Murder on the Green. H.V. Coombs
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would maybe have gone down a little better if he had been talking to Jess’s face rather than where it said ‘Old Forge Café’ on her apron.
She looked at Andrea with as much enthusiasm as he had me earlier, and he returned to his position at the stove. Jess shook her head. ‘What a plonker,’ she said dismissively to me.
The rest of the service passed by in a pleasantly hectic blur.
For me, it was a delight having a competent grill cook. All I had to do was plate up and help Francis whenever he stumbled, which was often, with a starter or a vegetable accompaniment.
The downside was the contempt that Andrea obviously held me in, his irritation obvious at being expelled from Justin’s side and forced into the hell of mediocrity that was the Old Forge Café.
I tried once or twice to get him to talk about life with Justin, to try and get some feel of their relationship, but it was useless. Any idea of getting useful clues from Andrea rapidly disappeared.
The last dessert cheque was done at about two-thirty and we started cleaning down the kitchen. Andrea disappeared outside to have a cigarette, and I took the opportunity to explain to Jess that she would have to put up with him for a bit.
‘But he’s so creepy,’ she grumbled, ‘and he keeps staring at me.’
‘It won’t be for long,’ I promised her.
‘How long?’
I decided to be honest with Jess as to why Justin had employed me.
‘Well, the situation is this …’ I scratched my head. ‘Justin is being blackmailed and he wants me to find out who it is and frighten him or her off. That won’t take too long.’
I briefly sketched in the background, and Jess’s expression became one of tender concern.
‘So he doesn’t want you for your cooking ability?’ Jess patted me sorrowfully on the shoulder.
I shook my head. Her large eyes regarded me sympathetically, which was nice on one level but added to my sense of inadequacy. My waitress seemed to have made it her duty to try and protect me from life and its hardships, which was great but a little demeaning.
‘That won’t take too long? Are you sure?’ asked Jess. ‘I mean, your last out-of-the-kitchen activity was hardly a resounding success, was it?’
She had that look that she habitually wore around me that told me she was certain that she was right and I was wrong. Unless it was a question of food. Her eyes held mine with the natural superiority that parents have over small children.
‘Anyway, the only good thing to come out of that was your getting to see Claudia again,’ she said, referring to my ex.
‘I dare say, but she’s engaged, and not to me.’
‘She gave you her phone number …’
‘Justin has every faith in me. I’m sure he knows what he is doing,’ I said, emphatically, shutting down the Claudia conversation.
‘You’re an idiot.’ Jess shook her head, but in a nice way.
Any resentment that I may have felt at being put in my place by a girl half my age (twenty-two to forty-five) was tempered by the fact that she was indisputably brighter than me, and the fact that I am very often wrong about things. For example, the time she had just alluded to, when I had fallen in love with a murderer (not that I had known at the time – I’m not that stupid) and had nearly died because of it.
So, no, it hadn’t been an unqualified success at all.
This, I reflected, was the man that Justin McCleish had hired to save his bacon. I consoled myself with the fact that surely he knew what he was doing.
‘Anyway,’ I tried to cheer her up, ‘you’re in charge of the kitchen while I’m away. Remember, Andrea is working for you, not vice versa. You’re on tonight, aren’t you?’
‘Sure am,’ said Jess. She didn’t look very excited by the thought.
‘Well, I’m off to see Esther. I’ll be back by close of service, when you can let me know what the Godfather out there is like when he’s on his own.’
‘I just can’t wait,’ said Jess sarcastically and went through into the dining room. You can’t bang a swing door behind you but, somehow, she managed to give the impression of doing just that.
I guess all villages have their movers and shakers and Esther Bartlett was prominent in Hampden Green. She was a Parish Councillor, she led the village litter clean-up days and she sang in the local church choir. Despite this, she was also the local white witch, High Priestess of the local coven and the Chair of SoBuNPag (South Bucks Neo Pagans). The witches were quite big on acronyms. She liked her food – she was a regular customer of mine and used me for catering for her parties, both secular and religious.
I was at Esther’s house to discuss a catering project with an associate of hers. Historically I had done quite well out of witches parties. They liked their food.
‘More tea?’ asked Esther. She had kind, blunt features resting on top of her several chins and a pair of very shrewd blue eyes. She was a big lady, who tended to favour voluminous flowing caftans. She was wearing one today, a riot of crimson paisley.
I nodded. ‘Please.’
She poured and smiled at me.
She was one of my favourite customers and her home-made jam made my Bakewell tarts all the better in my opinion. Though it still rankled that Andrea hadn’t noticed.
‘I hear that you’re working with the Justin McCleish!’ said Esther. ‘We’re all very impressed. What’s he like?’
‘Very nice,’ I said. ‘He’s doing a book on English gastro-pub food and wants my input, which is very flattering. So I’ll be with him and his team up at the Earl’s place, helping out, to get a sense of his cooking style.’
‘What’s his wife like?’ said Clare Reynolds. She was the other person at the table, another devotee of the Craft.
Clare was far more occult-looking than Esther, with wiry, jet-black, backcombed hair, hawkish features and a lot of eye make-up. In her black and purple clothes, she looked very goth-like, reminding me eerily of Robert Smith from The Cure.
She was the Chair of NoBWic, North Bucks Wiccans, a sister organisation to SoBuNPag and based in Milton Keynes. It’s not a place that has much of a mystical ring to it – Avebury, yes, Mont Saint Michel, yes, Tibet, yes, Glastonbury Tor, yes, Avalon, yes … Milton Keynes? No.
‘Aurora is very nice,’ I said.
‘I heard she was a bit of a bitch, man-mad!’ Clare said.
I shook my head. ‘I think that’s just the TV marketing people – they want her to float around looking gorgeous to attract male viewers – she’s actually not like that. She seems very sweet-natured.’
She had also made good on her promise to hire Jess to improve her computer skills. Jess was in raptures.
‘Anyway … food …’
Clare was keen on hiring me to do the catering for the NoBWic Midsummer Festival, also known as Summer Solstice or …
‘We call it Litha, the most powerful day of the year for the Sun God,’ said Clare dreamily. ‘… we shall leap sky-clad through the sacred fires …’
I looked dubiously at Esther who I found hard to imagine leaping naked through anything, much less a sacred bonfire. She caught my eye and grinned. I blushed, feeling sure she knew exactly what I had been thinking.
‘Well,