They surveyed the shop in silence. The stacks were messy where browsers hadn’t reshelved books properly. Annie would love sorting that, Harri knew, while he’d empty the dishwasher, which was at that moment whirring noisily from the kitchen nook.
Annie sipped her tea. She looked contented, had been, in fact, since the arrival of their very first paying customers this morning. She’d greeted them like this had been her bookshop all along, without a hint of nerves or self-consciousness.
Within twenty minutes of those first arrivals stepping inside she’d rung up two titles on the till (for the grand total of six pounds), and had convinced them (a couple in their forties with a friendly black Labrador) that they’d better stay for coffee and one of Harri’s grandma’s buns.
They’d been unable to say no, of course, and Annie had chatted with them about their mission to walk the entire Devonshire coastal path in sections over the course of the winter. She’d discovered they were from Bristol, and that the dog, Bailey, was thirteen years old and going a little deaf, and all before Harri had ground their coffee beans.
By the time Harri had delivered up their cappuccinos they were already friends and Annie was looking at their recent wedding photos on the woman’s phone.
‘You were amazing today,’ he said now.
She curtseyed a thank you.
‘Daily totals?’ she said, like they were back in Waterstones cashing up, where every night they’d take guesses at how much they’d taken through the tills and the person who came closest didn’t have to pay for the post-work pints at the pub.
‘Twothousandpounds,’ Harri said, and Annie caught the joke. They’d easily make that on a Saturday’s trading in the big bookstore.
‘I’m saying a hundred,’ she told him.
‘All right… Sixty, no seventy-two,’ he ventured.
Annie clicked the mouse with enthusiasm.
‘Oh.’ Her shoulders dropped. ‘Forty-nine pounds, sixty-two pee.’ She overdid the English pronunciation for laughs. ‘How much did you take in the cafe?’
Harri pulled the printout from his pocket. ‘Just shy of forty quid.’
‘For a day’s work?’ Annie complained. ‘I mean, I know I wasn’t frantic, but we had a steady stream all day.’
Harri liftedSwallows and Amazonsfrom the shelf behind him and opened the flyleaf, showing Annie the pencil marks inside. ‘I guess since about half the stock is second-hand and they’re pricing books like this at two quid a go, we’re not talking Bezos amounts of profit.’
‘I guess not,’ Annie conceded.
‘And since we’re not getting paid anyway, it doesn’t really matter,’ he said, putting the book back. ‘Anyway, wasn’t I closest? Didn’t I say seventy-two?’
‘But with the cafe takings, I was closest, so I guess you’re buying.’
‘Hey!’ Harri was ready to complain when the shop phone rang.
They both stared at it in alarm.
‘You get it,’ Harri urged.
After an exaggerated eye roll and a whispered ‘grow up’, Annie answered. ‘Borrow-A-Bookshop?’
Harri watched as she listened and nodded, and made the occasional ‘uh-huh?’ sound. She widened her eyes comically at him as the call went on. ‘Yes, we will… Okay… see you th…’
Whoever it was had hung up without letting Annie utter one full sentence. She set the phone back in its holder and turned ominously to Harri.
‘Our presence is requested up at the Big House. That wasLadyAraminta Clove-Congreve.’
‘We’re invited to dinner?’ Harri said worriedly. He did not like the sound of this, not when he was so close to the promise of a pint of cider in the local pub. They’d probably have a blazing fire there too, and fish and chips, and any number of nice wintry puddings on the menu.
‘Not dinner, no,’ Annie tolled dramatically, clearly enjoying the absurdity of it all. ‘We are summoned to a village meeting.’
Chapter Five
The Locals
