‘That’s a red tin,’ Iris said. ‘Who’s using red?’
They’d bought colour-coded silicone baking tins so that people could recognise their own cakes and take the right one home. Some were white, some pink, some sage green, some powder blue and some red.
‘Not me,’ Beth said.
‘Not me either.’ Myrtle looked guilty, even though Cathy could see her cake still in front of her, waiting to go into the oven. It might have been funny if the situation wasn’t so excruciating.
‘I’ve used red,’ Colin said. ‘But my cake isn’t in yet.’
‘Yes, we’re still working out your batter, aren’t we?’ Cathy reassured him.
Who did that leave?
Everyone else called out what colour they’d used, and when they’d all but done, there was one person who hadn’t contributed to the investigation at all.
‘Tansy…’ Cathy said gently.
Tansy looked up now, seemingly surprised to find everyone staring at her. ‘What?’ she said, her lips twisting into a challenging sneer. ‘It wasn’t me!’ she growled.
Erica put a hand up to halt Cathy’s next sentence. ‘Tans… come take a walk with me, eh?’
She led her niece outside, and Cathy could only assume it meant the cake that was in Iris’s spot was indeed Tansy’s, but that Erica knew better than to have this conversation with her in a crowded room where everyone would be listening in. She obviously knew what Tansy’s reaction might be, and that it was one best handled in private.
Cathy let out a sigh. She felt sorry for Erica, who seemed to be on edge whenever she had her young charge with her, and yet continued to make the effort. She thought about how hard that might be, what a burden it was for Erica, and saw that this was what love looked like. She must care deeply about her niece to keep persevering with her when she had no real duty to. What was the role of Tansy’s mother in all this? Did she even have a role to play, or did she leave it all to other members of the family? From what Cathy had seen so far, it looked as if the latter was the case and Michelle didn’t bother with her daughter at all.
She barely had time to process that thought – Tansy and Erica had only just closed the kitchen door when Iris launched into another verbal attack.
‘She did that on purpose! She’s had it in for me since she arrived!’
‘I’m sure that’s not the case,’ Cathy said, trying to keep a calm tone even though she felt the class unravelling. All the friendship and camaraderie they’d built up over the last few weeks was in danger of evaporating with this one careless act. Because it was obvious to Cathy, whether Tansy had done it deliberately or not, that she had taken Iris’s cake from the oven to put her own in, and to deny it when an apology might have defused the situation had only made things worse.
‘It was probably a misunderstanding,’ Colin agreed. ‘I can’t imagine anyone would have done that deliberately.’
‘She would – little snake!’ Dora chimed in. ‘The way she looks at everyone... I don’t know why she comes – she clearly hates us all.’
‘Perhaps she only meant to make room and took yours out so she could jiggle things about?’ Cathy suggested helplessly. ‘She might just have got distracted and then forgotten to put it back in?’
‘If there was no room on the shelf then she should have gone to one of the other ovens,’ Iris snapped back. ‘She had no right taking my cake out at all – it would have sunk and been ruined anyway, even if she had put it back in, and I would have thought that was my fault.’
Cathy couldn’t argue with that logic, but still she had to try to keep the peace. ‘She wouldn’t have known your cake would sink – she’s very new to baking.’
‘She’d know,’ Dora said.
The door opened and Erica came back in alone. She took Cathy to a quiet corner, away from the others, but everyone watched anyway. So Cathy turned her back to them and leaned in close to hide Erica from view.
‘I’m going to take Tansy home,’ Erica said quietly. ‘She’s a bit upset… I think it was a genuine mistake but… well, she’s not very good at taking criticism and I can see it blowing up if we stay. Best if I remove the touchpaper from the firework stack… so to speak.’
‘What about your cakes?’ Cathy asked, her heart sinking. Of all the people she didn’t want to have trouble with today, it was Matthias’s sister and niece.
‘I don’t know. Maybe the church can have them for a coffee morning or something. Not that they’d be any good for that.’
‘They were looking good to me,’ Cathy said with a smile she hoped was encouraging and non-judgemental. ‘How about I take them with me today and drop them off for you?’
‘You could give them to Matt,’ Erica said. ‘You’re seeing him tomorrow anyway so he could get them to us – save you a job.’
‘I don’t mind coming tonight with them,’ Cathy said. ‘It’s only twenty minutes on the bus.’
Erica shook her head. ‘Don’t make a special bus journey on our account. Listen… I’ve got to go; I’ve left her in the car. I’ll phone you later.’
Cathy nodded, and Erica went to hastily gather up her belongings. Cathy helped her, and while everyone else went back to their cakes, a defiant Iris opened up the oven, took Tansy’s half-baked sponge out and put hers back in its place. As Erica hurried out, Cathy rushed over to try to save it. A cake was a cake, and it had looked like a good batter – to waste it would be a crime. She found a vacant spot in one of the other ovens and slammed it in, hoping it wouldn’t suffer too much from the time cooling on the side. Then she let out a sigh. If this was how cookery club was going to be from now on, maybe she wasn’t so keen on it after all.
The atmosphere was tetchy as Iris, Dora and Cathy cleared up at the end of the morning. Iris still hadn’t forgiven Cathy for sticking up for Tansy (as she saw it), and Dora was firmly on Iris’s side this time. Cathy hated confrontation in any form, so she’d really been caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. She hadn’t wanted it with Tansy and Erica and she didn’t want it now with Iris and Dora.
They’d worked in silence for ten minutes when Cathy took a breath and broke it. ‘I think I might make next week the last cookery club.’
At this, Iris’s head whipped up. ‘What did you say?’
‘It isn’t fair to spring it on everyone over Facebook, so I’m going to announce it next week.’
‘But you can’t!’ Dora squeaked. ‘Everyone loves it!’
Cathy looked sadly at her. ‘Do they? As far as I can tell they didn’t love it today.’
‘If you got rid of that girl we’d be just fine,’ Iris said.
‘But that’s just it,’ Cathy said. ‘No exclusions. It’s supposed to be inclusive and open to everyone – wasn’t that our mantra when we first started it? To be there for people who were lonely or needed that bit of human connection to get through the week? To help people to help themselves, no matter who they were or what their situation? If we ask Tansy not to come back that goes against everything we set out to do.’