various job schedules.
Last weekend, Laura had been forced to call a daytime rehearsal on Sunday after church, thanks to so many people missing their weekday slots. Daniel had been a good sport and come along to help, but Gabe Baxter had been so incredibly rude – doing mincing impressions of Daniel whenever his back was turned and flat-out ignoring his stage directions – that Laura had vowed never to bring Daniel again.
‘Do you have to be such a prick all the time?’ she said when she confronted Gabe angrily the next day. Generally, she had adopted a policy of ignoring her tormentor, hoping that eventually Gabe would tire of harassing her and find another sport to amuse himself with. So far, sadly, he showed no signs.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said laconically, not looking up from his newspaper.
‘Give me that.’ To Gabe’s amazement, Laura snatched the paper out of his hand. ‘You know exactly what I’m talking about. What is your problem with Daniel?’
‘I don’t have a problem with Daniel. Other than the fact that he’s got bugger all to do with this play and should keep his nose out of it.’
‘Oh, grow up!’ snapped Laura. ‘He was trying to help.’
‘Well he failed, then, didn’t he? It’s bad enough having you as a director, never mind your stuck-up, “I’m a big-shot West End playwright” boyfriend showing up to get his ego massaged.’
‘You’re a fine one to talk about egos,’ Laura shot back. ‘And what, exactly, is so wrong with having me as your director?’
‘Never mind,’ grumbled Gabe.
‘Actually, I do mind. Your attitude is affecting the rest of the cast; it’s affecting everybody. Give me one reason why I shouldn’t direct this play, other than the fact that you don’t like me.’
‘You’re an outsider,’ said Gabe, snatching back his newspaper. ‘All right? You rent a cottage for a few poxy months and you think that makes you Queen of bloody Fittlescombe.’
It was so breathtakingly childish, Laura almost laughed. But one look at Gabe’s face made her change her mind.
‘I don’t think I’m Queen of anything,’ she said. ‘Harry Hotham asked for a volunteer and I obliged.’
‘Oh, I’m sure you’re very obliging to Mr Hotham,’ Gabe taunted.
Ignoring the innuendo, Laura said, ‘You should know I don’t bully easily, Mr Baxter. I have no intention of stepping aside just to appease your prejudices.’
‘D’you use big words like that in bed with Danny Boy? I’ll bet that’s what gets him off. “Oh baby, say it again! Get out your thesaurus, you know I love it.”’
‘You’re pathetic,’ Laura said contemptuously.
‘And you’re blind. He’s a fake and a poseur. You don’t need an Oxford degree to see that, love. Now are we gonna rehearse or not? Because I’ve got a farm to run.’
* * *
It was a Friday morning, two weeks before Christmas, and the village was alive with excitement. Fittlescombe’s festive celebrations had been condensed this year into a single long weekend, with the Furlings Hunt Ball on the Friday night, the Nativity play on the Saturday afternoon of Christmas Eve and Christmas itself falling on a Sunday. Everyone from the postman to the vicar had a part to play, and the sense of goodwill and village camaraderie was contagious.
When Laura stopped into the paper shop for her morning copy of The Times, the talk was all of the hunt ball.
‘Mrs Worsley was in here the other morning ordering place cards for the dinner. There’s going to be over three hundred guests this year. Three hundred!’
‘Did you hear that Tatiana Flint-Hamilton’s thrown over her duke for a footballer? He plays for Chelsea apparently.’
‘Poor Mr Flint-Hamilton.’
‘Thank goodness his wife’s not alive to see it.’
‘You’ll never guess who Lucy Norton saw in the chemist’s last Thursday. Keira Thingummy-bob.’
‘Who?’
‘You know. The pouty one from Love Actually. Banoffee pie? The annoying one.’
‘Keira Knightley?’
‘That’s it. Apparently she’s rented Bartley Mill Barn for a month! She’s coming to the ball for sure, and she’s bound to bring all her Hollywood friends. You don’t rent a barn that big unless you’ve got guests.’
Laura half tuned into the gossip as she waited in the queue. What with being so busy with the play, and all the excitement over Daniel, she’d barely thought about the hunt ball. Her invitation included a ‘plus one’, but the ball was the night before Christmas Eve, and she worried it might look too pushy to ask Daniel to an event on Christmas weekend. He had children, after all, and would doubtless want to spend the holiday with them. Besides, nothing had been said about Christmas plans. He and Laura had only been together (if you could call it that) for a month.
Still, it was a smart event. I’ll need something to wear, thought Laura. She was going up to London that night to see Daniel. It was his birthday and he’d asked her up to town for dinner and a show, which she took as a positive sign. Perhaps she could squeeze in some shopping while she was there and look for a dress. That way, the subject of the Furlings Hunt Ball would come up naturally.
‘That’s a pound.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘The Times.’ Mrs Preedy, the shopkeeper, smiled at Laura kindly. ‘It’s a pound. You’re miles away, aren’t you?’
‘Sorry.’ Laura fumbled in her purse for the coin.
‘No need to apologize, my love. If I were your age and spending every day rehearsing with Gabe Baxter, I’d spend a lot of time daydreaming too!’
The women behind Laura in the queue all laughed loudly. It was infuriating the way that three-quarters of the village seemed to view Gabe as Fittlescombe’s answer to Ryan Reynolds. No wonder the man’s ego was so big.
Blushing, Laura paid for her paper. ‘Believe me, Mrs Preedy, Gabriel Baxter couldn’t be further from my mind.’
‘Whatever you say, love.’ The shopkeeper winked. ‘Whatever you say.’
* * *
Rehearsals that afternoon went better than expected. The schoolchildren did a first run-through of their candlelit procession from the school to the church, where the play itself would take place. Laura had confidently expected at least one child’s hair to catch fire, à la Michael Jackson, but in fact everything went smoothly. Better yet, the reception infants had finally learned the words to all three versus of ‘We Three Kings’, and had sung something loosely approximating to a tune.
‘It’s coming together, isn’t it?’ Laura said excitedly to Harry Hotham, who
