“His daughter?”
“Yes, Celeste; must be about twenty-two, twenty-three now? She went to live there after uni, does something to do with the Cornwall Wildlife Trust, looking after ditches or some such. She’s a good girl. Did work experience on my farm. Feisty, like her dad. John is an absolute fool for her, thinks the sun shines out of her backside. But then I suppose we all think that about our kids.”
Oh, Celeste is his daughter, not his wife! Annie thought. She didn’t know why, but the revelation pleased her. She couldn’t imagine John being anybody’s fool, but she liked the idea that he had someone to give him a run for his money.
“I hope he’s not giving Mari a hard time about me opening the café,” said Annie.
“Don’t judge him too harshly.”
Annie pulled a face and was about to respond when Maeve put up a hand.
“I know, you two got off on the wrong foot and, yes, he can come across as brash. But his heart’s in the right place. Last winter was very hard for Mari; much harder than she let on.”
“But to force her to sell?”
“Did Mari tell you that?”
“Well, no, but . . .”
“Mari may not want to sell to builders, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t open to the idea of selling. Mari is a romantic and John is a pragmatist, but I am given to understand that their end goal is the same.”
Annie reflected on Maeve’s words. Perhaps her own wish to stay in Willow Bay and Emily’s fervent hopes to save Saltwater Nook had clouded her opinion of John Granger. Admittedly he did himself no favors, he was gruff and overly formal and quick to judge, but maybe his heart was in the right place.
Chapter 42
At four o’clock, Raye and Aiden helped the band pack up their stuff and began to ferry the garden furniture back up to the pubs ready for the barbecue. The last customers finished their drinks and melted away. The chill in the air was beginning to bite without the sun to lend its warmth.
Annie was exhausted; she could feel the armchair and the TV upstairs in the tiny sitting room calling her name, but since both sets of Willow Bay publicans had turned out in support of her new venture, she felt she must show her face at their joint barbecue.
“Don’t you have to get back for Alfred?” Annie asked.
“Back for Alfred?” Maeve exclaimed.
“I thought he was fixing your guttering today.”
“He is.”
“Oh, well, it’s just that he said he was going to get a pie and mash supper out of it.”
“He is,” said Maeve again. “He doesn’t need me to sit up there with him while he eats it! Besides, Alfred’s like me, not afraid of his own company. All he’s got to do is sling it in the microwave.”
“Has Alfred got a key to your house?” asked Gemma.
“Doesn’t need a key,” said Maeve. “I didn’t lock the door.”
“Isn’t that a bit dangerous?” asked Annie.
“Not really, my cottage is on the farm; there’s always some bugger around to notice if something is amiss. And both the girls know how to use a shotgun.”
“How silly of me to worry,” said Annie.
* * *
—
It seemed like the whole of Willow Bay had gone straight from the café to the pubs. People spilled out across both pub gardens, down the grassy banks, and even mingled in the road between.
Annie wandered among them and was surprised to find that she didn’t feel at all like an outsider. As the light faded and the temperature dropped still further, the outside lights went on, chimineas were lit, and thick woolen blankets were passed around in abundance; these revelers were clearly too practiced to be cowed by little things like cold and dark.
Annie wended her way through the throng to where Gemma sat outside the Sunken Willow. Esme was wrapped in a blanket and dozing contentedly on Gemma’s lap. At her feet, the scene was mirrored as Lennox, also wrapped in a blanket with his hoodie pulled low over his face, sat reading a comic by torchlight while Podrick snoozed with his head resting on Lennox’s knees. The glow from the chiminea lit the scene. Maeve leaned forward in a striped deck chair, poking the fire with a stick and adding more logs as required. Samantha and Tom sat cross-legged on the grass with a blanket pulled tightly around the both of them. Annie pulled up a deck chair and tugged a blanket up over her chest. The warmth of the fire was welcome, and Annie found herself lulled into yawning by the flickering flames.
“I’ve been thinking,” Gemma began. “Maybe we should read something a bit ghosty for our next book club, you know, in honor of it being Halloween and all that.”