“I’ll give youshiny bells, you little fucker!”
“Now there’s an offer.”
Fred spun round and found Mr. Bishop staring at her, one hand scratching his bushy beard.
“I was going to deliver your extra Christmas trees, but I’m not sure you can be trusted with them.”
She could feel tears pricking her eyes again. “My car won’t start.”
He looked from the bedraggled tree in Fred’s chokehold, which was now singing like it was melting, to the car and then back to her. “I generally find jump leads more effective.”
A snorted cry of laughter escaped her, and she wondered if she was becoming hysterical. “Everybody hates me.”
“Hate’s a strong word. People will calm down and realize it’s not really your fault.”
“Have you seen Ryan?” She couldn’t keep the sob out of her voice.
“I passed him on his way out of town. He was headed north in that clapped-out Land Rover of his.”
At that, Fred dropped the tree and began weeping pitifully. “It’s hopeless! And I’m so hungover! How is it even possible to get that much alcohol into a mug of hot chocolate?”
Mr. Bishop raised a bushy eyebrow. “Listen, you give me a hand with these trees, and I’ll take a look at your car. It’sprobably best you leave off going to town for a while anyway. Give folks a chance to cool off a bit.”
“Okay,” she sniffled. “Thank you.”
Fred helped the old farmer unload the trees—after giving her assurances that she wouldn’t cause them mortal harm—and helped him pull them on a sledge around the house and through the garden. The work calmed her.
“I didn’t know that Warren was going to write those things, you know,” she said, stopping to untangle the sledge from some trailing ivy.
“I rather thought not. Not your style.”
“It was supposed to be something good—a great advertisement for the town—not a hatchet job.”
“Sounds like a case of that young man putting ambition above scruples. Everyone knows it’s quicker to accrue fame via notoriety than virtue,” said Mr. Bishop.
Fred looked at him sideways. “You don’t miss much, do you?”
“Not much, no.”
“I wish the rest of the town would give me the benefit of the doubt.”
“You can’t behave like some city slicker trapped in a hillbilly backwater, and then be surprised when people assume you had something to do with an article slagging off the town.”
He was right, of course. When she’d first arrived, she treated being back here like a punishment, a signal of her failure, and by her allusions cast the people who chose to live in Pine Bluff as losers too.
“My problem was only ever with me,” she said, but she knew it sounded pathetic.
“I assume it’s over between you and the journalist in question?” Mr. Bishop asked.
“Yes, it is very much over.”
Mr. Bishop nodded. “Can’t say as I’m sad to hear it.”
They reached the aunts’ cottage and settled the trees into the two large buckets of water set out for them in the porch.
“You go back to the house and get yourself a cup of tea, and I’ll take a look at your car,” said Mr. Bishop.
“Shouldn’t I stay close, in case you need me to pass you spanners and things?”
