“What about work?” asked Maggie. “I don’t want you to get into trouble.”
“I’ll call Sotheby’s myself if they’re going to be dicks about it,” piped up Doreen.
Similar offers of being rude to his employer ensued. Those Cussing Crocheters sure knew their cusses.
“That won’t be necessary,” Duncan assured the small army of women who appeared ready to do battle for him. “I’ve got some time owing from all the extra hours at North Novelties.”
“That wouldn’t have anything to do with a certain North sister that happens to be staying at the shop, would it?” asked Ellen.
Duncan studied his snowy trainers. Simone looked over to see Star looking anywhere but at him. Something was definitely off with those two; she’d noticed a distance between them yesterday at decoration making.
“Right! It’s a plan!” called Betty. “I’ll close the café at two o’clock today, and we can stitch and bitch in there. In the meantime, we’ll need this canvas cleaned up a bit and a search of all sheds in the area for more. Bring your sewing machines and your can-do attitudes, and I’ll provide the mince pies and mulled wine.”
A cheer went up, and the village of Rowan Thorp sprang into action.
“I knew that Duncan was a good egg,” said Betty as she passed by Simone. “Excellent knees.”
Simone couldn’t help feeling a strange rush of affection as she watched the scene before her. People bustled about helping to clear the mess, some in pajamas and boots, others dressed for blizzard conditions. Mugs of hot tea were handed over garden walls, and plates of toast were ferried back and forth while children made snow angels on the grass. Belinda flung open the church doors so that everyone could hear Ron’s masterful organ playing, his fingers performing a kind of musical alchemy as haunting melodies of medieval Christmas carols suffused the cold morning air. This is what it was like to be a part of something bigger than herself. For too long she had been in a desert of her own sadness with nothing to see on the horizon but more of the same. There was no miraculous cure for her pain, but she felt ready to step into the little oasis that the village of Rowan Thorp was offering.
39
When Maggie had put the word around that there would be tree decorating in the rowan tree woods on Wednesday evening, she hadn’t expected almost the entire village to show up. Especially since many of them had not only helped with the cleanup that morning but also spent the best part of the day fashioning a patchwork tarpaulin that would be hung tomorrow, ready for the feast on Friday evening.
Joe had spent most of the afternoon replacing all the old strings of garden lights left by Augustus and adding twice as many more. Using the tree house as a kind of central flagpole—and performing some hijinks at the top of a ladder that were definitely against health and safety—he’d fixed strings of LED fairy lights to the base of the house and then stretched them across to the tops of the rowan trees around it. He wound lights around gnarly trunks, dropped them over bramble patches and up-lit mounds of ferns, and was rewarded with Maggie smothering him with kisses.
Now, well insulated against the determined chill in the air, the summer sisters stood by the open gate to Augustus’s garden to welcome everyone onto their father’s land.
At the far end of the garden by the entrance to the woods, Verity and Patrick guarded the wooden crates loaded with salvaged decorations from some rather bumptious squirrels. The pyre in the center of the long garden had steadily grown over the past few days and now looked set to rival any Guy Fawkes bonfire.
The trickle of familiar faces became a torrent, and soon a queue to get through the gate had formed, which trailed back along the high street.
Now that it was dark, the effect of Joe’s lighting display and the snow was magical. Appreciative gasps ran through the crowd, with arms full of edible garlands and baubles, as they chose trees to decorate. Miss Radley began to sing Christmas carols and soon everyone joined in as they worked. The rowan tree woods were alive with the tinkle of laughter and voices raised in song.
Children hung bird feeders on the branches they could reach, while the adults draped the garlands over the higher limbs. The WI brought a supply of gingerbread stars hanging from garden twine and added them to the crates of decorations, along with strings of dried orange slices studded with star anise.
“We made extra,” said Betty, eyeing a boy in a bobble hat who had just devoured a star, “to ensure that at least some of them make it onto the trees.”
“Thank you, Betty. You’ve done so much to help.” Maggie felt herself welling up at the scene before her, their little woods alive with activity.
“Oh, pish!” Betty batted away the thanks. “If I’ve said it once I’ve said it till I’m blue in the face: we’re a community; help will always be offered if you’d only ask.”
* * *
“Ah, good, there you are!” Gerry Myers said, intercepting Maggie on her way to see how Verity was getting on. “Now, I’m sure you know about the Rowan Thorp Twitchers.”
Everybody knew about the Rowan Thorp Twitchers; the local birdwatching group had hides set up in fields and groves surrounding the village. As well as rigorously keeping score of the common birds they spotted and being deeply competitive about documenting the rarer varieties, the hides were well known to double as places the twitchers could explore their naturism tendencies.
“Yes.” Maggie couldn’t quite keep eye contact with Gerry.
“What we’d like to do is set up a couple of bird cams here in the woods, so that we can watch the birds and mammals enjoying the feeders in real time. We thought we could stream it live on our webcast so that the whole village could enjoy the fruits of their labors.” He snorted at his own joke. “It’ll be educational for the kiddies and great for us twitchers. We thought we’d call it Bird Brother!” He snorted again. “Do you get it? Like Big Brother but with birds! What do you say?”
Maggie recalled her afternoon of bliss with Joe in the tent of intent. There’d be no more of those shenanigans if the twitchers were live streaming the woods for all to see. And then she remembered that the tent of intent had been donated to the great tarpaulin sewing bee and smiled.
“It sounds like a brilliant idea,” she said. Everyone had been so kind, and Parminder and Gerry had been especially generous by supplying them with their homemade cider for the wassail. The least they could do was let them pop a couple of cameras up. “I’ll have to check with Star, since she’s living here at the moment, but I don’t think it’ll be a problem.”
She was fairly sure Star had grown out of her naked outdoor yoga phase, but it wouldn’t hurt to check.
“No need,” blustered Gerry, slapping her on the back with a meaty hand. “I’ll do the honors.” And he strode off in search of Star.
* * *
By seven o’clock every last decoration had been hung, draped, and balanced, and everyone stood back to admire their handiwork. The effect of the bejeweled trees was one of majestic abundance. Every tree was festooned in a cornucopia of edible adornments, every branch dripped with fruit and nut embellishments, gingerbread pendants, and popcorn necklaces. It was a feast for the eyes as well as for the woodland critters, and Maggie wondered why they’d never thought to do it before. She couldn’t remember a time when she’d felt as connected to her community as she had done these last few days. It made the idea of having to leave at the end of January even more of a wrench.