1. Visitors in the Village

“Liz, I swear he’s the most handsome man I’ve seen in my life.”

Alfie came into the parlour with the tea things in time to hear Marge enthusing to her friend and business partner.

He smiled down at the tiny white-haired lady perched on the edge of the black leather armchair. “Talking about me again?”

She snorted. “Don’t flatter yourself, my lad.”

“Marge, dear, that’s unkind and unfair,” said Liz. “I think Alfie’s very handsome, and I’ve heard you say the same many times.”

Marge peered at Alfie through her oversized spectacles. “He’s handsome enough, I grant you.”

“Thank you, kindly,” Alfie murmured.

“But he’s handsome in an ordinary way. Mario looks like a film star. Hair as black as a raven’s wing, teeth as white as …” She paused, searching for the right word.

“Snow?” suggested Alfie, setting the tray down on one of Aunt Augusta’s occasional tables.

“They’re lovely teeth,” she snapped.

Alfie poured the tea into the Scandinavian-style cups he had recently discovered. “I can’t compete with someone called Mario. Especially not somebody called Mario with lovely teeth,” he said, handing a cup to Liz.

“Oh, Gussie’s crockery!” she said in delight. “It was so fashionable in the Sixties.”

“I found it in a box in a cupboard,” said Alfie. “I still haven’t gone through all her things.” His late aunt had been even older than Liz and Marge, but while their style was chintz curtains and fine bone china decorated with roses, Aunt Augusta had a taste that was all her own. The parlour’s psychedelic wallpaper, swirls of black, white, pink and purple, still made him shudder, and he couldn’t stand the avocado bathroom suite. But he also couldn’t face the upheaval of renovating. He spent most of his time in the brightly tiled kitchen, or the bedroom, which was a haven of tranquillity.

He gave Marge her tea and settled himself in the remaining armchair. “So, tell us more about the lovely-toothed Mario.”

Marge sighed in wistful reminiscence. “Gorgeous and utterly charming. Perfect continental manners. He’s Italian.”

“Is he a relative of Carlotta’s?” asked Liz.

“I don’t think so,” said Marge. “They were yabbering away in Italian together, but she just served him like any other customer.”

“You met him in The Horse?” asked Alfie.

Liz beamed. “I did. He bought me a gin and tonic.”

“Now we have it,” said Liz. “Marge doesn’t have beer goggles, she has G&T glasses. Any man who buys her a drink is the most handsome man she’s ever seen.”

Marge’s retort was interrupted by Alfie’s mobile phone ringing. He saw it was Sasha, muttered: “Not again,” and switched it off.

“Double glazing?” asked Liz.

A double-glazing salesman would be less persistent than Sasha and Sebastian. This was getting tiresome. He had made it clear he wasn’t interested in their business proposal. But there was no need to bore Liz and Marge with the details.

“London acquaintances. They suggested coming down to Bunburry to see me. I told them I couldn’t have visitors because I was renovating the cottage.”

Liz tutted disapprovingly at the blatant untruth.

“I’ll get around to it some time,” said Alfie. “But the wallpaper saps my energy.”

Marge eased herself off the large armchair and went to pour herself another cup of tea. Alfie reflected that they were probably much more at home in Windermere Cottage than he was. As Aunt Augusta’s lifelong friends, they had been constant visitors. He could barely remember his aunt, hadn’t given her a thought for decades when he learned she had left him her cottage in Bunburry.

She would never know what a godsend it had been, giving him an escape from London. Apart from the vicar, nobody here knew what had happened back there and that was exactly how he intended to keep it.

“I always think,” remarked Marge, “that a cup of tea is very dry without something to go with it.”

Alfie leaped to his feet. “The fudge – I haven’t even taken it out of the bag.”

“Men,” said Marge to Liz. “No good at multi-tasking.”

“Not even Mario?” asked Alfie under his breath as he headed for the kitchen.

The ladies had brought their usual welcome gift of Liz’s fudge. Alfie had first encountered it as a small boy when staying with his grandparents – his mother called it the best fudge in the Cotswolds, and he had no argument with that.

He was reaching for a plate when the Hallelujah Chorus broke out. Aunt Augusta’s doorbell chimes were as idiosyncratic as the rest of the cottage.

“Do you want me to answer it?” called Marge.

“Please,” Alfie called back. “But if they’re selling fudge, tell them we’ve got some already.”

Liz and Marge had given him industrial quantities of the confection this time, but he found it so irresistible he would demolish it within days.

He was vaguely aware of conversation as he arranged a mound of squares on the plate and came back into the hallway.

Marge was holding the door wide open, ushering in a man and a woman.

“A lovely surprise for you, Alfie,” she said. “Friends of yours from London, Sasha and Sebastian.”

“Alfie, darling!”

The familiar shrill squeal set his less-than-lovely teeth on edge. He braced himself as Sasha rushed towards him in a flurry of outré clothes and a jangle of jewellery. Her dress or wrap or kaftan or whatever it was called was undoubtedly designer, but Alfie always felt that her fashion statements would be better left unsaid.

She air-kissed him effusively. “I tried to ring you, darling, to tell you we were on our way, but it went straight to voicemail. I hope you weren’t trying to avoid us!”

Alfie forced a smile. “Of course not. Good to see you both.” He shook hands with Sebastian, who was wearing a gold-buttoned blazer, the silk handkerchief in the breast pocket matching his Paisley pattern cravat. He was also wearing his customary vague grin – he always seemed slightly disengaged from whatever was going on, letting Sasha do most of the talking.

Marge’s eyes were owlish behind her large spectacles. “Put the kettle on for some more tea, Alfie,” she instructed. “Liz and I will entertain your guests.”

She shepherded them into the parlour and Alfie returned to the kitchen to boil the kettle and seethe inwardly.

“Alfie?” The voice at the kitchen door was diffident. “I’ve brought you the tea pot and the milk jug.”

Liz was bigger than her friend, scarcely difficult since Marge was so birdlike, but Liz was very much quieter. He wasn’t sure how old they were, and would never be rude enough to ask. Although he knew Liz was the elder, she didn’t look it, her hair dyed a youthful sandy colour compared to Marge’s white curls.

“Thanks.” Alfie emptied the tea pot and started again.

Liz fetched another two of Aunt Augusta’s Sixties cups. Speaking softly to avoid being overheard, she said: “Are these the people who phoned, the ones you’ve been trying to avoid?”

Alfie nodded.

“You have to forgive Marge,” she whispered. “Sometimes she just doesn’t think.”

Alfie wondered what Liz would have done if she had answered the door. Told the duo that they were at the wrong address, perhaps, or that Alfie had left the country.

He smiled down at her. “It’s okay. They’re not that bad.” They were, but he could surely be civil for as long as it took to drink a cup of tea.

He put out more fudge and followed Liz back to the parlour with the tea tray.

Sasha and Sebastian were reclining on the vast black leather sofa. Sasha gave one of her little squeals when she saw him.

“We absolutely love what you’ve done with the place, don’t we, Sebastian?”

Sebastian grinned in agreement.

“This room is so amazing, so perfectly retro, such a lived-in feel. You’re so tremendously artistique that of course I thought you had done it all yourself, but Marge tells us you hired a designer.”

Alfie shot Marge a suspicious look.

“I said it had been designed by Augusta Lytton,” Marge explained innocently. His late aunt.

“She’s marvellous,” said Sasha. “What a feel for colour. You must give me her contact details – I could put a lot of business her way.”

Alfie thought he heard Marge murmur: “Good luck with that.”

“There’s still lots to be done,” he said defensively as he poured out the tea. “I don’t have a usable spare room yet.”

“You simply must tell us when everything’s finished and we’ll visit you properly – unless we’re not invited!” Sasha’s trilling laugh didn’t allow for that possibility. “Where we’re staying is all right, but it’s not exactly The Hilton.”

Staying? This was unwelcome news. Alfie had assumed they had simply called in en route to somewhere else. He handed round the tea and then passed round the fudge.

“And where are you staying?” asked Liz.

“It’s too funny,” Sasha collapsed giggling against Sebastian to demonstrate just how funny it was. “It’s a pub slash B&B called The Drunken Horse Inn.”

Alfie hoped he never committed the sin of mansplaining,...