‘You know that everyone here is looking out for you, don’t you?’ Gillian pointed out.
‘We are,’ chimed in Jeremy, adding his two pennies’ worth. Jeremy, in his seventies, was a close match in age to Gillian and a lively, friendly character. ‘Otherwise we’ll have Gillian to answer to.’
Gillian’s glance of agreement proved he was correct.
Morgan noticed Belle looking over at her gran fondly as she commanded a presence in the cottage that had once been hers. Belle had also told Morgan how much she’d missed her gran when her mum had taken her away from the village and how being in her life once again had made it whole. It sounded like such a dramatic statement, but the emotion layering Belle’s voice when she’d told Morgan that had been clear, and Morgan got it because she felt the same way about her mum.
It was hard to contemplate leaving all these people behind when she eventually went up to Scotland. Sometimes, living on her own in the cottage, it was easy to forget she was going to be married. She had a wedding to plan and had so far done nothing. But she would, soon. Ronan had proposed after only one year together and saying yes had come naturally. And he’d always made it clear he wanted to move back to Edinburgh, his birthplace. He’d mentioned it the first night they got talking in a cocktail bar, introduced by a mutual friend, and you didn’t mention that sort of thing to a girl you’d only just met if it wasn’t what you truly wanted as part of your life’s plan.
‘Coming here without Mum is a bit weird,’ Morgan admitted to everyone, although she felt less emotional than she’d expected. Instead, she felt comfortable.
Trevor, a man similar in age to Jeremy and Gillian and a good friend of Gillian’s, was the last to arrive at Snowdrop Cottage amidst many jokes that he lived the closest and should really have been there first. And once they were all seated – it was a bit of a squash in the kitchen but cosy – Belle and Sebastian delivered platters, bowls and plates to the table, the roast dinner laid out like a magnificent feast. Conversations battled to be heard, laughter rang around the table, the entire room filled with a welcome warmth.
‘Any plans to go back to the Snowdrop Lane markets?’ Belle passed Morgan the gravy boat.
Little Woodville was host to the Snowdrop Lane markets once a week, every Saturday. If you turned right out of the front gate to Snowdrop Cottage and kept walking, you’d reach Snowdrop Lane before too long. And a couple of hundred metres up the lane was a wide-open expanse bordered by Snowdrop Woods. It was in that open space that the markets were held and Elaina had had a stall there for years. Morgan, during her time back in the village, had helped her out and stepped in to run it solo on the days her mother wasn’t up to it.
‘I should do it soon, I know that much.’ Morgan pushed a piece of stuffing onto her fork and ran it through a puddle of gravy. Ronan had asked the same question, although he’d suggested she do the speedier option and sell everything on eBay. ‘Mum accumulated a lot of stock – she was forever buying things that caught her eye.’
‘Probably the best way to do it,’ Anne approved from the other end of the table. ‘I have to buy things as I see them or I forget.’
‘The trouble with Mum was that she collected things way faster than she sold them. She was always fretting she’d miss out on a bargain and already I know it’ll take weeks to shift everything.’
‘You’ll have it done in no time at the markets,’ Gillian assured her.
‘Elaina was a lot of fun,’ Barbara declared. She was a jolly woman who always had time for whoever wanted a chat. ‘I remember being at the markets when she sold Jasper’s wallet by mistake.’
‘I haven’t heard that story,’ said Morgan as laughter erupted. And rather than feel a wave of grief, she had a curiosity to know more, to glean as many extra details about her mum as she could. ‘How on earth did it happen?’ The murmur in the room also begged the question about the wallet belonging to the market manager.
Barbara explained, ‘Elaina had a near-identical one priced up and for sale, beautiful Italian leather it was, but when Jasper was helping her put up the sign at her stall that morning, his wallet must have fallen out of his pocket right next to the one she had. And Elaina sold it.’ To gasps, she responded with an animated tale of how Elaina had chased after the man when she realised she’d sold someone’s actual wallet. ‘I thought she was going to rugby tackle him to the ground.’
Morgan was pleased she hadn’t. But she loved the story and the amusement and applause the tale got.
Barbara, arms supporting her bosom beneath a lightweight, grey jumper, continued, ‘She swapped it with the other one and when Jasper saw the commotion, that was when he realised he’d lost his wallet. He bought her the biggest bunch of flowers he could find on Hildy’s flower stall – bright pinks, purples, yellow. He was so relieved to have it back.’
Peter, Betty’s husband, wondered, ‘Didn’t the man realise it was on the heavy side when he bought it?’ He thanked Anne who was sitting next to him as she picked up his herringbone cap that had been knocked from the wooden finial on his chair and put it back in position. Morgan wondered if he ever went anywhere without his cap, apart from the bakery, of course.
‘Maybe Jasper, like the rest of us, doesn’t use much cash any more,’ Sebastian suggested. ‘Perhaps the man thought the cards inside were fake.’
‘You do get those fake cards when you buy a purse or wallet,’ Anne agreed, fork poised in the air.
Gillian leaned closer to Morgan and said, ‘Bet he didn’t think they were fake. Bet he was cursing your mum for catching up with him when he’d almost got away with it.’
‘I’ll bet he was too,’ agreed Morgan with a feeling of mischief as the banter at the table continued and she and Gillian fell into an easy chat.
‘I remember your mother at one of these dinners telling us about a beautiful silver antique tray she’d sold at her stall.’ Gillian cut into a roast potato and its heat curled into the air. ‘She sold it to a young boy. Thought it would be a gift for someone. And then that evening she found him using it to sledge down the sloping part of the village green.’
Morgan burst out laughing. She could imagine her mum thinking that was terrible, and wishing she’d sold it to someone who’d appreciate it more. Elaina had always loved finding hidden treasures at bits and bobs shops or, more recently, because that’s all she could cope with, online. And she’d always imagined the sorts of homes the items would end up in, who would be the new owners. It was the reason Morgan couldn’t just pack everything up and get rid of it. Her mother would’ve wanted all of the things she’d chosen to be sold at the stall and so that was what Morgan had decided to do. Tegan had agreed too, which meant a lot because there’d been a tension between them on the day of the funeral and Morgan didn’t want anything else to add to it.
Both Tegan and Morgan were executors of Elaina’s will and had so far managed to deal with everything over the phone or via email as they ploughed through the tasks the best they could. But tomorrow, Tegan was coming back to the village again for the day and an overnight stay, leaving the farm she ran with her husband Henry in his capable hands. The sisters had always got on well enough, saw each other when they could, but Morgan got the impression there was something Tegan wasn’t telling her. Or was it just grief creating tension that might simply pass in time?
Morgan tuned back into the conversation around the table as they ate. Betty and Peter talked about their travel plans in autumn to see family, Barbara complained about the amount of work that needed doing in the churchyard to keep it tidy and Sebastian assured her he’d be over to take a look soon. With the Bookshop Café on Little Woodville’s high street, his new venture, he was no longer the caretaker at the school but he still took care of the grounds around the church, which Morgan had noticed were immaculate.
As voices filled the kitchen, Morgan caught Belle’s eye and they shared a giggle each time either of them tried to speak and gave up because it was too hard.
When the meal came to its conclusion, Morgan helped clear the table and scraped plates into the compost with Belle’s help. They could hear Jeremy and Trevor talking about their late wives, first dates, romantic gestures.
‘Imagine being so in love with someone that fifty years isn’t enough,’ Morgan sighed wistfully as she overheard Trevor. She piled the final plate onto the stack beside the sink.
