The Rose Garden

He’d been right, too, when he’d theorised that altering the past might prove impossible. By calling a warning to Jack as he’d entered the cave I had saved him from being shot then by the constable, but time had found another way to do what must be done, and even with my interference Jack had died the way that he’d been meant to. Even Daniel’s dagger that I’d used to kill the constable had, in the end, been thrown back to the cave floor and had scuttled to the shadows to lie waiting till Mark came to find it. History hadn’t changed.

At least, I didn’t think it had. I only knew the present seemed to be exactly as I’d left it. It just felt a little emptier.

As if on cue, a shadow passed the window and I heard the back door open and Felicity came in, balancing a plastic washing-up tub stacked with cups and saucers while she chatted on the mobile phone held wedged against her shoulder.

‘No, no,’ she was saying, ‘all over the floor. Well, we’ve switched it off, yes, but the thing is we’ve got a big tour group arriving a half hour from now, and … oh, would you? Thanks, that would be wonderful, Paul. You’re a prince.’

Carefully sliding the tub onto the worktop so the china didn’t clink too much, she rang off and greeted me, ‘Hi. I didn’t wake you with the last load, did I?’

Not sure what she meant at first, I glanced towards the sink and for the first time noticed it was nearly brimful, too, with soaking dishes, and a second empty washing-up tub sat off to the side.

‘No,’ I said. ‘What’s going on?’

‘The dishwasher’s leaking. We were putting these through so they’d be good and clean for our afternoon crowd, only something went wrong in the rinse cycle and we wound up with a flood in the kitchen and lovely baked soap on the dishes.’ She held up a teacup to show me and tapped the hard crystals of soap. ‘Just like rock. I’ve been scrubbing it off.’

I grasped at the chance to do something to keep my thoughts occupied. ‘Want some help?’

‘Claire said to let you rest.’ She looked more closely at my face. ‘She really got you with that door, didn’t she? How does it feel?’

I didn’t correct her assumption of how I’d been injured, I only assured her it wasn’t as bad as it looked. ‘I’m fine, honestly.’

Working together in under ten minutes we had both tubs restacked with clean cups and saucers.

‘Come on,’ I said, lifting the nearest tub carefully. ‘I’ll help you carry these back.’

It was going to rain. The air felt unmistakeably heavy and carried the scent of a summer storm underneath clouds that were gathering grey. As I followed Felicity up to the greenhouse I noticed that the thorn tree now wore flutterings of cloth strips left by some of our new tourists, and it made a proper cloutie tree beside the charming tea room.

As we came inside the smell of scones fresh from the oven overpowered all my other senses for a moment, and my stomach rumbled as I set my plastic tub of dishes down behind the serving counter. Susan straightened from behind the broken dishwasher and dumped a sodden rag into the bucket at her feet. She looked remarkably controlled, I thought, considering the crisis.

‘Thanks,’ she said, and sent a smile to both of us. ‘The floor’s dry now, at least. Did you get hold of Paul?’

Felicity nodded. ‘I did. He’ll be here in a minute, he said.’

‘Right, then.’ Looking around, Susan noticed my face. ‘God, Eva. That must hurt. Claire said it looked pretty awful.’

‘I’m fine,’ I repeated. But she’d reminded me I wasn’t in the clear yet, and I glanced around in my turn. ‘Where is Claire?’

‘She’s gone up to keep an eye out for the coach, let us know what the numbers are.’

‘Let’s get these tables set, then,’ said Felicity.

We weren’t quite finished when I heard the steps crunching down the curved path from the gardens above, but it wasn’t the tour group just yet. Only Paul, looking as though he’d rolled straight out of bed to answer Felicity’s emergency call, with his blue denim shirt hanging unbuttoned over the close-fitting T-shirt beneath.

Susan brightened. She was crouched behind the counter with him, showing him the problem, when another set of footsteps sounded briskly on the gravel and Claire came inside. ‘They’re here,’ she said. ‘Just coming down. The guide said forty-one.’

Susan stood, as did the plumber, who gave Claire a friendly nod and a ‘Good morning’. He was chattier with Claire than with the rest of us. He asked, ‘Where’s this group from, then?’

Claire wasn’t sure, but Susan told him, ‘Wales. They’re going on to St Non’s after us.’

He said, ‘Bad day for it,’ and stretched his shoulders. ‘Looks like rain.’

‘We only have to give them tea,’ said Susan cheerfully. ‘They didn’t want a garden tour.’ Setting out plates she asked Claire, ‘Forty-one, you said?’

Claire seemed oddly distracted. ‘What? Oh, yes, that’s right.’ She’d caught sight of me now. ‘Eva, darling, you ought to be resting.’ A motherly kind of reproach, but she said it with patience, the same sort of patience she’d shown when I’d strayed out of bounds as a child, and I felt the same need I’d so often felt then to just curl up at her side and tell her everything, because she’d understand.