looking for locations.’ Another quick look around the kitchen. ‘And this would be great. If you don’t do too much to it.’
A woodlouse outlier hurtled across the flags from the back door to the pantry and flung itself through the crack. The room was so quiet I could almost hear its legs scrabbling.
‘Do they… pay?’ I asked, slowly. Trying not to sound desperate.
‘Oh, yes. Depends on how long we need to shoot for, but, yep, they pay pretty well.’ He took his glasses off the table and slid them back on. ‘It’s got a good look. Unkempt.’ There was a patch over near the window where grass had grown in under the wall. ‘But picturesque,’ he added quickly. ‘And we need a location where we can film an entire storyline without being mugged by tourists. This is pretty isolated.’
Well. Money would be good. Luc was paying for Poppy, and the money from the flat had bought the cottage outright, but there would be bills I hadn’t foreseen yet. The cottage didn’t have central heating and, in Game of Thrones parlance, winter was coming. I didn’t have great hopes of the little wood-burning stove to heat the whole place, and the electricity tripped out if you plugged in more than four devices at once.
And I didn’t have a job.
‘I’ll leave you to think about it.’ Gabriel stood up. Indoors he looked taller; his head nearly rapped the beams. ‘You’ve got my number.’
‘I’ve also got the horse.’
‘Very true.’
‘Did you drive up here?’ I began to wonder. I hadn’t heard a vehicle before Luc’s, not since the early morning milker had dashed through on his motorbike on his way to the next valley.
Another headshake. ‘Walked. I don’t drive. Eyesight, you see. Not only can I not read a number plate at the required distance, I can’t even see the car the number plate is attached to.’
‘That must be…’ I tailed off. I had no idea what it must be like. Annoying? Or life changing?
‘It’s fine. You’re only two miles from Steepleton, if you go up over the cliff, and walking is a far better way to find locations than driving past. But, can I just ask for a quick tour? So that I can take a package plan back to HQ? Often we only use one room, but with this place – I think we could use the whole cottage.’
‘You want a tour. Of the cottage.’ I was desperately trying to remember if I’d picked yesterday’s pants up from the floor and whether my bedside reading looked suitably erudite. Had Poppy left shampoo and wet towels all over the bathroom? Was her room even possible to enter?
‘Just really quickly.’ Another grin. ‘I only want to get a general idea. I won’t judge, I’m not your mother.’
No, sunshine, you certainly aren’t, I thought, leading him slightly grudgingly out of the kitchen. He looked around the tiny hall, peered into the bare-floored living room, where our huge angular couch took up space like a dowager duchess in a squat. Up the stairs to the creaky landing, and a quick glance into my bedroom – where pants were not in evidence – and Poppy’s, which was ninety per cent K-pop posters. He ignored the bathroom, which was just as well.
‘It’s a lovely little place.’ I finally got him out of the front door. ‘If you give me the okay, I’ll put it forward. We would need to spend some time shooting here – we’ve got a storyline coming up about a serial killer, set to run through all nine episodes. I think this would make a great location for our killer to live.’
‘Well, I certainly won’t lie awake tonight worrying about that now,’ I said, slightly tartly.
He smiled, uncertainly. ‘Call it recompense for the broken nose. Oh, and don’t do too much work to the inside. We would need that slightly neglected vibe.’
‘Slightly neglected vibe,’ I muttered to myself, once I’d closed the door on him. Harvest Cottage wasn’t neglected. It was… it was… full of potential.
Even the woodlice laughed at that.
4
‘Hate it.’ Poppy swirled inside, dropping her school bag on the floor just inside the door. ‘Hate it, hate it, hate it. Why couldn’t we have gone to live with Grandma Bryant?’
The question took me aback a little. I followed her through, down the hallway and into the kitchen, which I’d tried to make smell homely and welcoming by baking some rock buns. ‘Because Grandma Bryant lives in a flat?’ And besides, my mother and I had a relationship that was uneasy at the best of times. Destructive at worst.
Poppy trailed through, coat half off one shoulder. ‘Yeah, but we could have stayed there until we found somewhere near my school. My proper school, not this dump that they call a school round here, where there’s only four forms in Year Ten and most of the sixth form are dorks. Who the hell am I meant to have a crush on when there’s no lush sixth formers?’ She flung open the back door and went out into the orchard, where Patrick, now complete with water bucket, was standing dreaming under one of the apple trees, tail slowly swishing. ‘I could have riding lessons now.’
‘No,’ I said quickly. ‘Money is going to be tight, and this isn’t a riding pony. I doubt he’s even broken to ride. Besides, he’s not going to be here much longer.’ I started telling her about Gabriel and Granny Mary, and Patrick, but she clearly wasn’t listening.
‘You’ve moved the van.’
‘Yes, Gabriel and I pulled it in here to keep the road clear. No, don’t go inside…’
‘I’m not going to touch anything.’ I followed her up the steps and we stood in the tiny doorway, peering in. ‘Look, it’s got everything!’
At the far end of the van was a built-in bed, half hidden behind curtains. Fitted cupboards lined the walls, a tiny stove jutted its chimney up through the roof and a sink and hotplate took up the rest of the space. There were photographs and ornaments on all the flat surfaces. I frowned, and poked a small china figurine of a dancing girl experimentally.
‘You’re not supposed to touch,’ Poppy said, gleefully.
‘Just wondering how it doesn’t all fall over every time the van moves.’
‘And?’ Clearly holding herself back from dashing around the van opening the cupboards and exclaiming, she stared out of the small window, as though our orchard were transformed into fairyland from being seen from inside this magical space. With all the drapings and decorations, the bunches of dried herbs and flowers that hung from the roof, the ornate soft furnishings and velvet curtains, the inside of the van had the feel of a faery bower. It seemed as if Titania had just popped out for a moment to gather some dew.
‘Blu-Tack.’
‘It’s gorgeous.’
‘And it smells of sausages. Maybe we should leave the window open for a bit to air it out.’ I pushed the glazed top half of the door and it swung, separate from the bottom half. ‘Come on, out. You wouldn’t want someone poking around in your bedroom, would you?’
We backed slowly down the steps. Almost childlike in her wonder, Poppy traced the outline
