Saint - Or Sinner?

Emerald O'Hanrahan (Emma Grundy)

Will continues on the path to self-destruction, upsetting family members and others along the way. Emma pops round and starts clearing things up, despite Will’s protestations that he will get round to it later. She suggests that he cleans himself up a bit and, when he returns, she is ironing shirts. “Still here then?” is his less-than-gracious comment. Instead of feeling grateful, Will moans because Emma is putting crockery back in different places from where Nic put them.

“Why are you here?” he asks her. “To see you’re OK” she replies and Will says he’s fine; in fact he was up half the night working on figures for Brian and he’s going to take them to him later “I only wanted to help” Emma says, with a tremor in her voice. “If you really want to help, get out” snarls Will and Emma leaves, in tears. True to his word, Will drives over to Home Farm to find Brian, who is very surprised that Will has been working on the figures and even more surprised when he sees that he has brought Poppy along with him. Brian tries to explain that the figures aren’t that important and Will should be concentrating on his family. Inevitably, Will takes this as a criticism and he ends up telling Brian to stuff his job. Not a bad morning’s work Will; reducing your sister-in-law to tears and chucking in your job - what will you do after lunch?

Clarrie is on the verge of despair; not just because Will won’t let her touch anything at home, but Joe (with whom Will had an almighty row last week) is not eating and spends seemingly all his waking hours out of the house or taking Gem out in the trap. You can tell that Joe isn’t right, as he turns down an offer of a drink from Jazzer. Mind you, he doesn’t turn down a similar offer from Jim Lloyd, who makes the mistake of trying to match Joe pint for pint.

Jim tries to encourage Joe to make things up with Will, saying that they should share their memories of Nic and that Will will like to know his wife’s final words. Joe gets up and Jim thinks he is off to see his grandson, but he isn’t, as we will see.

Back at Grange Farm, Clarrie and Eddie are wondering what they can do to mend the situation. Rooooth suggests that they try to get Will and Joe inside the same room. Eddie has doubts - he is afraid that this might make the situation worse, as both men are stubborn and both have quick tempers. However, he and Clarrie agree that it’s worth a try and they engineer a situation whereby Joe and Will are alone. Eddie’s worst fears come to nothing, as Joe apologises for not going to see Will all week and Will says how sorry he is for the way he spoke to his Granddad, but he was so angry. Joe replies that nobody should have to suffer what Will is going through and Will breaks down in tears. “Oh Granddad, she’s gone and she ain’t coming back, is she?” Will asks. “No son, she ain’t coming back” agrees Joe, sorrowfully.

Will doesn’t know what to do, but Joe says that he’s got to keep going for the sake of the kids. Will has another worry - Poppy is only four; what if she forgets her mother? Joe says that they mustn’t let her “Her mother was a saint and I won’t let her nor nobody forget it” he tells Will.

Three paragraphs ago we said that Joe left Jim. He didn’t go and see Will, but instead turned up at Honeysuckle, where Harrison Burns was carrying out some DIY. Joe tells PCB to look after Fallon and PCB is intrigued - surely Joe didn’t drop in just to tell him that? Apropos of nothing, Joe asks how is the investigation into the Matt hit-and-run coming along? PCB says that it is on-going as H&R is a serious offence and the police are duty bound to continue to try and find the perpetrator. Joe says it was probably some townie “doing motorway speeds on country lanes” and PCB says he knows why Joe wants it to be an outsider, as “you wouldn’t want it to be someone you know.” “No, you wouldn’t” Joe agrees.

Now, this could be a deliberate red herring, or are we being prepared for a shocking revelation? Consider - as Nic lay dying, she intimated to Joe that she would not go to Heaven. Add to this the fact that we know that she said something else, but we were not privy to her last words and you have to wonder whether or not Nic was trying to confess to running Matt over. If so, I don’t see why that should deny Nic place in Paradise - after all it is Matt we are talking about here and a goodly number of people in Ambridge would put her forward for a medal. Only Joe knows the truth, but it does seem odd that he sought out PCB specifically to ask about the H&R. Should Nic be the errant driver, surely Joe will keep it to himself? After all I’m not aware that many saints run people over and leave them for dead. Having said all this, I’m not entirely sure whether or not Nic can actually drive - if not, this is where my theory falls down.

Over at Home Farm, Kate has returned from South Africa and she astonishes Adam when she says that Siphiwe (Lucas’s new partner) is a very nice person. However, all becomes clear when she reveals that Siphiwe is older than her. Kate is keen to get back to work at Spiritual Home, but all is not well; the controversy about the contamination in Low Mead has led to all her Easter bookings being cancelled. Not only that, but her therapists are slagging off SH on social media. ‘How can you detox in a toxic environment?’ says one.

Brian does a good job of avoiding Kate (and his other children) but Jennifer is becoming increasingly worried - shouldn’t they tell their offspring that Brian is culpable? Brian cannot see what the point of this would be, other than to salve Jenny’s conscience and the conversation becomes heated. Brian is also put under pressure by Rooooth in her capacity as Ruairi’s representative on the Home Farm family council. Brian blusters and points to his record of running the business over the past few decades before he storms out. He tells Jenny later that his instinct tells him that everything will turn out all right and she just needs to trust him, but she is not convinced and this story has plenty of life left in it.

Another story that has intriguing possibilities involves the Fairbrothers. Toby thinks that his best chance of being allowed to stay at Hollowtree is for Rex to take over the running of Neil’s pig herd, but, when Toby tries to tell Rex about his idea, his brother won’t even listen. Undeterred, Toby asks Josh to run the idea past David, stressing that it would be Rex in charge. Josh reports back that his father thinks it’s a good idea, provided that Toby isn’t involved.

All Toby has to do now is sell the idea to his brother. Let’s consider; Rex knows sod-all about pigs, plus he gave up the geese business because he didn’t want to work long hours with animals in all weathers for scant reward. Add to this the fact that, although Anisha is a vet, she presumably doesn’t want a boyfriend who smells of pigs and it looks like Tobes has got his work cut out talk his brother into this. If he tries, I will be bitterly disappointed should Rex cave in - if so, he will exhibit all the backbone of a banana. Take my advice, Rex - grow a pair and tell Toby to sod off; if he bleats that a refusal would see Scruff gin ousted from Hollowtree, then so be it - I’m sure Rex could list a catalogue of the times that Toby has let him down. If you wimp out of this Rex, you will henceforth be known as ‘the invertebrate’.

Elsewhere, after his mammoth drinking session with Joe, Jim begs a lift off Alistair, as he feels he is over the limit. Alistair isn’t best pleased, as he waits outside a house for 45 minutes. Jim emerges, announcing that he has just booked his first piano lesson. Alistair cannot understand why this should take so long (“we have telephones for this sort of thing”) and the pair bicker all the way back to the Stables. Jim tracks down a piano for the lounge and Jazzer is alarmed, as it threatens his view of the TV. He enlists Josh’s help to persuade Jim to have a keyboard instead and - would you believe it? - Josh knows where he can lay his hands on one at a very good price.

And now we have a revelation - did you know that a native of Ambridge is an apiphobic? The person in question is Philip, who tells Alistair that Kirsty has invited him to help her with Jill’s bees. He agreed, but the problem is that he is terrified of bees. What can he do? If he calls off, Kirsty will wonder why, but he cannot face the thought of being confronted by thousands of the insects, crawling all over each other.

Alistair advises him to come clean with Kirsty - she isn’t the sort of person who would hold this against Philip, although Alistair says that she’ll probably laugh. In the event, Philip does fess up and, yes, Kirsty does have a laugh, but she understands and suggests that Philip accompanies her, but keeps well back. A grateful Philip turns up at the Stables with a bottle to say ’thank you’ to Alistair and Shula invites him to stay for dinner. Jim, who has returned with Alistair from his piano tutor’s, has invited himself to dinner and Shula remarks that everyone has a glint in their eye. Everyone that is, except Alistair, who, when a toast of ‘new beginnings’ is proposed, says to Shula: “Some of us are content as we are, aren’t we darling?” and she is hesitant, and doesn‘t answer. I have said for some time that something seems to be not quite right between Shula and Alistair and things that have been said recently (mainly by Shula) have done nothing to dispel this feeling. Also, what has become of ex-flame Dr. Locke - he appears to have vanished? Watch this space.