Because there are sausage rolls, I tag along. It’s been a while since lunch, and this trip to a pub might not include much more to eat than a packet of chips. Or crisps, as they call them here. I’ve driven past the two pubs in the village (each situated at opposite ends), but it’s hard to tell if they serve food or nothing more than packets of the dubious sounding pork scratchings. I’ve yet to ask about the provenance of those but I guess they’re a little like pork rinds.
“Is there something missing from there?” Isla pauses as she reaches the bottom of the very grand staircase. With a pensive finger on her chin, she glances left and right along the long hallway. “How odd.”
I feel Hugh’s attention swing my way as I reach the bottom stair. “What was that?
“It just feels like there’s something not quite right about this space.”
My response is to affect a noncommittal shrug, and thankfully, Isla quickly concludes I’m not the right person to ask. Yay for being a newbie here.
“We should tell,” Archie whisper-hisses as Isla moves out of earshot.
“No!” My sentiment is echoed by Hugh.
“But how are we going to get it back?” Archie asks plaintively, his arms held wide. “And fixed? I tried to get some glue from school, but I couldn’t!”
“Friend,” I say, reaching for his hand. “Don’t worry about it. And don’t borrow anything else from the classroom. Leave it to me.” And hopefully YouTube.
“But—”
“No,” repeats his elder brother. “Mummy doesn’t need anything else to worry about right now.”
Not to mention he doesn’t need to get into any more trouble. Though, come to think of it, it might be me who’d suffer most. Maybe I’d even be out of a job.
Aiding and abetting? Being a big old liar pants? Setting the children in my charge a bad example? Any of those seems grounds enough for dismissal.
Isla is greeting the dog as we enter a kitchen that’s a hive of activity, and the Dougal of today seems like another person. Dressed in chef whites, he doles out orders like the captain of a ship, though as he catches sight of the boys, he takes time to get down on their level, ruffling their hair.
“What happened to wee Archie?” he asks with astonishment. “Did someone stick you in a grow-bag while I was gone?”
“No, Dougal,” the boy laughs, rapidly shaking his head. “Tell him, Chrissy!”
“Tell him what, my bonny lad?” Chrissy asks from her position of peeling potatoes.
“Tell Dougal I just got bigger!”
“You must be eatin’ your greens,” Dougal replies without waiting for her collaboration. “Put it there,” he then says, turning to Hugh and holding out his hand. The pair shake, each of them wearing a thoroughly contagious grin. “I expect you’ve come to check on afternoon tea?” Dougal straightens, his demeanour and tone cordial but deferential as his attention moves the boy’s mother.
“I’m sure there’s no need for that.”
“All the same,” he says kindly.
“McCain said it was to be served at half past three to give the ghillie sufficient time to get our guests back.”
I wonder if she knows she’s wringing her hands.
“Yes, my lady. And Mari said she saw them comin’ up the north drive about half an hour ago.”
“Then we should be making our way to the . . .” Her anxious gaze falls to Chrissy.
“The blue parlour, my lady.” There’s a note of reassurance in Chrissy’s tone.
“Come along then, boys.”
“But the sausage rolls,” Archie complains.
“They’ll be there,” Dougal reassures. “I’ve prepared a different menu for the wee ones. I’m told there will be two extra children this afternoon.”
“Oh, yes. Mr and Mrs Duffy have two small boys,” she replies, distracted.
“Do they have sausage rolls in America, Holly?”
At Archie’s question, I turn from inspecting the baking tray Chrissy has just pulled from the oven. A baking tray full of perfect little golden puffs of pastry.
“Sadly, we do not.”
“You should go back and open a shop over there. Sausage rolls make everyone happy.”
“That would be a good idea. Except, I’d probably get very fat from eating one too many myself.”
“Sausage rolls are my favourite,” he says with an appreciative sniff as he’s steered out of the kitchen by his mother.
“We’d have snuck them both a wee treat if their mother hadn’t been with them,” Dougal says remorsefully. “But they’ll be eatin’ soon enough, I suppose.”
Mari and the girl referred to as “wee Sophie” appear in the kitchen not long after, both of them dressed in white shirts, black skirts, and hose, and are shortly followed by an austere-looking man in a grey pinstripe pants. A white shirt and a black tie and vest complete the ensemble. I’m guessing by the get-up, this must be the butler, Mr McCain. Or to his employers, no “Mr” required. Just like Madonna. Or Beyoncé. I wonder if his personality is as big.