In the wee small hours of Sunday morning Jack returned to his Cottage in order that he could emerge as normal and call for Kayleigh so they could walk to St Lucy’s as usual.
Well it was a bright sunny morning outside St Lucy’s church where the villagers were thronging around the war memorial, as the Remembrance Day parade, representatives of all the services, a proud bunch of Old soldiers, all arms of the scouting fraternity, local dignitaries et al, all came to a halt.
Jack thought it was nice to see the Vicar had returned, looking a little pale and drawn, but nonetheless back in harness.
“A family crisis” was the reason, circulating the village, for her absence the week before.
He felt there was more to it than that but it was good to see her back regardless.
It was a good service, vintage Katie, and then the village duly paid its tribute to the fallen in the time-honoured fashion.
Jack always felt a little humbled afterwards, honouring those men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice, and if they had known the outcome, their actions would not have differed.
Jack often wondered if the modern generation would be so resolute faced with the same challenges, he thought it doubtful.
Afterwards Jack and Kayleigh preferred to spend the rest of the day in each other’s company so declined the invitation for lunch at the pub and headed to the cottage and an afternoon of canoodling.
Although they had made a significant breakthrough in their relationship the following two weeks did not go at all smoothly.
Firstly he received a letter from Curtis, Mitchel and Lovegood, the Morehouse family solicitors.
It wasn’t of any significance to receive a letter from them after all there had been a steady stream of correspondence following his Uncles death so he suspected it would be more of the same, so when he opened it he was entirely unprepared for its contents.
The first part was fairly straight forward and was in the form of a request to go to the office to sign some papers but as he read on it detailed the new worth of the his Uncles estate and when he read the number he thought it must be a typo so he phoned Curtis, Mitchel and Lovegood and made an appointment for that morning.
When he got there he was shown straight in to see his Solicitor Christine Prunot who was five foot two and on the skinny side of slim with dark flowing hair, brown eyes, olive skin and a beautiful smile.
She had a full day of appointments but when you had a client as rich as Jack Morehouse now was, she felt she had to make space for him.
Although Jack would have been horrified if he had known he had caused such a kerfuffle.
After he had been settled in her office with a coffee she said nervously
“So how can I help?”
“I received this letter this morning” he said and lay it on the desk from where Christine picked it up and read it and when she had finished she nodded, and said
“Yes, that’s all in order”
“But the amount” he said “That has to be a typo, either there are too many numbers or the decimal point is in the wrong place”
Christine looked at the number again and then opened his account on her laptop and then declared
“No that’s definitely correct” she assured him
“But, it’s so much”
“It is” she agreed and opened a folder on her desk and added
“I have a few documents requiring your signature while you’re here”
“Sure” he said
“And of course we will need you to instruct us what you want to do with the legacy” she said “Any thoughts?”
“Not a one” Jack said “I have absolutely no idea what to do with it”
After he left the Solicitors he returned to his car and sat behind the wheel in a daze, he couldn’t get his head around the fact that he was now worth that amount of money, he had no idea that his Uncle had amassed such a fortune.
Since his Uncles death his life had changed and with the cottage in Turnoak and his income from the club he was able to live very comfortably in his semi-retirement, but he had just found out his Uncle was seriously rich and now by extension so was he, obscenely so.
“I need to talk to Kayleigh, I need to do something with this money, something worthy” he said and then his phone rang.
Jack was called in to the Club because James Lynch, the Entertainments Manager, woke up on Monday morning and his right knee couldn’t bear his weight.
It was the knee he had surgery on the previous year and Jack guessed that he had over done it over the previous few days.
James had had to retrieve his old walking stick from the back of the wardrobe to assist him on the walk from his flat to the car park.
But he really struggled with the drive to the club, and he struggled even more once he got to work so Jack made an appointment for him to see Dr Anderson at the surgery in the village but he couldn’t get him in until Monday evening.
It was the first appointment and there was only one other patient waiting and when James went into Dr Anderson’s office Jack remained in the waiting room.
After examining the knee the Doctor said
“I will have to give you a cortisone injection and you will need to rest it,” she instructed, “so stay off your feet and definitely no work for a couple of days”
After she had administered the injection, which hurt like hell, he put his trousers back on and limped back to the waiting room.
“What’s the verdict?” Jack asked
“Cortisone injection and a few days off my feet” James replied
“That’s ok I can cover you while you’re out of commission” Jack said
“No its fine I can do all the bookings from home”
“And how are you going to get to your 6th floor flat when the lifts are out of order?” jack asked
“Slowly?” he replied
“That’s not going to work” Jack said “you’ll have to stay with me until you’re properly mobile”
“But…”
“But nothing” he said so they stopped at the pharmacy and picked up his painkillers and his knee hurt as much on the walk to White Rose Cottage as it did on the way to the surgery, but something happened on the way to the cottage that distracted him from the pain, they met Elise Riley coming the other way.
“Hi Elise” Jack said and she almost jumped out of her skin
“Oh hello” she said blushing as she tried to catch her breath.
“Sorry I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said
“It’s ok, I was miles away” Elise said
“This is my friend James” he said “James this is Elise”
“Oh hello” she sighed and shook his hand “Pleased to meet you”
“Likewise” he said
“What have you been up to?” she asked looking at his stick
“It’s just my knee” he replied
“He’s been grounded so he’s going to be staying at mine for a few days” Jack said and that news seemed to put a smile on her pale lips.
So not only did Jack have to go to the Club for the best part of a week when he wasn’t expecting to but he also had a house guest and his house guest had an admirer.
Elise Riley was an IT security analyst and it was her job to test the IT security for vulnerabilities in a business or even an individual, she worked two days a week at the company’s offices in Purplemere and the rest of the time she worked from home, which was why she was in the village and was introduced to James.
It was also beneficial for her to work from home as she could see James again while he was incapacitated.
James on the other hand wasn’t sure about her at first, he thought she seemed nice enough but he didn’t think she was really his type, not that he had a type.
She was pretty enough, a smiley cheerful person in the right age group, mid-thirties, so he didn’t see why she couldn’t be his type.
He was very definitely her type, blue eyes, sandy hair, tall and slim and a year or two older than her, so she liked what she saw, she thought he was perfect, and she just hoped he saw her the same way and didn’t mind the fact that she was a bit heavier than she would have liked and that he would look beyond that.
While Jack was working at the club and James was laid up in the Cottage, Kayleigh also had to spend extended periods up at Plaxton Park because her husband had had a series of medical crises.
But James was aided in his recovery by regular visits from Elise who had fallen hook line and sinker for him.
On Tuesday morning after a painfully restless night he awoke to find there had been some improvement.
Elise had had to do some work in the morning but she made him some lunch and took it round and then sat with him all afternoon.
He really enjoyed her visit but he wasn’t sure if that was just because she alleviated the boredom or that he was attracted to her.
On Wednesday morning his knee was well on the mend, but he pretended that he still needed the stick though so that he could spend the afternoon with her again, but on Thursday he knew he could delay it no longer so he stayed to have lunch with her but then he had to leave.
During his brief stay at White Rose Cottage Elise had fallen for James completely and the regular visits were so she could be close to him and by the time he was ready to go back to his own flat in Purplemere he felt the same way about her, but that was as far as it went, for the time being.
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