‘But you’ve been gone from Wheaton a long time?’ Izz is mining him for details but isn’t going to get anywhere with this one.
‘I’m back to help Grandad,’ he says.
Makes sense. Scrimengor must be way past retirement age too. He’ll need someone to pass his baking empire to, and his rotten attitude has already chased off his own daughter so she’s unlikely to be interested. As far as I’m aware she’s in Scotland with her new bloke.
I take the keys and remark how Scrimengor must be glad of the help, but all I get is an uncertain look, so I try a different approach. ‘Anyway, thanks for these. I’m Margi, and this is my niece, Lucy. That’s Fern.’
He greets everyone properly. At least he’s got some manners. ‘Sully,’ he tells the girls.
‘Goodness, what an influx of youngsters for Wheaton,’ Izz presses on, chuckling and looking from Sully to Fern and Lucy. ‘Where have you all been hiding yourselves?’
I catch Lucy fidgeting and dropping her eyes to the ground, and I don’t know how to read that.
‘Can we go in?’ Fern pips, surprising us all. Her voice may tremor like a leaf on the breeze, but there’s real determination in there.
‘Fancy a peek inside too, Sully?’ I ask, turning for the lock. ‘You must have come to the gingerbread grotto when you were little?’
‘I’ve to get back to the bakery.’ He hikes his thumb behind him, looking like a man who’d far rather potter round a mildewed village hall than spend the day sweeping up after his grandfather.
‘Thank your grandad for us,’ Izz throws in. She’s less inclined to hold grudges and is kinder to Scrimengor than she needs to be.
‘Ah.’ Sully stops himself leaving, grasping an awkward hand to the back of his neck. ‘Grandad told me to tell you you’re not to light the fire in the hall, not unless you want a bonfire instead of a grotto.’
‘Oh, he says that every year,’ I say, swiping my hand through the air. ‘As if I would.’ I mean, I’ve been tempted, the hall’s always freezing but I’m pretty sure that chimney hasn’t been swept since the Sixties.
‘Right, then,’ Sully says, and he’s gone, making a dash through the rain before throttling the engine, making it splutter and bang.
Lucy waves as he manoeuvres through a painfully slow four-point turn on the empty road, and he raises his hand in reply.
The church bells ring for Sunday service.
‘OK, say a little prayer,’ I tell Izz as I slip the key into the lock.
I’m suddenly aware of Fern by my shoulder, champing at the bit to get inside.
‘Are you… are you filming this?’ I ask. She’s holding up her phone.
‘Can I? It’s a live stream for TikTok.’
‘You can do what you like; just watch your step,’ I reply, and I see her eyes widen. She’s positively bursting with intrigue as I push the doors open, perhaps a little more dramatically than I might have done if she wasn’t here. ‘You first,’ I tell her, and we all pile inside behind her, creeping along in a bunch like this is an episode ofScooby-Doo.
Fern’s whispering a commentary with lots of wows and gasps as her lens probes all the nooks and crannies of the entrance hall. I wish I could see the place through her romanticising lens. All I see are the effects of yet another winter’s neglect.
The hexagonal black and white floor tiles in the entrance foyer are dulled with dust, the kind that accrues in thick layers and turns sticky with moisture. The wood panelling is damp with a worryingly milky sheen that screams out for a good month of dehumidifying and polishing. The high white ceilings chevroned with neat beams (painted some time ago in a yellow ochre) are excellent for gathering spiders’ webs, and I roll my eyes at the sight of them hanging in dewy loops high above us.
‘Got your extending duster, Margi?’ Izz chuckles, seeing my horror.
There’s nothing in this first room, other than a collection of framed photographs and newspaper clippings from days gone by displayed in an arch around the door of the cloakroom, and there’s a desk where tickets are sold and guest lists checked off, and that’s it, other than the clusters of brown leaves in the corners that must have blown inside back in October during the pumpkin weighing – the last event of the gardening year in Wheaton. You’d be surprised how the promise of a few oversized gourds can attract a small crowd in an out-of-the-way village hall come the darker months.
A further set of doors awaits and above them hangs a painting of an aged King George the Sixth in what I think you could call ‘the naive style’, i.e., not very good and definitely done by a local. But, still, I’ve always loved the way the artist gave him the look of a goggle-eyed, stoical bear.
‘Just look at this lobby! It’s amazing,’ Fern is telling her phone audience, to my surprise.
She’s a bit young to appreciate mid-century rural shabby chic, isn’t she? Nevertheless, there are red love hearts lighting up her screen to show that viewers also like what they see.
In spite of the December rain, this room is flooded with golden light, even if the sunburst glassisa little green with algae on the inside and the place itself is frigidly cold. There is still a warm glow. An undeniable (if rather faded) glamour.
Fern’s trying to open the doors, all honey-coloured polished wood and frosted glass, that will lead into the main hall.
