Christmas Wishes at Pudding Hall by Kate Forster
11
Christa was tired when she came home from the food van and went straight to bed. Staying up late the night before talking to Marc had also taken its toll but when she woke in the morning she felt better and checked the time. It was only just seven and the house sounded quiet. She wanted to make some food for Petey and take it to him in the afternoon. She had his address from Zane and was planning on dropping it off and checking in on him.
Showered and dressed, Christa headed down to the kitchen where she put on the coffee, boiled the kettle and looked inside the refrigerator. No eggs.
Didn’t the boys say there were chickens outside? Peggy hadn’t arrived yet, so that must be why no one had collected the eggs.
Christa pulled on her coat and hat and opened the back door.
There was a glimpse of sunshine and the rain had stopped for a change. Christa saw a collection of wellingtons lined up by the back door and kicked off her shoes and slipped her feet into a pair, tucking her jeans into the boots. She looked around her and then took the gravel path lined with topiary trees that led to a brick wall. She followed the path around the wall until it opened up and she found herself inside a walled kitchen garden, carefully laid out, with winter vegetables in some of the beds alongside some of the empty ones. Presumably they were fallowing for the next plant. She had visited many organic farms and kitchen gardens when she was at Playfoot’s. Seeing the ways the farmers grew the vegetables was wonderful and she would always come back with a new supplier of purple carrots or baby beets.
So many vegetables, she thought as she walked towards a crop of cabbages so fat even Peter Rabbit would have had trouble munching through them.
‘Morning,’ she heard and saw a man standing up from behind a crop of Brussels sprouts.
‘Oh hi.’ Christa waved. ‘Are you the one responsible for all this beauty?’
‘I am indeed. I’m Bill, head gardener.’ He was a tall thin man, in his mid-sixties with a weather-beaten face and a green corduroy hat and boiled wool jacket with a long rain jacket over the top.
‘Christa. I’m the chef here until just after New Year.’
‘Peggy told me about you, said you were into all sorts of fancy things and you wouldn’t like my vegetables.’
Christa gasped. ‘That is entirely untrue, Bill. I would love to use these vegetables. I didn’t know they were here. I came on an egg hunt and found this instead.’
Bill seemed pleased with her answer. ‘You want to meet the girls do you? They are off the lay now it’s getting colder. You might luck out with the odd egg but I believe Peggy has been buying them from town.’
‘Has she? I didn’t know. They twins talk about the chickens as though they’re laying now.’
Bill shook his head. ‘Come down and look anyway,’ he said and she walked by his side through the grounds. He pointed out the different gardens on the way.
‘That’s the orchard. We have lovely pippin apples in there and there’s the pond, which has beautiful water lilies in the summer. Shame you won’t be here to see them.’
Christa looked up at the sky. ‘Peggy thinks it will snow soon,’ she said. ‘Do you think it will?’
Bill shrugged. ‘I don’t know. The bees went into the hive early – that can mean it’s going to be a harsh winter but I can’t say when the snow is coming.’
Christa looked around the garden. It wasn’t hard for her to imagine the beauty of the garden in spring and summer. Every edge of the pathway was trimmed so well there wasn’t an inch of grass that dared to creep a toe over the edge. The yew trees that lined the pathway were perfect triangles, standing proudly surrounded by frost on the lawns.
‘Have you cared for this garden for a long time?’ she asked Bill.
‘Since I was twenty. Came straight from horticultural school and stayed on. It’s been through three owners but Mr Ferrier is the nicest one we’ve had at Pudding Hall.’
‘Oh, how so?’ Christa asked. She was interested to know what others through of Marc, since she couldn’t always understand his moods over the past week. One minute he was saying he liked to help others and the next he was boasting about a vineyard in France. He spoiled his children yet he also neglected them. He was moody but could also be so attentive you felt like you were the most important person in the room.
‘The garden needed work done to it when he came but there was only me, and I didn’t have enough hours in the day or the budget to fix what needed to be done. Mr Ferrier let me have some young people to come and work here and he did everything I recommended. We drained the pond and restocked the water lilies. He let me replant the iris garden, brought in twenty thousand irises from the Netherlands. They came up last year but this year there will be more. Some of the rare bulbs I never thought I would have the chance to plant and raise.’
Christa smiled at him as they came around the water and the sound of chickens murmuring came within earshot.
‘It’s a beautiful garden, Bill. You should be proud of your work.’
The chicken coop was large but not too big and the chickens were scratching at the ground and eating some vegetable leaves.
‘I give the girls some scraps as there hasn’t been much coming from the kitchen lately.’
‘You will have all the scraps from now on in,’ promised Christa. ‘I didn’t know they needed them but consider them first in line for the veggie soup remnants I will have today, provided I get some fresh veg from a gardener I know.’
Bill lifted the lid at the back of the coop and pulled out three eggs. ‘Not enough for a family but enough for a breakfast,’ he said.
‘You keep them,’ said Christa. ‘I will get some tomorrow or ask Peggy to bring some in when she starts.’
Bill nodded and put the eggs carefully into the pockets of his wool jacket.
‘Now how’s about we get that veg for you. I have some parsnips that are ready to come out and some potatoes. How about some leeks?’ Bill seemed to be in his element sharing the bounty with Christa.
‘I have some winter carrots and lovely chard also.’ He listed more vegetables than Christa thought possible and she thought about the food van and how much they would like a nutritious soup. Not that the food they had was terrible but it needed more nutrients. The custard tart for the little toddler the previous evening was no doubt much enjoyed but it needed to be tempered with something to give the baby’s body something to grow with.
Bill had harvested her a feast and put it in the wheelbarrow and walked her back to the house.
‘Pudding Hall is a beautiful house,’ she said, looking at the lines and windows and the grand roofline.
‘Nothing like her for miles around here,’ said Bill. ‘There was talk that the house would become a hotel before Mr Ferrier bought it.’
‘Is that a good or a bad thing?’ she asked.
Bill snorted. ‘No one wanted this to be a hotel. It’s Pudding Hall. It’s a grand home but it needs a family, not just drop-ins. This is the first time Mr Ferrier has stayed here and he bought it three years ago.’
‘Really? If I had a house like this I would never leave.’ Christa laughed. ‘It’s a dream come true isn’t it? All these gardens and chickens and a pond and an orchard.’
Bill stopped, turned and looked around at the expanse of ground behind them. ‘There’re more but no one enjoys it. Sometimes I feel I’m keeping it alive just for me.’
Christa looked with him.
‘How about this morning, I bring the boys for a wander? They would love it. They’ve been cooped up inside with video games and television. Could you take us on a tour? I could bring morning tea.’
Bill’s face beamed. ‘That would be grand, Christa, just grand.’
He helped her carry the vegetables inside the house and then carefully put the eggs on the bench.
‘For morning tea – you might need them if you make something.’
Christa smiled at him.
‘You’re a star, Bill, thank you. See you at ten.’