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Minty didn’t mind one bit. High on the success of the evening, she clapped her hands, startling all the donkeys into a fit of loud braying, and declared the cocktail party would begin in a few moments in the ballroom.
‘Shall we?’ Alex asked Magnús, wiping her eyes, her cheeks burning pink. ‘Ah, that was amazing!’
Alex looked around in wonder as Minty gave her and Magnús the grand tour of the oak-panelled lobby and ballroom – the only two of the party who hadn’t visited the Big House before.
At first, the Christmas tree and the paperchains did a good job of hiding it, but as Alex’s eyes grew accustomed to the candlelight she noticed the thick cobwebs at the highest points of the ceiling, the peeling paint around the cornicing and the big bits of stucco missing from what must once have been an impressive frieze depicting a fox hunt racing all the way around the room.
There was a sad single bulb where a chandelier must have dazzled long ago. The bulb was doing its best but the many white candles in rusting sconces all along the panelled walls had to make up the shortfall.
A black grand piano stood at the centre of the room. It looked very old and valuable. The oak floor was shining, freshly polished for Christmas, and judging by the stern look on Bovis’s face at the sight of Mrs Crocombe’s daughter’s stiletto-heeled boots, it had been his handiwork. The young mum paid him no attention. This was her first night out in months and she was making the most of it out of sight of the school kids and parents who’d gone straight home after the service. She’d taken two cups of festive gin punch from the drinks table in the lobby and kept both for herself.
Minty was speaking proudly about how, decades ago, a young Winston Churchill had danced her own mother – a little girl at the time and in her nightgown – around the ballroom when she’d stumbled into one of Grandfather Clove-Congreve’s legendary after-hunt parties.
Minty didn’t hold with hunting, but she did hold with other traditions as far as she could. Alex listened as she told them how all the portraits had been sold years ago when the estate ran into debt – all but one. A rather foppish-looking man in hunting pinks stared down at them from his frame on the wall. ‘Grandfather Clove-Congreve,’ Minty told them. ‘I couldn’t part with him, even if he is going a bit fusty up there, poor chap.’
‘Great moustache,’ Magnús said, so seriously that Minty thanked him.
‘He was always rather dapper,’ she added, gazing up admiringly. ‘Mad as a brush, unfortunately, and rotten with cash. But still, traditions must hold. He’s staying on the wall, and that’s that.’
‘No paintings of your own parents?’ Alex asked, just as the murmur of chatter in the room dipped and everyone heard her overloud enquiry.
After a beat, during which Minty’s face grew suddenly haggard, she said, ‘No,’ and the coolness in the word was enough to stop Alex asking any more questions.
‘Don’t worry about her,’ Jude whispered, once Minty had strode off to discuss something with Jowan. ‘She’s hard to work out at first, but once you know her story, you can’t help feeling sorry for her. She doesn’t mean to be brusque.’
‘She doesn’t mean to, only its tradition,’ Elliot said dryly, before shaking hands with Magnús and introducing himself.
Elliot had thrown out all his resolutions about having a carb-loading, lean Christmas and downed a beer in seconds, his reward for getting those donkeys back in their stables while miraculously remaining unkicked and unbitten.
Jude was more sympathetic. ‘It can’t be easy for her. This whole place was her family’s, and now she’s confined to just these rooms, a wee kitchen and a bedroom while the rest of the house is turned over to developers, apart from Izaak and Leonid’s attics. Her dad squandered their entire fortune apparently, until her mum had had enough and disappeared to somewhere sunny. Where was it again?’
‘Madeira,’ Elliot put in.
‘That’s it, and Minty couldn’t keep the house going any longer. She’s got no brothers or sisters to help out, either. They’re turning the place into private lets now. The builders moved in last month; they’re gutting the place.’
‘That’s a shame,’ said Alex, watching Minty across the room. ‘So she was saddled with an inheritance she didn’t want.’
‘She was, hence all her “must stick with tradition” stuff and her desperation to attract visitors to the estate gardens.’
Elliot, still brooding about the donkeys, had lost interest in Minty’s misfortunes and was talking with Magnús. ‘We were at the bookshop before you, back in the summer, you know?’
‘That’s where we first met,’ said Jude, suddenly drawn in. ‘We arrived separately, not knowing each other. It was a double-booking mistake kind of thing.’
‘Best mistake of my life,’ Elliot smiled.
Mrs Crocombe seemed to have sniffed out that the conversation was turning to singledom and slunk up behind Magnús, making him flinch when she began explaining how she’d been responsible for bringing Jude and Elliot together and that they were likely to get married soon.
‘Eh!’ Jude flustered, ‘Cool your boots, Mrs C. There’s no wedding bells ringing in Clove Lore any time soon. Elliot, shouldn’t we check on the…’ She pointed to the door where they’d come in, and Elliot caught on quickly and agreed that yes, it was indeed time to go and check on that thing, and the pair said their goodnights and bustled off.
Alex heard them whispering as they left, about Mrs Crocombe being relentless and how she wouldn’t be happy until they’d gifted the local school with triplets.
Jude was still laughing brightly as she and Elliot swept out into the dark night and away from the village matchmaker. They had zero plans to emerge from their cosy home until after Christmas now that Elliot was on holiday and Jude’s uni assignments were in for the year.
Left alone, Alex glanced over Mrs Crocombe’s head towards Magnús as though sending a wordless SOS through sheer willpower. The older woman was drawing a notebook from her pocket and asking Magnús to kindly spell his surname and if he had any plans to stay in the country after his holiday was over. Alex’s heart turned hummingbird at the thought of the inquisition being directed towards her next.
‘Mrs C?’ Magnús stooped a little to talk to her. ‘Is Minty married?’
‘Married? Goodness, no. She’s been alone all her life, running this place. Married to the estate.’
