Page 32 of The Christmas Invitation
‘You wouldn’t think he was a Doome really, because they’re mostly fair and blue-eyed. He takes after his father,’ said Clara. ‘By the way, Mark, the hens are out.’
‘Oh, great. I’ll tell Gidney to round the little bastards up, before a fox gets them,’ he said gloomily.
‘Let’s get out of this freezer and somewhere warm. Where’s your mother?’ Clara asked.
‘In the morning room with Tottie. She’s only just told me you were coming over, so Mrs Gidney’s going to cut some more sandwiches.’
‘Good, I’m ravenous. Come on, Meg, this way!’
As I followed her across the flagged floor, a door opened in a pool of warm light and two dachshunds raced towards us, yapping excitedly.
‘Get down, Wisty,’ said Clara, as the largest jumped up at her, while the other, who seemed to be barely in charge of her body, like a teenager still growing into it, sniffed interestedly at my feet and wriggled.
‘This is Princess Wisteria of Underhill and that’s the runt of her last litter, Pansy,’ Clara told me. ‘Sybil hasn’t managed to offload her on to a buyer yet.’
‘Oh, come in, both of you, do,’ urged Sybil. ‘It’s so cold out there!’
The morning room was quite small and thankfully warmed by both a radiator and open fire of more modest proportions than the one in the hall.
Mark, who had followed us in and closed the door, had to reopen it, to let the two dogs back in.
Tottie was sitting near the fire with her long, booted legs stretched out.
‘Hi, Tottie – good ride?’ Clara asked.
‘Yes, thanks, we had a lovely hack over the moors. We met old Jonas from Oxberry farm and he said there’s a cold spell coming. He’s always right.’
The weather seemed pretty cold to me already.
‘I’ve told Mrs Gidney two extra for tea and it will be along in a minute,’ Mark broke in abruptly and then added, rather resentfully, ‘She’s going to cut into the ham, which I thought we were saving for Christmas, Mum.’
‘Oh, no – remember, we always have a Westphalian ham for Christmas, Mark, and it’s on order.’
‘Then cancel it! They cost a ridiculous amount and there’ll be only the two of us.’
‘Three, with Uncle Piers, and I think it’s too late to cancel the order,’ she said doubtfully. ‘It’s on its way.’
‘Then cancel the turkey instead, because I’m sure you have some ridiculously huge bird on order, too. We can have ham instead. Or one of those blasted hens – they’ve got out again.’
Sybil began to look distressed and I said quickly, ‘Please don’t cut into the ham on my account. I don’t eat meat.’
‘And you know very well that I don’t either, Mark,’ Clara said. ‘You go right back and tell her not to bother.’
He glowered and strode off again and we joined Tottie on a shabby tapestry sofa drawn up near the fire.
‘I see what you mean about the penny-pinching,’ Clara said to Sybil, who was making small distressed twitterings. She subsided into a chair and Wisty promptly lay on her feet. Pansy jumped up on to my lap and curled up.
‘Push her off, dear,’ said Sybil.
‘It’s all right, I like dogs,’ I said. Even strange little sausage dogs with one flyaway ear, a kinky tail and a slight look of having been put together by someone with a sense of humour and their eyes shut.
‘The boy’s turning into a skinflint,’ Tottie said.
‘Oh, no, he’s not that bad,’ protested Sybil. ‘It’s just that the renovations are costing so much more than the estimates … and then, there’s very little money to do it with, since most of what Daddy left was tied up in my annuity.’
‘Henry said he’d left you enough to live on very comfortably,’ Clara said.
‘Yes, but not to payallmy expenses for the horses, as well as investing some of my income in the business, which was another of Mark’s suggestions. His latest idea is that I earn my keep as some kind of receptionist-cum-hostess! He’s considering turning the old housekeeper’s room and bedroom near the kitchen into a sort of small flat for me.’
