—
I’m just double-checking what activities we have lined up for tomorrow, when Denise appears at the kitchen door, holding a large plastic crate. It’s what she uses for picking up what she calls “them glampers’ crap.”
“All done,” she says. “Been round the site. All spotless.”
“Great; thanks, Denise,” I say. “You’re a star.”
And she is. In a way. She doesn’t always turn up—but when she does, she’s very thorough. She’s ten years older than me and has three daughters and you can see them being marched to school in the mornings, with the tightest plaits I’ve ever seen.
“The things them people leave behind.” She nods at the crate.
“Did they leave a real mess?” I say sympathetically.
It’s always a surprise to me, how nice families in tasteful outfits from Boden can be so messy. And inconsiderate. One lot wouldn’t stop feeding Colin the alpaca all kinds of dumb stuff, however much we told them not to.
“You’ll never guess.” Denise’s eyes are flashing with a kind of dark triumph. “Look at this!” She pulls a Rampant Rabbit out of her crate and I gasp.
“No! No!”
“What’s that?” Biddy looks round from the cooker. “Is it a toy?”
Damn Denise. I do not want to have to explain to my stepmother what a Rampant Rabbit is.
“It’s…a thing,” I say hurriedly. “Denise, put it away. Which yurt was it in?”
“Dunno,” she says with an unconcerned shrug.
“Denise!” I clasp my head. “We’ve been over this. You have to label the lost property. Then we can send it on to the guests.”
“You sending that through the post?” Denise gives a short laugh.
“Well…” I hesitate. “Dunno. Maybe not.”
“Or this?” She brandishes a tube of cream labeled FOR PERSISTENT GENITAL WARTS.
“Oh God.” I make a face. “Really?”
“Nice top, though.” She plucks a purple T-shirt from the crate and holds it up against herself. “Can I have this?”
“No! Let’s have a look.” I peer into the crate, and, she’s right, it’s full. There’s a water pistol, a pair of children’s wellies, a bundle of papers, a baseball cap….“God, they’ve been messy this time.” My phone rings and I answer, “Ansters Farm, how may I help?”
“Oh, hello!” It’s the voluble voice of the mum in the stripy top. “Katie, is that you?”
“Yes! Is this…?”
Shit. What’s her name? I’ve forgotten already.
“Barbara! We’re on our way back. About twenty minutes away. We left behind…”
Her voice descends into crackles. The signal is so bad on the local roads, I’m amazed she got through at all.
“Barbara?” I raise my voice. “Hello, Barbara, can you hear me?”
“…very sensitive…” Her voice suddenly comes down the line again in a buzz of static. “I’m sure you found it…you can imagine how I feel…”
Oh my God. Did Barbara leave behind the Rampant Rabbit? I clap a hand over my mouth so I don’t laugh. Barbara with her clean, makeup-free face and her wholesome triplets?
“Um…”
“…absolutely mortified…had to come and get it in person…see you soon…” Her voice disappears. I gape at the silent phone, then look up.
“OK, I think we have the owner coming back.”
“Did she fess up?” Denise gives a short laugh. “I’d lie.”
“Not exactly. She said it was very sensitive and she was really embarrassed—”
“Could be this.” Denise holds up the tube of cream.
“Oh shit.” The realization hits me. “Yes. It totally could.”
I look from the Rampant Rabbit to the genital-warts cream. What a choice.
“You’re more likely to come back for a cream, maybe?” offers Denise. “If it’s on prescription or whatever?”
“But you could get that replaced.”
“The Rampant Rabbit’s worth more….”
I catch Denise’s eye and a wave of sudden hysteria comes over me.
“This is hideous.” My voice is shaking. “Which one are we going to offer her?”
“Offer her both.”
“We can’t say, Here’s a vibrator and some genital-warts cream; take your pick.” I clutch my stomach, unable to stop laughing.
“Find out which one it is,” says Biddy from the stove. “Get her into conversation about it, then when you’re sure which it is, go and get the item.”
“Conversation?” I double up. “What kind of conversation?”
“I’ll do it,” says Biddy. “Honestly, you girls! And put it in a bag,” she adds firmly. “Your dad doesn’t want to see that kind of thing lying around. And, yes, I do know what it is,” she adds, catching my eye with a little spark. “They’ve changed the designs, that’s all.”
Wow. This is the thing about Biddy: always full of surprises.
It’s only about ten minutes later that the SUV roars back up the drive. They must have been flooring it. We’ve decided that Biddy will get Barbara into conversation outside, while Denise and I lurk in the kitchen. And the minute we’ve worked out what the lost property is, we’ll come out with it, discreetly wrapped.
“Barbara!” Biddy steps out of the kitchen door. “I’m so sorry you’ve had to delay your journey.”
“Oh, it’s my own stupid fault,” says Barbara, who has leapt out of the SUV and looks very pink about the cheeks. “But I couldn’t relax till I’d retrieved it. A lot of things, you wouldn’t bother about. But that…”
I look at Denise and reach for the Rampant Rabbit with raised eyebrows. It’s sounding like the sex toy….
“Of course not, dear,” says Biddy in that cozy way she has. “Not when it’s such a very personal item.”
“Oh, it’s not mine, strictly speaking,” says Barbara. “It’s my husband’s.”
What? Denise and I stare at each other with wide eyes, then I take my hand off the Rampant Rabbit and put it on the genital-warts cream. It has to be that. Surely.
“Although he’d say I get more enjoyment out of it than he does,” Barbara says with a friendly smile.
Beside me, Denise explodes.
“Stoppit!” I whisper, and reach for the Rampant Rabbit again. I pick up the bag and prepare to head outside, though how I’m going to look Barbara in the eye, I have no idea.
“Well, Katie’s just fetching it for you,” says Biddy. “She’ll be out with it any moment.”
“That’s right.” My voice trembles with suppressed hysteria as I appear on the doorstep. “Here it is. Um…safe and sound.”
I’ve wrapped the Rampant Rabbit in brown paper and put it in a carrier bag, just so no one gets an untoward glimpse.
“Oh, I’m so relieved,” says Barbara as she takes the bag from me. “I expect I left it in the bed or somewhere, did I?”
I glance wildly at Biddy, my mouth clamped shut.
“I’m not sure, love,” says Biddy, totally unfazed. “But it seems likely, doesn’t it?”
“I’m so forgetful,” adds Barbara, with a sigh. “And the book hasn’t even been bought yet, so you can imagine how sensitive it is. As I say, I’m mortified. It’s so unprofessional, to leave a manuscript on holiday!”
I’ve frozen dead. Manuscript? Book?
“You’ve wrapped it up very nicely.” Barbara smiles and starts to poke at the brown paper. “I might just double-check it’s the right document….”
Shit, shit…
“Oh!” I try to grab the bag back from her. “Let me just…unwrap it for you.”
“I’ll do it.” She starts pulling the brown paper off and my stomach lurches as I see a flash of pink plastic.
“No trouble!” I say shrilly, wrenching the bag out of her hands. Ignoring her cry of surprise, I dash inside. “Papers!” I gasp, dumping the Rampant Rabbit on the floor. “It’s the papers.”
Denise is already one step ahead. She’s gathered up all the papers from the crate and shoves them into my hands.
“So, here we are.” I hurry back outside and thrust the pages toward Barbara, who looks a little taken aback. “I’m afraid they’ve got a bit muddled….”
“Not to worry.” Barbara starts leafing through the pages. “Yes, this is it. Again, I’m so embarrassed. It’s such sensitive material.”
“Really,” I say weakly. “No need to be.”