‘Trixie’s great, as I’ve said,’ Dora went on hastily. ‘And Alan, your son-in-law, is really nice, he bought me a gin and tonic in the pub last week and a packet of pork scratchings for Cadbury. He’s always buying rounds. He’s really popular and a very good journalist when he writes. I’m going to be a journalist when I leave school.’
‘And be a wonderful one,’ said Etta warmly. Moving down the village green they reached a sweet little house covered in red vine with a lovely but untended garden.
‘That’s Wild Rose Cottage,’ said Dora. ‘Toby and Phoebe Weatherall live there at weekends. Toby’s Ione Travis-Lock’s nephew. He earns quite a lot in the City working for your daughter Carrie.’
‘Really?’ squeaked Etta. ‘Does he like her?’
‘I think he’s a bit scared of her. He’s rather a wimp.’
As they passed a duck pond on the right, with Cadbury straining on his lead to put up the ducks, Dora hissed: ‘Quick, put on a pair of dark glasses,’ as they reached a square house with a front garden crammed with frantically clashing dahlias and chrysanthemums. ‘This is Debbie Cunliffe’s splash of colour. She’s always having rows with Ione Travis-Lock, who thinks Debbie’s flower arrangements in the church are too gaudy.
‘Her husband, the Nosy Parking Major, is always bellyaching about people driving or riding too fast through Willowwood – all jockeys drive too fast and overtake on the inside. Debbie is frightfully tactless, she’s known as Direct Debbie. Their house is called Cobblers, says it all really.’ Dora grinned.
‘Now this pretty hideous modern house next door belongs to Joey East, Valent’s site manager, I told you about him. Joey built it himself,’ confided Dora, ‘and got away with murder because he knows all the planners, so he didn’t have to bribe anyone. The Major and Debbie loathe having Joey next door because of the loud music and his four children bouncing around on the trampoline.
‘The only other ugly house in the heart of the village is built straight on to the high street opposite the pub.’ Dora lowered her voice. ‘Niall Forbes, the vicar, lives in it. Seth and Corinna riot around in the Old Rectory and Niall – who’s as gay as a daffodil, incidentally – is fobbed off with the New Rectory, a horror with no front garden so everyone can peer in to see what he’s up to.
‘Next time I’ll include a tour of the high street, the church and the school, and tell you the legend of Willowwood. It’s so romantic,’ promised Dora.
In the distance Etta could hear children shouting in the school playground and disloyally wondered who Drummond was murdering. They had walked almost in a circle to reach fields stretching away on the eastern side of the village. Above woods of willows flowing down to the river stood two imposing but adjacent barns, Harvest Home and Russet House.
‘You don’t need to be told anything about the people who live there,’ said Dora, ‘although I’ve probably said far too much about Romy.’
‘It really doesn’t matter, I’ve had such a heavenly time,’ cried Etta. As they took the steep footpath on the right of the barns that ran down through the woods to Etta’s bungalow, Cadbury leapt into the stream, bouncing around, snatching at great mouthfuls of water.
To the left through thinning trees, they could see the extent of the work going on at Badger’s Court.
‘Poor Niall, the vicar, is desperately low.’ Taking Etta’s arm so she didn’t slip, Dora had to shout over the din of the builders. ‘No one really goes to church except Martin and Romy sometimes, Direct Debbie and the Major, Painswick who I’m staying with and Old Mrs Malmesbury who keeps geese. She’s very deaf and yells to poor Niall to speak up.
‘And of course the Travis-Locks, who’ve got their own pew and a door from their garden into the church. Niall’s so petrified of Ione he can hardly get a syllable of sermon out, and she’s always bullying him to urge the congregation not to flush the loo and to bicycle to work. And he’s useless at refereeing rows between flower arrangers and bell-ringers. But he’s rather a boozer, so lock up your brandy if he descends on a pastoral visit. Now here we are at your bungalow.’
‘Which makes even the New Rectory look like a period gem,’ said Etta bitterly.
‘Well, the yellow blends in nicely with the autumn colours,’ said Dora kindly.