Since Ben and Joss Beckett took over The Fair Maid and Falcon, they have had to deal with ghosts, gangsters and well dodgy goings-on. Despite that they have their own family of twin daughters and dogs, and a fabulous ‘found family’ of friends.
It was almost seven o’clock before the sound of small bare feet announced the arrival of Roz and Allie. They came quietly into the room, but seeing I was home ran to me bubbling joyously.
“Hello Mummy Beckett. We thought you might have gone back to work.”
“No. I’m having a sneaky half day.”
“How do you have half a day?”
“You work until lunch service is over, then you don’t work until the next day.”
“Like a Sunday?”
“Yes. Except everyone gets a half day on a Sunday. Today it was only me.”
Roz nodded wisely. “Grandmother says the bad man was very vexatious to your spirit. And Esme kept watch but she says he was very impressed by our mother.”
I laughed.
“Esme is biased.”
“What’s biased?”
“Biased means that you love somebody and that makes you think they are special.”
“They might still be special then?” That was Allie who is inclined to pick at loose ends.
Sian stepped briskly into the fray. “They might indeed. But they might also be embarrassed if people make big thing about how special they are.”
Both twins nodded solemnly. Their daddy having made a bit of a stand about being careful not to embarrass people it was something they understood well.
“Anyway,” I said. “You two have a decision to make.”
They swivelled their blonde heads to face me. “Why do we have a decision to make?”
“Because later on there will be adults having supper here. You pair can have your tea now and be in bed just before the people arrive. Or you can have a snack and then get your baths so you can have supper in your jammies and be off to bed quickly once supper is over.”
Roz narrowed her eyes. “Who will be eating supper?”
“Aunty Stella, Uncle Neil, Ellen, Sian, Morgan, Simeon, Daddy and me.”
“That is a lot of our favourite people. What is for food?”
I barely managed to keep a straight face. “There is chicken cooked in red wine with salad, new potatoes and focaccia.”
“And will there be pudding?”
“Yes. There will be lemon pudding with clotted cream or vegan ice cream.”
“Or both?”
Allie looked so hopeful that I had to grin.
“Or both.” I conceded.
They looked into each other’s eyes. “May we stay up please?”
“You may, but you must promise to go straight to bed when you have had your supper and no bratty behaviour.”
“We promise.”
I held out my arms and they came for a hug. Sian stood up.
“Cheese toasties?”
“Oh yes please.”
The twins packed themselves into my lap and began telling me all about the fascinating storm. After a while the inevitable questions started.
“Mummy. Is the electricity still off?”
“What do you think?”
“We think we doesn’t know.”
“How could you begin to know?”
They thought for a minute then Roz piped up. “We could look out of the window beside the front door and see if the street lights are on.”
“And we could listen for the generator.” Allie sounded pleased to have an idea of her own.
“Why don’t you do both and then let me know what you think.”
They scooted out into the passageway becoming very quiet before walking back in on soft feet.
“There is no street lights and we can hear the generators purring so we think the electricity is still off.”
“And you would be right. The last message from the electric company said it may be back tomorrow.”
They looked at me with round eyes. “When our friends doesn’t have electricity they has to use torches and eat jam sammiches. How come we has generators?”
“How could we run the pub if we couldn’t pump beer or cook food?”
“That is a very good question Mummy Beckett.”
Sian set two plates on the table. “People wanting to eat should wash their hands right now.”
The love of food trumps everything else and the smalls rushed to their bathroom. Sian brought me a glass of deeply rich red wine. She grinned wickedly.
“You look to me to be a woman in need of fortification and I’ve had this open to chambray. It’s even burgundy to match the colour.”
I toasted her with my upraised glass.
“What are you drinking?”
“Ginger beer. As are the littles, and Dad when he gets here.”
I made to get up and she motioned me to sit still.
“I’m the person who gets well paid to mind the gruesomes, you need to sit down and let me earn my crust.”
I sat and she gave me an earnest look.
“Joss. Will you be needing me to wrangle small people after the summer holidays are over?”
“I would like you to continue with the job. But it’s your call.”
“What would you want me for?”
“Weekends. Half term breaks. Holidays. But. Not all of the time. You will need some breaks for yourself.”
Her smile was a mile wide. “I hoped for something like that. But I wasn’t sure if I’m doing a good enough job.”
I held out my arms and she came for a hug.
“That’s on me and Ben. We think you are doing great. But we haven’t got round to telling you. Sorry love.”
“That’s okay. It’s been a bit of a weird summer.”
“Hasn’t it just. And I’ve a worm in my gut thinks it’s not over yet.”
The twins erupted into the room and clambered onto their chairs.
“Oh look,” Ali exclaimed, “there’s faces on our toasties.”
I went to look and saw that there were indeed faces on their sandwiches.
“How did Sian do that?”
“Don’t you know, Mummy Beckett?”
“I do not. So we’d better ask her.”
Sian ambled over and opened the panini press to disclose a wire frame with faces outlined in wire.
“Saw this on TikTok and Dad made it.”
The twins eyes were as round as saucers. “You and Uncle Neil are very clever.”
“They are indeed. But you’d better eat your sandwiches before they go cold.”
Needing no second bidding they dived in.
“I wonder if we could have lettering made so the pub toasties…”
Sian giggled and I poked her in the biceps.
“What’s so funny miss.”
“Dad owes me a tenner. I bet him you’d be after having Fair Maid and Falcon branded sandwiches as soon as you saw this. He reckoned it’d take a couple of days.”
I couldn’t help laughing, even if it was slightly reprehensible that the family was betting on my reactions. While I was trying to drum up a disapproving comment, Ali looked up from her plate.
“Uncle Neil is a idiot to bet against Mummy Beckett working things out very fast.”
Roz nodded wisely. “It’s what she does.”
Once toasties had been absorbed we had a happy giggly bath hour. Things went a bit pear-shaped when they were back in the family room, wrapped in their dressing gowns, and discussing which jammies were most suitable as party wear. Roz wanted pink with kittens and Ali pale green with bunnies. Before they could start one of their rare, but exhausting, shouting matches I held up a hand for quiet.
“You don’t have to wear the same as each other, you know. Is there any reason why Roz can’t wear pink and Ali green?”
They stared at me. And Ali squinted her eyes. “Is this like Roz being able to hear Grandmother in her head, and me not?”
“A bit. And I sometimes wonder if Daddy and I have done wrong by buying you identical clothes.”
They thought about that for a minute then swarmed into my lap.
“No. You and Daddy Beckett got us what we likes. But maybe it would be fun to not always be identical.”
“You aren’t identical twins,” Sian put in. “You are what they call fraternal.”
“What do that mean?”
“Literally brotherly twins. But the science is easy to explain. When twins are identical, they start out as one egg, which splits into two babies. Fraternal, like you two, comes about when two eggs get fertilised at the same time.”
“How can you tell if twins is one egg or two eggs?”
“Identical twins are the same gender. You can’t be identical if you are a boy and a girl.”
“But we is both girls so we could be.”
Sian wagged a finger. “You two are very much alike. But you aren’t identical, are you?”
Ali pressed the palm of her hand against her forehead in a wonderfully theatrical gesture. “Of course not. We have different eyes. Mine are brown and Roz’s are blue.”
“Which proves my point. And I have a suggestion for you to consider.”
“Which might be what?”
I was behind them, but I could imagine the stink eye accompanying that comment. Sian laughed.
“You pair can stop looking at me like that, or I won’t tell you.”
The twins climbed down and went to stand in front of her.
“Was we giving you a glare?”
Sian crouched down to their level.
“You were. And you know you were. Now arrange your faces into a suitably attentive expression and I’ll explain.”
“Is this better?”
“Yes. It is. So. You can either wear different jammies like Mummy suggested. Or…”
“Or what?”
“Or let me choose a set.”
They barely hesitated.
“You choose.”
“Okay. You wait here.”
Roz and Ali came and huddled against my legs. Sian didn’t keep them in suspense for long, returning with pale blue pyjamas with a frieze of small forest creatures under umbrellas. The girls clapped their hands.
“Rainstorm babies. Oh you are clever, Sian.”
“She is. Isn’t she? Now you go and sit by the wood burner. I’ll bring you your iPads and you can look at a couple of cartoons while we make supper ready.”
They went happily.
Sian and I laid the table, prepared salad, put tiny new potatoes on to boil, and placed bread rolls in the warming oven. Once the gruesome twosome were fully occupied I beckoned Sian out to the boot room where I gave her the biggest hug. She hugged back, then looked at me questioningly.
“Just a thank you for averting a screaming match.”
“Them two are so close that when they do disagree it’s a very big thing,” she said wisely. “If it’s a daytime disagreement I just let them have at it, but when they need to be calm I step in firmly.”
“You do. But without swinging your authority.”
“Course not. I save that for intentional naughtiness. And I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t work when they get past themselves. Distraction is the thing then.”
“You really are good with children.”
She grinned, then sobered. “I hope so, because I’d like to be a teacher.”
“You’ll be brilliant.”
Her eyes sparkled and I understood how important this was to her.
“Me and Ben will help if you need.”
She burrowed in for another hug only to be interrupted by Allie’s voice.
“What are Mummy and Sian talking about?”
“How horrible small girls are…”
We were saved from retribution by the arrival of our supper guests.
We all enjoyed our meals, and had just reached the coffee stage when I felt Esme very close, and Ben’s phone rang. Esme put her cold little hand in mine and Ben took the brief call.
“There’s a minibus full of muscle parked outside the memorial garden. Finoula says they are screwing up their courage to go in.”
“We don’t want that, do we?” I felt my hackles rising.
“No. We don’t.”
Simeon stood up and bunched his shoulders. “I’ll just pop across to the bothy and collect some reinforcements.”
Morgan looked at me and her eyes were fierce. “Us girls will stay here shall we?”
“Please.”
Ben opened his mouth and I held up my hand. “No, love. I have to come and talk to them.”
For a second he looked mutinous, but then he grinned. “I have,” he said, “just been put in my place by an indomitable spirit.”
“Did Grandmother tell you off?” the twins asked.
“She did. And what did she say to you pair?”
“We has to stay here and not be worried because Mummy Beckett will send the men home with a flea in their ear. Which we doesn’t understand.”
Sian smiled. “It just means they will feel like you feel when your mummy is really cross.”
“Oh good. They will be very sorry.”
I was just absorbing that when Simeon returned. He had half a dozen brawny lads with him. And four of the hard handed Smith men.
“Security in the pub beefed up. Two will stay here with the family.”
“Right. We’ll leave the staffies here guarding Roz and Allie, but Stan and Ollie come with us.”
“Okay.”
“How hard is it raining?”
“It’s not. The sky is clearing and the moon is coming out.”
“That’s a help then.”
Grandmother spoke quietly in my head. ‘They search for Cherry’s resting place. Their clairvoyant will know she is not there. They will ask where she is.’ This cleared the way for me, I thought.
“Listen up,” I said. “These people have bought a clairvoyant with them.”
Allie nodded. “Yes. They want to steal Cherry’s bones.”
“I know. But she isn’t there. And I’m not prepared to have them stomping in and out of that peaceful place with their entitled ways.”
Roz smiled at me. “Are you going to spank their bottoms?”
“More or less. You two be quiet and good. We won’t be long.”
They smiled at me and nodded.
Ben’s phone chirped again. He listened briefly then showed his teeth in a sharp sort of smile.
“Jed and Finoula and Clancy are waiting for us at the gate of the market garden.”
“Okay. Let’s do this. Are you willing to leave the talking to me?”
They all nodded, and we made our way out into the boot room. We shrugged our way into fleeces and stamped our feet into wellies. Just as my hand touched the back door two small pyjama clad figures appeared behind us.
“Good hunting, Mummy.”
There will be more from Joss, Ben and their friends, courtesy of Jane Jago, next week, or you can catch up with their earlier adventures in Who Put Her In and Who Pulled Her Out.
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