Page 9 of Match Point in Crumbleton
‘Sure,’ Andy nodded. ‘People like to have a good turf out… and they don’t want to throw away anything with historical significance, so they bring them here instead.’
‘Seriously?’ said Cath.
Andy could swear that the pink blush had just paled by several degrees.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘It’s one of the reasons the council have had such a hard time finding someone to take over running the place. It’s full of junk and it’s falling down. They’ve only really got the funding to cover your position… so the repairs just get shunted further and further down the list. But… you know all this, right? They showed you around on your interview?’
Cath shook her head.
‘They didn’t?’ said Andy, suddenly feeling like he wanted to reel all his words back into his mouth and swallow them.
‘This is the first time I’ve been up here,’ said Cath.
‘Since you moved in?’ said Andy.
‘No. Ever,’ said Cath. ‘They did my interview online.’
‘But… Ruth did a video or something?’ said Andy.
He remembered hearing something about it. There had been some chatter about it down at the Dolphin and Anchor and rather a lot of giggling about “convenient camera angles.”
‘Mmm,’ said Cath. ‘I could never get that link to work for some reason.’
‘Well… deep breath,’ said Andy, forcing his voice to sound as light and cheery as he could. He wasn’t going to take the blame for scaring off the new curator before she’d even seen inside the museum! ‘How about I help you move the sofa and get the rest of this stuff inside while I’m here?’
‘Really?’ said Cath. ‘You don’t mind?’
‘Of course not,’ said Andy. ‘I’m not going to abandon you just because you’ve got the door open.’
‘Well… thanks. That’d be great,’ said Cath.
The beaming smile she shot in his direction promptly made Andy feel like he’d been thumped in the chest again. Out of instinct, he raised his hand to run his fingers through his hair—only to discover he was still wearing his hard hat.
What a prat!
He quickly grabbed the peak of the less-than-flattering item of headgear and yanked it off, ruffling his hair to get rid of the flat ring he knew would be there.
What was this woman doing to him? One smile from her and he seemed to be morphing into an image-conscious teenager, keen to impress the girl. Well… he wasn’t off to the best of starts, was he? So far, he’d managed to tell her to wiggle, and then frightened her half to death about her new job.
Smooth, Andy! Seriously smooth.
His only excuse was that he was thoroughly out of practice around beautiful women. Or… any women, really. He hadn’t dated anyone for months. Actually, make that years.
But what was he thinking about dating for?! Cath was probably married, for heaven’s sake. And no, he wouldn’t glance at her ring finger to check.
‘You… erm… you coming?’ said Cath, snapping Andy back to reality.
‘Er… sure,’ he said. ‘Shall we start with the sofa?’
‘I was thinking… shall we start by turning the lights on inside?’ said Cath.
‘Good plan!’ laughed Andy. ‘Sure you’re up for this?’
‘Not sure I’ve got much choice in the matter now,’ said Cath with a shrug. ‘I’ve signed the contract.’
Andy nodded and led the way.
‘The bank of light switches are just around here to the right,’ he said, moving slowly along the hallway and hoping he didn’t trip over any concealed "artefacts”. ‘Here we go,’ he added, coming to a halt in front of the gloomy patch of wall. Reaching up, he went to flick on the first row of switches, only for his hand to press down on top of Cath’s fingers.
