The Lost Guide To Life And Love Part 5

'Well, yes,' I grinned. He'd clearly read my mind. 'Go with the flow,' I'd said, hadn't I? 'I suppose I would.' So I ordered the lemon tart, so deliciously sharp and lemony that it almost made my eyes water. Clayton watched me eat it, rather as though he were an indulgent uncle. As I took the final forkful, he smiled, 'It's good to see a lady enjoying her food.'

Which, of course, immediately made me feel huge and greedy. I bet the women he normally took out for lunch did nothing more than nibble a lettuce leaf with no dressing. Maybe an olive if they were going really mad. I went pinker.

'Aren't you shooting today?' I asked hurriedly before he could comment on it again. 'I thought that was the point of coming up here.'

'Nah, it's pretty boring really. You stand where you're told, wait for some guys to shoo all the birds in front of you and you go bang! bang! and that's it. And it's all rules and etiquette and, "If you don't mind, sir," and a gamekeeper with a seriously bad att.i.tude. I wanted to go off and shoot in another direction. I could see plenty of birds there, but he just says, "I'm sorry, sir, we're not shooting those drives today." Well why not, eh? And you should see the clothes. He was wearing a suit right out of a picture book, like that boy in the film about the trains, you know, the one with wotsername in.'

'Jenny Agutter? The Railway Children?'

'Yeah that's the one. All tweedy with trousers to the knee and bright red socks. What a prat.'

By now Clayton was well into his stride. I could just imagine how he stood out on an expensive shoot, even amongst new-money millionaire businessmen and a bunch of footballers.

'I asked him how many birds we'd shot and he said, "About thirty brace, sir." Thirty brace? What's that mean? It means sixty, yeah. So why couldn't he just say sixty?'

As I laughed he glanced at his very expensive watch and sighed. 'Well, Miss Tilly, we'd better go. I have to be there when they come back and then we're back in training tomorrow.'

I sipped my last drop of wine as he paid the bill. For a nanosecond, the waiter's eyes lit up as he checked the amount and his impa.s.sive mask almost slipped, so I reckoned Clayton must have left a generous tip. Show-off. He made a couple of calls and when we went out, the helicopter was waiting for us. And we were heading home.

As the helicopter came down by Ravensike Lodge, I looked out anxiously for the shooting parties, but they were out of sight, thank goodness. I didn't think that the gamekeeper would take too kindly to a helicopter buzzing through his carefully driven birds. We got out, the rotor blades slowed down gradually to silence. The pilot walked off with a wave and Clayton and I were still standing there, with only the sound of the sheep.

'Thank you for lunch,' I said. 'And the helicopter ride.'

'It was a pleasure,' replied Clayton. 'Are you OK to get home from here? If not, I can get someone to drive you.' He nodded his head towards the house.

'No, I'm fine, thanks. It's been good.' And it had. I was surprised at how much I'd enjoyed myself. When he wasn't showing off, Clayton Silver could be OK, really. I supposed.

'Hey, I guess I'd better have your number, yeah?'

'Well, yes. If you think...I mean...Well, why not?'

He took out his desperately stylish phone, keyed something in and then handed it to me.

I saw that he'd typed 'Miss Tilly'. I tapped in my number and I resisted the urge to scroll down through his other numbers. I didn't want to seem too keen, so I just smiled and handed it back to him, as if it were neither here nor there.

He put his phone in his pocket, then put his arms round me and kissed me, first on the cheek and then on the mouth, just lightly but very nicely indeed. I didn't want to enjoy it. But I did. Quite a lot. I tried to look indignant but I failed.

'I'm glad you could join me,' he said. 'I enjoyed the conversation and I just loved making you go pink!' And, of course, I immediately went bright pink again. I was cross with myself. Cross with him. He laughed and added insult to injury by kissing my cheek once more before turning and loping back up the drive and in through the gates of Ravensike Lodge, which opened magically as he approached. I expect famous footballers get used to that sort of fairy-tale thing.

The house was spa.r.s.e, but clean. It had a flagged floor scattered with pegged rugs and a fire burned cheerfully in the range. As the photographer's eyes adjusted to the gloom, he noticed with surprise a small selection of books on a shelf by the window, and, in a chair by the fire, a boy of about eight or nine, his leg wrapped in makes.h.i.+ft bandages round a wooden splint, resting on a stool. The boy seemed to be knitting. He turned to look at the stranger.

'My youngest,' said the woman. 'He hurt his leg in a fall and cannot yet get back to work.' She dipped her head and shrugged off her shawl. He almost gasped at the sight of her hair-a rich red auburn. As she shook her shawl, one thick lock of her hair came loose and fell gently down around her throat. Impatiently, she pinned it back and he marvelled at the elegance of her movement. He could, he thought, have been looking at one of the society women who came to his studio to be photographed, not someone sc.r.a.ping a living in this wild dale. She nodded in the direction of the boy. 'Until he's back at work he can knit and make himself useful that way.'

She went to the fire, stirred something in the pot, tasted it and looked at the boy. 'You can have your broth now.' The boy's face lit up.

The woman looked at the photographer. 'You're welcome to a drop.'

'That would be very kind.' He was cold and wet and some broth would indeed be wonderful, but he knew there wasn't much food to spare in this household. 'But only a drop, please, Mrs...'

'Allen. Matilda Allen.'

Chapter Nine.

'A helicopter? Up to Newcastle? With Clayton Silver? For lunch?' Becca was seriously impressed. 'And he asked for your phone number? Oh Tilly, that is just so amazing.'

'Not really,' I said, trying to be cool about it. 'The helicopter was quite fun,' I admitted grudgingly, but I didn't mention the kiss. 'No, the best bit was that we sat and talked and had a proper conversation about what it was like when he was a kid. He had a rotten childhood and he has just done so well.'

After Clayton had kissed me, I had wandered back along the path to the cottage, slightly stunned. I hadn't noticed the ruins, the birds, the sheep, I no longer thought of all the men who had worked here a century or more ago, I was too busy replaying the previous four hours in my head. You go out for a walk in the middle of nowhere and the next thing you know you're whisked to one of the country's most exclusive hotels by one of the country's most eligible bachelors. In a helicopter. I laughed to myself because it was so ridiculous, I could hardly believe it. But there, in the pocket of my fleece, was the goodie-bag with the hotel's crest on. It really had happened.

But who were those men he had met? And why wouldn't he tell me about them? I thought of Jake's suspicions and was glad that I was in no danger of getting involved with Clayton.

Back at the house, I tried to bring myself back down to earth. I made a pot of coffee, but while I was waiting for it to brew, I went over the conversation in the hotel so much that by the time I came back to the present, the coffee had gone cold and I had to make some more. Finally, I got myself sorted, drank the coffee, had one more check through the cheese-maker piece and set off down to the pub to email it. The battered blue four-by-four was in the car park and I could see the tall figure in the shabby Barbour was at the back of the bar talking to Dexter. There was something familiar...and I guessed it was probably Matt Alderson, whom I'd seen striding across the fellside. With that, Becca came through with a mug of coffee. 'Here you are, Matt,' she said, and then asked, 'Where's Matt?'

For Matt Alderson seemed to have melted away from the bar, leaving Dexter busily wiping down work surfaces with a determined air and Becca with a baffled expression.

'Would you like this coffee?' Becca had asked me. 'Shame to waste it.'

'Thanks,' I'd said, which was when, in return, I had told her about my helicopter trip with Clayton Silver.

'Oh wow!' she said, enthusiastic, amazed and begging for all the details; I was more than happy to oblige. 'And he asked for your phone number? Now that really is a good sign,' she said.

I shrugged. Did I really care? He so clearly thought he'd impressed me with his helicopter and posh hotel and fancy wine. All very nice, but only stuff, really, just stuff.

On the other hand, I remembered the way he'd talked about his dad and Travis, his sort of stepdad, and his pride at getting his GCSEs. Now that had been a surprise. Maybe there was more to Clayton Silver than a tight T-s.h.i.+rt and decent ball control.

Finally Dexter came through with some spicy soup for customers and said, a little grumpily, 'The computer's free now, if you want it.'

'Better had, I suppose.'

I disappeared into the little corner and dutifully emailed my article over, plus notes and details for photographers. Then I emailed my mum because I thought she'd probably made a better fist of things than Clayton's mum had. I couldn't tell her that in so many words. And certainly not in an email, but it was sort of important to make contact, get in touch, so I just said that all was well but I still hadn't had time to track down our family roots. And, of course, I had to tell Polly about my amazing lunch date...As I was writing to her, an email pinged in from Jake. Short and to the point, he asked, 'Everything OK?' Which I guess was him thinking he'd done enough to discharge any duty of care he might feel he owed me.

'Brilliant!' I typed back. 'Clayton Silver flew me up to Newcastle for lunch.'

'Ha ha,' came the reply.

'No, really.'

'If really, then tell me more,' typed Jake.

So I told him the story-much more briefly and downbeat than I had told it to Becca. But I did mention the meeting with the strange men. I was curious.

'Any idea who they were?' he typed back immediately.

'No. He went into another room to talk to them so couldn't hear anything. Looked perfectly anonymous men in suits.'

'Be careful, Tilly,' Jake wrote back. 'Footballers live in a different world. Clayton Silver moves in some very dodgy circles. You don't want to get close to him.'

'You're right. I don't,' I replied, but just to wind him up and to show him that yes, I did have a life of my own, thank you, I added, 'But who knows?' though I did really. Clayton Silver wasn't my type and I certainly wasn't his. I'd read the gossip columns and the celebrity mags. I'd seen the pictures. I guessed I knew what footballers were like. And so I got on with arranging my next interview.

When I'd done that, I did have a sort of thought about Googling Clayton Silver, to find out more about him, but one of the family history mob was making noises about how he'd booked the computer to start at least ten minutes ago...Anyway, what would be the point? Inspired by the sampler about 'Wine is a mocker', I was drinking an elderflower and ginger cordial and watching Becca knit.

'I don't understand how you can just pick it up and knit a few st.i.tches, put it down and then pick it up and know exactly where you are,' I said, remembering my few hopeless attempts at knitting as a child.

'Practice,'she said. 'My mother's the same, knits every spare minute. Not that she has many. So did my grandmother. And my grandfather. Couldn't stand to be idle. Once upon a time, everyone in the dale used to knit-men and women and children. That was a hundred years or so ago, of course, but it still carried on.'

Whenever I could, I would clear any tables, to give her a bit more knitting time. I'd only been coming here a few days, yet already I felt part of the pub, part of the family. How could my life change so much in just a matter of days? I stacked up the plates left behind by a family with two very messy children and, as I was coming back with a cloth to wipe the table, the door opened and a small Asian guy came in. He went up to the bar and said politely, 'I come to buy scarf please.'

Dexter looked baffled, both by the man and by his request. 'Scarf ?' he said, rather helplessly.

'Scarf made by Becca,' said the man firmly.

Becca leapt in. 'Right, well, I only have one here with me now. I have more at home, or you can buy them at shops in Hawes, Alston, Allendale, Richmond, Durham-'

'Must have one now please. Mr Santini asked specially.'

'Alessandro?' Becca's face lit up. 'He wants one of my scarves?' Then her face fell a fraction. 'He's not coming to get it himself ?'

'No. He must be back in London, to play football.'

'Never mind, next best thing,' said Becca happily, and found the scarf she had shown Alessandro two days earlier. It was still carefully wrapped in tissue paper. Becca rummaged down below the bar and into her hessian bag, from which she produced a card. 'High Dales Designs. A twist on tradition by Becca Guy.' It had her email address on. She quickly added her phone number too.

'Nothing to lose, is there?' she grinned as she saw me watching.

'Anything can happen.'

She handed over the parcel and the man took it carefully and then produced a bundle of notes.

'No, no!' said Becca, before peeling off two and pus.h.i.+ng the rest back. 'Forty pounds is plenty, really.'

'You're missing a trick there, girl,' said one of the cyclists in the bar who'd been watching with some amus.e.m.e.nt. 'If he wants to give you hundreds, just you take it.'

'No. Forty pounds is the price and that's it.'

Alessandro's messenger shrugged, pushed the rest of the notes back in his pocket, thanked Becca again, made a small bow and left.

Becca and I stood either side of the bar and grinned at each other. All in all it had been a pretty good day.

The next day I had to tend to my life. I snaked back down the dale to a small town. After the track up High Hartstone Edge, the road that had seemed so perilously narrow when Jake and I drove up a few days ago now seemed like the M1. When I got to the small town it took me a moment to realise what was odd about it: there was no supermarket; in fact not a single chain store or national name at all. Every shop was independent and individual. Wonderful. I joined the queue at the baker's, relis.h.i.+ng that bread smell as I dithered between a crusty cottage loaf and an enticing small square loaf full of seeds and nuts. In the end I chose them both. 'Best way. Spoil yourself,' smiled the a.s.sistant as she deftly wrapped the loaves in sheets of tissue paper and popped them in a paper carrier bag with string handles. The bread was still warm and it took all my willpower not to start nibbling away at it as I walked along to the proper old-fas.h.i.+oned grocer's where they had a wonderful coffee grinder and the smell filled the air.

It was market day, so I spent a happy hour wandering round the stalls, buying crisp local apples, greengages, k.n.o.bbly carrots and huge creamy parsnips. 'Try some,' said the man selling chutneys, offering me a plate of crackers and a spoon to dip into the jars, and I finally settled on Hot Plum Relish and a jar of Malay vegetable pickle, both so good that they hardly needed meat or cheese. I bought homemade savoury wafers and some oat biscuits from a stall called 'Aunty Annie's' and I heard someone actually say, 'How do, Annie?' And I was sure she was an aunty, too. We must do another market feature on The Foodie, I decided, it was such a brilliant way to shop.

Standing back from the cobbled marketplace there was a small but very stylish department store; one window was filled almost entirely with scarves I instantly recognised as Becca's. They were really very good-bright pinks and purples, scarlets and blues, full of style and fun-and she should be charging a lot more than forty quid for them. If she sold them in London, she could make a fortune.

But the best thing of all was that I could get a phone signal here too. I sat squashed into a seat at a crowded cafe my shopping bags at my feet, and scrolled happily through my messages. There was a number I didn't recognise. Probably a misdialled one. I clicked on it just to be sure.

'h.e.l.lo miss freshface. how r u? lunch was good. c u soon.'

I clutched my phone, stared at it hard and scrolled quickly on to the next message. I didn't want Clayton Silver in my life. Didn't want him sending me texts. Then I scrolled back...and read Clayton's message again. Not exactly a love letter, was it? Not quite up there with great romantic missives of our time. Part of me was irritated by this attention. My finger went straight to 'Delete' but then I stopped. Because another part of me was ridiculously pleased that Clayton had bothered to send a text. Maybe the lunch, our conversation, had meant something to him too.

'For goodness' sake, girl, you have nothing in common. Stop acting like an impressionable teenager.' I gave myself a good talking-to, but I'm not sure how much notice I took of myself. I was still staring at the phone and chewing a delicious chunk of parkin when there was a knock on the window. I looked up. Jake was standing outside.

'It's all right, pet, he can sit here. I'm just going.' An elderly lady with half a dozen bulging shopping bags manoeuvred her way out of her seat with some difficulty and Jake slid in next to me.

'How did you know I was here?'

'Well I saw that rust-heap of a van parked up the road so knew you'd be here somewhere. I just kept my eyes open. How are you?'

'Fine.'

'Are you all right on your own in that house?'

'Yes, thank you.'

'And you're managing with work?'

'Yes, thank you.'

'Oh for goodness' sake, Tilly. I'm trying to be nice here. At least meet me halfway.'

The phone with the text message from Clayton burned in my hand. I didn't want to get into this with Jake. But Jake was right; he was trying to be kind. And maybe we needed to talk. And here was as good a place as any. Surrounded by people, we couldn't shout and yell.

'Could we have another pot of tea and some more parkin, please?' I asked the waitress.

'I don't want any parkin,' said Jake crossly.

'Yes, you do-it's delicious, all gingery and treacly and chewy.'

'Why are you always trying to push food onto me?'

I put my cup back in the saucer. 'Am I? Do I? I mean, did I?'

'Yes. All the time.'

I thought about it. 'Maybe, ' I said slowly, 'because food has always been important in our family. Even when my mother found it difficult to talk about things, especially anything to do with my dad, she would cook, try new recipes. A new recipe was a sort of offering, a gift, a way of bridging a gap. And, of course, it's one of the greatest gifts you can give. I mean, you're actually sharing the very stuff of life, aren't you? I mean...'

'Tilly,' said Jake wearily, 'it was just an observation. I didn't want a psychological treatise.'

'Oh.' Yet again, Jake had somehow put me in the wrong, made me feel silly. And I realised I didn't have to put up with it any more. 'I wasn't expecting to see you again,' I said. 'I thought you'd be far too busy researching with...Flick.'

'Did you really go off in a helicopter with Clayton Silver yesterday?'