‘Oh-kay,’ she said, sounding like she could totally resist. ‘I’d better go. I have work to do. Nice to chat.’ Little bit sarcastic-sounding there. ‘Bye.’
That could have gone better.
Cassie’s responses over the next few days to his messages about the animals and Laura were less chatty than usual; she definitely wasn’t that impressed by his hunting her down and the business suggestion. Well, fine. Her land would be perfect for his purposes, but there were other plots on other islands in the area, some for sale, presumably with much more amenable owners. Or Cassie might come round in due course.
* * *
A few days later, the quiet of the morning was shattered by some kind of large vehicle beeping and crunching over the gravel in the drive. James pushed his chair out from the desk and stood up to investigate. Life on the island was so quiet that he’d got to the point where he was mildly pleased at the possibility of a chat with anyone.
When he got round the side of the house, he found a large lorry coming to a halt in the drive.
‘I have your marquee,’ the driver told him as he swung down from the cab.
‘Sorry, I think you’ve got the wrong address,’ James said.
The driver’s companion already had the back of the lorry open.
‘It’s the right address,’ the driver said. ‘We’ve delivered here before for Cassie.’
James shook his head. ‘Nope, definitely a mistake. Cassie isn’t here. Sorry.’
‘It’s definitely today.’ The man showed James the booking form. Yep, it was today’s date. Odd, because Cassie didn’t strike James as someone who messed up in that kind of way. But she obviously had.
‘I’m thinking she must have made a mistake with the date when she booked it.’
‘I don’t think so. She confirmed last week.’ What?
The men didn’t look like they were going anywhere. And presumably they’d gone to quite a lot of trouble to get the marquee here. Unless by some lucky chance there was a marquee business on the island.
‘You local?’ he asked.
‘Pretty much. From the mainland. Just got off the ferry.’ Yeah, not that local.
James was going to have to call Cassie.
She picked up on the third ring. ‘Hi, James.’
‘Hi. I have a lorry with a marquee on it in the drive.’
‘Oh good. Thank you for letting me know.’ What?
‘Why? Did you actually order it for today?’
‘Yes? I thought I told you it was coming today? Did I put the wrong date?’
‘Erm.’ When did she think she’d told him? Oh. Probably in her notes. ‘What’s the marquee for?’
‘For the party?’ She sounded a bit impatient, definitely sure that heshouldknow what she was talking about. Given the level of detail she’d gone into about everything else, it did seem likely that she’d covered this party in her notes. So she was about to realise that he hadn’t read them. But seriously,whowould have read that many pages? The notes were practically book-length. And did he care whether she knew that he hadn’t? He did recall a heading along the lines of ‘social events’ in the notes index, but he’d assumed that would just be elaborating in excruciating detail on things like the island dinner that Dina had mentioned.
‘Party?’
‘Amy’s eighteenth?’ She sounded properly annoyed now.
‘Amy?’ WhowasAmy? This would be the party Dina had talked about.
‘Her party’s on Saturday. In the marquee. On the field. I definitely told you about it.’ Right. Maybe at this point the best thing would be for him to go and check her notes.
‘Okay. I need to go. I’ll call you back.’
