Hidden Treasures in Upper Bamton: Upper Bamton, #3

By Beth Rain

Keeping a big secret in a tiny community is never easy…

But that's just what Polly Binmore has been doing ever since she moved to Upper Bamton

Polly lives life on her own terms. Peace, quiet and plenty of mud are all she needs to be happy. That and selling her riverbank finds in her little shop – Hidden Treasures.

Unfortunately, her chaotic, noisy and loving family seem to think that she's been left undisturbed for long enough - and they're determined to give her a good shake-up!

Her mum's got a new lodger…
She's volunteered Polly as his unofficial tour guide…
And all her twin sisters will tell her is that he's a professor of classics… or an archaeologist… or something like that!

Whoever he is, Doctor James Parnell-Hooper has got another thing coming if he thinks Polly's going to waste precious hours waiting around for him. The tide is low and there are treasures to find!

Hoping to rattle his cage, Polly turns up bright and early at her mum's house only to discover that her unwelcome charge has already gone off on his own. She stomps off to find him… the last thing they need is for him to lose his way in the winding bends of the river Bamton.

When Polly stumbles across a treasure in the shape of a dishevelled but dashing stranger stuck in the mud, her day takes a much brighter turn. This definitely isn't the crusty old academic she's been searching for!

Will Polly finally learn that there's room in her life for a like-minded soul? Could this stranger help her discover feelings she's kept buried? Or is he just here to uncover the long-held secrets of the past?

A crisp autumn read full of long-held secrets and new beginnings. For fans of Holly Martin, Polly Babbington and Heidi Swain.

Hidden Treasures in Upper Bamton is the third standalone novella in the Upper Bamton series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Beth Rain
• Release date: Sep 30, 2022
• ISBN: 9798224091607

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

The sound of her mobile ringing made Polly Binmore jump. She was up to her elbows in a bucket of muddy water, and the sudden movement made it slosh over the rim onto the concrete floor of her shop.

‘Oops!’ she said, peering around for something to wipe her hands on. Finding nothing within easy grabbing distance of her cross-legged perch, she flicked her fingers ineffectually towards the bucket a couple of times and then ran her palms down the length of her thighs, leaving a pair of grubby, wet tracks on her jeans.

‘Alice?’ she answered at last, having glanced at the screen first.

‘Just checking you’re on your way!’ said her best friend in what Polly could only describe as a knowing tone.

‘Huh?’ said Polly, still trying to dry her free hand, this time on the front of her jumper.

‘Knit One Pour One? You promised you’d come tonight?’ said Alice.

‘Oh – yes! Of course I’m still coming,’ she said, pulling a face at the empty shop. Of course she’d completely forgotten!

‘Oh good,’ said Alice, ‘because your sisters are already here. Please – hurry up – put down whatever muddy trinket you’re playing with and come and save me?’

Polly quietly put down the lovely shard of pottery she’d just picked up from the collection on the damp newspaper next to the bucket. Her best friend knew her far too well!

‘Erm – my sisters?’ she said.

‘Yeah – remember them?’ chuckled Alice. ‘Twins. Bloody annoying?’

Polly sniggered. Oh – those sisters!

‘I mean it, Poll! If you leave me to deal with your family all night, I’m never going to forgive you.’

‘Fine!’ laughed Polly. ‘And my family aren’t that bad.’

‘No… they’re not,’ said Alice fairly. ‘But I’ve not seen your mum around here anywhere… and you know what your sisters are like when she’s not around to referee.’

‘Okay. Okay – I’m on my way. I’ve just got to shut the shop up and I’ll be there. Just… pour me a large glass of something delicious, okay?’ said Polly. ‘I’m going to need it to get through an evening caught between the terrible two.’

‘You’ve got it!’ laughed Alice, before hanging up.

Damn it!

Polly peered at the half-cleaned bucket of finds in front of her and then turned to the pile of goodies laid out to dry on the newspaper. She'd been looking forward to spending the evening sorting through them and maybe even getting some of the new bits on display ready for tomorrow. Ah well – she'd just have to leave the job half-done and finish them off in the morning.

Hauling herself to her feet, Polly began moving around the shop, turning off lamps and closing the window she’d opened earlier for a bit of fresh air. It had been a quiet day with just a single curious customer who’d wandered through the door this afternoon - but that didn’t bother Polly in the slightest. The tourist season was pretty much at an end now that autumn had arrived. It wouldn’t be long before the little foot ferry stopped doing its regular trips across the river – and then there would be even fewer people around. If she was being completely honest, that was how Polly preferred things.

She loved the discovery part the best – finding something special embedded in the river mud - something that might have lain undisturbed for decades before the current and the tide had brought it to the surface. Polly wasn’t anywhere near as interested in actually selling her treasures as she should be. She knew that it made her a terrible shopkeeper, but hey – who was judging?!

Polly guessed the popular name for people like her was a mudlark – though she never called herself anything of the sort. It seemed a bit formal for the fun she had sploshing up and down the banks of the Bamton.

Still, every single item on display in Hidden Treasures had been discovered by her. Each and every one of the thousands of objects in here had passed through her hands. She’d rescued them from the river mud, brought them back to the shop, cleaned them up and put them on display. Every direction she turned reminded her of a walk, a morning, a moment in the fresh air - and she loved that. It felt good to have a tiny slice of the world where she’d left her mark – even if it was just this shop that people called quirky when they were feeling generous.

The shop was full of old bottles and decorative potlids. Clay pipe bowls with worn patterns and craggy faces peeping from their surfaces sat alongside glass bottle stoppers, marbles, and rusted keys long since parted from their locks. There were paper bags full of bits of coloured pottery that she’d collected. Polly spent hours dividing them up into beautiful colour collections for crafters – but customers were always welcome to have a dig through and choose exactly what they fancied. Polly wasn’t into making mosaics herself – she preferred to let her customers choose what they wanted to do with the things that she found.

Hidden Treasures was the only shop in Upper Bamton, but even though she was biased and adored the place, Polly had always thought it was a bit of a stretch of anyone’s imagination to call it a shop. After all, it was more of a disused barn and it actually belonged to Alice’s father, Arthur Merryfield.

Arthur was Polly’s landlord both here at the shop and at home in The Old Gatehouse too. He owned Upper Bamton Vineyard, and the sprawling estate ran along the valley and extended right the way down to the river banks. The bit of land where Hidden Treasures stood with the Bamton Abbey ruins just in front of it was right on the outer edge of Arthur’s property.

Over the years, Polly had heard Arthur described as a surly old git due to his habit of keeping himself to himself. He’d withdrawn from village life after losing his wife and detested anyone who threatened his quiet existence. Polly wasn’t having any of it. Arthur was a lovely chap who’d fought hard to keep the developers at bay when they came sniffing around this beautiful valley they all called home. He’d been incredibly kind to them when they’d first moved to the village twenty years ago, protecting them with the same ferocity he used to protect the vineyard.

When Polly had turned to Arthur with her idea for the shop, he’d been more than happy to let her use the old barn, and when she’d explained that all her proceeds would be donated to a fund to get the old village hall back on its feet, he’d refused to take a penny in rent from her.

That had been years ago now, and sadly the village hall hadn’t progressed far at all. To start with she’d hoped to get a new roof on the old building but every time it came close to looking like they might actually start work, the builders would find something else that was wrong with the building that would need more work… and more money. Inadequate foundations, windows falling out, some kind of ominous rot that needed treating… the costs just kept going up and there was no way that the meagre sales in Hidden Treasures could ever hope to cover it all. After all… she was, quite literally… selling junk.

Being the nearest building to the ruins of Bamton Abbey certainly helped trade… or at least, it brought the tourists in to visit her. Unfortunately, once they stepped inside, most of them simply stared around in bewilderment. During peak tourist season, she tended to get sick of people asking her if she had any cold drinks, or if she sold ice creams. She’d had a woman in just last week who announced that she’d like a hazelnut latte and an almond croissant, and then had looked around expectantly as if waiting for Polly to magic it out of thin air. Hell – Polly was usually lucky if there was Gold Blend and a couple of soggy custard creams she could help herself to! Besides – it simply wasn’t that kind of place.

Most of Polly's customers were visitors to the abbey ruins – but some of the locals bought things from time to time as well. If she found a bottle that was a particularly good colour – a nice green, or vibrant blue poison bottle - she knew that there was a good chance that Patricia would snap it up. Patricia was a knitwear designer, and she was always on the lookout for inspiration for her work. So, anything with an unusual pattern tended to end up in the basket of her newly-refurbished vintage bicycle too.

Thinking of Patricia gave Polly a prod. She needed to hurry up and save Alice from her twin sisters before they drove her to distraction. She grabbed her jacket from the tiny little cubby hole she called a kitchen and then quickly checked the padlock was still in place on her store cupboard. Yup. Someone might be able to break into the shop without too much bother, but there was no way they’d get in there.

With one last check that all the lights were off, Polly pulled the door of Hidden Treasures closed behind her and stepped out into the crisp evening air. No wonder Alice had called her – she’d obviously lost track of time. It tended to happen quite a lot to Polly. Evening had descended while she’d been elbow-deep in water, scrubbing away at her latest bucket of finds from the riverbank. She stared lovingly at the front of her shop for a moment, admiring the sign that she’d painstakingly painted herself. She was quite proud of it – even though it wasn’t exactly straight and the letters were all different sizes. This was her happy place.

She turned the key in the lock – which gave a satisfying click. Slipping the lovely, time-worn key into her pocket, she gave the doorknob a rattle - just to make sure that it was locked securely. Then she rolled her eyes at herself. This was Upper Bamton after all - and besides, she couldn't imagine any visiting burglars would find much in her collection to interest them.

Making sure the doors were locked was actually more of a precaution against local livestock barging in and setting up home overnight than anything else. That had happened on a semi-regular basis when her mum had kept goats and she’d become used to finding the little rascals mid-way through chewing their way around the shop.

Given that it was quite a walk from her mum's cottage on the other side of the village, Polly had always been surprised that they knew where to come. But it was as though Hidden Treasures was some kind of goaty homing beacon. They were clever – and a complete nightmare. Luckily, they hadn’t done too much damage during their visits – which was a