Page 12 of The Christmas Invitation
He should have seen it after Roz had first dyed it, when it was more dark emerald than waterweed.
He looked at me thoughtfully. ‘And your eyes are a very unusual shade, my dear, somewhere between light green and turquoise …’ He frowned. ‘I seem to recall someone else with eyes of just such a shade …’
‘You know, I thought the very same thing when I first met Meg,’ Clara agreed. ‘I can’t remember where, though. It’ll come back to me.’
I got my unusually pale hair and the colour of my eyes from Mum (though my father was also fair, even if more of a dishwater blond), but I thought it unlikely that her path had ever crossed with the Doomes. Still, coincidencesdohappen.
‘You haven’t been to India in the last few years, have you?’ I asked hopefully.
‘No, not for … oh, perhaps fifteen years. Time flies,’ said Clara, accepting the change of subject without apparent surprise.
My sudden flare of hope died: Mum had vanished there some years ago and though that hadn’t been unusual, she’d always previously resurfaced after a while. This time, however, she simply seemed to have been swallowed up and there had been no contact.
‘My mother has the same colouring as me and she went missing in India a few years ago,’ I explained. ‘We haven’t heard from her since, so I just wondered if your paths might have crossed.’
‘No, afraid not,’ Clara said.
‘River went over there a couple of years ago to visit friends and went to see the owner of the bar where she’d been working.The man still had a holdall she’d left there with her passport and other things, but she’d never gone back for them.’
‘A complete mystery, then,’ said Tottie, looking at me curiously.
‘Meg was brought up in a commune in the Black Mountains and River is her adoptive grandfather,’ Clara explained. ‘Delightful chap. He’s going to come and stay for a couple of nights for the Winter Solstice.’
And I, I thought, would nowdefinitelybe escaping with him afterwards if Lex Mariner was going to be around the place!
I didn’t say that, though. My first impulse on seeing him had been to jump back in the van and make off, but I couldn’t do that. I’d accepted the commission and I’d paint Clara’s portrait. Then, if I hadn’t completed Henry’s, I’d decamp back to the Farm with River, promising to return later, though I wouldn’t. I’d have to add any finishing touches back at the studio.
‘Have another scone,’ Clara suggested, and I realized I’d wolfed down the one she’d already put on my plate. ‘It’s a good couple of hours till dinner will be ready, so they won’t spoil your appetite.’
‘I do seem surprisingly hungry,’ I admitted. ‘It might be the cold air outside. The temperature appeared to drop rapidly as soon as I left Thorstane and headed up over the moors.’
‘Yes, we have our own little weather system here in Starstone Edge. We’re surprisingly high up, so in winter it’s like living in a snowdome that a giant hand shakes from time to time,’ Henry said, poetically. He had an attractively light and melodious voice.
‘Grimlike Pass is only really driveable in good weather, so in winter we mostly rely on the road to Thorstane, and even that is often impassable because of snow or ice,’ put in Sybil.
‘We’re much higher than Thorstane, but the local farmers usually clear the road over the moors in a few days,’ Clara said nonchalantly. ‘And the electricity lines and phone rarely cut out, though we have oil for the range and heating, and lots of logs, candles and lanterns, so we’re fine if they do.’
‘Den and I would much rather not cook Christmas dinner on a temperamental old range by the light of a candle,’ Tottie said tartly, and I wondered how she – and indeed Den – fitted into the household. It was all a bit baffling and I felt too tired to get a grasp on all the relationships. Anyway, I expected they’d become clear in a day or two.
‘I’d better get back,’ Sybil said, putting down her plate and getting up. I saw then that she was in riding breeches and a heavy polo-neck jumper. ‘I left Juniper in the stable and it’ll be too dark to see where we’re going if I don’t set off now.’
‘I’ll come and see you off,’ said Tottie, and followed her out of the room.
‘We don’t keep horses any more, but Tottie often borrows Sybil’s spare hack and they ride out together,’ Henry said. ‘Our stables are always ready, if needed.’
‘Ican ride,’ said Teddy. ‘Sybil borrowed a Shetland pony from a friend last summer and taught me.’
‘If Mark has anything to do with it, the stables at Underhill will be turned into spare guest or staff accommodation soon, and poor Sybil will have to pay for grazing her horses in the top pasture,’ Clara said.
‘Since George left her a good annuity, there’s no reason why she shouldn’t pay for her horses’ upkeep, is there?’ Henry said reasonably.
‘Sybil never seems tohaveany money, though,’ said Clara.
‘Perhaps she’s just the penny-pinching type, or has a secret vice,’ he suggested.
‘I can’t think of any vice, other than spending too much on spring bulbs, that she could possibly have,’ said Clara with a grin.
‘Nor I,’ he agreed.
