A Tangled Web by Purser Ann

Author:Purser, Ann [Purser, Ann]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Endeavour Press Ltd.
Published: 2013-12-02T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Colin Osman sat in his comfortable armchair watching the regional news on television. From where he sat he could see across the park to the Hall beyond, and thought once more how lucky they had been that Peggy Palmer had not wanted to sell the shop after all. At the time, of course, they had both been really keen, but his Pat was a great one for bees in her bonnet, and her enthusiasm for running a village shop had soon waned. Now she was involved in cooking for the Harvest Supper, having long discussions with Doreen Price on the best way of serving eighty-odd people, and offering Colin's services in carving and serving giant roasts.

He had taken on the rejuvenation of Ringford cricket team, and a possible junior football team as well. The pavilion on the playing fields had been vandalised so many times that the Committee had lost heart. Nobody ever saw the damage being done, and it was always blamed on either the Robertses or marauding teenagers from Tresham out for a cruise round the villages.

What we need, thought Colin, is to give Ringford more of a sense of community. The old people keep to themselves, and the women have the Women's Institute, where they had certainly welcomed Pat with open arms. But if you were not a five pints a night man at the Arms, there was little for a chap like himself to do. He fully intended to stand for the Parish Council when the elections came round again, but in the meantime he had thrown himself wholeheartedly into the cricket revival.

Some success had come to their revitalised team, and with volunteer help the pavilion had once more been set to rights. But Colin could the see the winter coming on and only the ragged beginnings of a young football team to keep him busy. He turned off the television, and walked over to the window, staring across the park with its great trees still burning with autumn colours and sheltering flocks of chattering birds, all congregating in their miraculous way in preparation for their epic flights of migration. They must have some magical way of communicating with each other, drawing them all together at the right time, thought Colin.

'I know!' he said aloud, struck by a sudden idea. 'What we need is some kind of newsletter, something to report village goings on, so everybody reads it and feels part of the whole.'

He turned round and nearly ran out of the room in his excitement.

'Pat! Pat, where are you?' he shouted.

'Washing my hair,' came the muffled reply.

'I've got something really exciting to tell you,' he said.

'I know,' she said, emerging from the bathroom with a towel wound into a turban round her head. 'I know what it is, you're having a baby.'

'Oh, very funny,' said Colin, this being a matter of some controversy between them. 'No, Pat, seriously, I have just had this fabulous idea for the village.' He smiled at her pleadingly.

'Another one?'

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