Page 6 of The Battle of the Bookshops
Once Freya had personally talked them through the plats du jour, she had to shoot back to the kitchen, leaving Jules and Flo to enjoy their lunch. The maître d’ had seated them at the window, with a glorious view straight up the high street to the castle atthe top of the hill. The little restaurant was full, with a pleasant, convivial hum of conversation and tinkling of cutlery.
They both had the beetroot risotto on Freya’s recommendation, an earthy, sweet, and creamy dish, served with a dollop of fresh white goat cheese from, their chatty waitress informed them, Hollytree Farm, just up the road.
“That’s Finn’s place,” said Jules. “I remember him, and his brother... Ciaran, was it?”
“Ah, those boys,” said Flo, smiling, “they were mischievous, quite a pair... All grown up now, though. Ciaran runs the farm, and Finn runs the deli next door. He and Freya—well, she’ll tell you herself.”
Jules was intrigued, but Flo would not be drawn, so she turned her attention to lunch instead, her appetite whetted by the wide white china bowl of perfect risotto in front of her, exquisite without being fussy and robust without being heavy. She thought she wouldn’t be able to manage a pudding, but Flo talked her into sharing a slice of lemon tart, and that was perfect too: thin, crisp pastry; sharp but silky-smooth filling; and an unctuous dollop of crème fraîche on top, worthy of a top Parisian patisserie, which is probably where Freya had learned to make it. It was heavenly, thought Jules, sucking her little cake fork and laying it down on the empty plate regretfully.
As the waitress cleared the table and brought deliciously bitter French coffee, Jules took in the view. It was a bright winter day, and fluffy white clouds scudded across the sky, casting the high street into sunshine and shade by turn. It all looked reassuringly familiar: the cobbled streets, the buildings lining the high street alternating wonky Tudor beams and whitewash, elegant Georgian stone facades, and Victorian bay windows, the rooflines in jagged profile against the sky.
“What happened to Bootles?” Jules exclaimed in dismay. Howhad she not noticed earlier? Bootles Ladies’ Lingerie, Portneath’s famous emporium of underpants, was no more after trading for well over a hundred years. Formidable women had staffed long wooden counters with drawers behind them holding every example of underwear from wispy silk knickers to whalebone corsets. Teens were brought there by their mothers for their first bra (in Jules’s case it was Aunt Flo who did the honors, of course); brides went there for the underpinnings of their wedding dresses; bosomy older women loudly claimed they had gone nowhere else for their underwear over the course of several decades. And now, there it was: boarded up. The entire facade, including the pavement outside it, was shrouded in plain, black-painted sheets of plywood.
“Ah, yes,” said Aunt Flo, nodding sadly. “End of an era. A victim of online shopping and the big Marks and Sparks in Exeter is what we’ve been told,” she went on, with audible regret.
“But it was an institution,” Jules wailed. “Plus,” she added, her business brain kicking in, “it’s a pretty enormous shop, isn’t it? There’s that amazing atrium and—what was it?—two or three upper floors?” she mused, her commercial appetite whetted. “The rates alone must be colossal. I wonder what it’s going to be.”
“Don’t we all!” exclaimed Flo. “And I’ve got more right to know than most, seeing as it’s directly opposite us, but there’s been nothing, just rumors.”
“Rumors of what?”
“Oh, I don’t know... all sorts: burger bar, games arcade—something ghastly, I’m sure—they seem to be deliberately keeping it a secret,” said Flo, losing interest. “It’ll just end up being yet another tearoom, I expect. That’s what I’ve got my money on.”
“But the sign says it’s opening on Monday,” said Jules, her sharp young eyes focusing on the pinned white notice on the hoarding where the main door would be. “You must have seen them bringing in stock, surely?”
“I’ve been scrapping with your mother in Middlemass for most of the last week,” Flo reminded her. “I’ve had other things on my mind. I just hope it’s going to be something that will bring customers into town. I badly need to have a good summer’s trading this year.”
“Who owns it?” persisted Jules, barely hearing her as she peered at the upper windows, trying to see in, but the reflection of the sun on the glass defeated her.
“Ha!” exclaimed Aunt Flo. “The dastardly Montbeaus, who else? They’ve got their claws into most of the shops in Portneath, including mine, more’s the pity.”
“What? Really? I thought the building had been in Capelthorne hands for its entire history.” Jules dragged her eyes away from the former Bootles with difficulty.
“Since the dawn of time,” Flo confirmed, and nodded, “but there’s a thing now. The land it’s on is Montbeau controlled or something.”
“Ouch. What does that mean in practical terms?”
“Not much,” said Flo, dismissing the issue with a wave of her coffee spoon. “I pay a peppercorn rent every year. In fact, that reminds me, I really must dig out the paperwork at some point. My dear old solicitor’s nagging me about some hundred-year-old ‘lease’ nonsense. More admin, and a fat fee for someone, I’ll be bound.”
“Ooh, yes,” said Jules, reluctantly turning back and raising her coffee cup. “Talking about a hundred years, it’s Capelthorne’s centenary this year, isn’t it? That’s something worth celebrating.”
“Oldest bookshop in Portneath,” agreed Flo.
“Onlybookshop in Portneath,” corrected Jules.
“Just as well. There are barely enough customers as it is.”
“You should definitely do some sort of centenary celebration,” urged Jules. “It could raise your profile, a nice little piece in thelocal paper, maybe? Better still, a bit of an Instagram push, maybe a giveaway or two...”
Flo sighed. “I suppose so,” she said wearily. “There don’t seem to be enough hours in the day. Maybe we could do something in August, it’ll have more impact then.” She twiddled the little spoon on her saucer fretfully. “You could perhaps come back from London and give me a hand?”
Their eyes met, and then Flo immediately looked away. “Forget I said it,” she announced briskly. “Completely unreasonable. I know you’re so busy at work always, darling. Not fair of me to even ask.”
But there it was again, the nudge of responsibility, the twist of guilt that made Jules feel she should step into the vacuum that had opened up in Flo’s world through no fault of her own. After all, this was Aunt Flo—her greatest cheerleader in life—she owed her that, at least, didn’t she?
Sunday morning flew by. Jules set Flo up in the office taking inventory, while she did some long overdue cleaning. Even Maggie turned up and flicked a duster around ineffectually, looking sour-faced and put-upon.
Jules had too many issues on her mind to worry about her mother’s bad temper. In her head, she was drafting an email to her boss. It was difficult to find a form of words that made her message in any way acceptable, but ultimately her choice came to letting down family or letting down colleagues. She could see that allowing herself to decide which group she let down on the basis of who scared her the most was not the principled way to go. She owed Aunt Flo everything and she loved her... but she feared losing her job too. Shereallydid. Of course, it would be totally unreasonable to think she might be sacked for taking time off. The trouble was, Caroline Farquarson didn’t reallydoreasonable...
