Page 50 of The Little Island Flower Stall
‘There’s a supermarket,’ Bella said with one of her own. ‘I believe they stock a passable bunch. Not arranged by an artist like myself, of course.’
He started to laugh. ‘Agreed. I’m glad I saw your place before I saw the supermarket. Just imagine how bored I’d be now if it had been the other way around. So, your Liberation Day thing – you’re looking forward to it?’
‘I think it will be brilliant. It’s always a good event, and they definitely get bigger every year. Are you?’
‘God yes! I’ve got my good camera with me too – glad I decided to bring that. Should be able to get some decent photos. I can get some copies made for you, if you like.’
‘For me?’
‘Yes, it’s all right for me to take some of you in your uniform, isn’t it?’
‘Oh…I suppose so, yes.’
Bella wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about that. Was it weird? It was certainly flattering, especially given how attractive she found him. Surely, if he wanted photos of her, he found her attractive too? Or maybe she really was reading too much into it.
‘I mean, I won’t if you’re not happy about it. I would never?—’
‘It’s fine. Of course it would be lovely to have some photos to keep. It’s not every day you get to be a part of something like this, is it?’
‘Absolutely. I’m so glad I’m here during the week it’s on. It’s a real stroke of luck. It seems like I’m getting a lot of those since I arrived.’
The way he looked at her was enough to burn her up on the spot. She’d bet he didn’t even know he was doing it. She took a hasty glug of her cider and wished the food would hurry up and arrive, just to break the tension.
‘Would it be all right for me to meet you at some point on parade day?’ he asked. ‘I know you offered and it’d be nice to have a bit of company, but I’m making sure it’s still all right. I know you won’t be available all day, of course, but perhaps when you’re done, we could catch up, see what events are on.’
‘I think there’s quite a full day. As long as Celestine doesn’t need me, that would be nice.’
He gave her that look again and she almost wished he’d stop. After a moment that seemed to last far too long, where neither said a word, Bella spotted a waitress coming towards them with two plates of fish and chips. Not saved by the bell, but saved by dinner would do.
CHAPTER TWELVE
When Bella arrived back at Villa Rosa, there was a note on the mantelpiece. Celestine had felt tired and had gone to bed early. The pang of guilt was inescapable. Bella was here to help her aunt, and somehow, she kept forgetting that. Perhaps not even forgetting but deliberately ignoring her responsibility. Celestine would have said otherwise, but it didn’t stop Bella from feeling it. It was even worse when she went into the kitchen and saw that her aunt had left a wrapped salad and some ham for her on the table. Had Bella neglected to tell Celestine she’d be eating out with Rory? Now that she thought back, she couldn’t be sure. It took all her strength not to go and wake her and apologise for being such a terrible niece.
But even as those thoughts ran through her head, they were nudged aside by thoughts of Rory. She’d had such a great evening with him, and even as he’d left her – respectful as always to her insistence that she wasn’t looking for romance – there had been a look in his eyes that she couldn’t mistake. He liked her. She’d told herself not to be silly, that she was out of practice reading the signals, but she couldn’t ignore what she could see in front of her face. And the truth was, she liked him too. She liked him a lot. She couldn’t honestly say whether there wasan element of rebound, and that scared her, but it was useless telling her illogical emotions to behave. She liked him more every time she saw him. To ask for more was the most foolish thing she could do, and yet she wanted it.
The image of them kissing would cross her mind, and she would struggle to shake it. Her thoughts would wander to how his lips might feel, how his fingers might skim her back, how his hair would be if she plunged her hands into it, and she wouldn’t even realise she’d been daydreaming until something snapped her back to reality. She wondered if he was doing the same about her. She wished it, even as she told herself not to be stupid.
Not wanting to make too much noise while her aunt was in bed, Bella spent some time searching online for make-up tips to complete her 1940s look for the Liberation Day celebrations. But her mind kept going back to Rory, and then to things Rory did or said, and then to his quest, the thing that had brought him to Jersey in the first place. How strange it was that his search was connected to her aunt, almost as if it was meant to bring them together. Silly, but strange, nonetheless. It was a coincidence she found hard to ignore.
Hating herself for doing it, she went to the cupboard where Celestine’s photo albums were stored and took them out. After a few minutes of flicking through, she found the one containing the old pictures of Violette that Celestine hadn’t wanted to talk about.
‘She was gorgeous,’ she murmured, forgetting for a second that there was no one to hear her. It was easy to imagine this wide-eyed, raven-haired girl with her tiny waist and slender arms would draw the attention of any passing soldier. She’d have caught the attention of any red-blooded male. Her sister, Anais, was lovely too, but in a much more awkward way. And there was Dolly, chubby but cute, and her uncle Roland, young and gangly, but every bit as dour-looking as the man Bella rememberedgrowing up with. How he and sunny Celestine had ended up together was still a mystery.
What had Violette been like? she wondered. She looked as if she’d be feisty, like Cathy inWuthering Heights, all wind-torn and wild romance. She looked rebellious. Bella wished she could hear more, and it made her sad to think about what might have split her from Celestine. It must have been something very bad to make Celestine clam up every time Violette was mentioned.
Bella turned the page and there were more photographs. She was surprised to see so many – she might have imagined there wouldn’t have been much opportunity for photography during the occupation. Perhaps these had been taken before then. But the group looked too old to be much before the war, and afterwards they hadn’t been friends. It was just another mystery that Bella was unlikely to solve as long as Celestine was determined not to speak about it.
As she turned again, one of the photographs fell out of the book. Against the backdrop of the beach, not too far from where the flower stall now stood, posed Violette, Anais and Celestine. They looked like they’d been laughing at something: Celestine grinning, Violette with her hands over her mouth mid-giggle and Anais with her head thrown back. As Bella tried to fix it back into the album, she noticed something written on the back. There was a date: May 1944. So it was a year before the occupation of Jersey ended. Who’d taken it? Where had they got the camera? At the tunnel museum she’d read about the ban on radios and anything else that might enable the islanders to pass on information on the Germans to the Allies, so it seemed unlikely anyone had photography equipment either.
And then there was the writing. French? It was like no French Bella knew, but then she realised it had to be Jèrriais, the old language of Jersey. Hadn’t she read somewhere how it had been widely used during the war to send notes that couldn’tbe translated so easily if they’d fallen into German hands? But surely there was nothing of significance here? She’d heard Celestine use it before, of course. She supposed they must have spoken it all the time back then, just because they all knew it. Still, she wanted to know what it said.
Taking out her phone, she searched for a translation site. She had to dig deep, but eventually she found one and typed in the first sentence. It took a minute or two to get the odd spellings, and she wasn’t entirely convinced by the translation once she’d got one, but it seemed like it might be about right.
Friends and sisters. On pain of death we will keep our secret.
Bella frowned at the words on her phone. What the hell did that mean? Who’d written it? She couldn’t imagine Celestine writing something like that. The photo had been given to Celestine by one of the others, perhaps? It had obviously been taken by someone else. Who? Was it a reminder to Celestine of something she needed to do?
Bella read the rest of the message, but it seemed like it was just a confirmation of the location the photo had been taken and the full names of all three girls.
