Stay for Christmas. Please.
M x
God, what was he doing to her, she thought, as she closed the front door. She took a deep breath and put the card back into the envelope and put it in her room before she went back into the kitchen.
Petey was putting the leftover fudge into a box.
‘I’ll take this down to the van for the staff. Nice for them to have a treat, don’t you think?’
‘That’s very kind of you, Peter,’ said Peggy. ‘A generous heart is a good heart, I always say.’
Christa sat down. ‘That was the boys. They asked me to dinner tomorrow night,’ she said.
‘How lovely,’ said Peggy.
Christa looked at her and at Petey, who was now folding the top of the box.
‘Did you know about this?’
Peggy shrugged. ‘Not at all, they didn’t ask me to cook,’ she said. ‘Which was just as well. I’m a terrible cook.’
Christa started to laugh. ‘I thought you loved your shepherd’s pie.’
‘Loathe it. I don’t even eat it, but it’s easy,’ Peggy admitted.
Christa sat in thought for a moment.
‘I think I’m going to go back to my maiden name,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to be a Playfoot anymore.’
‘I don’t blame you,’ said Peggy. ‘I bet he was playing foot with all sorts of people.’
Petey laughed. ‘What’s your maiden name then, love? I did a lot of reading on surnames when Annie and I did research on the family tree. My surname is Chandler, which was the name for a candlemaker back in medieval times.’
‘I suppose Peter Fudge isn’t really an appealing moniker,’ said Peggy. ‘My surname is Smith,’ she added, ‘which is my married name, but my maiden name was Ramsbottom. That was hell when I was at school.’
Christa rubbed Peggy’s arm. ‘Children can be so mean.’ Peter stood up from the table and left the room and returned with a thick book.
‘What’s your maiden name then? I have a book of names that might have yours in it?’ Petey put down the well-leafed book and Christa looked at front.
‘The Big British Book of Surnames, updated 1999,’ she read aloud.
Petey picked up the book and held it in his hand.
‘Go on then, what’s your name?’ he asked.
‘Hartley,’ she said. ‘I have no idea what it means. Something to do with hearts I guess?’
Petey flicked through the book and then looked at her. ‘H.A.R.T?’ he spelled out.
She nodded. ‘L.E.Y.,’ she finished.
Petey looked up from the book. ‘That’s a popular name around Yorkshire,’ he said. ‘Your family come from here?’
‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘Dad didn’t talk about family much – only his grandmother from time to time – but then again, I didn’t ask. Self-absorbed teenager I guess.’
Petey looked at the page, running his finger down the list and then stopped.
‘Hartley. Stag clearing,’ he read aloud.
