Alex Brown - The Secret of Orchard Cottage - The feel-good number one bestseller

‘Yes please, that would be lovely. And there’s some cherry madeira cake left if you fancy another slice?’ April offered.

‘Ooh, don’t mind if I do.’ But then Edie hesitated, and changed her mind. ‘But I really shouldn’t, don’t want to ruin my figure.’ And she patted her perfectly tiny tummy with both hands, while a disappointed look darted across her face.

‘I’m sure a second slice won’t hurt.’ April busied herself with opening the tin, and after pulling a knife from the block on the side, she cut a couple of very generous slices, figuring it a crying shame if an elderly lady couldn’t have two slices of cake in one day if she really wanted to, and served them on to plates. ‘There, I’ll finish the tea while you tuck in.’ April put the plates on the table.

‘Well, if you insist, my dear.’ Edie wasted no time in breaking off a corner of cake and popping it into her mouth.

‘I most certainly do,’ April grinned, preparing the tea in a china tea pot, with cups on saucers, just the way she knew her aunt liked it.

‘You always were a persuasive child,’ Edie chuckled, licking crumbs from the tips of her fingers, thoroughly enjoying the treat.

‘Was I, Aunty?’ April asked, seizing the moment to talk about the past.

‘Oh, yes, very much so. Spirited! That’s what we used to say … your parents and I.’ April placed the pot of tea on the table and sat down, allowing herself a moment of contemplation while she remembered her parents. Their smiles. Her mum’s perfume – one whiff of Rive Gauche and April was in her childhood bedroom being kissed goodnight. She swallowed, hard, and rearranged her thoughts, not wanting to go there right now. It was at least twenty years ago and she had only happy, albeit faded, memories of her mum and dad, but she knew from experience that train of thought inevitably led to Gray. But his death was different. Raw. And he had suffered, been forced to be brave and face up to his end of life. At least her parents had gone quickly, most likely went out with a bang – literally, if the newspaper reports at the time were anything to go by with their unnecessarily graphic details about the crash. She had read them online, several years later, out of curiosity mainly, but had regretted doing so ever since.

‘And what did they say about you when you were a child?’ April asked, pouring her aunt some tea.

‘Cheeky!’ Edie shook her head. ‘But I got away with it you know.’

‘Oh, why was that then?’

‘I was the youngest. The apple of my father’s eye. Spoilt, my brothers and sister would say …’

‘Your sister? What was her name?’

‘Winnie.’

Bingo! April leant forward and the faded memory of her dad chatting to Aunt Edie in the sitting room, years ago, flooded into her head. She had been playing with her Tiny Tears doll on the carpet and Dad had picked up the photo of the woman in the uniform. April suddenly felt overwhelmed with joy, figuring it was very lovely indeed to be piecing her family history together – precious memories returning – bringing her long-gone relatives alive and making them immortal. And one day perhaps, she’d reach a point where memories of Gray would create the same feeling within her.

‘What happened to your sister, Aunty?’

‘I don’t know,’ Edie said quite abruptly, before finishing her cake. ‘Mmm, that was delicious. We must bake some more cakes, dear, you used to love helping me cook, do you remember?’ And April’s heart sank all over again on realising that the topic of Winnie seemed well and truly closed … for now.

The following day, having enjoyed her best night’s sleep in ages, up in the sunny rose-print-papered attic bedroom that she remembered sleeping in as a child, April was standing by the white picket fence surveying the front garden and wondering if she really would have enough time to tackle it before she went home. On closer inspection, it was a veritable jungle and there was no way April was going to make a deep enough dent in just one day. Maybe she could come back another weekend, bring Nancy and Freddie with her. Freddie might be inclined to be lazy around the house, but he was always up for doing outdoorsy stuff, and Nancy would be happy to get stuck in, April was sure of it.

Deep in thought, April had just taken a mouthful of her post-lunch mint tea when Aunt Edie appeared on the footpath wearing a floor-length, russet-red organza ballgown and a big sprig of cherry blossom in her hair. April nearly snorted tea from her nose, but managed to refrain from doing so in the nick of time. She then opened her mouth. And closed it. Utterly unsure of how she should react. Edie looked resplendent, like a shiny big Quality Street as she rustled down the path. But she was dressed quite inappropriately for another afternoon of pottering around her rural country cottage, or indeed cleaning her Aga … again, as she had mooted earlier this morning over their scrumptious breakfast of freshly laid eggs. Edie had asked April to check the hen house, and amazingly there were ten feathery, mud-splattered eggs waiting in the straw for them, which they enjoyed boiled with soldiers slathered in salted butter, made from bread from the baker in the village, whose sister lived in the cottage at the top of the lane, so ‘it’s no trouble for him to drop a loaf in when he’s passing by’, apparently. April had heard all about it from Edie over breakfast.

‘There you are, Winnie, my dear! I looked all over for you,’ Edie said in a very chirpy, singsong voice. April went to correct her, but didn’t get the chance before the old lady carried on talking, and besides, April wondered if it really mattered. Especially as she had lost count of the times now that she had reminded her great aunt that her name wasn’t Winnie. And when April had taken the opportunity again over breakfast to find out more about the elusive Winnie, her aunt had given April a baffled look, just as she had last night, before swiftly changing the subject. Not to mention the fact that Edie still hadn’t said a word about Gray; it was as if she really had forgotten he had died, and that in itself was worrying as April knew that her aunt had been very fond of him. Until his death she’d always asked after him when they spoke on the phone and she had never missed his birthday. In fact, when they last visited Edie together, it had been Gray that her aunt had seemed most keen to chat to, even taking him around the orchard and regaling him with stories of how she had enjoyed many summers playing in the fields, running in between the apple and pear trees with her brothers, paying special attention to Robert, April’s grandfather. Gray had said she was very lucid for a woman of her age – she had remembered the tiniest of details, such as the time Robert had found a baby starling with a broken wing and nursed it back to full health before setting it free.

‘That’ll be where your compassion comes from, April,’ Gray had said later in the car on the way home, and April had liked the thought of having inherited something of her grandfather. It was comforting, knowing that a genetic part of him lived on in her. It seemed important to April, with her not having any living relatives left apart from Edie. And April and Gray hadn’t been blessed with babies, despite them both wanting a family – they had tried at the start, soon after the wedding, but then when Gray became ill … it hadn’t seemed important any more. Although still young enough to have a baby, April doubted now that she’d ever be a mother, but she felt very lucky to have Nancy and Freddie in her life. Being their stepmum was a wonderful next-best thing …