There was an apothecary table behind the cash desk; there were capes and pestles and mortars and a locked glass cabinet, high up, with a warning sign, very small, saying ‘these ingredients are for play only’.
‘Hmm,’ thought Carmen to herself, smiling. Well, it was probably harmless. She turned round to go see how Mr McCredie was getting on when she saw Bronagh standing right in front of her.
‘Lovely shop,’ said Carmen hastily. ‘Isn’t it gorgeous?’
‘You think it’s nonsense, I can tell,’ said Bronagh, who looked like she could be slightly more frightening than her short stature and rosy cheeks would suggest. In fact, she had a touch of the Mrs Marsh about her.
‘It’s lovely,’ said Carmen, pointing to a large collection of light green glass baubles, glinting in the light. The shop itself was decorated for Christmas in heavy wreaths everywhere from a tree Carmen didn’t recognise.
‘What is it?’ said Carmen. ‘It’s beautiful.’
‘Hawthorn,’ said Bronagh. ‘Keeps the spirits out. Except the ones I invite in.’
She smiled, but it was still a little unnerving as the fairies in the corner giggled and the odd hypnotic music kept playing; the choirboys outside had all gone home for their teas.
‘Well, happy Christmas,’ said Carmen. Bronagh frowned again.
‘It isn’t Christmas, my dear! It’s midwinter! It’s Saturnalia.’
‘Okay,’ said Carmen.
‘Those bloody Christians. Came along and hijacked everything. It’s all just marketing, you know. Coke marketed Santa Claus. Bloody Christians marketed midwinter.’
‘Um … ’ said Carmen.
‘They took the ancient festivals and pretended it was about some … “baby”.’
Bronagh shook her head.
‘Bloody money men ruin everything. Happy solstice!’
They chinked goblets.
‘We are halfway out of the dark,’ she said. ‘Of course, in my line of work that’s not always a good thing.’ She looked at Carmen. ‘You are my guest,’ she said. ‘You must have a gift.’
‘Oh, please, no, don’t worry,’ said Carmen.
‘No, no, no I insist.’
She took a large bunch of keys from a buried pocket in her velvet gown and reached up to a little glass box.
She looked straight at Carmen.
‘Ooh,’ she said. ‘How interesting with you. A man problem … ?’
‘Yes, well, that’s hardly difficult to guess,’ said Carmen. ‘Seeing as I’m here on my own looking completely miserable.’
This was getting really embarrassing. She was grateful to Bronagh, she really was, but now she really wanted to be … where? She thought about it. In fact, completely to her surprise, she wouldn’t mind being in the house, on the big cosy sofa, watchingThe Muppet Christmas Carolagain with Phoebe curled up under her arm, and Pippa making sarcastic remarks about it and Jack pretending to shoot people on the screen with a banana (no guns were allowed in the house of course, not even Nerf guns).
Huh. What a strange thought.
‘No,’ said Bronagh, giving her that dark intense gaze again. ‘No. I think that’s all fine.’
Carmen laughed. ‘It is so very much not fine, I can assure you.’
‘No, it’s rather closer to home. It’s family. A sister?’
‘What?’ said Carmen, but just as she did so, she heard someone say her name. Waving cheerily across the room, his top knot bobbing above everyone else, was Oke.
