The Posy Ring Episode 35

The way he calls her “hen” reminds her both of her father and her grandma Nancy. Hen, sweetheart, which is she?

Cal looks at her and says suddenly: “You can borrow him if you like. I mean temporarily. I wouldn’t give him away for the world. But he can sleep here while you’re on the island if you want.”

“I have to go home anyway. I have a fair.”

“Ah yes. So you said.”

“But I’m planning to come back soon. Stay for a bit longer if I can. I needed to suss it out first. See if the place was habitable.”

“And it is, isn’t it?”

“Yes. It is. So I thought that I might come back and stay for a few weeks. See how I get on.

“But I have to keep selling things. I don’t have any other income. I have to make a living.”

“Well, if you want to borrow Hector for a while, you’re very welcome. We can make some arrangement.”

“Would he be OK here?”

“He seems to like you. And he’s a very discerning chap, our Hector.”

Hearing his name, the dog wags his tail, rushes over, licks Cal’s hand briefly, and charges off to sniff the undergrowth.

“Actually,” says Cal, “he’s not so much discerning as easy. He’ll go with anyone who feeds him. He’s the most laid-back dog I’ve ever met.

“I have this town house at the back of the Botanics, in Glasgow, and he spends some of his time there.

“He’s either sleeping, or in the gardens when he can persuade somebody to take him for a walk, some of his time on the road with me, and the rest here on Garve, chasing rabbits whenever he can.”

“It sounds like a great life.”

“It is. He’s happier than I am. But he’s no guard dog. Although I think he’d be company for you. Just having him in the house.”

He looks around. “Seems to me that you have enough stock here to last you a lifetime.”

“Well yes. But I have to be really careful. I don’t want to let anything go that I might regret later.”

She frowns at him, still suspicious. “Oh, that’s for sure,” he says, ingenuously. “No dodgy house clearance guys in here!”

She finds herself laughing. She can’t help at the weekend it. He’s the kind of man who makes you laugh. “No. In fact, no dodgy guys at all.” “I don’t do house clearances, hen.” The way he calls her “hen” reminds her both of her father and her grandma Nancy. Hen, sweetheart, which is she?

“I don’t suppose you do. Not with a shop like the one you have.”

“It’s not mine, though. My mum and dad own the shop. I just have an interest in it and they pay me a retainer, for the buying, plus commission on sales. Quite a lot of commission sometimes.

“But it’s their business really. Not mine.” They go into the house. She makes a big pot of coffee and they sit at the oak table in the living room.

The back door is open and Hector stretches himself out across the doorstep in the sunshine.

“You sound as though you don’t much like the shop.”

“Have you ever worked in a shop?” “No. Only fairs. My dad’s a musician. I started off doing stalls when he had a gig. Now I do quite a bit of online stuff as well.

“I have a degree in history, but I worked for one of the west of Scotland auction houses for a while. It kind of gave me a taste for it.”

“My mum worked in an auction house too.”

“I don’t think I was on quite the same level as your mum. I was a lowly porter.

“I packed things and unpacked them. I made sure the punters didn’t smash them. Or pocket them.

“I took phone bids. They can be a grumpy bunch, dealers. Especially the old men. I expect your mum’s an expert.”

“Have you been talking to Mrs Cameron?” “She was telling me a bit about you. I asked her,” she says, apologetically.

“Mum’s an art historian and conservator. She met my father at a private view.”

He frowns, drains his mug and holds it out for a refill. She wonders if his apparent hyperactivity is down to caffeine.

“Have you seen his work? Do you like it?” he asks, abruptly.

The truth is that she has indeed seen some of the work and disliked it, but before she can think of anything tactful to say, he pre-empts her.

“I don’t mind his early stuff. He used to do these strange little studies of the island.

But that was before he got bitten by the urban bug. Now it’s just moody, repetitive rubbish as far as I’m concerned.”

She shifts uncomfortably, not used to hearing somebody criticise a parent so forthrightly.

She would never be so disloyal to her own father.

Besides, she loves him too much. “Sorry,” he says, noticing her discomfort. “I get the bit between my teeth where my dad’s concerned. We don’t often see eye to eye.

“He’s so difficult. He thinks I should knuckle down and spend a lot more time in the shop.”

“What do you want to do then?” “Me? I did a course in furniture restoration. I’d like to do a lot more of that in the future.”

“I’d have thought your dad approve of something like that.”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But he doesn’t get the whole artisan thing. Despises what he calls crafts.

“He spent a fortune on our education, mine and Catriona’s. That’s my younger sister. And we both discovered that we wanted to go off and get our hands dirty.

“Catty was more successful at that than me. Very dirty indeed.”

“What does your sister do?”

She doesn’t like to admit that Elspeth Cameron has already told her.

“She escaped. Catty’s married to a hill farmer, back on the mainland. Jake Brodie. Not all that far from the ferry, which means I get to see them all quite often. Sheep farmers. Hard graft.

“As far as I can see, sheep mainly want to get dead and they find a hundred ways of doing it. But she thrives on it. They both do. And they have three kids as well.

“I like their life. I’m not sure I’d want to live it myself, mind you. But I do like watching them living it.” would

The Posy Ring, first in the series The Annals of Flowerfield, is written by Catherine Czerkawska and published by Saraband. It is priced at £8.99.