by Fiona Walker
‘Oh, Christ, Mummy,’ Alice flared. ‘Please tell me you haven’t got your claws into Blair Robertson?’
‘He’s one of my oldest allies,’ Ronnie said, eyes flashing at Pip. ‘If Blair’s father died, I’d be there for him too. We make friends for life in this sport.’
‘It’s just your family you walk out on.’
She rested her forehead against the lorry ramp for a moment. ‘I asked for that.’
The bolts clicked in.
Pip felt her heartbeat fly to three figures again, adrenalin kicking in hard. ‘The Captain has left you the stud!’ she told Ronnie shrilly.
Ronnie looked at her silently, not comprehending,
Alice was far quicker to work it out. ‘How do you know?’
‘I witnessed his will. He changed it a few months after Mrs Percy passed on. This whole place is now in trust to Ronnie for the rest of her life, then it passes to you, Tim and Pax.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ Alice’s cheeks were turning an odd aubergine colour.
‘This conversation is for another day.’ Ronnie moved towards her lorry cab. ‘I don’t think any of us is ready to have it now.’
‘You knew!’ Alice exploded.
‘Alice, let’s just leave it.’
Alice chased after her. ‘After everything you did to Dad, to Pax, after everything, you get the stud! How could he do that? What bloody manipulation tactics did you use on him?’ She barred her mother’s way. ‘You’re going nowhere, Mummy. Don’t you dare run away from this one! Unload the horses, Pip.’
Pip didn’t need asking twice and hurried to lower the ramp. No need to mention that Lester hadn’t let her unload a horse since one of the visiting mares had ended up in the walled garden. Everyone deserved a second chance. She did. So did Ronnie.
‘Don’t unload my horses, Pip.’ Ronnie’s voice was a ghostly echo of the Captain’s. ‘I’ll do it.’
‘Good!’ Alice looked astonished to have her bluff called. ‘Time to do the right thing, Mummy. I’m going to find Lester. He must be in bits.’ She dashed off, already dialling out on her mobile phone.
Pip gazed at Ronnie in awe. ‘Are you really staying?’
The bluest eyes in Gloucestershire crinkled, the deep, throaty voice making laughter of sadness. ‘Percys all stay the distance, Pip. Some of us just don’t stick to the course.’
6
Kit sensed his edgy, point-scoring family trinity pulling together as they walked from the restaurant along the mill chase to the river, its fast-flowing path snaking away with sinewy, reed-banked, tree-veiled unpredictability towards Ludd-on-Fosse. Their footprints trailed behind them, deeply embossed on the storm-muddied footpath, companionably close. Arms were cuffed, jokes made at his ageing expense, memories dredged up, voices overlapping. At their best, the Donnes were an indistinguishable stream of bright, laughing voices.
‘What was that Crafty Craft Race they used to run here on the river?’
‘The Compton Raftgatta. Villagers riding the rapids on planks roped to barrels that usually sank without trace.’
‘Lovely woman, Trace. Rubbish coxswain.’
‘Heigh, my hearts! Cheerly, cheerly my hearts!’
‘That’s Boatswain. The Tempest. Old Norm Turner in a sou’wester.’
‘I’d forgotten the outdoor village Shakespeare. Manor Farm, late nineties, Mum directing. We were waves. Cousin Bay was back from boarding school and insisted on playing Ariel like a Tarantino character. Then the man playing Prospero—’
‘Henry Walcote, the old vet.’
‘—fell ill and you read in the part on the last night. Remember that big electrical storm blew in during Act Five up by the standing stones and you kept throwing yourself on the ground during the “revels are ended” speech?’
‘I think you’ll find Kevin Spacey experimented with much the same concept at the Old Vic.’ Kit was accustomed to being ribbed about his hatred of storms, which dated back to an ill-fated boat trip on Ullswater as a child.
‘Storm’s coming in again now, Dad.’ His son’s smile challenged him, Hermia incarnate. The irony of Kit directing Lear next year was not lost on either of them.
Kit looked at his gym-pumped child, still trying to lock horns. He’d been doing it ever since his mother’s death, an instinctive urge to be alpha. But Kit knew the alphabet all the way to omega: the last word and last laugh should be shared.
‘Stormy weather...’ He started to sing.
They all broke into harmony. Hermia had loved Ella Fitzgerald.
Dragonflies hummed past, midge clouds floated in and out, their ankles were caught by nettles, brambles and bracken in swift rotation. Thrips were gathering, sweat rising.
They marched Indian file along a narrow section of path, singing at the tops of their voices, flattening against a hedge for a gaggle of heads-down dog-walkers, who nodded politely and steered a wide path around the noisy arty farties in inappropriate footwear, whom they took to be typical Le Mill lunchers.
They eventually stopped at the small waterfall known locally as the Hare’s Ladder, one of Hermia’s favourite spots, a gushing glass staircase to the river curtained with reeds and weeping willows.
Kit felt her memory standing by his side. A lifetime ago, they’d thrown down tartan blankets on the bank, drunk wine from the bottle, changed nappies and spun sycamore keys. He read the customary birthday sonnet, accompanied by a distant rumble of returning thunder, uncomfortably aware that his children were indulging him rather than engaging.
This year it was Sonnet VII, the seventh anniversary of a birthday now in remembrance not active service. Its metaphor took the sunrise of youth to the sunset of old age, claiming it pointless without children. Kit read it from his phone, its pertinence lifting his stumbled recital: ‘Resembling strong youth in his middle age, Yet mortal looks adore his beauty still, Attending on his... blasted screen lock... golden pilgrimage.’ The low-battery warning bleated, its screen banded with Orla (6). He switched it off hastily, the parallel door closed once more.
Kit plucked off his reading glasses and pressed thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose, pinching away the shame and euphoria as last night’s excesses echoed in his sinews and aching stomach muscles. He could attract adoring young mortals still. But his memory was as short-term on hope as it was lifelong on grief. He missed the one person whose grip on mortality had gone, their middle years an overture to loss, old age a solo golden pilgrimage stretching ahead, their children as for-ever young to her as she was to them. He wanted to lie down on the bank beside the Hare’s Ladder and ride out the storm, Prospero summoning his enemies.
‘Shall we go to Mum’s grave now?’
‘This is enough.’
‘Come to the house, Dad.’
‘We’re having a barbecue later. And Pimm’s jelly. Stay the night, Dad. Dance in the rain and all that crap.’
Thunder rumbled.
He shook his head. ‘I’ll go to the grave before I leave for New York. I always visit for Lughnasa.’
The four Celtic fire festivals: Samhain as winter closed in, Imbolc as spring burst, Beltane as summer budded and Lughnasa in harvest, his and Hermia’s private joke to remind them that they had been wild young pagan travellers once, had lost three days at Burning Man in Nevada, danced all night at the Puck Fair in Ireland and slept under the stars woaded in Glastonbury mud long before their children claimed it for their generation.
Kit heard Hermia’s voice in his head, defiant and amused: You and your big bunch of lilies four times a year, like quarterly dividends and VAT returns. You really don’t need to. I’m not there. It’s the last place you’d find me.
As they started to walk back, he told his children: ‘I’ve been thinking about selling the Old Almshouses.’
‘No!’ They spoke in horrified unison.
‘Hear me out. Prices here are ridiculous. There’s no mortgage on it. We can use the money to get you both on the London property ladder.’
&nbs
p; ‘But it’s our house, Mum’s house.’
Kit held his indignation in check, seeing two truths. To them, it was a safe harbour, to him a sanatorium of trapped time. He looked from one to the other, knowing that for them the Old Almshouses had far fewer of the negative connotations than it held for him. It had been bought in such a time of strain, the pressing need to relocate Hermia in adaptable living space when she came back from hospital, properties limited in the village, the sale of their beloved farm a huge wrench. His relationship with it had always been ambivalent. For at least a decade it had been his lime-tree bower and hermitage, now crammed with so many possessions that the notion of selling it was fanciful. Ferdie joked that the reason Kit no longer went there was because there was nowhere to sit, every piece of furniture piled with books. His kids just sat on the floor, happy amid the childhood never meant for them.
‘The place is wasted on us,’ he insisted.
‘On you, maybe.’
‘We hardly ever use it.’
‘You never use it, Dad.’
‘You’re afraid to set bloody foot in it.’
‘I am bloody well not!’
‘When did you last go there?’
‘Not long ago.’ Almost three months. Beltane. The children in the village school had been dancing around their maypole. He’d visited the church to lay flowers on Hermia’s grave, crossed the lane to let himself into the house to pick up some books and notes, then driven away so fast he’d taken out three verge-staked fête posters and the Neighbourhood Watch sign.
‘Come back with us now!’
‘There’s loads of wine in.’
They were walking in their own footsteps in reverse, brambles lashing them afresh.
‘It’s Open Gardens week – we’ve made a Donald Trump scarecrow.’
‘Yes, Dad, the garden needs serious attention. You’re that age. Maybe that could be your project.’
‘I bloody hate gardening!’
‘The village has lots of social activities for the over-sixties.’
‘I’m still in my fifties!’ He knew they were winding him up, but today pride came before being the fall guy.
‘The big six-oh isn’t far off.’
‘You’ll be needing single-storey living yourself soon. Mad to sell it.’
‘I’m not even fifty-nine till September, you maggot.’ He heard himself sounding like an enraged Keswick sheep farmer. ‘And I have a single-storey flat in Stoke Newington. Three floors up.’ With a new lover waiting. ‘The steps of which I take two at a bleeding time.’
‘No harm in future-proofing your assets.’
‘Try living here for a month, Dad, and see if you feel the same.’ His daughter turned to stand in his path, tossing her head back so that her hair grips lost hold again, grey eyes wide and direct, Hermia inviting him home. ‘You keep on telling us you’re going to take a sabbatical to finish the Siegfried Sassoon script. It’s the perfect retreat.’
‘I’m in New York until Christmas.’
‘When you come back. You’re directing Donald’s Lear in Stratford next year, after all.’
‘We’re rehearsing in London.’
They were back in the grounds of Le Mill, skirting the banks of the wide expanse of tarnished silver water, the clouds overhead as dark as the tree canopy from which they’d just emerged, a sharp new wind throwing up hair and collars.
‘So are you coming back with us now?’
He stooped to pick up a pebble, turning it in his fingers, remembering Ferdie asking him to place one on her grave. With a silent apology to his dear friend, he turned to spin it across the mill pool. It ducked and draked. Seven jumps. ‘No.’
*
The horsebox parked in front of the stud rocked lightly on its axles.
‘This is just for the night, sunshine,’ Ronnie told the whinnying ball of cooped-up energy as she clipped on the lead rope.
Standing well back, Pip watched as a dark bay exploded down the ramp, its mane curly from being plaited, its delicate, steely limbs wrapped in brightly coloured leg-warmer travelling boots, high-stepping, like a majorette. Lapping the yard at speed, Ronnie peered over stable doors, located a suitable one and started removing Velcro tapes with deft rips.
Pip hurried to help her, gathering up the boots and holding open the door to a stable, relieved that Lester had already made it up with deeply banked straw, brimming water buckets and bulging hay nets. He’d even put new binder twine loops on the tie-rings, she noticed. The more OCD attention the stallion man paid to the fine details, the more he rated his charges. Only the best visiting mares got this level of cobweb-stripped, mat-scrubbed accommodation. Ronnie’s horses were certainly classy, even to Pip’s untrained eye.
The second to come out of the lorry was the colour of Caramac, also sporting a curly clown mane and the longest, floppiest ears she’d seen. ‘Won her section this morning, so she’s very pleased with herself,’ Ronnie told Pip, pulling off the travel boots and handing them straight over this time.
We’re already a team, Pip realised happily. ‘First intermediate outing?’ She’d mugged up on Ronnie’s horses just days ago, never imagining it would come in so useful.
‘Goodness, you know your stuff.’ The big smile flashed distractedly over a small, square shoulder. ‘Not that I’d expect my father to have anybody less horse savvy onside.’ She ran an expert hand along the mare’s tendons, feeling for heat. ‘I’d like to turn both these horses out later, if I can.’ Glancing up at the sky through the half-door, she grimaced. ‘We’ll see what the storm does.’
‘You don’t have to worry about a thing,’ Pip assured her. ‘I’ll make sure they’re looked after.’
‘You’re an angel.’
Pip hoped that meant she wasn’t out of a job. A small pay rise and title like stud administrator would go a long way to cushioning the shock of losing the Captain.
It was only when the mare was inside her stable rolling enthusiastically in the straw that she remembered to hand Ronnie her phone. ‘Blair said “stay strong”.’ She inadvertently did an Australian accent, sounding like a dodgy Prisoner Cell Block H lifer. ‘He’s borrowed a car from someone called Brian.’
‘Which means he’ll have the bonnet up in a Buckinghamshire layby soon.’ Ronnie’s face grew watchful. ‘You two had quite a chat.’
‘Oh, I didn’t say anything,’ Pip assured her, trusty stud administrator to boss. ‘He thought I was you.’
There was a long pause. Then the smile came back, dazzling, all too brief. ‘You’re probably better at being me than I am right now.’
Pip’s heart was won. ‘I hope I didn’t get you in trouble with Alice?’
‘I’ve been in trouble with Alice for a lot longer than this. She really needs you at the moment, Pip. They all do. You’re very strong. The fact you were with their grandfather in his last days means a lot. Please keep talking to them. It’ll help you all. Grief’s the loneliest boat to find oneself in. The less you talk, the further out to sea you drift.’
Feeling valued and trusted once more, Pip puffed with pride. ‘I think we could both use a cup of tea, don’t you? I bet you haven’t eaten all day. I know exactly what will make you feel better. Follow me!’ She hurried to the hay barn to fetch it, lifting the Tupperware container off her car roof in triumph. ‘Egg salad!’ She spun round, not anticipating that Ronnie would have followed so close behind. The salad container banged hard against the side of her head, the contents spilling out in a strong-smelling purple explosion. ‘Oh, shit! Sorry!’
Knocked sideways, hand flying up to her temple, Ronnie staggered back a few steps.
‘It was an accident!’ Mortified, Pip’s hopes died in flashes before her eyes: no stud administrator job, no go-between messages to convey from sexy Blair, no foals and no Lester, exiled from the place she loved most.
To her surprise, Ronnie laughed, the loveliest throatiest sound. She’d ducked away fast enough to avoid an all-over dousing, but one side of her bob was
transformed from gold to beetroot crimson, her arm was coated and she had a radicchio epaulette on one shoulder. ‘Ugh! There are anchovies in here.’
‘Good for the bones,’ Pip pointed out. ‘Lots of Omega 3 and iron.’
There was a curious snorting sound, and she looked at Ronnie in alarm. For the briefest moment, giggles gripped the older woman. She could hardly breathe, leaning against one of the hay-barn supports, hugging it like a drunk. Pip understood grief did this sometimes, but it was hard to know how to react. Joining in felt a bit odd, although she threw in a few good-natured ha-has to show willing.
Pulling herself together, Ronnie straightened up, shaking lumps of egg from her hair. ‘God, I’m sorry.’ She wiped her eyes, struggling to hold a straight face. Underfoot, her dogs were already crowding in to clean up the spillage. ‘I must wash this off.’
‘Go straight to the hotel!’ Pip suggested, all too aware of the state of the house bathrooms. ‘Have a pampering afternoon. There’s a lovely spa there. Treat yourself to a seaweed wrap.’
‘That’s the last thing I bloody want.’ Ronnie raked back the red side of her blonde bob, still looking absurdly good. ‘Although I suppose poor Lester’s going to get caught in a storm one way or another if I stay.’
‘He’s very frail, these days.’
‘Oh, God, is he?’
‘He just needs time to let it all sink in. Come back tomorrow. I’ll keep an eye on everything here, look after your horses, get hold of Tim and Pax one way or another, and call you later with an update. The storm’s coming in, so there’s no point in us all standing about here getting wet.’ Pip knew she’d almost turned this around. It would take just one more push. ‘And I’ll have a quiet word with Alice about the grief-boat thing. Make sure she knows how much you care and that she’ll never drift out to sea while I’m here to help.’
Ronnie gnawed her lip, blue eyes unusually bright. ‘You are unbelievably kind, Pip.’
‘I’m a good egg!’ Pip watched for another giggling fit, half hopeful.
