Flora had them all up to the farmhouse, and together they pored over the increasingly battered recipe book.
“Everything is to come from here,” she told them. “Scones. Cakes. Pancakes. We’ll do two soups every day. Toasted sandwiches. Nothing too complicated. But you HAVE to follow these recipes.”
Mrs. Laird nodded.
“Those are Annie’s recipes,” she said seriously. “And she was the best cook I ever knew here.”
“Which is high praise coming from you,” said Flora.
They divided up the work. Flora took pastry, as she had such a knack for it, and found it comforting to do, although she wasn’t above kneading a loaf once in a while. She and Mrs. Laird took the new recruits step by step through the cakes. Iona and Isla, both fair-haired, pink-cheeked, healthy-looking girls, smiled happily. They were being paid rather better than the other island jobs were offering for the summer season.
Everyone pitched in to clean out the shop, and the boys came down to give it a lick of paint on the inside, Innes flirting up a storm with the girls home for the summer. Fintan didn’t give them a second glance. I’ve been such an idiot, thought Flora, reminding herself that she must talk to him about it sometime. When they’d stopped teasing the great big fancy-pants London legal hotshot for being down on her hands and knees scrubbing behind a radiator.
POP-UP they wrote on the sign outside.
“Just so people know,” Flora said. Once the council had had their vote, she was going back to London. If they wanted to carry it on afterward, that was fine, but she wouldn’t be here.
“Pop-up?” said Mrs. Laird. “What does that even mean?”
“It means it’s temporary. That it’s only here for the summer.”
“Well, just call it ‘summer,’ then.”
Flora shrugged.
“You could call it Annie’s Café,” said Mrs. Laird.
Flora looked at her, but didn’t say anything.
“I don’t think so,” she managed finally. Mrs. Laird nodded kindly.
“The Café by the Sea,” said Isla.
“It’s Mure. Everything’s seaside,” pointed out Iona, and Isla rolled her eyes.
“That will do,” said Flora. And the café by the sea was stenciled on a nice white wooden sign that went well on the pink wall, and Innes and Hamish shinnied up and hammered it in.
They’d been thoroughly checked over and the shop was full to the brim with scones and cakes, Mrs. Laird’s bread and Fintan’s cheese, warm pasties, and pies glistening with fruit. Looking at it, Flora couldn’t suppress an incredible feeling of pride as to what they’d accomplished in a few short weeks. She quelled the thought immediately. But this wasn’t just pushing paper about or running to help the lawyers, or filing or sitting in front of the computer. This felt, for the first time, as though she’d actually built something. Made something that was useful, and beautiful. It was a very unfamiliar feeling.
“Wish me luck, Dad,” Flora said as she headed out to open up on the first morning. The pink had long gone from the sky; it was a clear, beautiful day and you could see for miles. They were now well into June, when the days never ended, and the tourists had descended, exclaiming over the beauty of the landscape and the deep tranquility of the island.
Eck only grunted.
“Seems like a will-o’-the-wisp thing to me,” he said. “And I lose the boys again.”
Innes bit his lip.
“Is it still that bad?” Flora said. “Surely selling the cheese will help?”
“You’re going to have to sell a hell of a lot of it. We got the bill in for the calf transportation.” The farm was taking its yearlings to Wick to sell at the market. “We’ll be lucky to cover our costs.”
Flora rubbed her hands over her eyes. She didn’t know what to say.
“And now you’re taking Fintan away for good.”
They both looked at him. He was wearing a dapper new blue-and-white-striped apron over a white T-shirt and tight jeans.
“I think Fintan checked out a long time ago,” said Flora.
“Maybe you’re right,” said Innes. “Well, good luck. Save us a pie.”
Chapter Thirty
In fact there was to be no pie saving. From the second the Café by the Sea opened, it was massively popular—at first through rampant curiosity and a few people down to see what Flora was up to. But after they’d tried the products—the bread, the cakes, the cheeses of course—it became simply an obvious thing to return. Flora could barely look Inge-Britt in the eye, even though the Icelandic woman was manifestly unbothered and in fact they were hardly in competition with a bar that would reluctantly hand you a watery cup of coffee.
The very first customer Flora had, at 8 A.M. on that bright morning, was Charlie.
“Teàrlach,” she said with pleasure. He looked so cheerful and handsome coming in, taller than the door frame. She caught sight of a bunch of waifs behind him in a motley selection of red and yellow wet-weather gear that had obviously seen a lot of use.
“I see you’re back with the wee boys again.”
“Thank God,” said Charlie. “Last week it was lawyers—no offense.”
“Look at me!” said Flora, who was also wearing a stripy apron.
“Are they all so competitive and joyless?” said Charlie, shaking his head. “So status obsessed and uptight?”
Flora thought about Joel.
“Pretty much,” she said glumly.
“Anyway,” said Charlie, rubbing his hands, “they pay the bills. Right! I want a dozen sausage rolls, two loaves of bread, and that entire fruitcake.”
Flora looked at him.
“Seriously?”
“I’m planning on making them very hungry.”
“You’ll empty out half the shop.”
“Make more! I’ll come back and have a scone this afternoon.”
Flora grinned.
“Well, you can have that one on the house.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
She bundled the whole lot up, threw in a couple of extra sausage rolls, and waved heartily at the faces outside the window, some of whom waved tentatively back. She smiled to herself, knowing what a wonderful day they had in store, especially if it stayed as light and bright as this. As Charlie turned to go, she was struck by something—excitement and happiness at the lovely day, and the weird amazingness of being surrounded by things she’d made herself, even though this wasn’t, she told herself, her real job, her real life. Which meant she didn’t have to behave the way she did in London.
“Teàrlach,” she called as he dipped his head through the doorway. “Can we . . . would you like to have a drink sometime?”
He looked at her in mock horror as all the kids gathered round, laughing and shouting at him. He held up his hands.
“Oh, don’t do this to me.”
“Och, sir, she loves you! Is she your girlfriend, sir? What’s Jan going to say, sir?”
“Pipe down at once, all of you . . . Come on, come on, get moving, keep it up.” And he started to herd them up the little harbor road, but just before he vanished out of sight, he turned round, nodded comically, and gave Flora a huge wink.
She was still smiling as she went to check on Iona and Isla in the back, taking things out of the oven, and even when Lorna popped in on her way to school.