The kitchen, as always, brimmed with delicious smells and Amelie was hard at work putting the finishing touches to an enormous pastry-topped pie.
‘That looks good.’
‘It’sChurer fleischtorte,’ said Amelie with an impish smile.
‘And you’re going to tell me what that is,’ said Mina, already curious as to what was in the pastry case.
‘It comes from the city of Chur, of course, and it contains ground pork, bacon, milk-soaked bread, and red wine. It won’t win any beauty contests,’ said Amelie with that incredible turn of English phrasing that never ceased to amaze Mina, ‘but it tastes delicious.’
‘I’ll look forward to trying it. I came in to see if you needed any help.’ Surreptitiously, she studied the purple shadows beneath Amelie’s eyes.
‘I’ll enjoy your company if you’d like to stay, and you could peel some potatoes for me. And,’ Amelie said with a teasing smile, ‘tell me all about your snowboarding adventures.’
Mina laughed. ‘I think I had more faceplants than adventures. I might have a few bruises. Luke says I want to run before I can walk, but I had a great time and I’m determined to master it.’
She peeled the potatoes quickly and asked for another job. ‘You’re supposed to be on holiday, not playing sous chef,’ grumbled Amelie, although she still handed over a pile of carrots to peel and slice.
‘Yes, but I came to see you as well.’
‘You see me in the kitchen every morning and yesterday we had a lovely run out.’
‘We did,’ Mina agreed. They’d spent a couple of hours skiing along the valley to the village of Blitzingen where they’d stopped for hot chocolate in a pretty little café by the river. The route, which followed the River Rhone, had been a nice easy one and Mina was really starting to get the hang of cross-country skiing. On the couple of occasions she’d been out with Claudia, the other woman had helped her to improve her technique.
‘And I’m quite capable of managing without you,’ said Amelie, her face suddenly brightening with that naughty pixie smile of hers. ‘Besides, I drafted in a helper this morning. Dave has made his lemon drizzle cake for everyone.’
‘Has he now?’ Mina made a thing of dropping her knife in mock surprise. ‘I thought I was the only one you trusted in your kitchen, and more to the point, how on earth did you wangle that one?’ Even after relatively short acquaintance over cake and coffee and dinners, Mina was very grateful that Amelie hadn’t seated her next to the acerbic and opinionated Sarah. It was clear to everyone that Sarah liked to have Dave under her thumb, quite literally, at all times.
‘Yes, and next week, he’s going to make his legendary chocolate log.’ Amelie grinned and looked over her shoulder before whispering, ‘Sarah was complaining yesterday, over cake, about how she was desperate for a lie-in and to not have to do anything too strenuous today. I suggested that she sat by the fire and read a book, we have a good selection.’ There was a bookshelf in the lounge on the back wall, with a variety of books of different genres in different languages, presumably left by previous guests. ‘But she was worried that Dave would be bored as “he’s not very resourceful” and then she would feel guilty, and then she wouldn’t be able to read a book.’
Mina could imagine exactly how the conversation might have gone; she was only surprised she hadn’t actually heard Sarah’s complaints. No one would have described the woman as softly-spoken; her words boomed out like a foghorn with the volume turned to max.
‘I said that she would be doing me an enormous favour if she would lend Dave to me.’
Mina marvelled at Amelie’s clever psychology. By requesting Sarah’s permission, she’d played to the woman’s vanity and tendency to want to control her husband.
‘Very clever.’
‘I thought so,’ replied Amelie with an insouciant grin.
Dave appeared in the kitchen at ten-to-four, and Mina smiled to herself at his barely concealed schoolboy pride.
‘Have you seen my cake?’ he asked.
‘I have, it looks wonderful.’
‘Amelie says I can carry it in.’ His face fell for a second. ‘I sound like a ten-year-old, don’t I?’
‘No,’ said Amelie, suddenly stern. ‘You sound like a man with a gift for baking, who wants to share his skill with new friends.’
As if by magic, his shoulders straightened and Mina mentally high-fived Amelie. Her godmother had an innate gift of understanding what made people tick. What a precious skill, and one she’d love to emulate. Perhaps if she’d been more mindful of what drove other people and what they wanted, she might have made things with Simon work. Then she shook her head. That was rubbish: she and Simon had been totally incompatible from day one, neither of them had wanted to recognise it, and for the first time, she understood he was as much at fault as her. It was a relief to realise that she wasn’t the only one who had messed up.
She followed Dave into the lounge, carrying the tea plates and dessert forks. With the kindness she’d come to expect from the guests when they were all together, everyone oohed and aahed over the cake. The finish didn’t quite have Amelie’s professional precision, but the moist sponge glistened with lemon-soaked sugar and it smelled delicious. Mina noticed that Amelie watched Sarah’s face like a hawk, almost as if she were preparing to jump to the defence of her chick.
This, she realised, was an important moment, and as soon as she was served her slice of cake, she took a forkful.
‘Oh Dave,’ she exclaimed, completely truthfully. ‘This is amazing. You should go onBake Off.’ The sponge was light, fluffy, and moist, and the subtle flavour of lemon came through without being overpowering and was perfectly balanced by the sharp acidic hit of the lemon sugar drizzle topping.
Amelie shot her an approving smile and they exchanged a conspiratorial nod. Job done.
