Page 34 of A Merry Little Christmas
‘I’ll let you know when I’m feeling better. Hopefully I’ll see you on Wednesday.’
There was a brief pause. ‘Wednesday?’
‘Cake run day? I usually pop into the site office?’
‘Oh, yes. Sorry. Yes. You said you’d bring me a chocolate doughnut. Look, I need to go right now. But take care of yourself, Katja. Andstay at home, okay?’
I said goodbye and ended the call, feeling strangely unsettled.
Stay at home, okay?
His insistence that I look after myself seemed weirdly at odds with the distracted way he’d been recently. The funny banter between us –always one of our greatest strengths – had been non-existent during that phone call. It had been literally like talking to my GP!
When the phone rang again a moment later, I pounced on it in the wild hope that it was Caleb again, wanting to apologise for sounding weird.
But it was another name that flashed up.
‘Maddy? How are you?’
She groaned. ‘Not as bad as I was last night but I’m still feeling pretty sick.’
‘What? Really?’
‘You’ve been feeling bad as well, haven’t you?’
I frowned. ‘How do you know that?’
‘Because Jaz just phoned me to say she was feeling nauseous and Ellie’s chutney kept repeating on her. And funnily enough, that’s exactly what’s been happening to me.’
‘And me as well!’ I gasped.
‘I thought so. I phoned Fen and she said she felt a bit sick yesterday and was starting to worry she might be pregnant again! But she says she feels fine today.’
I frowned, finding it hard to process this. ‘So hang on. Are you telling me you think it was Ellie’schutneythat made us all queasy?’
‘What else can it be? We all had some, didn’t we? And we’ve all been feeling rough ever since?’
I frowned. ‘Wouldn’t Ellie have felt rough herself if she’d been tasting the chutney as she went along?’
‘Maybe shewasill, but she put it down to some other cause?’
‘I really thought I was coming down with some weird virus.’
‘So did I. Until Jaz phoned and we realised it could be something we both ate.’
‘It wasn’t nice. The chutney. But actualfood poisoning?’
‘Who’s going to tell Ellie?’
‘Not me.’ I shuddered at the very thought.
‘She has to know. I mean, she’s donating multiple jars of the stuff to the WI sale and it’s happening next week. Can youimagine the news headlines if she manages to make an entire village ill, just in time for Christmas?’
‘Ellie the Sunnybrook Poisoner?’ I groaned. ‘Oh, don’t.’
‘Someone has to tell her and it sounds like you’re all chicken,’ pointed out Maddy. ‘I’ve got a horrible feeling it will have to be me.’
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
