might sneeze.’
‘Join half the congregation. Must be the dust the cleaners can’t reach. There’s even a box of tissues left out with the pamphlets and hymnals as you go in.’ She sighed. ‘Oh, sod it, if you really hate the idea don’t come. I’m a cow for nagging.’
‘Cows moo, not nag,’ Bryony pointed out, and laughed. ‘I’m winding you up. I’ll come if only to see what the sermon is like.’ She had a thought. ‘Er, they don’t go on too long do they? My attention span is a bit limited these days.’
‘Nope. Old Mrs Cobbett starts to cough loudly after ten minutes to wind them up. Right must dash. See you at ten thirty a week on Sunday, if not before.’ Maddie did her usual rush around, air kiss and disappearing act.
Which left Bryony with another problem. Clothes suitable for church.
That bubble bath was fast becoming a fond never had memory.