Seven Eight Play It Straight (Grasshopper Lawns Book 4) Read online

  ‘He sounds very exciting.’ Edge said politely and drained her glass. ‘Ready to walk across to the campsite and get you settled in?’ They crossed the road to the campsite, which at this time of year was crowded with caravans and a positive village of tents down at the furthest point. Edge pointed up at the short row of shops. ‘You can get all basic groceries there, and the one with Rainy Days & Mondays on the window has books and DVDs and a billiards table. Or as I said earlier, you’re more than welcome to come over to the pub tonight.’ She handed Fiona the key as they walked towards the first rondavel. ‘It’s pretty basic, and I could only book it until Friday, but all going well you should be back at JJ’s by then.’

  ‘Or in prison,’ Fiona remarked bleakly, and unlocked the door to let them in. The round room was divided in two, by far the larger space given over to the living area with two easy chairs under one window, a table and chairs under the other, and twin beds between.

  ‘There’s a bathroom, kitchen and cupboard space through the doors. The kitchen’s always stocked for a new booking with the essentials of life—eggs and milk and coffee, that sort of thing. As I said, basic but comfortable enough, I think.’

  ‘It’s fine.’ Fiona looked round indifferently.

  Edge tried not to feel irritated. ‘Shall I leave you to unpack? Come back across for nine, if you like, that’s when I plan to walk up for a drink in the pub. It’s very relaxed and informal.’

  ‘No, don’t leave me alone! I’ve hardly any unpacking to do anyway, only the things you’ve lent me. Can we go visit Aunt Vivian?’

  ‘Only if you stop calling her aunt. She isn’t really your aunt, after all. There’s hardly ten years difference in your ages, it makes her feel ancient.’ Edge tried to soften any element of criticism. ‘I’ve asked Kirsty to stop calling me aunt, too. She keeps forgetting.’

  ‘Oh, fine.’ Fiona prickled. ‘How about visiting Titania Pinkerton, then?’

  Edge glanced automatically at her watch. ‘I suppose she’ll have eaten by now, it’s rising eight. But she’ll faint if you use your usual language on her.’

  ‘Oh, am I still doing it? Brian had a go at me about it, he said it’s boring. I told him he was boring. But I thought I’d stopped. It’s local colour, anyway, everyone says it in Scotland all the time.’

  ‘Yes, you’re still doing it.’ Edge smiled wryly at the thought of Brian ticking Fiona off, and Fiona shrugged.

  ‘Okay, then. I won’t say fahhhhk any more. She was coming out on her verandah as we walked past, you obviously didn’t see her. And I’d love to borrow one of her books. She must have the whole set.’

  Miss P was indeed on her verandah and delighted to have a fan visiting. Edge went next door to collect the bottle of wine that she and Fiona had started. Fiona was in full flow when she got back, talking about Jamey’s worry about the funeral.

  Oh, you’ll have to ask Gerald,’ Miss P said earnestly. ‘He’s a Death Consultant.’

  ‘That sounds awfully like a hired killer,’ Edge remarked doubtfully as she perched on the step leading down to the garden, and Miss P tapped her shoulder playfully.

  ‘Silly! He started his working life as a mortician but found that most people haven’t a clue about death. Such a very difficult time. He branched out and used to offer a whole support service, you know the sort of thing, wills and stuff, and grief counselling, and funeral organising—everything, really. He’s very good.’

  ‘But what would he do?’ Fiona was wide-eyed and Miss P leaned forward enthusiastically.

  ‘Death brings out a great deal of submerged emotion, you know. Guilt, and anger, and regret. He has an absolute knack for getting to what really upsets people and helping them resolve it.’

  Before Edge could deflect her, she had surged into the apartment to phone Gerald’s internal number. Within minutes he could be seen cutting across the lawn towards them, and Fiona joined Edge on the stair to give him her chair. Miss P brightly told him the story and he turned his deep-set eyes on Fiona.

  ‘It goes without saying that parents want their children to be happy, but they also want them to be conventional, and successful, and utterly normal. Happiness doesn’t always fit into the conventional mould. I could certainly speak to them, if you like.’

  ‘I’m not sure how we could work an introduction,’ Fiona said doubtfully as her phone rang. She excused herself to walk out into the garden to take the call, and came back looking puzzled.

  ‘Talk of the devil. That was Tim’s mum, and she sounds absolutely bonkers. She said she was so sorry not to have been in touch earlier, and hoped I was bearing up under my terrible loss, and suggested I go meet them for tea at some place called Prestonfield House tomorrow to discuss funeral arrangements. I didn’t like to say I had a show, but luckily I’ll be finished in time anyway. Not a word about Jamey, or how was he, or anything. Why on earth would she think I was devastated by Tim’s death? I mean I am, but because of Jamey, and not to that degree!’

  ‘Well, it certainly sounds as if you’ll be invited to the funeral, so you can take JJ with you.’

  ‘Well, yes.’ Fiona brooded, then gave Edge an irritated look. ‘You know what you said about not saying Aunt Vivian—Jamey doesn’t care to be called JJ. If you don’t mind.’ She turned her shoulder and told Gerald, ‘I said I may be bringing a friend who has been very supportive, if you wanted to come too?’

  Gerald nodded, his deep-set eyes gleaming in a look that the Lawns residents had quickly learned to recognize and dread. ‘I mind one time,’ he started, with the sonorous note in his voice that inevitably signalled he had mounted one of his hobby horses and was preparing to ride, and Edge’s stomach gave an audible rumble. She pulled herself to her feet guiltily.

  ‘Oops. Gerald, before you get started, we haven’t eaten yet. Fiona, what do you want to do about supper? There’s a light supper at the house, usually soup and rolls, or we can get something out of my freezer, or go out?’

  ‘Soup and rolls would be fine for me,’ Fiona said indifferently. ‘We can go after Gerald tells me his story.’

  ‘Well, I want to shower and change quickly, so I’ll pop back here for you.’ She smiled at Miss P and Gerald, who was looking slightly offended. ‘I won’t be long. Half an hour, tops.’

  ~~~

  Despite her slenderness, Edge had a hearty appetite which certainly wouldn’t be satisfied with soup and rolls. She had a small chest freezer in her box room, which produced a pie quarter she had baked herself, in one of her rare bursts of domesticity, to put into the tiny oven. The evening was heavy and humid and she turned on the overhead fan in her bedroom alcove after her shower as she dressed quickly, choosing charcoal cotton slacks with a red silk camisole which matched a light red and charcoal silk over-blouse. She pinned her hair up tidily, gave her face a critical glare and added the minimum of makeup. Too hot for more.

  Mortimer wound plaintively round her legs as she took the pie, which smelled surprisingly good, out of the oven. One eye on the time—twenty five minutes of the thirty used up—she ate quickly and smiled as she heard Gerald’s voice become audible through the open window. Fiona must have tried to interrupt him, which always made him raise his voice, and from the current volume she must have tried more than once. Serve her right, and it would be very good for her to have to listen to someone else for a change. Edge slowed down to enjoy her meal. She always found her own cooking interesting, but the pie was delicious by any standards and she regretted not writing down how she had made it. What was another ten minutes? She sat at her desk and turned on her computer to catch up with her emails.

  Brian arrived as she finished eating, but waved her back to the computer, saying he would go out to her verandah and have a cigar.

  ‘Help yourself to something to drink,’ she said vaguely. ‘I’m just skimming emails in case anything’s urgent. And you could go rescue Fiona from Gerald, next door.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ He squeezed her shoulder and went to the fridge. ‘I
’ll hide inside in case they spot me and want a referee. I’m not sure which talker I’d back to win out of the pair of them.’

  He switched on the television, with the volume turned low, flipping through channels to find some sport, and she blocked out the distraction as she read. The fifth email was from an unfamiliar name, but quoted a name she knew very well as the subject, and her attention sharpened. She was engrossed when Fiona arrived, and only vaguely aware that Brian had switched off the television and was getting Fiona a drink.

  ‘Fuck, Edge, now I see why you were so rude. That man can talk for Scotland. I think he’s still at it. How does Miss P bear it? That was mean of you, because I say Aunt Vivian.’ She rounded on Brian, laughing. ‘Cruel and unusual punishment.’

  ‘Well, Vivian’s younger than me, and I would put you over my knee if you called me Uncle Brian.’

  ‘Oh, I never would, you’re far too sexy to be an uncle!’

  He laughed, flattered, as he gave her a glass of wine. ‘Don’t tell me, tell Edge. Sometimes I think she doesn’t find me sexy at all. And you’re still swearing, young lady.’

  Fiona ignored this and looked across the room. ‘Hello, Edge, I’m here! You’re being very rude, again!’

  ‘Oh!’ Edge turned from the computer with tears in her eyes. ‘Such bad news—Beauty’s dead! Beauty Ncube, Fiona, don’t you remember her? She was your father’s absolute mainstay back even before I met him, his cook and housekeeper. She ruled our lives with a rod of iron.’

  ‘Beauty—yes, I do remember, she scared me to death the first time I met her. But she turned out to be so kind; I didn’t realize you were in touch with her.’

  ‘I phoned every year on her birthday, but this email is from her son. He wants to know if they’ll still get her cheque this year, as she’s only missing the anniversary by a few weeks.’

  ‘She was in the tontine with us?’ Fiona came over to the desk. ‘I’d forgotten that. She never came to the dinners.’

  ‘James left special dispensation for her, he knew she hated flying. She was always invited, with a travelling companion if she wanted, but never chose the option.’ Edge stood up and went to the bathroom for a tissue, her eyes swimming. ‘It’s the worst timing for her poor family, too.’

  ‘She was a good age, though. Wasn’t she older than Daddy?’ Fiona emptied the wine bottle into Edge’s glass and handed it to her sympathetically.

  ‘Same age. She’d have been seventy six in December.’ Edge dabbed at her eyes, put the glass down on her desk and blew her nose. ‘I’ll have to let Vivian know. She always said James wouldn’t have married me if Beauty hadn’t approved of me. I never realized at the time, she always made a huge fuss of me, spoiled me shamelessly. I thought she was wonderful, and Kirsty absolutely adored her when she was living with us. Her son says she was paying for two grandchildren to go through university. He doesn’t know how they’ll manage if they don’t get the tontine cheque. They won’t, of course. I’ll have to speak to Patrick to see what I can send.’

  ‘Why Patrick?’ Brian asked suspiciously and Edge looked surprised.

  ‘He controls all my funds. All I ever have is a few thousand pounds on hand for emergencies, and my credit cards.’

  ‘Does that mean you’ll have to go to dinner with the bugger?’ Brian was deeply resentful of Edge’s accountant, who was a close friend and occasional date, and she felt another flutter of irritation at his perpetual jealousy.

  ‘No, Brian, it means I’ll phone him up and tell him I want to send money to South Africa. And he’ll wave a financial wand and make it happen. That’s what he does. The dinners are a perk, because he’s such fun.’

  He grinned sheepishly at her tart tone and got out a cigar. ‘I’ll slink out with my tail between my legs and enjoy this on your verandah, then.’

  ‘I’ll come with you, I love your cigar smoke.’ Fiona jumped up, not seeing the fleeting look of panic on his face. Edge bit her lip as he shot her an alarmed glance, then looked sorrowfully back at the email on her computer screen and reached for her phone to start her phone calls.

  Grasshopper Lawns

  Fiona erupted into Edge’s apartment after her walk with Brian and Cheryl, talking before she had barely entered the room.

  ‘Fu—damn, it’s so hot today, this isn’t Scottish weather at all! I thought you were insane having overhead fans in Scotland, but I’m glad you do. Edge, before I go over to the rondavel to shower I was hoping to borrow something to wear to Prestonfield House—oh, hello Aunt, I mean, hello Vivian!’

  ‘Hello yourself. Edge said you were walking, but how you can in this weather! It can’t be fun at all.’

  ‘It was a bit much today,’ Fiona agreed frankly. ‘It’s the humidity, I think, and cloud cover keeping the heat in. And Brian was absolutely foul to me.’ She flashed a smile at both of them as she stood under the fan, lifting her hair with a sigh of relief. ‘I was fretting about Gerald and this meeting this afternoon and he said it was entirely my own fault and I had to stop going on and on about it. Cheeky sod.’

  ‘Edge told me about your outing. Gerald can be a bit much. Honestly, the lecture he gave me the other day, just because I answered his phone by mistake. It’s identical to mine, and if it’s so precious to him he shouldn’t leave it lying around, should he? That was before I heard about his consultancy thing, so in all fairness I suppose it could have been somebody in direst need but it wasn’t; it put me quite out of charity with him at the time. I was just saying to Edge we can’t risk letting him rant at the Murdochs, not if you’re meeting them purely to wangle getting JJ—I mean Jamey—to the funeral. I love Prestonfield House, and I haven’t been for ages. Why don’t Edge and I come too, and hang about in the background? If he does go over the top we can come over and break the flow.’

  ‘Oh, yes. I really have been worrying. Edge was paralyzingly rude yesterday, actually got up and walked away, and he barely missed a beat.’

  ‘I wasn’t that bad!’ Edge said indignantly to Vivian, who was laughing, ‘I really wasn’t. Nothing like as rude as William has been, and that never fazes him either. And yes, you can borrow an outfit if you want, although Kirsty rang looking for you, so you can go back to the apartment. I think she left a message on your phone, too.’

  ‘I haven’t checked for messages yet,’ Fiona said vaguely as she opened the fridge door. ‘But that’s good news. All your clothes simply hang on me, and make me feel the most terrible frump. May I take some lemonade?’

  ‘Feel free to help yourself to anything.’ Edge kept her voice entirely neutral, but Fiona, after a slight pause, stuck her head around the fridge door, looking penitent.

  ‘Sorry, darling Edge. That probably sounded rude. I spend my life around men, I forget the social niceties at times. Your clothes are divine, but you have to admit they’re supposed to be worn close-fitting, not baggy. And they are a teeny bit fuddy duddy.’

  ‘You could always borrow something from Sylvia, she’s about your size.’ Vivian was slightly frosty, which brought Fiona’s vivid smile back to her face.

  ‘The pocket Venus? She’s absolutely terrifying, I’d never dare. I don’t have to move back to the apartment, do I? I don’t think I can face being there until Jamey’s released from hospital.’ She shuddered theatrically and perched on the edge of a chair, lemonade in hand.

  ‘You’ve got the rondavel until Friday,’ Edge reminded her. ‘What time are you meeting Tim’s parents? Will you have time to go to the apartment first after the show? Otherwise we can go there after tea, on the way home.’

  ‘Yes please, because I want to visit Jamey before the show, and I’m meeting the Murdoch lot straight after the second show, quarter past four. So I’ll need something I can wear to Prestonfield House. Is it posh?’

  Edge and Vivian looked at each other and shrugged. ‘Not posh, as such, but not jeans.’ Edge got up and opened one of the wardrobe doors concealed behind the panelling. ‘I think I’ve got just the thing. Not remotely fuddy duddy.
’

  She lifted out a cream and black outfit and turned the hanger towards them. ‘The skirt is a wraparound, so that’ll fit. The jacket is a one-size-fits-all affair; it looks like a draped pashmina but has seams. A bit over the top for tea, but with a t-shirt you can dress it down. You won’t need the jacket anyway, it’s too hot to wear it, so you can carry it. You absolutely cannot wear those hideous boots with it, though. What size are your feet?’

  ‘Oh, I love it!’ Fiona darted across and held it against herself. ‘You never got this in Scotland!’

  ‘No, it’s new. Anne made me buy it in Florida a few weeks ago. Shoes?’

  ‘I have shoes at the theatre: cream and black sandals with black fuck-me ankle straps. And some black t-shirts from rehearsals. Perfect. I can’t believe how often I’m thanking you at the moment!’

  ‘You can call that one-size-fits-all until you’re blue in the face, that wouldn’t fit me in a million years.’ Vivian heaved herself out of her chair to come over for a closer look. ‘Very nice, though. So what’s the plan? We go through with Gerald and meet you there at the hotel?’

  ‘You and I go in my car,’ Edge said firmly. ‘I’ve driven with Gerald once, and I reckon I was lucky to escape with my life. How he keeps a licence I will never know. He’s lethal.’

  ‘Yes, but we can’t bring Fiona back in yours,’ Vivian objected. ‘We could perhaps fold her into the back if we weren’t bringing clothes as well, but anyway even you, even William, couldn’t be that rude to Gerald.’