Chapter 3
‘Bye, Gran.’ Isaac was standing outside a low garden gate at the end of a brick path he’d just walked back down after dropping his grandmother at the Victorian semi-detached cottage it belonged to.
Like many of the others we’d passed, her garden was full of early blooms, making it look cheerful and welcoming.
Unlike the expression on Isaac’s face as he swung back to face the Land Rover.
‘Get in the front now if you want,’ he said.
My backside thanks you.
As I stood to open the back door and scoot round to the front, he started the engine and pulled off. I landed with a thump back on the wooden bench.
My backside most certainly doesn’t thank you for that, you eejit.
‘I thought you said I could sit in the front?’ I yelled over the engine. Not only had suspension been skimped on with this vehicle, sound insulation obviously hadn’t been an option either.
He glanced back, frowned and pointed at the gap between the front seats before returning his attention to the road.
I seriously thought about staying put but there was padding up there.
I shuffled along the wooden bench to the front and then, gripping both driver and passenger seat for grim death, launched myself through the gap, whacking my shin on something as I did so and nutting the windscreen as Isaac pulled to a halt to allow a tractor that had just rounded the bend to pass by.
I bounced back off the window and landed on the cushioned seat.
It was nice but perhaps not worth the two bruises I’d acquired in the process.
‘Seat belt,’ he said, without acknowledging that might have been an idea prior to him leaving his gran’s place or a possible concussion.
I clicked the belt into position as loudly as I could.
After several more minutes of riding in a silence so thick, you could lay a patio with it, I made an effort to break it.
‘It seems like a lovely village. Your gran obviously likes her gardening too.’
‘As well as you, you mean?’ He flashed me a look I couldn’t read.
‘No… I… err… I meant as well as you. Is that where you got your interest from?’
‘Partly.’
And that was the end of that conversation.
We rode on for a few more minutes until the houses gave way to fields and a large stone wall running along one side that was too high to see over.
The verges were full of primroses and buttercups ahead of the frothy cow parsley that would follow.
Flashes of purple showed me that the sweet violet here had escaped the over-foraging much of the country had succumbed to as a result of their flowers being sprinkled liberally on many a dish on The Great British Bake Off.
Masses of forget-me-nots tumbled around them all, preparing to burst into bloom. It was utterly beautiful.
‘You won’t last.’ Isaac’s statement ripped me from my bucolic daydream.
‘Sorry?’
‘You won’t last here.’ He threw me a glance. ‘And I know you didn’t go to Kew.’
Puffing myself up, I blustered at him. ‘I don’t know what you mean!’
He swung the Landy to the left and we entered a driveway that I couldn’t see the end of.
‘Don’t worry. I’m not going to say anything. Barnaby hired you for reasons best known to himself and I’m not about to upset him by binning you on the first day.’
‘How very generous.’ My tone was flat. ‘What makes you think I didn’t go to Kew?
’ I was one of the few people, although admittedly the number was slowly growing, who didn’t do social media.
Not in any real sense. I think there was still an Instagram account kicking around somewhere but I hadn’t posted on that for years.
I really should shut it down. Either way, I knew I hadn’t made a mistake that obvious.
‘Let’s just say I have sources.’
‘How nice for you. Ever thought they might be wrong?’
‘Nope.’
‘Well…’ Outwardly, I was as cool as a jug of Pimms filled up to the brim with ice. Inside, I’d melted entirely into a puddle. ‘I’m sorry to say, in this case, they are.’
‘We both know they’re not so you can drop the act, Emmeline.’
We were still hurtling up the driveway, lined on either side by towering beech trees.
‘Don’t you think you ought to slow down a bit?’ I said, gripping the edge of the seat.
‘I’ve been doing this a long time. Unlike you.’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ I said as we bumped over a rut. ‘Ow!’
‘See what I mean?’ He slowed down a little.
‘Right. I see.’
‘What do you see?’ he asked in a bored tone.
‘Threatened by a woman, are you?’
At this, he burst out laughing, which wasn’t exactly the effect I was going for.
‘Not at all. My grandmother would have my guts for garters if I even had a thought in that direction.’
‘So, what the bloody hell is your problem?’ We bounced over another rut and I bit my tongue in order not to let out another sound.
‘My problem,’ Isaac said as he pulled up to a small, picture-book cottage, ‘is that I needed an under-gardener to help me.’
I opened my mouth to speak.
‘A qualified under-gardener. I don’t have time to be running around after some city girl who’s crying because she got mud on her brand-new designer wellies.’
‘OK. I’m probably about to get fired anyway so it doesn’t matter if I say it now, but you really are an arse, aren’t you?’
His sandy eyebrows raised a quarter of an inch.
‘And I’ll get an Uber to take me back to station, thanks, rather than risk life and limb with you at the wheel again.’
‘I didn’t offer.’
‘Obviously. I was saying on the off chance that the pigs mentioned in the details about the place were of the flying kind.’
It might have been the late-afternoon sunlight but I thought I saw his mouth flicker momentarily in amusement.
‘And, yes, I might have told a slight fib about studying at Kew.’
‘You mean outright lie?’
I carried on. ‘But you’re wrong about the rest. Yes, I came from London but I grew up on a smallholding in a very rural area. We grew everything we needed. I was expected to help out from an early age and did.’
I didn’t need to tell him that, at the time, I couldn’t wait to grow up and get away and had enjoyed the trappings of London life for a long while.
But the truth was that the last few years, the happiest I felt was when I was tending my little pot plants on the balcony, being my dad’s own personal under-gardener or nosing around the garden centre or nursery with him or my bestie, Freddy.
‘That’s a good start. So, what did you actually do before you came here?’
I stayed silent.
Isaac rolled his eyes. ‘I don’t have the power to fire you, if that makes you feel better. That’s down to Barnaby and Edward.’
A small wave of relief washed over me.
‘I can just recommend that they do.’
My nerves pinged back under piano-wire style tension.
He made a rolling motion with his hand. ‘So?’
I shook my head. ‘Fine. I was a senior advertising executive – that part is true – but I’d had enough.
I wasn’t interested in trying to make people think they needed more all the time.
And I wanted to get away from London – from the noise and the people.
I wanted to feel clean air in my lungs.’ I gave a shrug.
‘Basically, I needed a complete change and a break.’
Isaac let out a huff of a laugh as he stepped down out of the vehicle and turned back to face me. ‘The last thing this job is going to be is a break. This is your new digs for the time you’re here.’
‘Which, according to you, won’t be long.’
There it was again: that ghostly smile of amusement.
‘You’ve got spirit. I’ll give you that.’ He pulled a key from his pocket. ‘This is one of the tythe cottages on the estate, Rose Cottage.’
‘It’s beautiful,’ I said, looking up at the brickwork as the late sun tinted it pink. To the left and above the door, the well-pruned branches of an aptly planted rose were supported with wire.
‘It’s been empty for a while but the family have had it cleaned prior to your arrival. Everything’s as it should be but it was also built in 1859 so bear that in mind.’
‘The house on the smallholding we lived on was of a similar age.’
Isaac nodded. ‘Here are your keys.’ I held out my hand and he plopped a small bunch in it. ‘That’s the front, that’s the back.’
‘And that one?’
He gave a shrug. ‘No one actually knows. It’s just been on there forever. Let me know if you find out. Any questions?’
I felt like I had a million but also, ridiculously, if I asked any of them, it was a point to him.
‘Just one.’
He tilted his head and I knew I’d made the right decision. ‘Which is?’
‘What time do I start tomorrow?’
‘Eight a.m. I’ll meet you here. Don’t be late.’
With that, he turned and walked to the Land Rover, got in and tootled off at a much more sedate pace back to whatever bridge he lived under.
I made a point of not watching him leave and instead looked up at my new quarters.
Freshly white painted sash windows glowed in the spring sunlight and the pale pink of the front door, also freshly painted, was welcoming and just the colour I’d have chosen myself.
I walked up the brick path to the stone steps.
Chamomile grass released its warm scent as I crushed it beneath my trainers and to each side, a burgeoning cottage garden tempted me with early colour and perfume.
Now that Isaac had gone and I was surrounded by a garden, I could already feel the knots releasing in my stomach.
I got to the door, pushed the old key into an equally old lock and turned it.
Inside, I could smell beeswax polish and the pale parquet flooring gleamed with the colours thrown through the decorative glass of the fan light above the front door.
A vase of freshly cut daffodils was a burst of sunshine on the dark oak of the slim console table.
After the time spent with Isaac, any and all sunshine was gratefully received.