Snow in April

by Rosamunde Pilcher

  “Yes, it is. Come and drink it up before it gets cold.”

  They sat, facing each other across the scrubbed kitchen table. Liz held the mug in her hands as though her fingers were still cold. Her expression was provocative.

  “We were talking about you getting married.”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “How long are you staying at Cairney?”

  “Until everything’s been tied up. And you?”

  Liz shrugged. “I’m meant to be south now. My mother and Parker are in London for a few days on business. I called her when I got back from Prestwick—to tell her about Charles. She tried to make me say I’d go back to them, but I explained that I wanted to be at the funeral.”

  “You still haven’t told me how long you’re staying at Rossie Hill.”

  “I haven’t any plans, Oliver.”

  “Then stay for a little.”

  “Do you want me to?”

  “Yes.”

  To have this settled and said somehow broke down the last of the tension between them. They sat on, talking, time forgotten. It wasn’t until the clock in the hall struck twelve that Liz’s attention was distracted. She looked at her watch. “Heavens, is that really the time? I must go.”

  “What for?”

  “Lunch. Remember that quaint old-fashioned meal or have you stopped eating it?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Come back with me now and you can eat it with my father and me.”

  “I’ll drive you home but I won’t stay for lunch.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’ve wasted half the morning already, gossiping with you, and there’s the hell of a lot to be done.”

  “Dinner, then. Tonight?”

  He considered this and then, for various reasons, rejected the invitation. “But would tomorrow do?”

  She shrugged, easy, the epitome of feminine pliancy. “Whenever.”

  “Tomorrow would be great. About eight o’clock?”

  “A little earlier if you want a drink.”

  “OK. A little earlier. Now, put your hat and coat on and I’ll drive you home.”

  His car was dark green, small, and low and very fast. She sat beside him with her hands deep in the pockets of her coat, staring ahead at the bleak Scottish countryside and so physically aware of the man beside her that it almost hurt.

  He had changed, and yet he had not changed. He was older. There were lines on his face that had not been there before, and an expression in the back of his eyes that made her feel as though she was embarking on an affair with a total stranger. But it was still Oliver; offhand, refusing to commit himself, invulnerable.

  For Liz, it had always been Oliver. Charles had merely been the excuse to haunt Cairney, and Liz had shamelessly used him as such, because he had encouraged her constant visits, had always been glad to see her. But it was because of Oliver that she had gone.

  Charles was the homely one, stringy and sandy and freckled. But Oliver was glamour. Charles had time and patience for a gawky teenager; time to teach her how to cast a line, serve at tennis; time to nurse her through the agonies of her first grown-up dance, show her how to dance the reels. And all the time she had eyes for no one but Oliver, and had prayed that he would dance with her.

  But of course he hadn’t. There was always someone else, some strange girl or other invited up from the south. I met her at University, at a party, staying with old so-and-so. Over the years there were a great many of them. Oliver’s girls were a local joke, but Liz did not think it was funny. Liz had watched from the side-lines and hated them all, mentally making wax images of them and spearing them with pins, wracked as she was with the miseries of teenage jealousy.

  And after her parents’ separation, it was Charles who wrote to Liz, giving her all the news of Cairney and keeping her in touch. But it was Oliver’s photograph, a tiny crooked snapshot she had taken herself, which lived in the secret pocket of her wallet and went everywhere with her.

  Now, sitting beside him, she allowed her gaze to move fractionally sideways. Oliver’s hands on the leather-bound driving-wheel were long-fingered, square-nailed. There was a scar near his thumb, and she remembered how he had torn his hand open on a new barbed-wire fence. Her eyes moved casually up the length of his arm. His sheepskin collar was turned up and around his neck, touching the dark, thick hair. And then he felt her gaze and turned his head to smile at her, and his eyes, beneath the dark brows, were as blue as speedwells.

  He said, “You’ll know me next time,” but Liz did not reply. She remembered flying in to Prestwick, her father waiting to meet her. Charles has been killed. There had been a terrible moment of disbelief, as though firm ground had fallen away, and she was left staring down into a huge, gaping hole. And then, “Oliver?” she had asked faintly.

  “Oliver’s at Cairney. Or should be by now. Driving up from London today. The funeral’s on Monday…”

  Oliver’s at Cairney. Charles, dear, kind, patient Charles, was dead, but Oliver was alive and Oliver was at Cairney. After all these years she would see him again … Driving back to Rossie Hill, this thought was never out of her mind. I’ll see him. Tomorrow I’ll see him and the next day and the day after that. And she had called her mother in London and told her about Charles, but when Elaine had tried to persuade her to leave all the sadness behind and come south, to be with her, Liz had refused. The excuse came pat.

  “I must stay. Father … and the funeral…” But all the time she knew, and revelled in the fact, that she was only staying for Oliver.

  * * *

  And, miraculously, it had worked out. She had known that it would from the moment that Oliver, for no apparent reason, had suddenly turned in the churchyard and looked straight into her face. She had seen it then, first surprise, and then admiration. Oliver was no longer in a position of superiority. Now they were equals. And … which was sad, but made everything a great deal simpler … there was no longer Charles to be considered. Kind Charles, maddening Charles, always there, like a rusty old dog, waiting to be taken for a walk.

  She let her busy, practical mind speed ahead, allowed herself the luxury of indulging in one or two pretty images of the future. It all worked out so neatly that it might have been pre-contrived. A wedding at Cairney, perhaps, a little country wedding in the local church, with just a few friends. Then a honeymoon in…? Antigua would be perfect. Then back to London—he already had a flat in London so they could use that as a base for further house-hunting. And, brilliant idea, she would get her father to give her Cairney house as a wedding present, and the casual suggestions she had put in Oliver’s way this morning would, after all, come true. She saw them driving up for long weekends, spending summer holidays here, bringing children, having house-parties…

  Oliver said, “You’re very quiet all of a sudden.”

  Liz came back to reality with a bang, saw that they were already nearly home. The car swept up the drive beneath the beeches. Above, bare branches creaked in the cruel wind. They swung around the curve of the gravel to come to a halt in front of the big door.

  “I was thinking,” said Liz. “Just thinking. Thank you for bringing me home.”

  “Thank you for coming over to cheer me up.”

  “And you’re coming for dinner tomorrow? Wednesday.”

  “I shall look forward to it.”

  “A quarter to eight?”

  “A quarter to eight.”

  They smiled, conveying their mutual pleasure with the arrangement. Then he leaned across to open her door, and Liz got out of the car, and ran up the icy steps and into the shelter of the porch. Here, she turned to wave him away, but Oliver had already departed, and only the back end of his car could be seen, disappearing down the drive, on its way back to Cairney.

  * * *

  That evening, when Liz was in her bath, she was interrupted by a telephone call from London. Wrapped in a bath-towel she went to take it, and heard her mother’s voice on the other end of the line.

>   “Elizabeth?”

  “Hallo, Mummy.”

  “Darling, how are you? How is everything?”

  “It’s fine. Perfect. Wonderful.”

  This lilting reply was not exactly what Elaine had expected. She sounded puzzled. “But did you go to the funeral?”

  “Oh, yes, that was ghastly, I hated every moment of it.”

  “Then why not come south … we’re here for a few more days…”

  “I can’t come yet…” Liz hesitated. Usually she behaved like a clam over her own affairs. Elaine continually complained that she never knew what was going on in her only daughter’s life. But all at once Liz felt expansive. The excitement of what had happened today and what might be going to happen tomorrow was getting the better of her, and she knew that if she did not talk about Oliver to someone, then she was going to burst.

  She finished the sentence in a burst of confidence.

  “… the thing is, Oliver’s here for a bit. And he’s coming over for dinner tomorrow night.”

  “Oliver? Oliver Cairney?”

  “Yes, of course Oliver Cairney. What other Oliver do we know?”

  “You mean…? Because of Oliver…”

  “Yes. Because of Oliver.” Liz laughed. “Oh, Mummy, don’t be so dense.”

  “But I always thought it was Ch…”

  “Well, it wasn’t,” said Liz quickly.

  “And what has Oliver got to say to all this?”

  “Well, I don’t think he’s exactly displeased.”

  “Well, I don’t know…” Elaine sounded confused. “It’s the last thing I ever expected, but if you’re happy…”

  “Oh, I am. I am happy. Believe me, I’ve never been so happy.”

  Her mother said, faintly, “Well, let me know what happens.”

  “I will.”

  “And let me know when you come south…”

  “We’ll probably come together,” said Liz, already imagining it. “Perhaps we’ll drive down together.”

  Her mother rang off at last. Liz laid down the receiver, wrapped the bath-towel more firmly around herself and padded back to the bathroom. Oliver. She said his name, over and over. Oliver Cairney. She got back into the bath and turned on the hot tap with her toe. Oliver.

  * * *

  Driving north was like driving backwards in time. Spring was late everywhere, but in London there had at least been traces of green, an incipient leafiness on the trees in the park, the first stars of yellow crocus in the park. Daffodils and purple iris flowered from pavement stalls, and there were displays of mouth-melting summer clothes in the big shop windows, making one think of holidays and cruises and blue skies and sun.

  But the motorway cut north like a ribbon through flat country that grew progressively more grey and cold and apparently unproductive. The roads were wet and dirty. Every passing lorry—and Caleb’s old car was passed by practically everything—threw up blinding showers of wet brown mud that smothered the windscreen and forced the wipers to work overtime. To add to their discomfort, none of the windows seemed to fit properly and the heater was either faulty or needed some secret adjustment which neither Jody nor Caroline could master. Whatever the reason, it did not work.

  Despite all this, Jody was in the highest of spirits. He read the map, sang, did complicated sums to work out their speed average (sadly low) and their mileage.

  We’re a third of the way there. We’re halfway there. and then, “In another five miles we’ll be at Scotch Corner. I wonder why it’s called Scotch Corner when it’s not even in Scotland?”

  “Perhaps people get out there, and buy themselves scotches?”

  Jody thought this very funny. “We’ve never been to Scotland, any of us. I wonder why Angus came to Scotland?”

  “When we find him we’ll ask him.”

  “Yes,” said Jody cheerfully, thinking about seeing Angus. He leaned back for the rucksack that they had prudently filled with food. He opened it and looked inside. “What would you like now? There’s a ham sandwich left and a rather bruised-looking apple and some chocolate biscuits.”

  “I’m all right. I don’t want anything.”

  “Do you mind if I eat the ham sandwich?”

  “Not at all.”

  After Scotch Corner they took the A68, the small car grinding up over the bleak moors of Northumberland, through Otterburn and so on to Carter Bar. The road wound upwards, looping to and fro against the steep gradient, and then they crested the final hill and passed the border stone, and Scotland lay before them.

  “We’re there,” said Jody in tones of the greatest satisfaction. But Caroline saw only a spread of undulating grey country, and in the distance hills that were white with snow.

  She said, in some apprehension, “You don’t suppose it’s going to snow, do you? It’s terribly cold.”

  “Oh, not at this time of the year.”

  “What about those hills?”

  “That’ll be left over from the winter. It’s just not melted.”

  “The sky looks terribly dark.”

  It did. Jody frowned. “Would it matter if it snowed?”

  “I don’t know. But we haven’t got snow tyres and I’ve never driven in really bad weather.”

  After a little, “Oh, it’ll be all right,” said Jody, and took up his map again. “Now the next place we’ve got to get to is Edinburgh.”

  By then it was nearly dark, the windy city spangled with street lights. Inevitably, they got lost, but finally found the correct one-way street and headed out on the motorway towards the bridge. They stopped, for the last time, for petrol and oil. Caroline got out of the car to stretch her legs while the garage attendant checked the water and then attacked the dirty windscreen with a damp sponge. As he did this, he observed the worn, travelled little car with some interest, and then turned his attention to its occupants.

  “Have you come far?”

  “From London.”

  “Are you going on?”

  “We’re going to Strathcorrie. In Perthshire.”

  “You’ve a long way to go.”

  “Yes. We know.”

  “You’ll be driving into some dirty weather.” Jody liked the way he said dirty. Durrty. He practised saying it, under his breath.

  “Will we?”

  “Aye. I just heard the weather forecast. More snow. You’ll need to watch. Your tyres…”—he kicked them with the toe of his boot—“your tyres are no’ all that good.”

  “We’ll be all right.”

  “Well, if you get stuck in the snow, remember the golden rule. Don’t get out of the car.”

  “We’ll remember.”

  They paid him and thanked him and set off once more. And the garage man watched them go, shaking his head at the irresponsibility of all Sassenachs.

  The Forth Bridge reared ahead of them, with warning lights flashing. SLOW. STRONG WINDS. They paid their toll and drove out and over it, slammed and battered by the wind. On the far side, the motorway cut north, but it was so dark and stormy that, beyond the headlights’ feeble beam, they could see nothing.

  “What a shame,” said Jody. “Here we are in Scotland and we can’t see a thing. Not so much as a haggis.”

  But Caroline couldn’t even rustle up a laugh. She was cold and tired and anxious about the weather and the threatened snow. Suddenly the adventure was an adventure no longer, but simply an act of the greatest possible folly.

  The snow began to fall as they left Relkirk behind them. Blown by the wind it came at them out of the darkness in long streaks of blinding white.

  “Like flak,” said Jody.

  “Like what?”

  “Flak. Anti-aircraft fire. In war films. That’s what it looks like.”

  At first, it did not lie on the road. But later, climbing up into the hills, it became quite deep, piled in ditches and on dykes, blown by the wind into great pillow-like drifts. It stuck to the windscreen, and piled up beneath the wipers until they stopped working altogether and Caroline
had to stop the car, and Jody got out and, with an old glove, wiped the snow from the glass. He got back into the car, wet and shivering.

  “It’s all in my shoes. It’s freezing.”

  They moved forward again. “How many more miles?” Her mouth was dry with fright, her fingers clamped to the steering-wheel. They appeared to be in a country quite empty of any sort of habitation. Not a light showed, not another car, not even a track on the road.

  Jody turned on the torch and studied his map. “About eight, I would say. Strathcorrie’s about eight miles.”

  “And what time is it?”

  He looked at his watch. “Half past ten.”

  Presently they topped a small rise and the road ran downhill, narrow between high dykes. Caroline changed down and as they gathered speed, braked gently, but not gently enough, and the car lurched into a skid. For a terrible instant she knew that she was out of control. A dyke reared up before them, and then the front wheels thumped into a bank of snow and the car came to a dead stop. In trepidation Caroline started up the engine again, managed to turn the wheels out of the drift, and back the car on to the road. They moved on at a snail’s pace.

  “Is it dangerous?” asked Jody.

  “Yes. I think it probably is. If only we had snow tyres.”

  “Caleb wouldn’t have snow tyres, even if he lived in the Arctic.”

  They were now in a deep glen, tree-lined and running alongside a steep gorge. From this came the sound of a river, purling and splashing above the sound of the wind. They came to a hump-backed bridge, very steep and blind, and, frightened of sticking on its slope, Caroline took it in a small burst of speed, and then saw, too late, that beyond it the road took a sharp turn to the right. Ahead were drifts, and the blank face of a stone wall.

  She heard Jody gasp. She spun the wheel, but it was too late. The little car, suddenly with a mind of its own, headed straight for the wall, and then plunged nose-first into a deep ditch full of snow. The engine stalled instantly, and they finished up at an angle of forty-five degrees with the back wheels still on the road, and the headlights and the radiator buried deep in snow.

  It was dark without the headlights. Caroline put out a hand to switch them off and then turn off the ignition. She was shaking. She turned to Jody. “Are you all right?”