Last Christmas Read online

  As the village hall was still out of action, the meeting had been called at Diana’s house. Fortunately she had a large house situated in a road just off the High Street, halfway up a hill, with a massive lounge that had splendid views of the Shropshire hills. It was a balmy evening so Diana had thrown her patio doors open, letting in the sounds of distant baaing and the odd car. It felt extremely odd to be sitting here discussing the Nativity.

  ‘Right, first things first,’ said Diana. ‘Here’s this year’s script, hot off the press from my own fair hand or, should I say, computer.’

  She solemnly passed round the scripts. Pippa, who was sitting next to Marianne, whispered mischievously, ‘Bet it’s exactly the same as last year’s.’

  When the scripts arrived on Marianne’s lap she realised with a groan that Pippa was right. Apart from a few updates to mention the credit crunch and the flood, the script was word for word the same as last year’s, right down to the pesky elves.

  ‘I think you’re forgetting something very important,’ Miss Woods said huffily.

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘As we don’t currently have a village hall, where exactly are you planning to put on your great oeuvre?’

  Diana shot a poison-dagger look at Miss Woods, before declaring: ‘The Vicar has kindly said we can use the Parish Centre. Moving swiftly on—’

  ‘It’s too small,’ said Miss Woods bluntly. ‘You know how packed the Nativity gets. The Parish Centre’s all right for your average Sunday when three people and his dog turn up. It cannot possibly cope with all the grannies and aunties and uncles and cousins who come out to watch the Nativity on Christmas Eve.’

  ‘Well…’ Diana looked utterly flummoxed for once.

  ‘I’ve got a suggestion,’ said Marianne shyly. ‘Why don’t we use the chapel at Hopesay Manor? It’s beautiful, very simple, and probably the perfect place for a Nativity.’

  Diana, looking disconcerted that someone else had made a suggestion, let alone someone as new to the village and as young as Marianne, looked on the verge of pooh-poohing the idea. But Pippa jumped in with, ‘I think that would be wonderful’, and Miss Woods said, ‘I’m sure Ralph would be delighted to host it.’ The rest of the committee nodded their agreement, so Diana had to reluctantly concede to Marianne’s suggestion.

  Emboldened by her success, Marianne ventured, ‘I’ve got another idea. Which might help us all. Has anyone seen this?’ She produced the issue of Happy Homes that featured the Nativity competition. ‘I thought we could enter it and, if we win, put the money towards a new village hall, which could become our community centre too, from where we could run the post office and shop. What does anyone else think?’

  ‘That’s an excellent idea,’ said Diana, snatching the magazine out of Marianne’s hand. ‘The Parish Committee are already thinking we need the village hall to offer services for the elderly as well as being a meeting place. I shall look into it straightaway. Luckily we already have our script in place. I’m sure that will steal a march on our competitors.’

  ‘That wasn’t quite what I meant—’ muttered Marianne. She felt as if she’d been steamrollered by an enormous truck. Whatever chance Hope Christmas might have had in the competition, they didn’t stand a chance of winning it now.

  ‘So, as you can see from the pictures I’ve taken,’ Noel was concluding his presentation to the GRB board ‘the eco town is not a sensible way forward. And in the current economic climate, I would venture to add that it would be an economic disaster to continue on this path. May I remind you of the original plans I made for sustainable housing on the Hopesay Manor Estate? There is lots of potential for this kind of development in the area, which would fit much better with the local community and provide a long-term plan that we could feel proud of being involved in.’

  ‘Let me just stop you there, Noel,’ said Gerry Cowley. ‘I think we’ve seen enough. Matt, have you anything to add?’

  ‘Yes, I have,’ said Matt, ‘I think Noel is painting far too gloomy a picture of the situation. From what I understand from Luke Nicholas, his investors are perfectly happy to stay on board with the current project, so long as we go ahead with plans to divert the river. I’m doing a feasibility study on that as we speak, and it’s looking like the best solution. Given how much money we’ve already invested in this project, it seems utterly foolhardy to leave it now. I think it offers the best solution currently, as well as in the long term. There are many residents of Hope Christmas whose houses have been affected by the flood. Some of them may well be interested in investing in property with state-of-the-art flood defences. We are currently looking into ways we can make the option more attractive for them.’

  Noel knew he’d been wasting his time, even before Matt started speaking. He turned over the card in his pocket that Ralph Nicholas had given him. Did he dare go freelance? Could he afford to do that to his family?

  ‘Noel, a word,’ said Gerry as the meeting broke up. Noel stayed where he was, wondering what was going to come next.

  ‘I think we can safely say the Hope Christmas project hasn’t been working out as planned,’ said Gerry. ‘So I’ve come to my decision. With regret, Noel, I can’t keep carrying you any longer. This time I’m going to have to let you go.’

  Gabriel and Dan were in the barns shearing sheep. Stephen loved nothing more than coming home from school and leaning over the pens, watching his dad and Dan at work. Gabriel enjoyed it too. He loved the feel of the wool coming off the sheep’s back and watching the ridiculous expressions on their faces as they wobbled off, looking distinctly spooked about being naked.

  Stephen had seemed much happier over the last week and, though he clearly missed Benjy, as Gabriel did, he had come to terms with his loss remarkably quickly. Gabriel wished he could accept it so readily. He needed to get a new dog soon, a sheep farmer was useless without one, but Benjy had felt like so much a part of him, he couldn’t quite bear the thought of a replacement yet.

  He’d also been so busy helping out at Pippa and Dan’s, shearing sheep, and taking this year’s lambs to market, he and Marianne had had scarcely any time alone. Probably just as well really, he reflected, as he still hadn’t quite worked out how to tell his son, following Stephen’s revelations. Pippa assured him it would only be a matter of time before Stephen finally accepted that his mother wasn’t coming back, but Gabriel wasn’t so sure. For all her flakiness, Eve had always shown Stephen great tenderness in the times when she’d been well enough to. And Stephen was an incredibly loyal child. Gabriel had the feeling that, whatever she threw at him, Stephen would always accept her back. He still felt a twinge of guilt for not having told Stephen his mum had been with his grandmother at Easter. Maybe that hadn’t been the right thing to do after all.

  ‘Right, all done for today,’ said Gabriel, as the last sheep ran off to join her naked friends, baaing indignantly. ‘Want a cuppa?’ he asked Dan.

  ‘Not today,’ said Dan. ‘I still need to get rid of the rotten floorboards in the lounge. It’s going to be months before we’re straight again.’

  Luckily for Dan and Pippa, her parents had a large farmhouse on the outskirts of Hope Christmas, so the whole family were currently ensconced there, but the clear-up operation was likely to take, as Dan had said, months. Gabriel had had a lucky escape.

  He said goodbye to Dan and he and Stephen headed home. When they got in, Gabriel ran a bath and jumped into it while Stephen watched TV. He was having a rare moment of relaxation when he heard the doorbell ring. Damn. Stephen was under strict instructions never to open the door to strangers. Gabriel leapt out of the bath and, searching for any clothes that weren’t filthy and smelling of sheep and finding there were none, he threw a towel round his waist and went down to answer the door. Maybe it was Marianne, she’d said she would call.

  ‘Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes and no mistake.’ Standing in front of him, looking remarkably cheerful and even prettier than he remembered, was Eve.

  ‘A
ren’t you going to invite me in?’ she said.

  Part Four

  Someone Special

  Last Year

  December 24/25

  Marianne took a deep breath and looked around her. The hall at Hopesay Manor was thronged with people sipping champagne and eating canapés. By the staircase stood the most massive Christmas tree Marianne had ever seen, sparkling with white lights that segued through the colours of the rainbow and back to white in a way that would have looked tacky if they’d been attached to the outside of a council house in Peckham, but here looked immensely graceful. Marianne found herself mesmerised by them. At least it gave her the pretence of something to do. After a perfunctory introduction to half a dozen people Marianne had never met before, Luke had deserted her. Establishing incredibly quickly that she had absolutely nothing in common with the two women he’d left her with (Clarissa, who cared for nothing except her horses, and Stella, who wanted only to talk about hedge funds), Marianne had made her excuses and disappeared into the crowd.

  She’d wandered about forlornly before hiding herself by the fire in the corner of the vast drawing room, trying not to look too much like a wallflower, wishing that Luke wasn’t proving so elusive. The tight knot of worry that had been building in her since yesterday’s disastrous family lunch was getting bigger by the minute. For some reason, she suddenly had a very bad feeling about this evening. Luke seemed so on edge around her and, if she hadn’t known better, she might have thought he was avoiding her.

  ‘My rogue of a grandson not looking after you again?’ Ralph Nicholas had appeared at her side. He had an uncanny knack of doing that.

  ‘Oh, I expect he’s got lots of people to catch up with.’ Marianne felt utterly feeble for trying to excuse the inexcusable, but she couldn’t bear to admit to this kind man how desolate and abandoned she was feeling. To make herself look slightly less pathetic, she turned her attention to the impressive stone fireplace that dominated the room and pretended that she was concentrating on a detail in it. It was carved out with fleurs-de-lys, and cherubs flew from the corners of the mantelpiece. Above the fireplace hung a massive oval mirror with gilt edges and, above that, carved into the stonework, was a coat of arms with a Latin motto.

  ‘What’s the writing above the fireplace?’ she asked, squinting at it.

  ‘It’s our family motto,’ said Ralph. ‘Servimus liberi liberi quia diligimus.’

  ‘What does it mean?’ said Marianne. ‘I never studied Latin.’

  ‘Freely we serve, because we freely love,’ said Ralph. ‘It’s a code I’ve always tried to live by.’

  ‘Freely we serve, because we freely love,’ Marianne repeated slowly. She vaguely remembered Luke quoting it at her, on her first trip to Hopesay Manor. ‘I rather like that.’

  There was a pause, during which Marianne wondered how soon she could politely make her excuses, when Ralph suddenly asked, ‘Has Luke ever shown you round the place properly?’

  ‘Well, only that first time, when we met you,’ said Marianne.

  ‘Let me give you the guided tour, then,’ said Ralph.

  ‘What about your guests?’ enquired Marianne.

  ‘Do you think they’ll even notice if I’ve gone?’ said Ralph.

  Marianne laughed and followed Ralph through the house back to the hallway with its amazing oak staircase. It was even more magnificent than she remembered. She remembered the black and white marble paving in the hallway, but had forgotten just how ornate the carvings in the ceilings were. More flying cherubs graced the corners of the room, and the ceiling high above them was dominated by a painting of the world on which an angel stood, plunging a giant sword into a writhing serpent.

  ‘St Michael casting Lucifer out of heaven,’ said Ralph.

  Ralph led her upstairs and guided her through various bedchambers, many of which had four-poster beds made of oak.

  ‘They’re so small,’ marvelled Marianne. ‘Were people dwarves in the olden days or something?’

  ‘Ah, a common misconception,’ said Ralph. ‘People in the sixteenth century discovered by trial and error that if they didn’t sit up in bed they were likely to suffocate with the smoke as their fires went out, so they slept sitting upright in bed.’

  ‘Well, I’d never have thought of that,’ said Marianne, marvelling at the rich tapestries on the walls depicting hunting scenes, mythological creatures and pastoral idylls. Ralph was a wonderful guide and took the trouble to explain every detail.

  The connecting corridors between the rooms were often low and panelled in oak, and round every corner there seemed to be a new surprise as Ralph took her past nooks and crannies, and then, to her delight…

  ‘We have at least three, but I’ve only found two,’ said Ralph, as he took her into a smallish, rather Spartan-looking room with a wooden seat and small table in one corner. ‘Just lean on that panel there for me, would you?’

  Marianne duly leaned on the panel and suddenly there was a click and the whole thing swung open to reveal a tiny little chapel.

  ‘It’s a priest hole,’ she cried in delight.

  ‘Indeed it is,’said Ralph. ‘This is where my ancestors used to have mass said by their priest during Elizabeth I’s time.’

  ‘This house and everything, it’s so amazing,’ said Marianne as she followed Ralph back down the corridor to a minstrels’ gallery above the Great Hall where the party guests were thronging.

  ‘Glad you appreciate it,’ said Ralph. ‘But my absolutely favourite part of the house is here.’

  They came down the main stairs back to the hall, and he led her down a dark side passage. He opened a small wooden door and Marianne gasped. They were in a wonderful little chapel, where the organist from the village, Mr Edwards, she thought his name was, was playing ‘Silent Night’.

  ‘Sorry, Ralph,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t resist.’

  ‘Carry on, carry on,’ insisted Ralph.

  The chapel was very plain, with whitewashed walls and a simple altar underneath a stained glass window. It was lit with candles and the pews were dark oak. In the furthest corner she could make out the tomb of a mediaeval knight. ‘One of my ancestors,’ said Ralph, ‘he was a Templar. His father’s buried in the Temple Church in London.’

  ‘It’s wonderful,’ said Marianne, looking round her in awe. ‘So simple, yet beautiful. How old is it?’

  ‘There’s been a chapel of some sort here since mediaeval times,’ said Ralph. ‘I’m glad you like it.’

  ‘I love it. Thanks so much for showing me,’ said Marianne.

  ‘My pleasure,’ said Ralph.

  Marianne stood in silence, drinking it in as Mr Edwards played the haunting notes of the ‘Coventry Carol’. It was the perfect setting for such ancient music, which seemed to hang in the air somehow, and Marianne was momentarily transported to another place, another time. In her mind’s eye she could see Ralph’s ancestors standing here in this very same chapel, listening to the same ancient song of praise. The carol came to an end and Marianne shook herself from her reverie, before glancing at her watch.

  ‘Oh my goodness, is that the time? I’d better see where Luke’s got to.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Ralph. ‘Don’t let an old duffer like me stop you having fun.’ He stopped to chat to Mr Edwards, while Marianne made her way back to the party. Luke would be wondering where she was by now. She was heading back for the hall when she heard whispers and giggling round the corner. Was that Luke’s voice? Who on earth was he with?

  Marianne walked down the corridor with a sinking heart. She turned the corner, to see her fiancé with his tongue stuck firmly down Clarissa’s throat.

  ‘That’s it.’ Cat kneeled back on her heels. She’d sorted all the presents into piles of those to go under the tree and those to go into stockings. James, who’d been up and down the stairs like a yo-yo, had been sent back to bed with stern warnings that if he came down one more time Santa certainly would not be coming. Paige, who had just woken up, burst into tears
when she heard her brother declare loudly that there was no such thing as Santa, but Cat had managed to pacify her in the end.

  ‘Drink and one present before bed?’ Noel came into the lounge proffering a bottle.

  ‘What a good idea,’ sighed Cat.

  She leaned back into the sofa and snuggled up next to Noel, grateful that Angela had gone to bed hours earlier.

  ‘Happy Christmas, sweetheart,’ she said, ‘and thanks for all your help today.’

  ‘I didn’t do anything,’ protested Noel.

  ‘Yes you did,’said Cat.‘I wouldn’t have got anything done without you.’

  ‘Right, presents,’ said Noel, putting his glass down.

  ‘Mine aren’t desperately exciting, I’m afraid,’ said Cat.

  Noel got up, went over to the Christmas tree and picked up one of his to give to her, and Cat scrabbled under the Christmas tree for something halfway decent. She found him a couple of CDs she knew he’d like.

  ‘Great, thanks,’ he said and kissed her on the top of her head. ‘Go on, open yours. You’re going to love it.’

  Cat ripped open the gossamer-thin paper wrapped round what looked like—was—an envelope. She opened it curiously. Noel clearly was expecting her to like it as he was jumping up and down like a demented chicken.

  ‘A day at the Sanctuary? Noel, that’s fabulous! But can we afford it?’ said Cat.

  ‘Shh,’ said Noel putting his finger to her lips. ‘You never do anything for yourself. I think you deserve a treat.’

  ‘I feel terrible, none of your presents are nearly that generous,’ said Cat.

  ‘I know a way you can make up for it,’ said Noel mischievously.

  ‘We’ve got to do the kids’ stockings first,’ warned Cat.

  Noel went up first to check everyone was finally asleep and, giggling like schoolchildren, they went round the house putting presents in stockings. This was the best bit of Christmas Eve as far as Cat was concerned. She loved the sound of rustling presents, and the sight of the children softly asleep, knowing how excited they were going to be when they woke up. It took her right back to her own childhood.