Beatrice (The Tipton Hollow 2)

Once on the doorstep, he turned back to look at her. “By the way, Harriett said to remind you that you are hosting the Circle tomorrow night.”

Beatrice put her hands on her cheeks and stared at him in horror. “Oh Lord, I completely forgot.”

Mark grinned at Ben over her head. “You should stick around for that, it is an interesting group,” he declared with an unholy grin before he turned around, gave them a wave, and left.

“The Circle?”

“The remaining members of the Psychic Circle decided that they wanted to continue to meet on a regular basis. We are all interested in making things, so started up a sewing circle instead. We discuss all sorts of things while we make various items of clothing and household fripperies.”

“I had heard that you were into philanthropy now,” Ben replied as he thought of the strange warning he had received from Mrs Underwick.

“Philanthropy? Who on earth told you that?”

Ben read the look on her face, and knew that he had said the wrong thing. “I had heard that you undertake charitable work now,” he corrected, but far too late to correct the damage.

“Well we do, but it isn’t philanthropy,” she snapped defensively and turned to put a pot of water on to boil, effectively drawing an end to the conversation.

A small voice warned her not to lose her temper with him. After all, he had been more than helpful to her over the last day or so. It would be very bad tempered of her to chastise him for a throw-away comment. Still, it galled her to think that people we gossiping about her back.

Curiosity made her turn back to face him. “Who have you been speaking to?”

Ben had the good grace to look a little evasive. “Oh, I just heard on the grapevine that you were working for charitable causes now.”

She threw him a dark look but remained quiet.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The slightly uncomfortable silence remained between them while she made the tea. As soon as it was ready, Ben carried the tray into the sitting room and they both took their usual seats on the sofa. Beatrice poured and they sat back to savour the silence for a moment before she reluctantly raised the issue she least wanted to discuss: the Circle. It was awful to think that she had to defend the activities of such an innocuous group, but it was important that Ben understood the truth, if only so that she could ensure he didn’t believe the rubbish he had heard from the gossips.

“When the clairvoyants were arrested, we decided to disband the Psychic Circle. Nobody wanted to sit in the dark anymore, especially after what had happened and, to be honest with you, none of us had the will to try and find a more reputable clairvoyant. I think that we all lost confidence in them. However, we still wanted to get together because we quite enjoyed our little meetings. Harriett’s aunt, Babette, has made good friends with Hetty, Mark’s mum, and wanted to meet up more often,” she glanced at Ben. “This was before Mark and Harriett married, you understand?"

Ben nodded but remained quiet.

“Well, we were all in the process of making various things. Hetty was crocheting a blanket, a

lthough remarked that she had no idea what she was actually making one for given that she didn’t need one. Babette was embroidering some napkins, and Harriett was knitting a tea-cosy. The other members were making all sorts of things, most of which they didn’t have a need for. We agreed to meet up, but also decided to work while we chatted. To begin with, we just had a cup of tea while we talked. Harriett then started to bring cake. Then Mrs Dalrymple brought yet more cake. Then someone brought sandwiches. One day, for some reason, we couldn’t get everyone together in an afternoon and so decided to meet up one evening. I put on a supper for everyone and it has gone from there really. Each week, we all meet up at someone’s house and whoever plays host provides a buffet type meal. You know, cakes, sandwiches, pigs in blankets, that kind of thing.”

“You eat and drink tea while you socialise.”

Beatrice nodded. “Exactly. Anyway, over time, we gradually made a pile of things that we didn’t want or know what to do with, so we decided to give them away. At first we used our contacts; friends and the like. Then word got round and we started to get requests from some of the elderly members of the community. Mrs Ambleton cannot knit anymore because of her arthritis so offered to buy the wool for a new shawl if someone could make it for her. Tuppence took that one on. Then Mrs Dentworthy’s son put a hole in his jumper. The Dentworthy’s don’t have much money and couldn’t even afford a second-hand replacement, so Hetty made him one from some odds and ends. Unfortunately, Mrs Dentworthy is rather proud and we knew she wasn’t likely to accept it as a gift, so we held a raffle. We sold tickets for ha’penny a strip and put the jumper, as well as the unwanted items, up as prizes. Harriett sold the tickets in her shop, and Hetty and Mrs Dalrymple went knocking door-to-door. The tickets all sold out and the prizes went.” She smiled at Ben conspiratorially. “Mrs Dentworthy won a prize and picked out the jumper Hetty had made for her son.”

Ben fought a smile, and lost. “You are really a very sneaky group of ladies, aren’t you?”

Beatrice laughed aloud.

The way her eyes sparkled gave her a look of such vibrancy that she appeared more beautiful than ever, if that was at all possible. He struggled not to draw her closer for a kiss and merely shook his head in disbelief at just how ingenious their plan was. Those who were too proud to accept charity got what they needed, and felt as though they were giving something back to society by buying raffle tickets.

“What charitable cause did you cite to sell your tickets? I mean, you just didn’t raffle everything off to make a profit, did you?” For some reason, Ben seriously struggled to contain his laughter.

Beatrice beamed up at him but didn’t hear his swift intake of breath, or notice the stunned look of surprise that suddenly appeared on his face.

“We used some of the money to purchase some of the yarn and things we needed to make another set of items. However, we made more money than we needed to spend, so donated the rest to the orphanage in Great Tipton. They said they were going to use it to purchase new toys and clothing for the children.”

She named a sum of money that made Ben’s brows rise in shock, and he turned toward her with such a look of admiration on his face that, for a moment, left her speechless.

“Heavens above, you really are quite ingenious,” he declared in wonder. He took a sip of his tea and thought about the waspish comments Mrs Underwick had made about the Circle’s endeavours, and suspected that the old woman was jealous at just how successful the enterprising group of women were.

It annoyed the hell out of him to think that someone like Mrs Underwick could quite deliberately attempt to discredit the hard work of anyone else, no matter what they tried to achieve. It seemed extremely narrow-minded, judgemental, and completely unfair. After all, people were just people. What appealed to one person might not appeal to another, but that was just the way that life was. People were different and, while everyone had a right to voice an opinion, nobody had the right to judgementally condemn someone else’s work in the cruellest of ways just because they could.