‘As soon as I’ve cleared the steps, I will be at your beck and call. Promise.’ He tucked the phone firmly in his pocket and drew up the zip of his ski jacket.
‘Good, because you’re on soup-making duty,’ she called out to his departing back, already planning what needed to be done next. If she started some bread dough now, fresh bread combined with a hearty vegetable soup would feed plenty of people without too much effort. That was lunch taken care of. One step at a time, she told herself, as the number of jobs and tasks started to unravel in her head.
‘Want a cake-maker?’ asked a cheerful voice.
She could have kissed Dave as well. His timing was impeccable. Everything was possible. She needed to utilise all the help she could get. How on earth had Amelie done all this on her own? No wonder she’d had a heart attack.
‘Dave, just the man. How do you fancy making azuger kirschtorte?’ She pointed to the recipe on the wall.
Dave pulled a doubtful face. ‘Not sure about that. Never made one of those before.’ He made no move to read the laminated sheet of paper. Mina brightened her smile, hiding an inward sigh. How difficult was following a recipe? It took her a second to curb her instinct to chivvy him along and tell him it would be easy. Poor Dave was standing there full of indecision and uncertainty when she really needed him just to crack on. Mina chewed at her lip. What would Amelie do?
She thought of the conversations she’d shared with her godmother. Amelie wouldn’t push him; she was trying to build his confidence. Mina’s personal view was that if he made it and it was a success, it would be a triumph; if it wasn’t, it wasn’t the end of the world. And that was the difference between her and Dave. She was a risk-taker while he was not. He preferred to follow rather than lead. She needed to keep things within his comfort zone. Not everyone wanted to experiment all the time. Some people liked to stick with the tried and tested, like her adopted parents. Guilt pinched at her. Sometimes she wasn’t as patient as she could be with people, didn’t always accept their differences. She’d been quite impatient with Simon sometimes. He took forever to make a decision, and if she were honest, she’d quite often made them for him.
And today she needed some certainty. She couldn’t afford to have to find an alternative cake if this one didn’t bake to plan.
‘OK, plan B. How do you fancy making a Victoria sponge?’
His lugubrious heavy set face lifted immediately. ‘My nan loved a Victoria sponge. Swore by a recipe in her old Be-Ro book. I tell you, that thing was falling apart.’
‘Excellent.’ Mina smiled. Now to push him a little – she couldn’t quite help herself. ‘And what about doing it with a bit of a Swiss twist?’ She deliberately nodded her head in encouragement, which she seemed to remember was a psychological trick to get people to agree to do things.
‘What do you mean?’ His words radiated suspicion which made her laugh out loud.
‘Nothing too wild, I promise. But I’d quite like to keep things a little bit Swiss for Amelie’s sake. I was thinking of a filling made with cream and cherries. What do you think? There are loads of frozen cherries in the freezer.’
The careful ruminations of his mind were reflected in the movement and twitches of his mouth. Dave would never make a poker player.
‘Hmm, I suppose I could make a sort of cherry jam. Nan was a great jam-maker too.’
‘Perfect.’ She gave Dave her best encouraging we’ve-got-this smile.
Now all she had to do was sort out dinner. She glanced outside at the snow. It was still falling. Would they get to the hospital today? And if they did, she needed to get a message to Amelie before then to let her know that everything was under control and that Mina wasn’t leaving any time soon. Which reminded her she needed to make a few personal calls of her own.
Hannah answered almost immediately, and before Mina could say a word, said, ‘I’ve done it, Mina. I’ve done it.’
‘Done what?’
‘Booked my trip to Ireland. I’m going in September.’
‘Wow, and what about work?’
‘I’m taking a sabbatical. I wasn’t quite brave enough to jack it all in. That’s the sort of thing you’d do.’
‘Ha! Funny you should say that. I might be just about to commit career suicide.’
‘Why? What have you done?’ Why was it that everyone always assumed it was Mina that had done something?
‘Ihaven’t done anything. Not yet anyway but…’ She paused, trying to find the right words so as not to alarm Hannah unduly. ‘Amelie’s had a health scare. She’s in hospital. But she’s going to be OK.’ Mina crossed her fingers on both hands so as not to tempt providence. ‘She’s had a heart attack, but the doctor said she should make a full recovery. She’s just going to need to rest and recuperate for a while.’
‘Oh no, poor Amelie. Is she OK? Have you seen her?’
‘I think so. And I haven’t seen her today. The nearest hospital is half an hour away, and it’s chucking down with snow, I’ve never seen anything like it.’
‘You are in the Alps,’ Hannah pointed out with dry amusement.
‘Yeah, even so, it’s really coming down. It would bring Manchester to a grinding halt, I can tell you.’
‘You might have to wait until tomorrow,’ mused Hannah.
