Chapter Three: A Surprise

"Molly, dear, could you mind the table for a little bit? I need to ask the tea ladies for a fresh pot of tea." Mrs. Kershaw rose to her feet, holding an old brown teapot in her hand.

"Yes, Mum," Molly said dully.

Mrs. Kershaw gave her daughter a sad smile. "Cheer up, dear, I'm sure someone will be along who will give your gingerbread the appreciation it deserves." She put the pot on an empty tray and headed off at a brisk walk.

Molly's mood, which had been flying as high as a hot air balloon when the fete opened, now resembled that same balloon with a gaping leak in it.

She glanced at the noticeably depleted platter of jam tarts, and the almost empty basket of vanilla cakes. Even the seedcake had a substantial dent in it.

And then she glanced at the basket of gingerbread. It was completely full, save for one or two pieces.

Molly wrinkled her brow in confusion. Everybody loved gingerbread. How could you not? And Gran's recipe was the best. "It always cheers someone up when they're feeling poorly or gloomy," Gran always said.

So why wasn't anyone buying it?

Did it really taste that bad?

No, it couldn't be that. Molly and Mrs. Kershaw had sampled everything that was bound for the fete, and nothing that wasn't utterly scrumptious made it onto the table.

One or two of the old ladies from the committee - Mrs. Wentworth's henchwomen - had passed by and looked at the gingerbread basket with looks of pity, but did not stop to buy a piece themselves.

Molly let out a sigh, filched a small piece from the basket, and popped it into her mouth. She let the flavors of butter, treacle, and spices unfurl over her tongue.

"Gingerbread's a mysterious sort of sweet," Gran said one rainy afternoon, pouring the batter from the mixing bowl into the pan. "It needs all those different flavors so it can shine properly. Like a painting, I suppose, with the different colors, and the sunshine and shadows."

Baking always got Gran into a "thinking sort of mood," as she liked to call it.

"There's the sunshine: that'll be all the sweet golden things like the butter and sugar and treacle. And all those lovely spices, the ginger and cloves and cinnamon, are the shadows."

Gran slid the pan into the oven. "For some people, if they eat nothing but candy floss and barley sugar, gingerbread will taste strong and spicy. And yet to someone who's eaten too many sour and bitter things, that same gingerbread will taste sweet."

Maybe that was it. No one was buying the gingerbread because they were all too happy.

No, that couldn't be. Mrs. Wentworth was never happy; she was a bitter old hag.

Resting her chin on the table, Molly listened to all the sounds around her.

"Ring toss, try your luck! Three throws for a penny!" That was the man at the ring toss stall.

"Fortunes told! Come see what the future holds for you!" That was the fortune-teller lady.

"I have never seen such a slovenly, disheveled table! Put everything in proper order this instant!" That was Mrs. Wentworth, loudly lecturing the young women working the jumble sale table not far away - and from the looks of it, driving one girl almost to tears.

Molly heard Little John neigh and whinny from behind the tent.

Perhaps he could do with a treat as well. Molly got up from the table and headed out the back of the tent, pulling out an apple she'd put into her dress pocket earlier. Little John accepted the apple with great thanks and much crunching.

As Molly scratched the horse's neck, she saw someone sitting on a bench nearby. It was a soldier.

He was sitting there, quietly watching all the activity of the fete, but showing no signs of wanting to join in any of it.

He must have come in on the train that was stuck at the station; people were saying it was a special train carrying wounded soldiers up to London. But he didn't look like the soldiers who'd just gone to try their luck at the ring toss game. His uniform was different, and Molly guessed he must be an officer; he looked like some of the captains from her father's regiment.

But it wasn't just his uniform that made him look different, and Molly wondered why.

And then she realized: those other soldiers had been really happy. Cheerful.

This man was sad. And he looked like he'd been sad for a very long time.

He must have hurt his leg, because he was holding a cane. But Molly guessed that his leg wasn't the only thing making him sad.

She went back into the tent and sat back down at the table, thinking.

"Somebody needs to cheer him up," she said to herself.

And then an idea came to her.

xHPx

Hastings was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he didn't hear a pair of small footsteps walking in his direction.

"I don't belong here," he said quietly.

"Please don't say that, sir, of course you do," a voice said.

Hastings jumped nearly a foot in the air. "What - who said that?" He looked around to see who'd spoken to him.

It was the little girl who'd been giving an apple to the gray horse. "I'm sorry, sir, I didn't mean to frighten you!" the girl spluttered.

She looked to be about nine or ten years old, with long reddish-blond hair and a dusting of freckles across her nose and cheeks. She was wearing a light blue gingham dress, a matching hair ribbon that was just barely keeping her hair tied in place, and a pair of brown boots. She held a tiny package, about three inches by three inches, of grease-stained brown paper in her hands. And she looked embarrassed.

"No, no, it's all right, Miss…er…"

"Kershaw," the girl said. "Molly Kershaw."

"Pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Kershaw. I am Lt. Arthur Hastings," Hastings responded. "What can I do for you?"

"I wanted to ask if you would like some gingerbread," Molly said, holding out the package. "My mum and I are selling it from our table. Or at least we're trying to."

"Oh, well, really that's very kind of you, but I couldn't possibly..."

"No, please. I think you need it."

"Why would that be?"

"Well," Molly said, shifting from one foot to the other, "please don't be cross when I say this, but you look really sad."

That stopped Hastings in his tracks.

"I made it from my gran's recipe, and she always says that her gingerbread can help anyone who's feeling really sad," Molly went on.

"Excuse me, how much for a bit of this seedcake?" a man's voice shouted.

Molly blanched. "Sorry, I have to go!" She put the wrapped package into Hastings's hands and ran back toward the tent, where a man in a tweed suit was waiting.

Hastings sat there, slightly dumbfounded.

Then he opened up the small package. Inside was a generous-sized square of dark brown gingerbread. The smells of spices wafted up to meet his nose, and his stomach rumbled, reminding him that he hadn't eaten anything that day other than a cup of weak tea and some dry toast before the train left Portsmouth.

Well. If the girl was so insistent on being generous, it would be rude to refuse her gift.

He broke off a fragment of the gingerbread and popped it into his mouth.

xHPx