Harri cocked his head, but he couldn’t say anything as Annie had her head around the door again.
‘Jowan?’ she was whispering. ‘Can you come through?’
When Harri passed into the shop behind Jowan he found the old man from the day before panting and dripping wet, fit to fall to his knees.
Jowan was dragging the armchair closer to the fire, sending Aldous scurrying for cover into Annie’s arms.
‘Sit, please. Let’s get you dry,’ Jowan said and the man obeyed, shuffling to the chair.
‘I’ll get a blanket,’ Harri said, running for the linen cupboard in his room.
‘I’m gonna bring you some tea,’ Annie told the man loudly. ‘And cake. Stay there.’
The man said nothing, only accepting their help.
Jowan went so far as removing the man’s sodden slippers, setting them on the hearth to steam. He wrapped the old man’s bare feet in a towel.
‘Are you on ’olday?’ Jowan asked him. ‘Visiting someone in Clove Lore?’
The man shook his head. His tiny spectacles were spotted with rain but he didn’t draw them off.
Annie, still gripping the unimpressed Aldous under one arm, set the tea and bun on the table by the man’s side.
The man set about feeding himself with a deliberate restraint, placing the paper napkin across his damp lap like this was the Ritz.
The three stood back and observed him, Aldous wriggling until he was comfortably curled up against Annie’s chest, totally disinterested in the stranger.
‘You don’t recognise him?’ Harri whispered. ‘We thought he must be a local.’
‘Never seen him before,’ Jowan said. ‘And I’ve lived ’ere all my life.’
‘What should we do? He seems lost,’ Annie said, rocking the little dog and hugging him close.
‘Do?’ Jowan said, perplexed. ‘Dunno. Might just be passing through.’
‘But he was here yesterday. He slept right there for a long time,’ said Annie.
Harri started at this. ‘You don’t think he’s been outdoors all night, do you?’
‘I hope not,’ Annie replied in a low voice, approaching the man again. ‘Is there anyone we can call for you? To pick you up? Any children? A carer?’
The man looked at her with an air of irritation. Harri saw the sharpness in his eye. It was the same look he’d given them yesterday when they’d suggested he’d been left behind by a coach group.
‘Reckon I’ll call Mint,’ Jowan said. ‘She’ll know what to do.’
Within the hour, the bookshop was full of whispering locals, and the old man was fast asleep, his cup drained and the cherry bun delicately nibbled away. Aldous had, unnoticed, crept up onto his lap and was also sleeping soundly in the warmth from the fire, happy to share the best seat in the place with the old stranger who, to the little dog’s expert nose, smelled of mothballs, Murray Mints, and conservators’ resin, not that anybody ever asked Aldous’s opinion about anything.
As they dozed, oblivious, the village elders, Minty, Mrs Crocombe and Mr Bovis, agreed he was no Clove Lore local; they’d recognise him if he was.
Two brothers, Monty and Tom, definitely identical twins, Harri concluded, had called in too, and confirmed he hadn’t been a fisherman pal of their late father’s, and they’d left again, but not before a friend of the twins, a young police officer by the name of Zoë arrived. She was in running gear, evidently not on duty today.
Minty spoke to her with discretion. ‘If he’s here; he’s in our care. No need to involve Social Services just yet,’ she said, and Harri had been surprised to see Zoë deferring to the lady of the manor.
Zoë made a few phone calls on her mobile and came back to let everyone know there were no active missing persons reports for anyone meeting the man’s description. ‘Not in the county, not in the country,’ she elaborated.
Minty’s eyebrows raised. ‘Check his pockets?’ she said.
Zoë did as she was told, deftly lifting the strange objects out one by one.
