'Hi!' Her voice squeaked alarmingly. 'I mean, hello. I'm Jemima. I guess you're Leviticus and Ezekiel?'
'Ten out of ten.' The right-hand twin scowled.
Whoops, Jemima thought, wrong pitch. She tried again. 'How am I supposed to tell you apart?'
'You're not.' The twins spoke together.
Jemima shrugged. 'Okay. Suit yourselves. Whenever I see you, I'll just yell "Oi, you!" and that'll cover you both.'
There was the merest flicker of matching smiles. The left-hand twin scuffed the carpet. 'We're not supposed to be up here. Mum said the flat was private now. Mum said we was to leave you in peace. Mum said we was to meet you properly at tea-time.'
His brother joined in the scuffing. 'We just wanted to have a look at you first. Do you mind wearing glasses?'
'No. Why?'
The twins stopped scuffing. The right-hand one spoke. 'There's a boy in our class – he wears glasses. Some of the kids called him specky-four-eyes.'
Jemima winced. She'd had much the same treatment at primary school. Younger and older children accepted differences without question, but at the cocky pre-teen stage children could be brutal. Along with a boy with extensive dental bracework who had been naturally called Metalmouth, and three very overweight pupils, she'd formed a sort of outsiders' club. They were still in touch with each other. 'But you don't call him names, surely?'
'Nah, course not. Glasses are cool. We beat up everyone who bad-mouthed him. He's everybody's best friend now.'
Nice kids, Jemima thought. Maybe they weren't as scary as she'd first thought. The left-hand twin gave a sudden cherubic smile. 'You're running the bookshop, aren't you?'
Safer ground. 'When it opens. Do you like reading?'
The twins exchanged glances. 'Nah. Well,
Lost Diaries
is okay. And
Colour Jets.
Telly's better.'
Slamming shut the wardrobe door, Jemima picked up a bundle of towels and headed towards the bathroom. 'Maybe you'll change your mind when the shop opens. You'll have to come and tell me which books I should stock.'
'Might do.'
Jemima turned away and grinned. So far so good. She paused again at the bathroom door. 'I have got one problem – your names.'
'We told you. We answer to each other's.'
'No, not that.' Jemima turned on the water and raised her voice. 'I mean Leviticus and Ezekiel – they're one heck of a mouthful. What do people usually call you?'
The left-hand twin wrinkled his nose. 'Bastard, mostly.'
'No – not always,' his brother corrected quickly. 'Bronwyn Pugh sometimes says "them little buggers".'
'Yeah,' a ginger head nodded. 'An' ole Bathsheba Cox told Mum we're the spawn of the devil.'
Allowing herself to laugh in the privacy of the bathroom, Jemima was straight-faced when she walked back into the bedroom. 'Well, I'm going to call you Levi and Zeke, OK? And I
can
tell you apart.'
'You can't!'
'No one can 'cept Mum and Dad!'
'Yes, I can. You,' she pointed to the left-hand twin, 'have got more freckles on your nose. They're kind of splodged together. And I guess you're Levi
'Just shows you don't know everything,' he started bullishly, then sighed. 'Oh, bugger.'
'That's that sorted, then.' Jemima smiled serenely. 'Zeke's got the splodgy nose. Now, I'm going to have a shower. See you later.'
'S'pose so,' they muttered together, then looked at each other and nodded. 'You're okay. See ya.'
Jemima closed the bathroom door and leaned against it, letting her breath escape slowly. She licked her forefinger and drew a line in the air. 'Round one to Jemima Carlisle.'
Having had very little hands-on experience with the clergy, Vicar Glen was going to be the next hurdle. It was one she crashed into at tea-time.
Looking mutinous, the twins were sitting side by side at the dining-room table when Jemima came down after her shower. Gillian, cool in something pale and floaty, and which Jemima would bet a month's salary – if she had one – came from Monsoon, looked warily at them from behind a huge willow pattern tea-pot.
'They're sulking because I said this had to be a proper sit-to-the-table tea in your honour, rather than pizzas on laps in front of
Grange Hill
To be honest, they're not all that happy with sandwiches and cake. And they're miffed that you can tell the difference between them. I think they were counting on causing a fair bit of mayhem. Are you settled in up there?'
Jemima nodded, sliding into a rather shabby but very beautiful walnut and velvet chair. 'Everything is great, thanks.' She helped herself to two doorsteps of hacked bread as Levi and Zeke pushed butter and a pot of shop jam towards her. 'Is – er – Glen – urn – Mr Hutchinson not joining us?'
'I do hope so.' Gillian looked distracted and stirred her tea fiercely. 'I told him you were here.'
'Dad's down the pub,' Zeke mumbled through a mouthful of bread and butter. 'He's always down the pub. We don't wait for him.'
Jemima concentrated on her plate. If the Vicar had a drink problem it wasn't any of her concern really, was it? It might explain why Zeke and Levi were so unruly. A mother whose head was away in the land of hearts and flowers, and a father – a man of the cloth, no less – who was joined to the barmaid's apron....
'Boys!' Gillian's laugh held a note of tension. 'You shouldn't say things like that. Whatever will Jemima think?'
'That Daddy's always in the Cat and Fiddle – and he is – 'cepting for when he's in church.' Levi beamed jammily at Jemima across the table. 'When he does come home he's usually asleep.'
'And he snores something dreadful, but that's only 'cause he's so old.' Zeke crammed an entire slice of bread into his mouth at one go. His following, 'Can I leave the table now, Mum?' was accordingly muffled.
'You haven't had any cake.' Gillian was definitely twitchy.
'Don't want cake. We'll have crisps later.' The twins slid from their chairs and smiled at Jemima. 'See ya.' A nanosecond later the dining room reverberated behind them.
You could cut the tension with the cake knife. Wondering just what sort of set-up she'd so casually drifted into, Jemima sipped her tea and stared out through the open french doors. The walled garden shimmered in the afternoon sun. Butterflies were practising for summer by flexing their wings on the green shoots of the buddleias. It was a fragile peace.
'Gillian! Are you in the dining room? Have I missed tea? I was – oh, damn and blast!'
'Glen.' Gillian's smile was stretched. 'He's probably fallen over the boys' roller-blades.' She raised her voice. 'We're in here, darling! Come and say hello to Jemima.'
With her very limited knowledge of vicars, Jemima had already conjured up a stern and severe figure in full clerical regalia. Gaunt, she decided, with a dog-collar choking a scrawny neck and cheeks criss-crossed with red-veined over-imbibing. He'd have gimlet eyes and a mouth singed by breathing hellfire and damnation. He'd probably be wearing gaiters – or was that only bishops? He'd – she stopped in mid-fantasy and gawped.
A stunning Richard Gere lookalike in jeans and a grey sweatshirt smiled sheepishly round the dining-room door. 'Sorry about the curses. It was the roller-blades – again.'
Jemima closed her mouth with a snap as Glen came into the room. He was probably older than Gillian by at least ten years, but simply oozed sexuality. Her mother would have curled up and died for him.
'Hello, sweetheart,' he kissed Gillian's cheek and then extended a slim hand towards Jemima. 'And hello to you too. It's lovely to see you.'
'It's – er – lovely to be here.' Jemima blushed, and sniffed surreptitiously for any signs of alcohol, completely bemused by his golden glory.
Glen sat in Levi's vacated chair and helped himself liberally to bread and jam. 'I do hope you'll be happy in Milton St John. And after today, the awful meet-the-family bit, I promise you we'll leave you to your own devices. I'm sure we'll all be far too busy to get in each other's way.' He smiled fondly at his wife before nodding seriously at Jemima. 'Despite what you might hear in the village to the contrary, I'm very, very proud of Gillian having her own career, you know. She writes for lots of different magazines, and the money has – well – transformed our lives.'
A faint blush swept into Gillian's pale cheeks. 'Glen! I don't think Jemima wants to hear about it. Anyway, we're supposed to be above things like money and material possessions. The ladies of the parish would have a fit to hear you talking like that.'
'True.' Glen poured his tea. 'But you have to admit it is very pleasant to live comfortably instead of scrimping and saving. And I am proud of you, darling, inordinately so.' He beamed at Jemima. 'You probably won't recognise her, of course, because she writes under a pseudonym.'
Gillian dropped her cake fork with a clatter. 'Sorry! Clumsy of me. Oh, yes – I – I write as
Janey
Hutchinson for the mags and for the local Am Dram group in Upton Poges.'
'And very nicely, too.' Glen reached across and patted her hand amidst the bread and butter, as Jemima gathered the crumbs together on her plate. She hadn't got a clue what was going on. She assumed that Gillian's new-found wealth, as well as funding the Monsoon frock collection, meant that Glen could spend even longer in the Cat and Fiddle. But, assuming they had more money than the clergy were used to, why on earth should Gillian have seemed so desperate to rent the attic flat?
Gillian, still appearing slightly flustered, paused in refilling the teacups and took a deep breath. 'So – how did it go? The meeting?'
'Wonderfully well,' Glen nodded heartily. 'We've practically got the whole village behind us. I only wish you'd come along and lend your support, darling.'
'I can't.' Gillian sliced cake with swift jerks. 'I'm far too busy writing. Anyway, with people like Bathsheba Cox and Bronwyn Pugh spearheading the attack you certainly don't need me.'
'Er – shall I leave?' Jemima pushed back her chair. 'I mean, if this is private –'
'Oh,' Gillian sighed. 'We're so rude. I keep forgetting you know absolutely nothing about village politics. Glen has been to the Cat and Fiddle –'
'I think the twins mentioned it.' Jemima bit her lip. 'But, I mean, everyone likes a drink – don't they? Except those who don't, I mean. At least... Well, drinking socially is fine …’
'I'm not an alcoholic.' Glen sat back in his chair, the Richard Gere eyes creased with delight. 'What
have
they been telling you? That I spend all my free time in the Cat and Fiddle?'
'Well – something like that – not, of course, that it's any of my business ...'
'The village hall is being renovated. We're using the back room of the Cat and Fiddle as a temporary replacement.' Glen was still grinning. 'As I sit on practically every Milton St John committee, I spend half my life there.'
'Oh. Right.' Jemima could feel the blush scorching her throat. She pushed back her chair and stood up. 'Look, I'm sure you have loads of things to talk about – and I really should try and find my feet. Would you object if I rounded up the twins and got them to give me a guided tour of the village?'
'Not at all. Great idea,' Glen nodded round a mouthful of cake. 'You'll probably find them on the fruit machines in the Munchy Bar. And I do hope you don't think we were being greedy over the rent on the flat. I told Gillian that I thought it was somewhat excessive. I mean, if you think we should lower it...'
'It's fine.' Jemima paused in the doorway. The rent had actually seemed ridiculously low, but maybe that was just the difference between Oxford and the heart of the country. Gillian appeared to be trying to communicate something to her with frantic eye-signals. Jemima, completely at a loss, resorted to what she hoped was an all-encompassing smile and slid from the dining room.
As Glen had predicted, she located the twins among the blinding whirrs and fizzes of the Munchy Bar's one-armed bandits. They were both losing heavily, and didn't raise too many objections to the Milton St John trek.
'Mind,' Levi said as they wandered slowly along the dusty street – it was still far too hot to be energetic – 'you'll probably see everyone if you just sit on that ole bench by the duck pond. Everybody comes by sooner or later.'
Jemima, used to the crowds and traffic of Oxford, was enchanted by the tranquillity. Everywhere was a mass of emerging green, with tiny pastel buds tipping the branches. The stream gurgled pleasantly. The honey-coloured houses still basked; dogs and cats scratched half-heartedly; people leaned on bicycles and chatted to other people with shopping baskets; somewhere, from an open window, a radio played.
'That's it then, really,' Zeke said kindly as they reached the end of the chestnut tree colonnade. 'It's mostly all stable yards. You see more horses than cars here. There's not much more to it, apart from the football field. It's a bit boring, don't you reckon?'
'I reckon it's paradise,' Jemima said fervently. 'No noise, no traffic ...'
'No bloody anything.' Levi took hold of her hand. 'Still, Upton Poges is quite good.'
Zeke, not to be outdone, caught Jemima's free hand. 'An' we go to the pictures in Wantage, and Newbury's just the biggest place in the whole world!'
She smiled down at the twins. 'Thank you for being my escorts anyway. Now, I want a simple answer to a simple question.'
The matching gooseberry-green eyes zoomed in from each side. Two sets of sandy eyebrows arched inquisitively.
'I want to know,' Jemima continued, 'if they do great big ice creams at Maureen's Munchy Bar? And she raised her voice above the yells of assertion, '– I want to know if I'm the only person out of us three who fancies one?'
'Nah! I can eat two!'
'Betcha can't!'
'One each,' Jemima said firmly as they approached the curve that fronted the Cat and Fiddle, the Village Stores, the Munchy Bar – and her bookshop. 'And I'm paying.'
The twins grinned gappily, the friendship sealed, and scampered off ahead to place their orders. Jemima followed at a more leisurely pace, trying not to look smug. In spite of the rather strange undercurrents at the Vicarage, she felt that she had the measure of the twins.