She poured out a small measure into each glass before sliding two towards him and Laura.
“What’s this?”
“Slivova.” She raised her glass “Gezuar!”
“Cheers,” he replied.
Laura made an attempt to learn the new word. “Kezuah?”
“Gezuar,” Rovena corrected. “It means ‘happiness’ in Albanian.”
So that’s where she was from. He’d been thinking about it earlier but didn’t want to be rude and ask.
“Gezuar,” he repeated. The drink was vile. He drank it down quickly, trying not to grimace. Rovena immediately poured him another measure.
“Crikey, this isn’t for the faint-hearted,” Laura said, pulling a face. “What’s it made from?”
“Plums,” Rovena answered. She was drinking more slowly, taking tiny sips. “In my country, every house make their own. Sometimes they put other fruit. But here we have a lot of plums. Some of the women in the Casemate make this and sell it to the rest of us.” She took a small sip. “A little taste of home.”
Adam tried again, a small sip, breathing over it. The initial shock of the strong alcoholic fermented flavour gave way to a rich, fruity warmth. Not so bad.
Laura merely touched the glass to her mouth then licked her lip slowly. “Do you mind me asking, what brought you all from Albania to this island?”
He’d been wondering the same thing but hadn’t known how to ask without sounding intrusive. Laura, though, managed to ask lightly but sound genuinely interested.
Rovena shrugged. “I don’t know. We all have different stories. Some left during the war, many are refugees. We were in England, but it’s hard to get work when you are a refugee living in hostels in the north of England. Then a company called Glinn Etsell advertised and they were willing to employ refugees. We jumped at the chance. They gave us a lot of promises, homes, jobs, a safe place with no crime.” She blew out a long breath.
“My daughter was dating a boy but there was no job for him. Anyway, he had a restaurant job and didn’t want to lose it. We agreed she would make some money then go back to London. It was their big dream, London. She didn’t know she was pregnant.”
“Didn’t he try to follow her when they found out?” Adam couldn’t help asking. His own mother had fallen pregnant at twenty and had been alone.
Rovena sighed. “He tried but the company here didn’t give him a job because they only had funding for women. That was the deal, charity and government funding to create jobs for refugee women.”
“Didn’t she want to go back to him to have the baby?” Adam was thinking of the self-serving doctor who wouldn’t provide her with any care unless he was paid. In England she’d have been entitled to free treatment from the NHS.
“We can’t go back to England.” Rovena shook her head. “We didn’t understand that this island is not part of the UK. You can’t see it because people speak English, it’s the English Channel Island, no? But politically, legally, it’s not the UK so when we left, we lost our refugee status and now we have to apply from scratch. But of course we can’t be granted asylum because here we are not under threat. There is no war or crime.”
“Did no one explain that to you before you took the job?”
“No. We didn’t know. No one would have come if we knew. Some of the women walked across borders to escape the war in Kosovo and waited years to get accepted in England. They would not have sacrificed their asylum rights.”
She shrugged. “But we are here now, and we are trying to make this factory work. Because the company sold us the factory. Not the land or the building because that belongs to the island, to Lord Du Montfort, but the business itself, they sold us the shares. It’s ours now, and we have to make it successful.”
“Are you managing to sell the curtains and upholstery you make? Because I don’t think I’ve heard of your production before I came here,” Laura asked suddenly. She’d been silently listening, Adam thought her too tired, but apparently, she’d been busy thinking.
“We have some help.” Rovena’s voice didn’t sound confident. “Lord Du Montfort is promising to tell people about us so maybe we will have some good orders.”
Adam remembered his first meeting when Lord M had given a big speech. So that’s what that was about.
“This place is full of kind people. Look at how you came to help us tonight. I wish I could pay you, now. But I will save and pay you in installments—”
“Don’t even think about it,” he interrupted her.
Pay him? This woman in her immaculately clean and tidy little house with cheap furniture. The thought of the huge savings he’d left in the bank in England nearly made him gag. “You owe us nothing.”
“Thank you. You are very kind.” She yawned and pushed herself up from the sofa. “I will sleep with my daughter tonight. You can have my room. I put clean sheets for you. And in the morning, I will make a special breakfast.”
Laura stood up. “Can I help?” She screwed the top back on the bottle ofslivova.
