The flames in the grand fireplace crackled and sparked, the wine flowed, everyone wanted seconds or even thirds of the turkey, the tree lights glinted and it felt very much like Christmas.
‘Hold on! What’s that?’ Mrs Crocombe asked sharply, spreading her hands over the table in front of her to silence everyone. She had her beady eye fixed on Jude’s ring finger.
‘Oh, yes, weum, we’re engaged,’ Jude confirmed, and the noise that went up in the ballroom almost lifted the roof.
Jude was made to do a lap of the table showing everyone her ring, and Elliot shook hands and grinned dopily from all the attention.
‘Itoldyou there would be a wedding at Clove Lore before long!’ Mrs C. said, sighing happily.
‘You should get married here,’ Izaak put in, making Mrs C. wink at him. He’d always been a supporter of her matchmaking. Nobody paid any heed to Jude and Elliot shaking their heads and saying they weren’t planning on rushing anything; this pinpoint of light in Clove Lore’s future was too irresistible not to conspire about.
‘Get married where? We’ve no chapel now, remember?’ Minty tolled.
‘Well, when you think of something, there’ll be the pub for your guests to stay in,’ Bella put in.
Finan asked his wife if that meant they were staying put and she’d told everyone assembled that the Siren’s Tail was staying open come hell or high water and there’d been more cheers and tears at that.
‘Glad to hear it,’ Finan told his wife, leaning in to kiss her.
It wasn’t the Christmas anybody had planned – it had come a day too soon for starters – but it still felt like Christmas around that table, enough for everyone to forget, just for a few minutes, what their world must look like out there.
Tomorrow would be a different matter entirely. Cold hard reality would have to be faced. For now, it was Christmas Eve and there was food and books and company.
Minty held on to the spark of pride burning inside her, hoping it would be enough to burn away the other feelings she wanted to shut out. The feeling of having lost a friend, of having been kissed and then not wanted – feelings far worse than standing in the ruins of her family’s destroyed chapel.
Yet she wouldn’t look at Jowan across the table; it hurt far too much. Better to treat him with civility and keep him at arm’s length. Of course he wanted to talk about it, but what could he say? He loved Isolde and no one could replace her in his heart. She’d been a fool to think she could.
When it was time, she helped clear the dishes and shouted over the happy rabble, ‘Charades, anyone? Anyone? No? Righty-o then,’ and Monica Burntisland and Mrs Crocombe’s daughter had remembered they were teachers and gathered everyone for stories from the children’s gift books.
Minty couldn’t avoid him, though. In a quiet moment between stacking clean dishes away in her dresser and cutting the Christmas cake she’d been saving for a far different kind of Christmas, Jowan made his way to her side in the kitchen, the spot where they’d kissed only hours before.
‘Mint, shouldn’t we talk?’
‘We’ve spoken every day for the past twenty years. Can’t we take one day off? Or a week, even? In fact, Jowan,’ she set the knife down and forced the platter of sliced cake into his hands. ‘Unless you have anything to say to me that isn’t about your beloved Isolde, I don’t have ears to listen.’
Jowan’s lips stretched thin and apologetic.
‘Well then,’ Minty concluded. ‘Let us not speak for some time, eh? In the morning you can get back to the cottage. There’ll be a great deal to do, as there is here. A bit of a break from seeing one another might do us both some good.’
Had he protested, it would have sounded weak, so he said nothing and carried the cake into the ballroom where the candles in their sconces glowed orange and the children were settling on makeshift beds and turning pages in their books.
Minty was right, he brooded. They needed to stay away from one another. Then maybe these feelings of guilt and regret would pass. He settled in a chair by the fire once more and absently scratched at Aldous’s head.
Everyone was quiet and still, full of food, and putting off thoughts of their flooded homes with storytelling and illustrations. Only Jowan’s mind circulated with unquiet thoughts as turbulent as the storm that had caused so much mischief, only there’d be no recovering from this mess. He feared that, once hurt and betrayed, Minty would protect herself from him forever. They would never be close again.
Chapter Thirty-One
Christmas Morning at the Bookshop
‘I’m dreading this,’ Jude said over Jowan’s shoulder as he turned the key in the lock.
Magnús stood back at the foot of the steps, holding Alex’s hand. He’d seen it all last night and it had been bad. That was by torch light. In the harsh light of Christmas Day it would be an even sorrier sight.
‘Just remember,’ Magnús said, ‘it can all be repaired, OK?’
Jowan pushed his way inside without a word and his heart cracked in his chest.
Most of the water had seeped away through the floorboards of the Borrow-A-Bookshop but it had left behind a layer of silt, mud and Jowan dared not think what, which was deposited everywhere like a sludgy blanket.
