Free Eleven Pipers Piping by C. C. Benison

Stanhope.
    “Hello,” he called.
    “Oh, hello.” The woman turned, a slight jerk to her movements indicating that he had startled her from some reverie. The first thing Tom noticed were her cheeks, plump as red apples. She looked asgrandmotherly as a figure on a biscuit tin, but for the girlish set of her hair, parted to one side and pinned back with a pink butterfly hair slide, and the brassiness of her lipstick, almost as red as her cheeks. As he stepped towards her, he was further shaken from his grandmotherly imaginings. Behind her gold-rimmed spectacles he could see the sharp shrewd eyes.
    “You’re not the manager, surely.”
    Tom fingered his clerical collar, the object of her scrutiny. “No, I’m not.” He hesitated. “Are you wanting to stay at the hotel?”
    “Well … yes.” Her puzzled frown told Tom she thought he was dim. “If it’s not a bother.”
    “I think the hotel’s—”
    “I did ring the little bell on the desk out in the lobby some time ago, but there was no response. I expect no one could hear it over the noise.”
    “There’s a private function tonight. A Burns Supper, as it happens.”
    “Really? For the staff?”
    “Er, no … perhaps I should fetch the owner. He’s hosting the supper. If you’ll have a seat, Mrs.… Miss …?”
    “Ingley. Judith Ingley. Mrs.”
    “I’m Tom Christmas. I have to make a slight detour, Mrs. Ingley, then I’ll get Mr. Moir directly.”
    “Moir? Then there are no Stanhopes?”
    “Will Moir is married to a Stanhope, so, yes there are Stanhopes … You know the family, then?”
    “A little.” Judith Ingley’s smile was indecipherable.

    A few minutes later, Tom returned to the reception room with Will, who said: “I’m very sorry, Mrs. Ingley, the hotel is closed for renovations.”
    “Oh, dear …”
    “We haven’t been taking any reservations for the New Year. I hope someone on staff didn’t make a booking by mistake.”
    “No, I … really, I drove down on a sort of whim. I didn’t think at this time of year …”
    “Where did you come from?” Tom asked.
    “From Stafford. I didn’t imagine the weather would turn so.”
    “That’s a fair distance in these conditions.” Tom glanced at Will, wondering if he might make some accommodation at Thorn Court for the traveller. But Will’s attention seemed directed inwards. His large, bony hand pressed into the chintz fabric on the armchair set before the dying fire, as if he were making an effort to keep himself upright. Judith, too, was studying him.
    “Are you well, Mr. Moir?” She reached down for the handle of a bulging handbag.
    “I think maybe the curry hasn’t agreed with me.” Will placed his hand against his stomach.
    “Discomfort or pain?”
    “A little discomfort. It’s nothing.”
    “Upper abdomen?” she persisted, opening the clasp of her bag. “Are you feeling any pain or discomfort in your chest, perhaps? I trained as a nurse,” she added with a look that brooked no argument.
    “You do look a bit peaky, Will,” Tom added.
    “Really, it’s nothing,” Will said, asperity rising in his voice. “All it is, is … wind.”
    Judith peered at him coolly. “Well, if you say so.” She snapped the clasp shut. “Now, I wonder if there’s a bed-and-breakfast …?”
    The few there were in the village—Weir House, the Moon and Stars, and Red Cottage—paraded across Tom’s mind, but he knew that in this, the lowest weeks of the low season, their owners had not unwisely flown off to the Caribbean or Florida or the Algarve for a bit of sun. Once upon a time the Church House Inn had a carriage trade, but Emily Swan had three siblings, a mother, and afather who was the inn’s landlord. There were no rooms at that inn.
    “You mightn’t get any joy.” He shot Will another prompting glance.
    But Will was merely prompted to embellish the current condition of Thorn Court: “Much of the furniture has been moved to storage and the heat is off in the