‘Don’t expect any sympathy from me,’ she said. ‘I wanted a quiet night in, but you insisted. Let’s go wassailing, you said.’
‘It was Roger’s idea, and we’re staying at his house tonight, Sergeant, in case you’d forgotten. He’s doing us a curry.’
‘I am. Prawn and chicken, all the trimmings.’ Poland chuckled. ‘You know you’re in trouble when he’s calling you “sergeant”. I used to call my fiancée “darling”.’
‘You’re divorced, Roger.’
‘True enough. Maybe I’d have been better off if I’d called her Cruella de Vi—’ He was interrupted by the jangling of a host of small bells. ‘Ah, jolly good, the Morris dancers are here.’
‘Fuck me, that’s all we need,’ grumbled Jane.
A loudhailer crackled into life. ‘Right then, ladies and gents, welcome to Oake Cider Farm. My name is Malcolm Hope-Bruce and I’ll be your master of ceremonies this evening. As you know, Oake is very much a family affair, and you’ve met my sister-in-law, Diana, and my nephew, Jos, at the bar. I hope everyone’s enjoying the mulled cider?’
A cheer from the crowd.
‘Let’s go wassailing!’
Dixon joined in, half-heartedly, if only to drown out Jane’s sigh; that and delay drinking the mulled cider a little longer.
‘We’re almost ready for the procession out to the orchards,’ continued Malcolm. He was carrying a shotgun over his shoulder, the barrel glinting in the light from the flaming torches being held aloft by the crowd behind him. ‘Has everyone got a copy of the incantation so you can join in? For those of you who don’t know, the idea is to ward off evil spirits so we get a good crop of apples for next year’s cider making.’
‘The bloody Morris dancers will do that on their own,’ said Jane.
‘We all sing the incantation, then when I’ve fired the shotgun, rattle your pots and pans if you’ve got them and hit the trees with your sticks. After that, we welcome the good spirits with offerings of burnt toast soaked in cider.’
Dixon put his arm around Jane’s waist and pulled her towards him. ‘Don’t. Say. It.’ Then he kissed her on the lips. ‘Just keep thinking about Roger’s curry. And if it’s horrible, we can feed it to Monty under the table.’ He looked down at their feet, where a large white Staffordshire terrier was sitting patiently. The dog’s nose was twitching, his eyes fixed firmly on the person carrying the toast.
‘Everyone is welcome to have a go,’ continued Malcolm, still shouting into his loudhailer. ‘We just hang the toast in the branches of the trees, drink from the wassail cup, then there’ll be a display from the Mendip Morris dancers.’
‘Oh no you don’t.’ Jane reached out and took hold of the fur-lined hood of the coat in front of her, stopping her half-sister, Lucy, in her tracks as she made a beeline for the bar. ‘You’re coming with us. If I can’t get out of it, neither can you. And besides, you’re sixteen.’
‘It’s only cider,’ protested Lucy.
‘You won’t get past that dragon at the bar, anyway,’ said Poland. ‘I thought she was going to ask me for ID.’
Dixon offered the girl his plastic cup. ‘Here, have this.’
‘No fear, that’s the mulled stuff. I think I’d puke.’
‘I’m getting another one,’ said Poland. ‘She can have a half of the plain stuff, surely? Then I thought we’d just tag on the end of the procession.’
‘A half then,’ said Jane, a frown appearing from underneath her bobble hat.
The procession started to move off in the direction of the apple orchard, lanterns hanging in the trees lining the track. The crowd was following a couple of folk musicians, one playing a frame drum, the other a piccolo.
‘It dates back a thousand years,’ Poland said over his shoulder as he waited at the back of the queue for the bar.
‘They had nothing else to do back then,’ said Jane. ‘And they certainly didn’t have a curry waiting for them.’
‘It guarantees a good crop of apples.’
‘So does fertiliser.’ Dixon had given up on his mulled cider and was busy tipping it down a drain.
‘Peasants.’ Poland turned back to the bar. ‘I got us some copies of the incantation, so we can sing along,’ he said, appearing seconds later with a plastic cup in each hand and several bits of paper between his teeth.
‘He’s your friend, you deal with him,’ Jane said, watching Dixon rummaging in his inside coat pocket. ‘Oh, that’s bloody marvellous, that is. Please tell me that’s not your phone buzzing?’
‘I am duty SIO tonight. I did warn you.’
‘Knowing your luck you’ll have to drop everything and go.’
‘Funny you should say that,’ Dixon replied, with a consolatory shrug. ‘Save me some of the prawn stuff.’
Chapter Two
‘Sorry, Sir.’ Cole had been watching Dixon park his Land Rover on the pavement opposite the bungalow, and opened the garden gate.
‘Don’t be,’ replied Dixon, with a shake of his head. ‘I was wassailing.’
‘Oh, that’s great fun,’ said Sarah, from the porch. ‘I love the mulled cider too.’
Cole gritted his teeth. ‘She’s driving me round the bend,’ he hissed. ‘Too bloody keen by half; I feel like I’m caught in her slipstream.’
‘Just go with the flow, Nige, and take the credit when your protégé becomes the next chief constable.’
‘Yeah, right.’
‘What’ve we got?’ Dixon stopped at the front door, noticing the muddy footprints on the newspaper in the hall, then he looked down at Cole’s boots.
