Huge boots. Huge feet.
What was it they said about shoe size? Big feet, big … a blush tiptoed up Ella’s throat.
‘I’m confident about getting a sale for you and your brothers, Mr Honeychurch. It won’t be easy—’
He’d ducked his chin towards his chest, but his eyes flicked up when she said that, and met hers directly for the first time. They were blue like the paint on the old house’s architraves. Dark, near-navy. The colour of a pool at midnight, the moment you dived in.
Sheesh. Get a grip, Ella.
‘I didn’t come about the house, Mrs Davenport. I have every confidence you’ll do a fine job selling it.’
‘Miss. It’s Ella,’ she said automatically.
‘Sorry, Ella. I didn’t come to ask anything about the house. I came to see if you’ve seen my cockatiel? A bird about this big?’ His hands made a small shape, like he was trying to squeeze something too large into a tiny box.
Why was she so obsessed with size today?
‘Of course. I’m so sorry. I thought you were here about the house. Yes. We found a white cockatiel. I put a photo on Facebook. He’s in a cage inside.’ She indicated inside the house with her hand, and Jake used that as an invitation to jog up the steps.
‘You got him into a cage?’ He sounded surprised.
‘There was an old one in the shed. My son found it when he was cleaning the shed out.’ Ella opened the screen door quietly and led Jake into the house. ‘I’ve put him in one of the rooms where it’s quiet. Native birds were chasing him, poor little thing. We gave him a drink. My son took a shine to him. Actually, he’s going to be a bit sad that you’re here now. Sammy wanted to keep him.’
As if on cue, the front gate squealed. Footsteps slapped up the path and Sam called, ‘Mum?’
‘In here, Sam.’
Sam burst through the screen door, making it bang. He stopped when he saw Jake. He had to stop; there was no more room, and Jake Honeychurch had the type of shoulders you didn’t neatly sidestep in a metre-wide hall.
‘This is Jake, Sam. He’s the bird’s owner.’
‘The bird was my grandmother’s, actually, Sam. This is her house. Percy got out earlier today and flew here. He’s done it before, so I had a pretty good idea about where to go looking for him,’ Jake said.
Sam’s face wilted, much like the celery clenched in his fist.
Ella tried to keep them all moving along. ‘I put the cage in here.’ Stepping further into the house, she turned into a room on the right. She’d left the cage just inside the door, tucked near the wall in the darkest corner. Perkins III peeked up at them, all glinty-eyed.
‘I didn’t know this old cage was still here,’ Jake said softly.
‘Look, I hope I didn’t do the wrong thing. I ordered a mini-skip … we’ve been having a clean out. There was so much clutter in the shed. Harvey said you wouldn’t mind, and I hadn’t been able to contact you about it.’ Did that sound like she was accusing him of not getting back to her? ‘Maybe I should check your email address against our records. I might have the address wrong. That might be why you didn’t get back to me.’
‘You’ve got the address right. Ella, I really don’t care what you do if it helps you sell the house. My brothers and I are happy to leave the entire thing with you. Do what you think is best.’ He put his hand on the hook at the top of the bird cage and lifted it easily. ‘Thank you for looking after Percy for me,’ he said to Sam.
‘His name’s Percy? No wonder he was happy to come to us, Sammy,’ Ella said to both of them. Jake’s brow had creased at her comment about the bird’s name, so Ella explained. ‘Percy looks just like the cockatiels we used to have. We called them all Perkins. Perkins I. Perkins II.’ She indicated the cage. ‘He would have been Perkins III if we’d got to keep him.’
‘After Kieren Perkins. He’s Mum’s favourite swimmer,’ Sam added. He knelt to push the celery sticks through the bars of the cage, jiggling them to the cockatiel enticingly.
Ella’s spine stiffened. She could have done without her son adding that bit of information, but she didn’t think Jake noticed, and to cover it she said, ‘Percy and Perkins are close enough he probably felt right at home with you, Sam.’
‘It doesn’t matter now, anyway. Nothing matters.’ Sam dropped the celery and the pale green stalks sulked to the bottom of the cage. ‘I hate this place. I want to go home.’
‘Sam—’
‘And I hate you.’
With that, Sam stormed from the hall, slammed the door and ran.
Ella did that thing mothers all over the world do all the time. ‘I’m so sorry, Jake. He’s not been himself lately.’
‘No need to apologise,’ Jake said.
Ella thought he might be about to say more, but he didn’t. Instead he added, ‘Nice to meet you. Thank you for looking after Percy.’ He backed out of the room, and he was almost at the front door when he turned. ‘Please don’t spend any more time cleaning this old place, Ella. Not on my account.’
He pulled the door open, and held it until it shut quietly behind him. Then he closed the latch.
CHAPTER
3
‘Well, thanks for that, Percy Bird. I could have done without that this afternoon,’ Jake said, as he put the old bird cage on the back seat of the Landcruiser and strapped the seatbelt around its girth.
He climbed in the front seat and fired the engine, thinking about his real estate agent. Ella Davenport was younger and prettier than the photographs he’d seen in the paper, but
