she was practically passing the door.
‘You owe me, Vickie,’ she said, surrendering, helpless in the face of this two-pronged attack.
‘Big time,’ Vickie replied, with a grin that had better be of relief. ‘Come and see me when you get back and I’ll have the kind of job waiting for you that will make you drool.’
Aaah… She’d nearly fallen into the carefully set trap. Once money had exchanged hands…
‘On second thoughts, have this one on me,’ she replied. Then, giving her full attention to her unexpected charge, she said, ‘OK, Maisie, let’s go before my car gets clamped.’
‘Is this it?’ the child demanded, unimpressed, as they reached the street and she was confronted by a much cherished, but admittedly past its best, VW Beetle.
‘This is my car,’ Jacqui agreed, opening the door.
‘I never travel in anything but a Mercedes.’
At which point she began to understand Vickie’s anxiety not to be left alone with Miss Maisie Talbot for any length of time.
‘This is a Mercedes,’ she said, briskly.
‘It doesn’t look like one.’
‘No? Well, it’s a dress-down-at-work day.’
Maisie’s little forehead wrinkled as she considered this outrageous statement. Then she asked, ‘What’s a dress-down-at-work day?’
It was too late to wish she’d kept her mouth shut. Something to bear in mind, though, next time she thought of being smart with a six-year-old.
‘It’s a day when you’re allowed to go into work wearing jeans instead of a suit,’ she explained.
‘Why would anyone want to do that?’
‘For fun?’ she offered. Then, because Maisie’s idea of fun was dressing up, not down, ‘OK, well, sometimes, to raise money for charity, grown-ups pay for the pleasure of wearing whatever they want to work. Wouldn’t you like to wear your princess outfit to school instead of your uniform and raise some money for a good cause at the same time?’
‘I don’t go to school.’
‘You don’t?’
‘I have a home tutor.’ Then, ‘Is that why you’re not wearing a proper uniform? Because you’re dressing down for charity?’
Jacqui, who had never worn a uniform, proper or otherwise, pretended she hadn’t heard as she busied herself brushing down the back seat, retrieving a couple of toffee papers from the floor before she tossed in the white linen holdall next to her own bag and said, ‘OK, Maisie, hop in and I’ll buckle you up.’
Maisie stepped aboard, like a princess boarding a Rolls-Royce, and spread her skirts carefully across the seat. Only when she was satisfied with the result did she permit Jacqui to fasten her seat belt.
‘So,’ she said, in an effort to move the conversation along a little, make a connection. ‘Are you planning to be a model when you grow up? Like Mummy?’
‘Oh, please,’ Maisie said, giving her a look that would have withered nettles. ‘I’ve already done that and it’s sooo boring.’
‘I’d heard that,’ Jacqui said, getting behind the wheel and starting the car.
‘When I grow up, I’m going to be a doctor just like…’
‘Like?’ she prompted, checking the road and pulling out. But Maisie didn’t answer, she had already got out her personal CD player from the bag containing her ‘Stuff’ and clamped the headphones to her ears, plainly indicating that she had no further interest in conversation.
It was fine, Jacqui told herself. She’d got used to journeys without endless kindergarten chatter. Eventually. You could get tired of making up new verses for ‘The Wheels on the Bus’.
‘We’re nearly there, Maisie,’ she said, as she took the exit from the roundabout marked Little Hinton.
‘No, we’re not,’ Maisie replied, without bothering to look up. It certainly made a change from the more usual, ‘Are we there yet…? Are we there yet…? Are we there yet…?’
But then there was nothing ‘usual’ about Maisie.
Unfortunately the child knew what she was talking about.
The village itself was nearer ten miles than six from the motorway, but it was easy enough to find and it certainly lived up to its name. There was a village shop with a post office, a pub, a garage and a small school, where a group of children were playing a skipping game in the playground, and a scattering of houses huddled around an untidy patch of grass masquerading as a village green. It took all of five minutes to check them all out, but it didn’t come as a complete surprise to discover that High Tops was not among them.
The clue, of course, was in the name.
The village nestled in a small valley. Behind it rose a range of hills that were mostly obscured by low cloud. It didn’t take a genius to work out where a house called High Tops was likely to be.
‘So much for the “minor” in diversion,’ she muttered, pulling up outside the village shop. ‘You can forget the postcard, Vickie Campbell,’ she muttered to herself.
‘I told you we weren’t nearly there,’ Maisie said.
‘So you did.’
‘It’s miles and miles and miles. Up there,’ she added, pointing in the direction of the mist-covered hills.
‘Thank you for that, Maisie. Please don’t move while I ask for directions.’
‘I know the way. I told you, it’s up there.’
‘Lovely. I won’t be long.’
The child shrugged and clamped the headphones back in place.
‘High Tops? You’re going up to High Tops?’ The doubtful look she received from the woman behind the shop counter was not reassuring.
‘If you could just point me in the right direction?’ she prompted.
‘Are you expected?’
The city girl in Jacqui resisted the urge to enquire what possible business it could be of hers; this was, after all, deep in the country, where, according to folklore, everyone considered it their right to know everyone else’s business. Besides, she really needed directions.
‘Yes, I’m expected,’ she said.
‘Oh, well, that’s all right, then. Could you take their post for me?’
The woman didn’t wait for her to reply, just handed her a carrier bag full of mail.
‘Right, well,’ she said, ‘if you can give me directions. I’m running a bit late.’
‘All
