ARCADIA: A Case For Willows And Lane by Peter Grainger

Author:Peter Grainger [Grainger, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-06-16T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen – 20th November

‘They asked you for what? The cheeky bastards…’

The four of them – Emily, Summer, Sir Roger and Jennifer Parkes – were seated in the lounge of the Parkes’ beautiful home: it was just as Emily had pictured it, with a view out of the patio doors down across the sloping garden and into the valley of the Kenwyn river. All she could see was the lawn, the properly-pruned dogwoods in their brilliant winter colours and the tops of bare oak trees.

Summer had just explained to Sir Roger about the email she had received this week, confirming the details of her visit to Ynys Gwyrdd and asking whether she would, if required, be able to supply evidence that she was solvent – they might ask to see proof of her financial situation.

Summer said, ‘They’re quite open about it. They don’t want hippies or hangers-on – not their words, mine – because they have some serious ideas about saving Western civilisation.’

Sir Roger nodded as if that made some sort of sense, and then something else must have occurred to him: he looked very directly at Summer, and Emily did not miss the look that her neighbour gave him in return. Quite what this was about, Emily could not tell. When Summer had shown her the email from the foundation, she, Summer, had said without embarrassment that this might cause a problem, depending on how much money the people from Arcadia were expecting to see. Emily had not asked, of course she hadn’t, but it was clear that the young woman was short of money. Hadn’t Emily wondered about that herself recently, more than once? After all, no job but the bills keep coming.

Emily had immediately said that it was not a problem: she could transfer money into Summer’s account in a matter of minutes – they should do it immediately, just in case. There had been the predictable protests but in this case Emily had won – no money had been transferred as yet but she had Summer’s account details safely filed away.

This meeting on a Saturday morning had been Sir Roger’s idea. He said it would be a chance for them to brief him and his wife about all that had been learned since their last conversation, and to agree some terms now that Summer had a date planned – she was due to visit Ynys Gwyrdd on Friday the third of December. But Emily guessed that he also needed to meet them in person again, especially Summer: nothing had been heard from or of their daughter since he first came to Emily’s home in Polcoombe, and their anxiety must have increased. In their minds, she realised, the trip Summer was going to make had taken on greater significance as a result. This could have been done in a telephone call, as had one or two other matters, but because Summer might see their daughter soon, they wanted to see her: it was the most tenuous of connections but, in the circumstances, understandable.

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