A House On The Hill.

Chapter 1

"Isabel!" I yelled from the front door. "Post's come!"

"Dump it all on the kitchen table!" Isabel shouted back from upstairs. "I'm busy!"

I shrugged, picking up the letters and walking with them through to the kitchen, looking through the pile as I went. There was one for Isabel which looked suspiciously like a bill, and two for me. One had the telltale American stamp on it, and I sighed. Arthman. Surely he must have moved on from me by now, I thought, as I sat down and opened the letter. It was the usual drabble, how are you, have you gone out with Newham any more since I last wrote, have you had any more cases, my life is so boring, how's the weather, blah blah blah. I read it through quickly, before leaving it open on the table. Isabel would help me write a reply.

The second letter looked as if it had been redirected quite a few times. I opened it up, and gasped in surprise.

"Izzy!" I yelled up the stairs. "Guess who I've got a letter from!"

"Barnes and Fisher?" Isabel shouted back, and I heard her feet across the landing.

"No! Better!" I yelled again, as my sister hurried down the stairs.

"What could be better than a letter from Barnes and Fisher?" she asked, as we headed back into the kitchen together.

"A letter from Pansy!" I replied, collapsing into hopeless giggles as Isabel groaned, rolling her eyes to the heavens.

"What does she want?"

I smiled evilly.

"It's an invitation to go and spend some time with her down in Lesser Farthing. Apparently, she's lonely."

Isabel put her hands on her hips.

"No!" she said bluntly.

"But she'd be so happy to see you!" I pleaded. "Me too, no doubt."

"But she's so..." Isabel trailed off, pulling a face, and waving her hands in front of her face randomly.

"Her heart's in the right place" I sighed. "It's just a matter of making sure her head is too."

"Her head's wherever she left the filter between her brain and her mouth" Isabel grumbled. "Remember the sewing classes!"

"That was not her fault!" I compained. I liked my friend Pansy Price, and Isabel forcibly didn't.

"She told the sewing mistress that her demonstration piece looked like a drowned rat!" Isabel sighed.

"It did look like a drowned rat!" I pointed out.

Isabel sighed again.

"Yes, but the rest of us didn't mention it!"

I rolled my eyes.

"That was years ago, Izzy. We're all a lot older now!" I pointed out.

"Are we actually going?" Isabel asked, sitting down at the table, and I threw the bill and Arthman's letter at her.

"Well, I'm going, and it's a long way to Lesser Farthing, so..." I trailed off hopefully.

"I'll come." Isabel finally gave in. "But don't invite us for more than a week. I'll go mad."

"Done" I smiled. "I don't think I could cope for more than a week, Izzy."

We both laughed.

"Is this Arthman again?" Isabel sighed, waving the letter at me. I nodded.

"I'm running out of small talk. I don't know how much longer I'm going to be able to keep it up, even with your help" I admitted, biting my lip.

"It's a nice challenge" Isabel said democratically. "Tell him we're going down to visit Pansy, talk a bit about her, talk a bit about your past together, talk a bit about the countryside, answer all the questions he's asked, and tell him you'll explain all about the trip when you get back. Easy" she added, winking. I looked doubtfully at her.

"Plus, it gives you topics to write about next time" she smirked. That convinced me.

"Right" I sighed, taking a pen and paper from one of the sideboards. "Help me."

"Only if I don't have to come to Lesser Farthing" Isabel replied stubbornly.

"I'll do it myself, then" I retorted, flouncing up to my room. Isabel was coming with me, whether she liked it or not. I was not going on my own! Partly because it was a long journey, and I wanted company, but mainly because if I was going to spend a week with Pansy Price I was going to need Isabel's moral and physical support just as much as she was going to need mine. Pansy Price had always been a very bubbly child, and now she had grown up she was, undoubedly, a very bubbly adult. She was my age, but unlike me she was decidedly pear-shaped in figure, and her tendency for cakes, pies, and pastries explained why. Her weight was a constant stress to her, it always had been, as next to food her other favourite thing was men. And, as she always gasped dramatically whenever anyone came to visit, men never paid attention to the more rounded ladies these days. As a result, her shocking mane of ginger hair was always determinedly straightened, curled at the ends and hair laquered into numerous ill-copied versions of London fashions behind her round face, which Isabel had once said looked like a Vogue model hit by a bus. This flattened-Vogue face of hers was always hidden under six inches of makeup, and her lips spent most of their time shockingly red or shockingly pink. Her clothes could be anything from vivid flower prints to almost-graceful muslins, and while I always smiled and asked gently whether or not Pansy's choices were really accpetable for the occasion, Isabel would simply make some allusion to a paper bag or a circus clown and that would be the end of it. I sighed. I was taking a bit of a risk, bringing Isabel to Lesser Farthing, but I really couldn't do without her.

After finishing Arthman's letter, I started on a reply to Pansy. I wrote that I would join her in Lesser Farthing in a week's time, and that Isabel was also coming, and to expect us for a week or so. Just as I finished, Isabel herself hollered up the stairs again. I sighed, and went to see what all the fuss was about this time, looking forward to a week out of Paddington.