Christmas at Hope Cottage: A Magical Feel-Good Romance Novel(31)

Emma wiped her eyes. ‘No, it’s okay,’ she said, and sniffed. ‘I think it makes me feel better knowing that I’m not the only one,’ she went on, thinking of all the people who came here looking for something to help them too.

‘No,’ said Evie, simply, stroking her hair. ‘You’re definitely not alone.’



* * *



As the years passed, Emma collected stories about her parents the way some people collect photographs, storing them carefully in her mind so that later she could take them out, and mull them over while the rest of the cottage was asleep, wondering if she was more like her mother or her father.

She’d learned from Evie that her mum had been fiery, with a quick temper. ‘She wasn’t a chatterer, you know, like some girls,’ she said, pausing as she kneaded dough one clear day in spring, while she and her sisters made lavender biscuits for Tom Harvey, Uncle Joe’s partner at the used car dealership, who was struggling to sleep lately. ‘She used words sparingly, even as a child, as if words cost money. But she was quick to stand up for what was right, and didn’t back down for anyone, regardless of age or size, or…’

‘Common sense,’ agreed Aggie, her feet up on the table, slurping a coffee, her head buried in a book from Dot’s secret library.

‘Why?’ asked Emma.

‘Well,’ said Dot. ‘When your mam was about your age now, nine, she broke into a neighbour’s back garden – Clifford Hobb – to rescue Gizmo. He was a rather sad, lonely Alsatian who was tied up to the fence outside, even during the worst of the winter. The owner kept him as a guard dog, you see, didn’t really think of him as an animal with feelings and needs.’

‘Oh no!’ exclaimed Emma. She was a huge animal lover.

‘Well that’s what she thought, too. When she heard about poor Gizmo, all she said was “Tisn’t right” and when she heard his cries on the way home from school, soon after, she decided that enough was enough, and she hopped the fence, and broke him out.’

‘What, really?’ exclaimed Emma, mouth open in surprise.

‘Yep,’ said Evie. ‘Took him home with her. Our eyes nearly popped out of our skulls when she brought him inside, poor thing. See, his owner ran the old metalworks factory, Hobb’s Steelco, before it closed down. Kept a fair few of the villagers in work at the time, so none of them were willing to risk his wrath and report the treatment of the dog.’

‘But that’s unfair – that shouldn’t have meant he just got away with it!’ exclaimed Emma.

‘That’s what your mother thought too,’ said Aggie.

‘We’d reported him though,’ said Dot.

‘Not that anything was done,’ Aggie said, and sniffed.

‘He’d been tipped off by someone, and took the dog inside the day someone came by for an inspection, and we were told it must have been a false alarm,’ agreed Evie.

‘My foot,’ huffed Aggie.

‘So, what happened after she brought him home – was he cross?’ asked Emma.

‘Furious,’ said Evie.

‘See, she left a note, telling him exactly what she’d done.’

Emma’s eyes bulged at her mother’s daring. Perhaps that had been her way of sticking up for what was right as an adult.

‘She also told him that she was going to be keeping Gizmo from then on if he didn’t want to treat his dog better.’

Emma shook her head in amazement. ‘What did he do?’

‘Well, he came here, mad as hell. We were ready to box him ourselves, obviously not about to let him intimidate her, but somehow she made him listen and in the end he agreed to let her keep the dog.’

Aggie grinned, ‘Well, he was furious, of course, but he couldn’t very well threaten a nine-year-old girl, so he left it.’

Emma liked thinking of the brave young girl who hopped fences and saved animals. It was hard though to reconcile her with the image of the woman who was always busy in her home office, typing away on her computer, and whose life was strictly regimented, with appointed mealtimes and play dates. She supposed that growing up changed people.

It was harder to collect stories about her father because they didn’t know that much about him, but she’d pressed for as much as she could.

‘Well, what I can tell you straight off the bat is that he was handsome, and Scottish,’ said Dot one bright, cold morning in late October as she sat next to Pennywort, a mug of spiced pumpkin coffee in her hands – a Halloway tradition that had begun shortly after they visited America in the autumn for the first time, and came home with a pile of new recipes, inspired by their travels. Emma especially liked the Plucky Pumpkin Pie and Get up and Go Gumbo.

Dot’s eyes were vague, lost in thought. ‘He was a stranger to Whistling, so I suppose to your mam he would have seemed exotic.’

‘He had really beautiful eyes too – sort of a—’ she began.

‘Sea-green colour,’ said Emma, remembering, and having to swallow the lump of sadness that the image caused.

‘He had a good sense of humour though. When they first got together she was always laughing,’ remembered Evie.

Later she found a surprising source, who told her many more stories about her father. Her Uncle Joe, who had employed her father at the used car dealership when her parents had just met.