A Finer End

“Nick who works in the bookshop down Magdalene Street? Yeah, sure.”

“Has he been in today?”

“No. Yesterday, though. Late. Moped over his coffee like he’d just lost his best friend,” she added, with an air of disappointment.

Thanking her, Kincaid crossed the street and ducked into the stone passageway that led to the Glastonbury Assembly Rooms. The doors stood open and he climbed the stairs to the café on the first floor. It was only semi-partitioned from the corridor and the meeting room, but it was an inviting, comfortable-looking space, if a wee bit scruffy. Ella Fitzgerald crooned Cole Porter over the sound system, and several tables were occupied by customers bent over books or newspapers, enjoying the Sunday-afternoon lull. He went through the buffet queue and, when he reached the register, struck up a conversation with the cashier, a pleasant woman wearing a baseball cap. When they’d discussed the cake and the weather, he asked her if she knew Nick. “Tall, slender chap, with dark curly hair?”

“Who could forget Nick?” she said, laughing. “Comes in all the time.”

“Has he been in today?”

“As a matter of fact, he has.”

Kincaid pounced on the slight hesitation. “Was there something odd today?”

“Nick usually comes in on his own, has a meal or a coffee—always chats me up—but today he was deep into it with a strange bunch, at the table in the corner there.” She nodded towards a table beside the worn sofa.

“Strange, how?”

The woman shrugged. “Well, you know Glastonbury—you see all kinds. I’ve been here twenty years and nothing surprises me. But this bunch, they’re serious pagans. Moonlight rituals on the Tor, that sort of thing. Gives me the willies, and I wouldn’t have thought that was Nick’s style.” She eyed him more critically. “Is there some reason you’re looking for Nick?”

“Just a friend passing through, wanted to say hello. He’s not on the telephone, so he can be the devil to get in touch with.” Giving her a reassuring smile, he took his coffee and gingerbread to a table beside the disused fireplace, mulling over this latest bit of information. Who were these people? Druids? Witches? And just what was handsome young Nick up to now?

“Any joy?” Kincaid asked, sitting down on a tufted ottoman.

Winnie looked up from a thick batch of papers. “No, but it’s interesting reading. These are estate documents—it seems the Montforts have owned property in this area practically forever.”

“I suppose that follows. But Uncle John never talked much about his family.”

“What was he like?” Winnie nodded towards the silver-framed photos on the bookcase. “I can see that Jack resembles him.”

“In looks, yes, but Jack’s much more like his mother in temperament. Uncle John was terribly reserved”—he pulled a long face—“and I always wondered how he and Aunt Olivia ended up together. When we went on holiday, he never joined any of our activities. He always had more important things to do.”

“Was it just you and Jack and your mothers, then?”

“And my pesky sister. And sometimes my dad, when he could get away.”

“It sounds lovely,” Winnie said a little wistfully, then looked back at the papers in her hand. “Do you think Jack’s father felt that family history and stories were frivolous?”

“A waste of valuable time, I’d guess. Uncle John read The Times from front to back every day of his life.” When Winnie laughed, he added, “I don’t want to give you the wrong impression. My uncle was a kind man, of good character, and I’m sure he was well respected—although I never thought about those things as a child. But he wasn’t the sort to build stage sets in the back garden and help put on productions of Peter Pan.”

“And your dad was?”

“Always ready for an adventure, my dad. And speaking of adventures—I think it’s time I see what Jack’s got himself into in the attic. Can I get you anything else?”

Winnie demurred, and was already immersed in her papers as he left the room.

Climbing the stairs to the first floor, he thought about his family, so taken for granted in childhood. He had assumed that everyone’s parents were interested in their children’s doings, and that all fathers participated in their children’s lives.

The downside to possessing a creative and involved father, however, had been that his dad sometimes forgot to take care of mundane matters like the electricity bill, and he remembered more than one occasion when they had camped out in the house by candlelight until things could be put right. Fortunately, his mother had possessed a practical streak that he suspected his aunt Olivia had not shared, and she’d managed to keep things running smoothly most of the time.

It had been a while since he’d been home—he should take Kit to visit his grandparents, now that the boy had had a chance to get used to the idea. And he would ask Gemma and Toby too. They could make a proper holiday of it.