Twisted Strands Read Free Page B

taken to the country life. If I didn’t know you were a townie born and bred, I’d believe you’d never lived anywhere but here in the whole of your life.’
    Josh chuckled and his jowls wobbled. ‘There’s a lot to be said for city life, but I always had a yen to be in the country.’ He laughed again. ‘Strange, isn’t it?
Eveleen and I seemed to have swapped places. She’s taken to the city life.’
    ‘That’s because Richard’s there,’ Andrew said softly and there was an unmistakable note of longing in his tone. ‘She’s with the one she loves, isn’t
she?’
    ‘True enough,’ Josh said and touched Mary’s hand across the table. ‘And I’m with the woman I love.’
    ‘Oh, Josh, you old softie.’ Mary smiled and tapped his hand as if in gentle admonishment. But even the young girl could see from the pink tinge suffusing her grandmother’s
cheeks that age was no barrier to love. Bridie watched the interplay, feeling, as she always did at such moments, excluded. She leant against Andrew and smiled coyly up at him. ‘Perhaps
you’d like to come and live in the country too. Would you?’
    ‘Oho, not me. There’s not much I don’t know about framework knitting. Trouble is – it’s all I know. ’ He pulled a comical face. ‘And besides,
I’m frightened of cows.’
    Around the table, they joined in his laughter.
    ‘So,’ Bridie went on, ‘tell us what’s been happening to you this week.’
    The guarded look that always seemed to come into his eyes when she asked about his home life was there again. ‘Oh, just work as usual. You know.’
    ‘No, I don’t know,’ Bridie burst out. ‘I don’t know because I’ve never been allowed to visit you. I don’t know where you live and work
and—’
    ‘Bridie,’ Josh spoke sternly. ‘That’s enough. I won’t have you upsetting your grandmother.’
    ‘But—’
    ‘I said, that’s enough!’
    Colour suffused the girl’s face and she bit her lip as she flashed a defiant look at Josh, but she said no more. Beneath the table, Andrew squeezed her hand warningly.
    For several moments, the meal continued in silence, the only sounds the singing kettle on the hob, the settling of coals in the range’s grate and the clatter of cutlery against plates.
    At last Mary laid her knife and fork carefully together and leant back in her chair and sighed. ‘I suppose I ought to ask you how my mother is, Andrew. And – and my
brother?’
    Bridie gasped and glanced towards Josh. Even he hadn’t told her that Mary’s own mother was still alive. And this was a most unusual event. Mary never asked about her family in
Flawford and now Bridie was very much afraid that Josh was going to blame her for having raised the subject.
    Immediately Josh was reaching out again to take Mary’s hand. ‘Now, my dear,’ he began, ‘don’t go upsetting yourself.’
    Mary smiled at him. ‘It’s all right. I’m not upset. It’s high time I at least enquired after them, even if I can’t bring myself to go and see them ever
again.’
    Before Andrew could answer, Bridie, unable to restrain herself any longer, burst out. ‘Your mother ? You mean to say that I’ve got a great -grandmother and you never even
told me? I thought there was only me grandfather.’
    For a moment Mary looked shamefaced as her eyes met Bridie’s accusing stare. The older woman’s glance dropped away, but she nodded.
    Andrew cleared his throat awkwardly and said, ‘She’s quite well. She doesn’t get out much now, though. Her legs are bad.’
    Mary smiled wryly. ‘Not even across the road to the chapel on a Sunday? That won’t please Harry.’
    Andrew laughed. ‘She still has to attend chapel. Both services on a Sunday. He sees to that. He pushes her across the road in a bath chair.’
    The tension in the room eased a little as Mary smiled too. Then she murmured, ‘I’m glad she’s all right. It wasn’t really her fault, though she could have supported poor
Rebecca a little