I certainly was. And the longer I went without telling anyone, the harder it became to confide even in Poppy, to whom the whole of my life, up to the point I left for university, had been an open book.
Chapter Seven Brief Encounters
Although my discoveries about my mother had upset me deeply, there wasn’t really any time to sit about brooding or to work out what, if anything, to do about it.
I still had lots of packing to do, including bubble-wrapping my extensive collection of ornamental angels, many of them given to me as gifts. I was also trying to make a large enough stock of Chocolate Wishes to tide me over until I could start up production again in the cottage, so the Bath was chugging away pretty well non-stop as it heated and stirred the couverture, and trays of chocolate-coated angel and heart moulds covered every surface, hardening before I could put in the Wish and seal them up.
It would be wonderful when I had a separate workshop, because chocolate making had taken over the flat!
Meanwhile, not even imminent house-moving could stop Grumps’ steady output of one or two chapters of novel per day, or his incessant correspondence: cranks of the world, unite! I told him again this morning that email would be easier and quicker, and I could show him how to do it in no time, but he said the devil was in the machine and it could stay there.
Then he added that that had given him an idea, and started scribbling away, my presence forgotten, so I tiptoed off and left him to it, though I don’t suppose he would have noticed if I’d blown a trumpet in his ear and then slammed the door.
‘So, how did it go?’ I asked Poppy when she called round on the morning after her date. ‘Did he turn up?’
‘Yes, but I didn’t realise it was him for ages. We were both sitting separately in the pub for half an hour, each thinking the other one wasn’t coming. Felix was in another corner, hiding behind a newspaper like a spy. He kept peering over the top of it.’ She gave her irrepressible giggle. ‘In fact, it was like a singles night for the severely shy!’
‘I thought your date told you he looked like Tom Cruise? He should have been easy to spot.’
‘Actually, he looked more like a spinning top. He had a small head but a huge stomach and little legs.’
‘I don’t think Tom Cruise is very tall, is he?’
‘No, but at least he’s good-looking! This one had a face that could stop clocks.’
‘That bad?’ I said sympathetically.
‘Worse! I mean, I’ve no objection to homely, but Cruise Missile was gargoyle ugly! But eventually, when no one else turned up, the penny dropped that it must be him, because he was constantly watching the door as if he was waiting for someone.’
‘Cruise Missile? Is that what he called himself in the ad?’ I asked incredulously. ‘You didn’t tell us that bit!’
‘It didn’t seem important,’ she said simply. ‘Just a name to grab the attention.’
‘It seems to have hooked you, all right. What did you call yourself?’
‘Riding Mistress.’
‘Riding Mistress?’ I looked at her and she gazed innocently back at me. Considering what her mother is like, I can’t believe how naïve she can be sometimes, but she has a very literal mind, which must account for it.
‘Well, that’s what I am, isn’t it?’
‘Ye-es…’ I said slowly, ‘but – well, never mind. What did you do next, sneak out of the back door under some pretext and leg it?’
‘No, I went over and asked him if he was waiting for Riding Mistress, and he was, only I could see he was really disappointed in me too.’
‘I don’t see why,’ I said loyally, though it’s true that Poppy’s idea of making an effort to dude herself up a bit was usually confined to applying rose-tinted lip salve and running a comb through her slightly frizzy, damp-sand-coloured hair, usually the comb she has just used on Honeybun’s tail.
‘He told me straight out why he was disappointed: it was because he’d thought I would be wearing riding breeches and carrying a whip!’
‘Oh dear, one of those.’
‘He certainly was. We hadn’t been talking more than five minutes – and he didn’t even offer to buy me a drink – when he said he’d been a very bad pony and why didn’t we go back to my place so I could school him. I was a bit gobsmacked.’
‘I take it you didn’t oblige? How did you get away?’
‘I caught Felix’s eye and mouthed, “Help!”’
‘The gallant knight to the rescue – good old Felix!’
‘Not immediately: he got up and slipped out of the back door and I thought for a minute he’d abandoned me, though of course I really knew he wouldn’t. I panicked a bit and I was just stalling Cruise Missile by telling him my mother was at home mucking out, when Felix came in again through the front door, marched right up and said, “There you are, Poppy! The children are crying for you – please come home with me, darling. I’m so sorry we argued!”’
‘I think he’s been reading Victorian melodramas again,’ I said. ‘So then…?’
‘I got up and smiled at Cruise Missile and said I was sorry, it had all been a mistake, and then we left and went back to Felix’s shop. It was horrible at the time, but after a bit it all seemed sort of funny and it was a pity to waste a night off, so we went to see a film in Southport. We did try phoning to see if you wanted to come with us, but there was no reply.’
‘Yes, the phone rang,’ I remembered, ‘but I was at a tricky bit with a big angel for a personalised card reading, so I couldn’t answer, and then I forgot about it. I’ve swung into major production. The whole place smells like a chocolate factory.’
‘It always does,’ Poppy said simply. ‘I like it.’
It was no surprise that Felix phoned to give me his version not ten minutes after Poppy left, and it was similar, except that he insisted Poppy’s would-be date was sinister and creepy.
‘In all fairness, I think Poppy unintentionally sent out all the wrong signals. He sounded to me more sad and insignificant than anything,’ I said.
‘Dangerously weird,’ he insisted. ‘I can’t imagine how, growing up with a mother like Janey, she manages to stay so…’ He paused, racking his brains to describe the puzzle that was Poppy, the Maria von Trapp (bar the singing) of Sticklepond.
‘Sweet and innocent?’ I suggested. ‘That’s just what I thought.’
‘I’d say trusting and credulous. I’ve told her to stop answering that kind of advert.’
‘Did she agree?’
‘No, she said just because there was one rotten apple, it didn’t mean the whole barrel had gone squishy. You’ll have to make her see sense.’
‘But she gets lonely, Felix, and I can’t always go out with her, I’m too busy with the business and trying to keep track of what Jake is up to.’
‘Jake’s legally an adult now, you don’t have to do that.’
‘He might be legally adult, but he’s still my little brother and part-boy, part-man. I want to make sure he stays on the right track until he goes to university. Then I’ll have done my best and it’ll be out of my hands.’
‘Yes,