She looked sober as she returned to their anxieties. ‘Going back to what you said, nobody quite likes to ask questions when Walter is so set against discussing it. He won’t talk about the accident and he refuses to talk about this oil rumour, and people are fond of him and don’t want to upset him. I’m surprised Gordon Dean isn’t poking his nose into it on general principle. Mind you, I’d ask him about it myself, but I’m another who doesn’t want to upset Walter, so I’d better not pry.’
A new arrival made her eyes gleam appreciatively. ‘Oh ho, the vicar’s here. Just watch the women cluster round. Not,’ she added, ‘that he’s the only good-looking young(ish) man at this party, the place is positively swarming with them. See that brown-haired one by the bar? He’s Gordon Dean’s assistant, Brendan Whittaker, been here a few months, but I don’t think I’ve seen the tall dark man who’s talking to the doctor before.’
‘Speaking of good-looking,’ Sam murmured, ‘here come Edith and Rory. He’s a surprise, isn’t he? The likeness is very strong, apart from his height.’
‘Of course,’ Harriet remembered. ‘You knew Edith’s father, didn’t you? Yes, Rory is very clearly an Attlin. It must be quite painful for the old people but they won’t let on.’
Lara Dean sauntered forward to greet the newcomers, nodding coolly to Edith, but offering a cheek to Rory and to the Reverend John Forrester. ‘Have you met our new vicar, Rory? Dad tells me he’s a great asset to the village and very popular with the ladies.’
Edith was amused to see that the vicar took Lara’s advances in his stride, but she was less impressed by the way Rory was reacting. To be fair, he had little choice in the matter as his hostess had seized his arm and was parading him round the room to introduce him to her guests. Like Harriet, Edith had noted the surprising number of young men so she ignored Rory’s rolled eyes and waded in.
‘Hi, Brendan, how’s it going?’ She fluttered her eyelashes at the other men in the group; her grandmother had told her to be sociable, after all. ‘Am I interrupting? I haven’t seen Brendan since Christmas.’ Within minutes she had been offered a seat, handed a glass of champagne and a plate of nibbles had been set on a table beside her.
‘I know you won’t eat this, Brendan.’ She nodded towards the prunes wrapped in bacon. ‘I spotted some veggie snacks over there.’ She held out the plate towards the tall dark American who had been talking to his host and was now giving her an appraising once-over.
‘Not for me, thanks,’ he grinned. ‘Not bacon, with a name like Goldstein.’ He took a sip of champagne. ‘That’s Mike Goldstein,’ he told her. ‘I’m here on vacation. Maybe you could show me round?’
Mike’s dark eyes gleamed in admiration as Edith perched on the end of a sofa beside him. Working at home might turn out to be more fun than she’d anticipated, she mused, if Mike happened to be here for a while. And besides him, there was Rory … yes, well. She glanced round the room. There he was, still being paraded round by Lara, and looking tired and bored so that, in spite of her sense that there was some mystery about him, she felt a pang of sympathy, especially when he caught her watching him, and rolled his eyes.
She responded eagerly to Mike Goldstein’s advances, throwing a crumb of conversation at Brendan too, acutely aware that the vicar was now a bystander, an appreciative grin on his attractively rumpled face.
After a while he came over to her and somehow cut her out from her admirers. ‘Talk to me now, it’s my turn,’ he told her. ‘I’m sorry I missed the dinner last night but I was already booked for a dull evening I couldn’t get out of. I gather it went well?’
Edith had briefly been introduced to him once over the Christmas holidays when she had spent a few days at home before heading north for Hogmanay with her mother and stepfather, but otherwise she had barely spoken to him. Now she had time to take his measure, she saw that the vicar of Locksley was a very attractive proposition indeed.
‘Tell me about your family’s connection with the church,’ he demanded. ‘I’m trying to mug up so I don’t sound a fool when tourists interrogate me. I’ve read the little booklet about it, but the Attlins have been here forever. Besides, my own special interest is the late Roman period, so the mediaeval history is a bit of a blur.’
She melted at once, never proof against appreciation of the place dearest to her heart and they were soon deep in conversation about the Attlin chronicle and the Roman story.