Page 7 of Watch For Me By Candlelight

He was still slightly confused, but he followed the red-head and her jeans into the reception area.

She went behind the counter and Theo suddenly realised. ‘Aha! You work here.’

‘I do indeed. It’s a bit late, you know. Are you sure you want to come in? We close in about an hour. It’s four o’clock on a Friday.’ She looked up at the multitude of clocks that surrounded her.

‘An hour is fine,’ Theo told her.

‘Well, if you’re sure.’

‘I’m sure.’ Theo noticed a man sitting on an old church pew to the side of the room, his legs stretched out in front of him, inspecting a smartphone.

‘The signal doesn’t get any better here, does it?’ the guy said, directing his comment to the red-head.

She shook her head, concentrating on the till. ‘Nope. It doesn’t. You can use the laptop if you want.’

‘Thanks Kate. I’ll nip up now.’

‘Yep, you know where it is. There.’ She looked up at Theo and stapled his receipt to a little fold-out leaflet with a map on it. ‘If you follow the markers you can’t get lost. And if you don’t see it all, come back tomorrow. I should be on the desk until lunchtime at least. If I’m around, I’ll just let you back in.’

‘Thanks.’ He took the ticket from her. ‘You’re positive the boss won’t mind?’

She laughed. ‘I am the boss. It’s all mine. Well, I look after the place. It’s not mine, actually physically mine. You know?’

‘I know,’ he said. ‘Well if you’re the boss and you say it’s okay, it clearly is. So I start through here?’ He indicated the door to his left. It seemed to take him into the cottages and, he assumed, would lead him through the whole terrace if he kept on going.

‘Yes, start there. I’ll be out front if you need anything, just next to that bicycle. A friend wants to borrow it, but it’s in no fit state at the moment.’ She stared at the doorway thoughtfully. ‘I have plans for it though.’

‘Great. If I can’t find you, I’ll just ask your colleague.’ Theo nodded to the side-door where the man had disappeared.

The girl — Kate — laughed. ‘You can ask him, but he probably can’t help you. He doesn’t work here. He’s my boyfriend.’

For some reason Theo felt a bit miffed at that. She had a boyfriend. Oh, well.

‘Okay. I’ll just look for you.’

‘I’m not hard to find,’ she replied with a grin. ‘Oh! Can I ask you to leave your backpack behind the counter here, please?’

He had to agree with the “not hard to find” comment. He’d found her three times already today and he hadn’t even been trying.

‘Sure.’ Theo swung the backpack off. He handed it over to her and she dropped it onto the floor.

‘Like I said, just find me when you’re finished.’

‘No problem,’ he said and smiled at her.

* * *

Kate watched as the visitor disappeared through the door into the first cottage. Theo Kent. She’d read the name on his credit card. It was an automatic thing she did. Her poor customers; she knew more of them by name than they probably realised.

She looked at his backpack and saw it was pretty well-used and battered. He was definitely outdoorsy; the sort of guy you could envisage running up a mountain before breakfast and kayaking across an ocean after lunch. Kate couldn’t quite comprehend that level of physical activity for herself, but some people apparently thrived on it. And she had to admit it did wonders for their physique. Not that she should have been noticing such things, but still . . .

She headed back outside and squatted down by the bicycle. She had acquired some sandpaper from the tool store and thought she might as well try to take some of the flaky paint off. She’d need a bit more time and some proper equipment to stabilise the chassis and deal with the tyres though.

As it turned out, Theo Kent was the last customer of the day. Kate was a little startled when one of the clocks from the reception area struck four and she looked up. None of the clocks ever went off except the cuckoo clock; that bellowing ding dong ding dong was anything but her little wooden bird popping his head out. She dashed into the reception area and saw Theo looking as confused as she was.

‘Hey,’ he said. ‘I just came back through to get my bag. And your clock went off.’ He nodded over at the big grandfather clock from the Hall.

Kate frowned. ‘It shouldn’t have done. I’ll have to check it later.’ She reached down and retrieved the backpack. ‘There you go. It’s not as heavy as it looks, is it?’