While his thoughts might have wandered, Jess had struck up an easy conversation with Patrick and he was busy pouring her a drink.
‘What are you going to have?’ she asked Sebastian.
He hadn’t had a drink in The Old Goat for such a long time, the tumble of thoughts and emotions stuck in his throat as he tried to speak. Eventually he pointed to a cask beer and said, ‘I’ll try a pint of that, please.’
They stayed at the bar, the warmth of the room encouraging Sebastian to loosen the scarf around his neck and unzip his jacket. As he sipped the beer, which was too strong and dark for his tastes, he wished he could loosen his spine as easily as his scarf. Wished he could wave a magic wand and make his life as simple as he’d dreamed it might be, all those years ago with Catriona.
He’d all but abandoned his glass when Mrs Keel bustled into the bar, scanning its occupants. Her eyes widened as she saw the two of them.
‘Now that’s what I call serendipity,’ she said, her easy smile and the floral lilt of her voice lifting Sebastian’s spirits. ‘It’s wonderful to have you back at Kirkshield, Your Lordship. Especially as we’re short a piano player for our rehearsal. At least, we were …’ Triumph edged into her voice as she fixed him with her indomitable stare.
‘Me?’ he said, aware of a loaded huff coming from Patrick’s direction.
Mrs Keel narrowed her eyes at the landlord then refocused on Sebastian. ‘Aye, Your Lordship. You. And Jess, you can come along, too. We could do with more singers. I’ve heard you singing in the scullery. Come away then, let’s not keep the choir waiting any longer.’
Chapter 8
The piano in the Kirkshield village hall was almost as out of tune as the one Jess used to play in the community centre around the corner from Vivi’s mid-terrace. The musty, unloved smell in the space was the same, too: damp wood and plaster never provided with sufficient heating, mixed with the unmistakeable smell of burning dust coming from the recently fired-up space heater, all doing battle with the chill of late afternoon.
Learning to play the piano had turned out to be a passing phase for Jess, but it clearly meant far more to Sebastian, if the way he effortlessly sight-read the carol accompaniments was anything to go by.
Their arrival had caused a bit of a stir among the rest of the singers, and Mrs Keel had rattled through introductions far too quickly for Jess to catch many of the names. They were mostly locals if the way they greeted Sebastian was any indication. Some were enthusiastic to see him, a few seemed reverential. But it was impossible not to notice the subsequent glances between many of the villagers, the muted enthusiasm at his presence, the negative, under-the-breath comments Jess caught as she took her place at the end of one of the rows of singers, closest to the piano, with Digby at her feet.
None of them were as rude as she had been to Sebastian when they had been in the attic, at least not to his face. Nor were they as openly antagonistic as the landlord in The Old Goat. Jess might have appeared to have been studying the range of optics behind the bar when Sebastian and the landlord had been talking, but she’d heard every word – and Jess’s curiosity had been piqued by whatever had happened between Sebastian and the landlord’s daughter, Catriona. Presumably a relationship of some depth which had gone wrong. Jess wondered how, and why. Not that she herself was renowned for her ability to hold down a relationship with anyone for very long, truth be told. Running for the hills wasn’t outside her remit, especially if things looked like they might be getting serious.
Jess flicked at the booklet of carols Mrs Keel had shoved into her hand on their arrival. ‘Good King Wenceslas’ was next up. A carol all about a member of the nobility who went out of his way to help the poor and needy. Jess glanced at Sebastian as he took his lead from Mrs Keel and began to play, wondering if the carol had been picked for anything other than its musical appeal.
As she sang the final verse, Jess decided she was being too cynical. Mrs Keel seemed to be in charge of the choir, and passive aggression didn’t seem to fit with her otherwise forthright attitude. Jess got the feeling that if Mrs Keel wanted to say something, she’d say it. She wouldn’t bother to dress the sentiment up.
‘Can I just say, I haven’t heard such a beautiful voice in quite some time,’ Mrs Keel said, beaming a smile in Jess’s direction. ‘Did you not hear her, Your Lordship? Jess out-sang every last one of us.’
Jess felt her cheeks spike with heat as she glanced around, hoping Mrs Keel’s words wouldn’t antagonise the rest of the singers. Thankfully, the nods and grins she was met with were enough to set her mind at rest.
‘I wonder if you might allow Jess some time to join us – she could be our soloist if she likes, what with Aggie being struck down with laryngitis,’ Mrs Keel said.
‘Not surprising, given her cottage is as damp as a frog’s belly,’ muttered someone further back in the ranks.
Sebastian either didn’t hear the stray comment or chose to ignore it. ‘You don’t need my permission.’ He aimed his words in part at Mrs Keel, but also to Jess.
‘I suppose I could,’ Jess said.
Mrs Keel clapped together her hands. ‘That’s decided, then. Excellent. I’ll let you know when the next rehearsal is. And if Your Lordship is at a loose end, we would all benefit from your skills on the piano, if you wouldn’t mind. What with Aggie being our pianist, too.’ She didn’t give him a chance to argue, turning away and saying, ‘For now, thank you everyone, sheet music on the piano before you leave if you don’t mind.’
Maybe it was all in Jess’s imagination, but it looked as though Mrs Keel’s words had pleased Sebastian. He closed the piano lid gently, his hand resting for a moment on the flaking veneer of the fallboard as a scud of different emotions passed across his face, before it settled back into his customary inscrutable gaze.
As they headed back to the castle, Sebastian glanced at Jess. He had heard her sing; it would have been impossible not to hear the quality of her voice, the clarity of her tone shining bright among the rest of the voices.
He should ask her about her singing, find out more. It would be great to have someone to talk about music with. But he’d also heard the comment about Aggie Fernell’s cottage. Another complaint. Another issue to add to the ever-lengthening list. It was one thing to have a clearer idea of the work needed, both in the castle and the properties in the village, but he was no nearer finding out how he was going to finance it all – and continuing to pay for the services of a housekeeper they didn’t need wasn’t going to do anything to help the situation.
Apart from the rents from the estate’s properties, and the tenant farms, the only incoming revenue stream available to the estate seemed to come from the shoot days. Which was ironic, as it was the thing Sebastian had most wanted, from a very young age, to put a stop to.
He was aware some would class him as a hypocrite – after all, he’d never so much as entertained the notion of being a vegetarian – and yet, the idea that shooting birds as they were terrified into flying away should be considered fun, or a sport, had never sat well with him. Even if the birds were destined for the food chain, and restaurants were crying out for fresh pheasant, Sebastian had never managed to stop his throat drying at the thought of what was happening whenever he could hear the guns.
Plenty of people did seem to enjoy it, though, and a meeting with Robbie – someone he had always liked, despite the reason for his employment on the estate – had sent Sebastian into a greater quandary. Robbie had explained how many dates had been put in the diary for this coming winter, how many birds the old earl had insisted they should rear and release into the woodland, how many folks were travelling from all over the world, no less, to participate in a shoot day on Kirkshield Estate.
The bottom line was that, regardless of Sebastian’s discomfort, it was the only current enterprise which generated any serious income for the estate. And income was what was needed to ensure the estate didn’t fall any further into the red.
The situation had been doing laps around Sebastian’s brain all day. He had given Robbie permission to continue as had been planned by his father, and Sebastian knew it was the only logical decision to make for the immediate future, nevertheless it sat very heavily.
