Free The Inn at the Edge of the World by Alice Thomas Ellis Page B

and the ploughman’s in the bar, refusing to burden Finlay’s sister-in-law with the necessity to provide chicken in a basket or battered prawns.
    ‘You’ll find your lunch laid out in the dining room,’ he said as he saw Jessica and Harry. ‘Just let me know when you want your soup.’
    ‘There’s no hurry,’ said Harry. ‘Do you know who lives in the Manse?’
    ‘You mean the Old Manse?’ asked Eric. ‘The minister’s been gone for years, I believe, and some chap from London’s got it. It’s called the Old Manse now. He doesn’t usually come down in the winter – comes down in the summer with a load of people for the sailing.’
    Jessica wished that Harry hadn’t asked this question. The answer, whatever it was, had been bound to be painful. She was imagining a young Harry gathering mussels at low tide with his young love and going home to boil them in the kitchen of the Manse while the minister wrote sermons in his study . . .
    ‘Do you want a brandy?’ asked Harry.
    Jessica pulled herself together. ‘This is on me,’ she said, ‘and I’m having a Bloody Mary.’ She began to imagine Harry and his wife, paddling with their little boy and laughing . . . Impatient with herself she asked, ‘Where are the others?’ although she wasn’t interested.
    Eric shrugged. ‘Went walking, I suppose,’ he said. He didn’t care either as long as they weren’t late for lunch and he wouldn’t be left clearing the table as opening time approached. Despite the relaxed laws he closed the inn in the afternoon. It was quite busy today. The professor, the girl and Mrs H. were back, and several of the locals were downing pints and ham sandwiches. He thought perhaps his luck had changed until he noticed that everyone was looking at Jessica and realized the word had gone round that the island was entertaining a celebrity.
    ‘So what did you do today?’ asked the professor of Jessica.
    ‘I walked along the shore,’ said Jessica.
    ‘You must have passed my place,’ said the professor. ‘It’s down on the left. Next time you must call in.’ The girl in the duffel coat glowered. ‘This is Amelia,’ said the professor as an afterthought.
    Jon shot in. ‘Where’ve you been?’ he said to Jessica. ‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you.’
    ‘Why?’ asked Jessica, startled by his accusing tone.
    Jon stared at her suspiciously. Acting innocent, was she? Well, she’d learn he didn’t take that sort of thing from his women. ‘
You
know . . .’ he began and then became aware that people were looking at him oddly. ‘I’ve got an idea,’ he said, ‘for a script – this place gave me the idea . . .’
    Oh,
hell
. Jessica had a method for dealing with this sort of thing, but it evaded her. ‘You must tell me about it,’ she said, and he began to do so. Well, I didn’t mean
now
, she thought, not this minute. I didn’t mean it at all, and I certainly didn’t mean
now
.
    ‘This sounds to me like shop,’ said the professor, eyeing Jon’s blond curls with dislike. ‘We don’t allow shop on the island.’
    ‘No, no,’ said Eric in an undertone. ‘No, no, no. We’re not going to have any of that.’ He glanced round to check that there were enough large men to sit on people should the need arise and started out from behind the bar.
    The locals discouraged violence because it could draw the attention of the police. They only had one policeman on the island, and since they didn’t want the number to increase they assisted him
in absentia
whenever they could. It was part of the island mentality. Islanders are used to handling their own problems and resent outside interference. It was only in the season when the bald-headed ones came over that the locals tended to stay discreetly in the background. They were accustomed to disarming those of their number who had had a dram too much and taken it into their minds to shoot their womenfolk – or lifting the hopelessly inebriated out of snow-filled