The Garden of Forgotten Wishes - Trisha Ashley Page 0,16

I have taken on the running of the café, because I can keep an eye on things from my own kitchen if I want to.’

My head was starting to spin a bit with all this information, and we hadn’t even got on to the subject of my work yet! But she was twittering blithely on.

‘My sister Myfanwy is a painter, like my father was, so we use the café to hang some of her works, though of course she sells mainly through London galleries – she’s quite well known.’

The name Myfanwy Price-Jones did sound familiar, now I came to think about it, though I didn’t know a lot about art. I looked at the dark serried ranks of oil paintings on the whitewashed wall. Now my eyes had adjusted to the interior light, I could see that they were semi-abstract works that seemed to depict cascades of water, fern and rocks and the flickering suggestion of something winged and slightly humanoid …

‘Myfanwy – we always call her Myfy’ – she pronounced it My-fee, not Miffy, like the rabbit – ‘looks after the garden, too, but she doesn’t have a lot of time to spare. We had a much older sister, Morwenna, who married the last owner of Old Grace Hall. The two gardens are linked because our families are.’

I expect I was staring at her blankly by now, because she put down her empty cup and patted one of my hands with a clashing of metal and clinking of pigeon-egg-sized stones.

‘Never mind trying to take it all in now, Marnie, because it’s going to be terribly confusing for a day or two, until you’ve met everyone and got your bearings. I expect you’d like to see your little flat and then bring your things in and settle in before lunch, wouldn’t you?’

‘Yes … but we haven’t yet discussed the work and—’

‘Oh, time enough for that over lunch,’ she said. ‘Come on!’

She left Charlie in charge and took me through to a cavernous back room, where the ice-cream chugged away to itself, and on through a kind of scullery to a small hallway.

‘There’s the back door, which you can use to come and go, though there are keys to the café door on the ring I’ll give you, too.’

She opened another door I’d thought was a cupboard and revealed a boxed-in flight of steep steps.

‘These are the original stairs, and private to your flat because we have our own in Lavender Cottage. Up we go!’ she added gaily, and led the way up to a small landing. ‘There’s the connecting door to the cottage – so we’ve put a bolt on your side, so you can make the flat quite separate – and this,’ she announced, throwing open the door on the other side, ‘is your new home!’

The large, light living room had a kitchen/diner area at one end. The floor was dark, varnished wood, scattered with brightly patterned rugs.

‘We used it as a guest suite originally, then had it done over like this when Mum needed a full-time nurse towards the end. It’s quite basic, I know, but I hope you’ll find it comfortable.’

‘Oh, I think it’s lovely,’ I said. There was a long, low squishy sofa in a faded linen cover, a sheepskin rug before a fake electric log-burner and a wicker basket chair with buttoned cushions. The bedroom just had room for a white-painted high metal bed, a small bamboo table next to it, a chest of drawers and a narrow wardrobe. A tiny shower room opened off it.

‘I love it,’ I said warmly.

‘I’m so glad, though I’m afraid we only have electric night-storage heaters in the cottage, which aren’t terribly efficient, but you have the little electric stove too, and we have open fires and log-burners in the cottage, so the whole building keeps very cosy.’

‘I’ve been living in a series of more or less ruined French châteaux for the last few years, so to me it’s positively luxurious,’ I assured her.

‘Sounds fascinating and you must tell us all about it,’ she said, with one of her bright-eyed looks. ‘Now, I’ll mind the café while Charlie helps you to bring your things in and then we’ll leave you to settle in. You can come down for lunch in the cottage at about twelve thirty – come through from the café – and I’ll introduce you to my sister then. She can tell you all about the gardens.’

‘I’m afraid my car is very full of boxes,’ I said.