Walnut Mince Pies at the Frost Fete Read online

  Walnut Mince Pies at the Frost Fete

  By Laura Briggs

  Smashwords Edition

  Copyright 2021 Laura Briggs

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com to purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Cover Image: “Cornish winter village”. Original art, “Evening winter village scene” Stekloduv and “Spring Ribbon,” by Zandiepants. Used with permission. http://www.dreamstime.com/

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Dear Reader,

  What could be cozier than an English village fete? Perhaps an old-fashioned Christmas market—or both, in the case of Julianne’ s latest life chapter.

  A place as idyllic (and fictional) as Ceffylgwyn couldn’t have a village fete and seasonal market without them being just a little bit magical, eclectic … and a tiny bit chaotic at times. Nothing feels more idyllic, however, than strolling by stalls of holiday greenery, handcrafted ornaments, and baked goods: the perfect way to spend a December afternoon, especially with a stop at the tea tent. Part of Ceffylgwyn’s market’s charm was inspired by some gorgeous German Christmas markets, but with a twist of English Christmas tradition to bring on the plum pudding and wassail for the carols. As for the key component of this market, I think you’ll find the addition of Father Christmas’ children’s village to be a pretty unique sounding experience (I would totally go on the candy slide!!)

  Unsurprisingly, Julianne could use some fun and relaxation for the holidays. Those of you wondering whether her life can stand much more chaos after the events of Cornish Gold at Summer’s End, well...the answer is yes, of course. She and Matt have their parenting work cut out for them, with foster son Joel’s withdrawn behavior and daughter Sylvia’s sudden rebellion. As always, they have each other to lean on, not to mention their ever supportive circle of friends. In this case, a new ally in the form of Sylvia’s school teacher, the cheerful and charming Ben, whom readers can expect to see more of in future stories.

  And if you’re rooting for manor house chef Michael to find true love, well, there’s a twist in his storyline that offers new possibilities and ‘what ifs’ that even Julianne isn’t sure what to make of. Elsewhere, Kitty braces herself for another crazy family gathering, and housekeeper Mrs. Norris reveals hidden talents no one could have dreamed of as Christmas in Ceffylgwyn proves as comforting as mincemeat pies and cocoa on a chilly afternoon.

  Happy Christmas—and happy reading—to you!

  Prologue

  The ad for the Christmas tree seller's website popped up in bright red and greens on the screen of my computer on this November morning, as I sipped my coffee. Outside the window, frost glittered in our front garden, decorating Matt's dried stalks of hollyhock like glittery wizard's wands.

  I wasn't shopping for my own tree — my husband would remind me that needles turn brittle long before Christmas day in a heated room. My kids would adore it, but Sylvie and Heath, unlike me, had grown up accustomed to mixing American-style commercialism with the 'ye old English' traditions of local villages in a unique harmony. Even after a decade, I still had to come to grips with ancient customs that included a carol about serving a boar's head.

  The order form for Christmas trees on my computer screen was actually arranging for them to be delivered to a nearby countryside hotel which had just finished renovations, and was opening its grand new conference center and banquet hall with a wedding this Christmas. A wedding which I, Julianne Rose, and my business partner Kitty, had been hired to make perfect, right down to the delivery of six perfectly-flocked Christmas trees with boughs of greenery and holly for decoration.

  I sent my confirmation date in the reply, then leaned back in the plushy old armchair that still needed reupholstered. The only twig of Christmas around me was a little sprig of holly Matt had cut from some bushes, propped by a postcard my parents had sent from their caravan trip to South Dakota. The berries were an orangey-red, like the 'streaks of fire' in my auburn hair, as Matt called them when he first admitted the force of his attraction to me.

  Frost on the lawn and a simple sprig of holly in the early morning hours were a tiny taste of peace in my chaotic life. Mother of two with a new foster son sleeping in the next room, I knew the value of small moments and early mornings when everybody else was still asleep, even Matt's midnight mane buried underneath his pillow, with a half hour before his wakeup call would chime.

  Joel was settling into our house ... sort of. A child who had suffered abuse and neglect would need extra time, the social worker had reminded us a hundred times, in case we should start to feel nervous that he wasn't adapting to our world. Normal wasn't coming overnight, in other words.

  At least the kids had taken his arrival surprisingly well — that is, they'd given him his space, and went on with their lives most days without staring at the non-speaking little boy at the breakfast table, who hunkered over his toast. So long as only Joel had to go to special classes and therapy sessions, they simply flexed their world around his new one. Maybe it wasn't ideal, but with neither staring nor squabbling, Matt and I were calling it a truce in this shift in our living arrangements.

  I closed the tree's website link, then opened the one for the online toy retailer, pinning it to my browser as a reminder that while mince pies were still a few weeks away, shopping time was nearly here. What to get for a boy who doesn't talk and only wants to hide from us in small spaces? I had a feeling that the two hundred piece MegaMetal war machine action kit being advertised on sale was not the perfect choice for Joel — or for Heath, who would scatter all its pieces with a seven year-old's zeal. But that set of children's hardback classics and the E-Z rug hook kit would be perfect for Sylvia's advanced reading skills and bad crafting skills going on eight years of age after her last birthday.

  Just a bit younger than Joel's age, really. Only he felt so much younger, so much more vulnerable than my little daughter, who worked so hard to act older than she was — and hadn't seen any of the hardships of living rough, unlike the boy who had taken her old room. How could two children so similar be so different? How could I navigate buying gifts for an eight year-old going on sixteen in the classics and a nearly ten year-old whose most enthusiastic reaction to anything so far had been my son's old fidget spinner?

  Maybe this should be Matt's year to do the family shopping. He and his interns were busy with their garden design for the professional English landscape garden competition, but he didn't have any landscaping commissions on his plate currently — whereas I had a wedding to plan, plus had let my friend Amanda rope me into a role in the village's Christmas market and fete this year.

  Not to mention the whole pregnancy thing. Number four would drop into our lives sometime next spring, so we would have diapers to change on top of all the rest.

&
nbsp; Yup, it was definitely my husband's year to find a gift basket for my parents and his sister's family. Maybe he could find the right gift that would speak to a non-communicative little boy.

  Walnut Mince Pies at the Frost Fete

  by

  Laura Briggs

  Chapter One

  Lady Amanda possessed as much excitement and vibrancy as the ginger from whence her color of hair earned its name, and she applied it not only to her role as lady of the manor at Cliffs House but to every community-minded organization in the village of Ceffylgwyn, where we lived. After a brief stint on the local council, she turned her attention back to her real passion, the local business and tourism promotion organization which she helped establish — hence how she came to be involved in the local Christmas celebration.

  "This year's theme is the Frost Fete," she said, passing out fliers to all the volunteers gathered for the meeting. "The party and the market are not adhering to the Old English theme strictly — just the spirit of it. As most of you know, Noreen chose it and was planning to spearhead the process until her unfortunate slip on wet pavement. I've been tapped as replacement, but in the spirit of the original plans, we shall proceed largely as she intended, since progress had already begun."

  "Is this bit about the food right?" the local curate Martin glanced up from his page.

  "Yes, it is," said Amanda. "I know that English Christmas traditions beyond mince pies sometimes seem a bit ... odd ... but Michael has compiled a potential menu, from which all the food stalls have taken inspiration for this year."

  "Good thing I'm in charge of games. I've never fancied roasting boar's head," he answered, to a chorus of hearty chuckles. Beside me, Kitty made a face.

  "This year, there will be a kid's activities table with crafts for children, inspired by Christmas and by old English traditions — that will come under Martin's heading, unfortunately, unless other volunteers would like to join," joked Lady Amanda.

  I could feel her gaze fixed hopefully on me and Kitty. My business partner raised one eyebrow as she glanced at me. "We could take a turn," I said, holding up my hand. "The greenery stall is only open on Fridays and Sundays." At least according to the schedule in my hand.

  "Thank you, Juli. And thank you for calling attention to the extended time period for this year's market," said Amanda. "This year, we've increased the festival's time by a full week. As you all know — especially Martin — we're hoping that charitable donations at the fete day's tea tent fundraiser will increase significantly in return. Since I am sharing duties at the local business promotion booth, I will be hostess for the Old English Christmas Dinner that will be served for tea on the fete day itself — tickets are available, and we highly encourage people to buy one."

  She checked her list. "Let's see ... Michael on menu, Martin on games, Juli, Kitty, and Rosie on crafts ... Nigel handling the carnival's hired gear and the final Saturday's activities ... Juli, Kitty, and Marian on greenery ... and we have a complete list of vendors stalls, which Charlotte kindly helped coordinate in between perfecting her mince pies," said Amanda, passing out a second list. "Assembly begins this weekend, but I'm quite certain that Martin will be needing additional help for the Father Christmas Village, in whatever theme he chooses."

  "How about gingerbread?" shouted Cal, who was near the back. I knew he would be one of the carpenters tapped for repairing food and merchant stalls, not to mention cutting plywood houses for the children's market.

  Martin nodded in agreement, and Lady Amanda ticked off an item on her list. "Lorrie, you'll be volunteering for the tea tent, I presume? Charlotte, you've signed up for the Christmas tombola, which is part of our charity fundraising effort — this year's prizes donated by local businesses and the market's merchants... make certain no one's extra volunteer hours clash with their stall's hours of operation, please."

  The village's Christmas market was usually held the last two weeks of December before Christmas, on the church common, with an emphasis on providing local greenery and plenty of warm snacks of the usual Christmas fare — roasted chestnuts, Charlotte's mince pies, spiced hot wine — with the Cornish touch of traditional pasties and saffron bun. Usually the fete day with the biggest activities fell on the last Saturday before Christmas. The past few years, however, the event had begun to expand as more visitors began appearing on weekends, in search of country charm and small gifts for friends and family. That's when the tourism bureau put up a stall promoting local businesses, and the children's market expanded from the bean bag toss game and milk bottle towers to the Father Christmas Village.

  Father Christmas usually put in an appearance on Christmas Eve, just before the market's last day ended at dusk — that was the highlight, other than whatever delectable food Michael prepared for the tea tent and winning a decent prize with the spin of the tombola. Last year, I had won a free tea for two at the swanky Bronze Perch tea house down the coast.

  I perused the lists we'd been given, all of which had a tiny festive sprig of holly printed at the top. Lots of ornament booths and handmade knitted things, lots of chestnuts and wassail and spice biscuits.

  "This must be Michael's menu," I said, separating the final sheet from the others. "Mmmm. Cherry butter Danish biscuits. I have no idea what those are, but they sound great."

  "He worked most of this up before he took on the kitchen at Evergreen," said Kitty, flipping the page over to read the menu on the back, which belonged to the Old English Christmas tea — the luxury of Tudor royalty in modern cuisine, without a boar's head, thankfully. "He knew he wouldn't have time between here and Penzance."

  Michael was substituting for a posh Penzance hotel's restaurant chef for the holidays, which meant he wasn't downstairs in the manor's kitchen baking his usual fruit scones and butter biscuits for the fete's English dinner, but spending half his days making plum truffle and smoked salmon souffles instead.

  "I guess we can't tap him to fill in if our caterer for the wedding falls short," I joked. "Not unless the chef is coming home from Athens early. Not that Michael isn't busy already. He usually does the menu for whatever big charitable endeavor has booked the manor during the season. He should really take a holiday for himself."

  "He's too busy for that," said Kitty, focusing on the view of the green ahead of us, where the first stalls were under construction. "Rumor going around says he's spending time with the new sous chef," she added. "So it's probably not just the usual busy stuff keeping him in Penzance some days."

  This statement was like a dash of cold water hitting me. "Michael's dating someone?" I glanced at her. "Is it true?"

  I was shocked, because Michael hadn't been out with anybody in ages. His emotional connection with the comedian Kimmie last winter had been the closest I had seen him to falling for someone in a long time. Something about that experience had made me think he wouldn't be ready to move on to romance, either.

  She shrugged. "I didn't ask," she answered. "But I know he's seen Sadie a time or two when he goes to the port markets there. They had dinner."

  "His idea or hers?"

  "Who knows? Maybe last winter made him think a bit. Nothing like being star-crossed to give you a swift kick back to reality — my mum used to say that after every sad romance movie on telly."

  Wisdom from Bets, which I pictured delivered grimly between puffs on a cigarette. "Is that based on what Michael said, or just your opinion?" Nobody knew Michael better than Kitty did — even me or Lady Amanda. He and Kitty had a friendship connection that was unique to them.

  "Little of both," said Kitty.

  Kimmie had a boyfriend. An actor on a popular BBC police program, who seemed like the sort of guy one half of television's most popular primetime comedy duo should date. It wasn't like Michael was going to rush to London on his motorcycle and ask her to break up with a heartthrob celebrity and date him, even if the few texts I read from Kimmie to him carried an undercurrent of longing whenever she talked about Michael and Cornwall, beneath the spark
ling wit and silliness on the surface.

  A few cooking lessons, a few sparks of chemistry, a few text messages sent by people who had become friends with a dash of something more involved — it didn't have to blossom into true romance.

  Right?

  It was better not to think about what might have been. I decided to drop the subject of Michael's wise and inevitable decision to move on. Mostly because I felt bad that he ever had to make it in the first place. "So," I said, "Where's our patch of turf this year?" I turned the map from Amanda's dossier, trying to find the greenery stand, where Kitty and I would help people bundle together cuttings of holly, mistletoe, ivy, and other English plants for decorating wreaths.

  "We're by the straw ornament stall," said Kitty. "Near the antique shop's table. I reckon that puts us in earshot of the screams from the kindermarket."

  Over her shoulder, baby Tige stirred, a curious hand reaching for her mummy's paperwork. At six months and counting, Tige had begun to blossom a few wispy baby curls in the same shade of black as Kitty's own, but they were hidden underneath the knit sock monkey cap which covered her ears against the cold.

  "Mine," said Kitty automatically, tucking the hand back — but squeezing the little rosy mitten hand at the same time. She glanced over her shoulder, looking into the baby's serious face, where a smile broke out.

  I was still amazed that Kitty's frame hauled Tige around the way it did — from the newborn baby bunting to this backpack-like kid carrier that hauled Tige — or Rosamund, as her grandmother Bets staunchly declared every time the nickname was mentioned — like a military knapsack through the everyday battles of planning customers' events. I definitely didn't think I could do it with number four, who was already beginning to form a noticeable bump underneath my 'Keep Calm and Drink Wassail' t-shirt and coat.