Read Pickers 3: The Valley for Free Online

Maxine. "They're local brew. We make some rather good black powder here abouts." Julien said. "Anyway, I was on the way to the kitchen. The meat should be about ready now. I'll bring it through in a couple of minutes."

* * *
    "It is good that your uncle has a family now." Remy announced, as he navigated as near to a straight line as he could along the pavement.
    "But...." Veronique had refused more of her uncle's drink than her father had, but she was still tipsy. Not as bad as Tony, though. He was far ahead of them, but had stopped to prop himself up on a street sign. Maxine seemed more lost in thought than drink, wandering along the middle of the street with her hands in her pockets.
    "But?" Remy said after a moment.
    "But. You sounded like there was an unspoken 'but' at the end of your sentence. 'But she's no older than my daughters.' That sort of thing."
    "It never once crossed.... Well, maybe once. But you saw the way they looked at each other when they were telling their story of how her caravan ended up here and they chose to stay."
    "And those boys are adorable."
    "Little Remy wants to know everything there is to know about the wagons. I suspect.... Suss.... Yeah, suspect, that he's going to be visiting us lots as we strip them down."
    Veronique leant in to whisper to Remy, "Did you see how Maxine reacted when she found out Georges Meunier is single?"
    "No gossiping about your sister. You know how grumpy she can get." They both looked across at Maxine, who was giving them a suspicious look. Perhaps they weren't as quiet as they thought.
    They caught up with Tony, who accepted his wife's support before they moved on. "So.... So how does it feel to be home?" he asked.
    "It still hasn't sunk in." Veronique admitted. "Give it another week or two."
    "In two week's time, we'll be leaving here again. But not for as long this time." Remy turned around as he said this, and looked up at the mountains they would be climbing. They stood out, grey in the moonlight against the deep black of the night sky. "And let's not be so loud, or they'll throw us out before then."
     

"Tree!"
    Luke had learnt a word in the last ten minutes. Now, every plant, from a bunch of herbs up, was "Tree!" As they were in the greenhouses, he was using his expanded vocabulary extensively.
    "Tree!"
    Veronique picked Luke up and stepped closer to the plant that he was pointing at. "That's a tomato plant." she said. "Can you say that? Tomato? Plant?"
    "Tree!"
    "We'll work on that, shall we." She put Luke down on the slatted wood walkway and slouched down when he reached a hand up to her.
    The town didn't have an orphanage the way so many others did. There had been years of taking them in one or two at a time, but this influx of children was the biggest they'd ever had in one go. They had been put up in a pair of adjoining chalets in the still underpopulated up valley part of town.
    Tony and Veronique had spent the morning emptying wagon two, filling shelving in some old warehouse with wares. It had been an enlightening exercise. They never did stock takes when they were on the road, and some of the pieces that had been pulled from the depths had been thought long lost. They had been helped by the Scouts, though some of the time it felt like their assistants were only there to see what treasure would come from the back of the wagons. When everything that wasn't bolted down had been removed, they had called it a day. Tomorrow they would strip out the fittings and start conversion for the trip over the hills.
    When they had split from the weary workers heading for a late lunch, and Veronique had led him along a street that ran up river, Tony had quickly guessed where they were going. "You just want to see how he's doing, of course." he said as he hooked his arm through hers.
    "I want to see what he looks like when he's been cleaned up."
    The wooden A frames of the chalets were nearly grey with age, almost matching the plaster facing and the cinder blocks