A Vintage Wedding (13 page)

‘I never knew white came in shades,’ said Belinda.

‘Nor did I, until I met Rachel,’ said Raff.

Just for a moment Rachel felt there was something special in the way he said the words and then she pulled herself together.

‘Why don’t you top up Rachel’s glass and take her for a quick tour while we wait for the pie to brown?’ said Belinda.

‘Would you like that?’ said Raff.

‘Yes please,’ said Rachel. ‘I’d love it.’ She got up from the table feeling slightly odd. It couldn’t have been the wine because she hadn’t drunk much of it. She wondered if it was because she was absolutely surrounded by clutter and quite possibly dirt and yet she was entirely calm. Maybe it was because she had begun to know Lindy, who also lived in chaos, or maybe it was because this place was more like a museum or National Trust property than an actual home.

‘Follow me, then.’

He led her out of the kitchen through a couple of passages. ‘This is the hall.’ He switched on the overhead light, which cast an eerie glow over the large, dark furniture that filled the space. ‘It’s all a bit Gothic.’

‘There are some lovely pieces, I think,’ said Rachel. ‘But I expect the house needs rewiring.’

‘I know damn well it does! Mum wouldn’t ever let me sort it out because it would mean moving too much stuff.’

‘But if she’s going to move, I don’t expect she’d want to bother.’

‘I’m not sure about this moving thing. I keep telling her she’d do better to sell off part of it and stay here. She’s lived here all her life – it was her parents’ house, and before that, her grandparents’.’ He opened a door and ushered Rachel through it. Again the light from a dim bulb did little to illuminate the room, which was big. And yet the clutter was evident.

Every surface except the seats of the chairs was covered. There were lots of tables of various sizes scattered round and every one of them was covered. Piles of magazines, which turned out to be copies of
Country Life
going back decades. Another table was covered in books: art books; big, illustrated books about country houses; gardening books; wild-flower books; bird books.

‘Goodness me,’ said Rachel, moving from table to table. ‘There’s quite a large shop’s worth of books here.’

‘My grandparents collected them; so did my parents. I think my mother has stopped now.’

The surfaces not covered in books were covered in china. Figurines, dishes, jugs, bowls, whole dinner services and tea sets, piled up and, Rachel discovered, dusty.

Round the edges of the room were glass-fronted cabinets, equally full of china. Rachel longed to get a torch or a table lamp so she could inspect it all properly.

‘I think if your mother really wants to downsize she should just turn her house into an antique shop until all the stuff is sold. This lot must be worth a fortune!’

‘I don’t think my mother would be able to cope with people wandering about her house arguing about the price of things.’

‘No! That would be awful. You’d have to do it for her. Even sell it in your yard.’

He grinned. ‘Maybe I should suggest it. I’m sure she’d love the thought of her antique china being sold alongside cast-iron guttering and chimney pots.’

‘Or put it on eBay and sell it item by item. Beth would do it for her. For a commission, I expect. Or you could have a separate department selling smaller items. Beth would design a section of your website, making it all look gorgeous. You have got a website?’

Raff frowned. ‘I have, but it probably needs an upgrade. I’ll talk to Beth about it, if she’s good.’

‘She’s brilliant. She’s doing one for Vintage Weddings as soon as possible. No business can survive without an online presence.’

Belinda came into the room. ‘So are you setting up a business, Rachel?’

‘Yes, with two friends. Lindy you may know? She’s Sarah Wood’s daughter? And Beth, who’s new to the village like me.’

‘Well, let’s go and eat and you can carry on telling me about it. I like to hear about “women doing it for themselves”.’ Belinda sent her son a challenging look. He laughed.

The kitchen table had been as heavily laden as the rest of the surfaces in the house, but once cleared had just about enough room for three people to eat. Rachel sat at her place and sipped more wine. She felt strangely happy, as if she’d gone to a theme park and enjoyed a roller-coaster ride when she hadn’t expected to. There was so much clutter she could no longer feel bothered by it. It was like some sort of therapy.

‘Do start,’ said Belinda, pouring more wine into her glass.

Rachel glanced at Raff, who was already forking up cottage pie. Had he brought her here to cure her of something? If so, it was outrageous. She moistened her lips to speak. ‘This is the most delicious cottage pie I have ever eaten,’ she said. She wasn’t sure that had been what she’d intended to say but it came out, because it was true.

‘Thank you, darling,’ said Belinda. ‘We had a truly massive joint the other day so this is actually made from leftover beef. That and equal quantities of butter to potato makes a very nice pie, though I say it myself.’

The plates were red hot and cracked and discoloured. They had once been very good quality but Rachel decided that if Belinda made a habit of heating them to such searing temperatures they were bound to deteriorate. Somehow it didn’t seem to matter.

‘So, tell me more about this business you girls are setting up.’

Rachel explained as succinctly as she could. She had never met anyone like Belinda before and found her daunting. She seemed unpredictable and strange. Her values were unlike those of anyone Rachel had known. She was obviously kind and welcoming, but the clutter? What sort of a person let things pile up like that? It was weird.

Belinda produced bars of chocolate for pudding, tossing a selection on to the table. ‘Help yourselves. They were on offer. Coffee? Tea? Or brandy, Rachel?’

‘Er, tea, please.’

They sat at the table eating chocolate and drinking tea, Belinda and Raff catching up with each other’s projects.

‘So, Rachel, what do you do? Apart from the wedding thing?’ The forget-me-not-blue eyes were intense. Rachel realised mother and son shared both the colour and the expression.

‘Well, currently I’m an accountant, bookkeeper, that sort of thing.’

‘So you’ll be useful to this plan to clean up the village hall?’

‘Yes. The thing is, there’s going to be a wedding there. Which means we have to hurry up and get it presentable.’

‘We’re mist-coating it tomorrow,’ said Raff.

‘White, I assume? Very minimalist then,’ said Belinda.

Rachel assumed she disapproved. ‘To begin with, yes. We might introduce some colour later.’ Not if she had anything to do with it, of course, but she was aware she wasn’t actually the appointed interior designer.

‘Well, that sounds nice. I’m leaning towards minimalism myself,’ she said. ‘Hence the downsizing thing. I’m going to get rid of everything I don’t need.’

‘Maybe you mean decluttering?’ said Rachel bravely.

Belinda shook her head. ‘No. That would be implying my things are clutter.’ The blue eyes were piercing and Rachel was sure she had offended her. ‘I don’t think they are because many of them are beautiful. In fact, I have some things you might find useful in your new business. Follow me.’

Still unsure if she had caused terrible offence by her use of the word ‘clutter’, Rachel followed Belinda down a dark passage. Belinda opened a door and switched on a light. It was a dining room. The table was loaded with china, piles and piles of it. It was all gorgeous – the sort of thing that gave the word vintage a good name.

‘It’s all yours if you want it but you’ll have to take it away,’ said Belinda. ‘I starting sorting some of it but gave up.’

Rachel went into the room and nearer the china, amazed that there was even more than she’d seen already. It was lovely. Old, elegant, not in perfect condition but still beautiful. ‘You could sell this on eBay,’ said Rachel.

‘So could you. I can’t be bothered with selling things. I’ve got enough to live on and can’t see the point of having more money than you need.’

This was a surprising concept. ‘But Raff would do it for you.’

‘Look, darling, if you don’t want the crockery, all you have to do is say so. I’m sure Raff could get someone to take it all away.’

‘I – er – we do want it,’ said Rachel. ‘I just need to think of where we could store it.’

‘Haven’t you got a house?’

‘Yes, but—’

‘There you are, problem solved. I’ll get Raff to bring it round to you.’

Rachel took a few calming breaths. She couldn’t have rejected the china: it was a hugely generous present. But the thought of her spare room being full of random plates and saucers, soup bowls and tureens made her panic. She forced herself to be rational. She could put some of it in the other shed and it wouldn’t be for long. Beth could probably sell a lot of it, and earn them some money. It would be fine.

‘That’s so incredibly kind of you,’ she said and then, out of nowhere, came, ‘When we’ve got the hall sorted I’d be glad to come and help you with your reorganisation.’

Belinda beamed. ‘Thank you, darling. That would be wonderful!’

Lindy had felt a bit guilty to be leaving the working party – Rachel scrubbing away at the rafters, the others round the skirting and walls – to go back to her boys. Her father had done an hour or so and now they were with her grandmother and Lindy knew they would have been making cakes. Thus, there would be hot tea and cake waiting for her. She was looking forward to getting her boys home afterwards, bathing them and then curling up on the sofa with them to watch a film. She was just wondering which of their DVDs she could bear watching again when she almost bumped into a man coming along the path to the hall.

‘Oh! So sorry! I was miles away!’ said Lindy and then looked up. The man was both strange and familiar, and it took her a few seconds to see that the person she thought she recognised in him was in fact her own little boys. Then she realised who it was.

He stared down at her. He too was frowning. ‘Lindy?’

Lindy laughed. ‘Hello, Angus.’

He gazed down at her for a very long time. ‘It seems a bit of a cliché to say: my, how you’ve grown, but you are … very different.’

‘I’m bound to be. It’s been years. So much has changed.’ And so much hadn’t changed, she thought. ‘You didn’t come to the wedding.’

‘No. I should have done. But I was a long way away and … my parents didn’t think it was a good idea.’

‘Don’t worry about it. It wasn’t worth the trip. The marriage didn’t last long.’

He shook his head, obviously not sure if he should laugh or commiserate. ‘I know.’

Lindy cleared her throat, suddenly embarrassed by his scrutiny. ‘Don’t let me stop you. You were obviously going somewhere. The hall, presumably.’

‘I was going to the working party. I heard about it in the shop. Is it over? You’re leaving?’

‘My grandmother has got my boys. I skipped out early. But it’s still going on.’

‘I’ve come back to the area after a long time away. I wanted to get involved. I went to my first Cub Scout meeting in that hall.’

Lindy laughed. ‘Goodness me. Well, if you want to help, my mother is in there. She’d be delighted to have you on board, I’m sure.’

‘Well, she might be. I’m an architect.’

Lindy nodded. She didn’t tell him she knew that. ‘That will be useful – later, anyway. At the moment we’re just redecorating so we can hire it out, raise a bit of money for repairs. The roof is in a bad way. Although you’ll find out all about it if you find Mum.’

He nodded. ‘I’d better get in there then. But, Lindy, I hope to see you around? I haven’t seen my nephews for years, not since they had a day out with Edward.’

She nodded. She remembered the time her ex took the boys out for the day and brought them back in the middle of the night. She thought she’d die of worry. Fortunately for her, he never showed any interest in taking them out again and shortly afterwards left the country.

‘Billy was just a baby,’ she said.

‘I’d like to catch up with them. Be an uncle.’

‘They’d like that.’

‘And would you like that?’

She smiled. ‘Well, you wouldn’t be my uncle.’ And although she longed to stay and talk she was already late. ‘I’d better go and pick them up. Go in and talk to Mum.’

Lindy walked to her grandmother’s house with a smile on her face. She remembered Beth asking her if she’d got over her crush and she hadn’t properly answered the question. Because, seeing Angus again just now, she wasn’t convinced she had. It was obviously true that absence – several years’ absence in her case – made the heart grow fonder. She laughed. What was she like!

As she went through the bathtime routine, the twenty-nine readings of the
Gruffalo
and other sleep-inducing rituals, she thought, which she hadn’t done for ages, what it would have been like doing all this with a partner. The thought made her sigh a little. Even when he had been around, Edward hadn’t been the most dedicated of fathers. She and Edward had had Billy in the faint hope it would help mend their relationship. Lindy would never regret having him, but he hadn’t worked as glue. And she had always been secretly grateful Edward had made the break in the end, by having an affair. It meant she kept the kids and the moral high ground. But even with her very supportive family it had been tough bringing up the boys on her own.