“Good morning!” said Elspeth Binney.
Elspeth walked into the front garden accompanied by a woman who would never be mistaken for a Handmaiden. The stranger was tall and lean, but curvy, and her legs seemed to go on forever. She had pale blue eyes, high cheekbones, lustrous honey-blond hair that flowed down her back in gleaming waves, and a tan that rivaled Jack’s. She wore a khaki vest dotted with pockets over a formfitting white tank top and she’d pulled a pair of scuffed cowboy boots over her skintight blue jeans.
It was hard to guess her age—older than Jack, I thought, and younger than me—but in her case, age was irrelevant. She was certifiably gorgeous, and though I’d never seen her before, I knew who she was. The three cameras hanging from straps around her neck were a dead giveaway.
“May I introduce my niece?” Elspeth said brightly. “Jemima—”
“Jemma Renshawe,” the gorgeous woman interrupted gruffly, raising one of the cameras to her eye. “Pretend I’m not here.”
It was impossible to comply with her request as she writhed around us, snapping photographs of our startled faces from every conceivable angle, but I pretended, for Elspeth’s sake, to take her niece’s uncouth behavior in stride.
“Pleased to meet you, Jemma,” I said.
Jemma grunted.
“Yes, er, welcome to the village, um, Jemma,” said the vicar, looking both uncomfortable and bewildered. “If you’ll forgive me, I must return to the vicarage to, um, to revise my sermon.” He sidled awkwardly toward the lane in a bid to escape the slinking shutterbug. “I’ll say good-bye for now, then, shall I? I look forward to seeing you this afternoon, Jack.”
“Count on it, Vicar,” said Jack, who appeared to be vastly amused by the situation.
Bree was not amused. She waited until the vicar was gone, then strode up to Jemma and cupped her hand over the camera lens. Jemma rose from a contorted crouch and looked at Bree in surprise.
“Problem?” Jemma asked.
“Yes,” Bree snapped, squaring her shoulders. “I don’t recall giving you my permission to take my photograph.”
“Oh.” Jemma’s puzzled expression vanished. “Sorry. Forgot. Get carried away sometimes.”
“Jemma is working on a book about Cotswold villages,” Elspeth intervened hastily. “She’s been commissioned to take photographs of villagers.”
“I’m not a villager,” said Jack. “I’m not even English, so you may as well delete my photos, Jemma. Bree and Lori aren’t English, either, but they live here, as does Mr. Bunting, who’s English to the bone. I’m sure he won’t mind being in your book.”
“It’s okay with me, too,” I said. I wasn’t wildly enthused about having my left nostril immortalized in print, but I didn’t want to upset Elspeth by opting out.
“What about you?” Jemma asked Bree.
“Yes, all right, I suppose you can use my photographs, too,” Bree said with ungracious reluctance. “Come on, Jack. If we keep hanging about, the garden center will be closed before we get there.”
Bree marched off to climb into Jack’s car and Jack ran after her, calling cheery good-byes to Elspeth and to Jemma. Jemma grunted at me and left the front garden. Elspeth watched her go, then turned to me.
“Your niece is very . . . interesting,” I observed.
“She has an artistic temperament,” said Elspeth. “When she has a camera in her hands, she becomes obsessed.” Elspeth’s brow furrowed worriedly as she gazed toward the empty gateway. “She didn’t even want a cup of tea after her long drive down from Yorkshire. She preferred to get straight to business.”
“She’s certainly not a time waster,” I said encouragingly. “She swept in and out of here like a real pro.”
“Yes,” Elspeth said without conviction. “She doesn’t approve of posed photos, you see. She prefers to capture images fleetingly, in unstructured environments. She believes impromptu photos give a more accurate reflection of human nature.”
“Fascinating,” I said dutifully.
“She’s brought an awful lot of equipment with her,” Elspeth said, and the creases in her forehead deepened. “Two computers, a printer, and all sorts of paraphernalia. It wouldn’t fit on the desk in the guest room, so Jemma spread it out on my dining room table.”
“A small sacrifice,” I said, “when you consider the end result.”
“Indeed,” said Elspeth. “It will be worth it in the end. And it’s all very . . . interesting. If you’ll excuse me, I should probably go after her.”