Creature Comforts

by Trisha Ashley

  ‘That’s natural enough,’ Cameron said. ‘It was a big shock when you found out you’d been driving.’

  ‘I think I’ve told you everything I can remember,’ Tom said, looking relieved, but also unusually shifty, much like Judy had when I’d finished asking her questions, so maybe it was just that they’d been having one of their secret trysts in the woods that night. And if so, then it really wasn’t any of my business.

  My mobile rang just after I got back to the Lodge, where only the two house dogs were awake to greet me.

  ‘Izzy?’ Kieran’s voice demanded aggrievedly. ‘Got you at last! Why haven’t you been answering my calls? I’ve even tried the landline a couple of times and had Debo and Judy tearing me off a strip.’

  ‘Well, I noticed you seemed to have lost the power to text, though I kept checking for messages, but Debo and Judy said you’d rung only once, yesterday evening,’ I said, surprised. ‘They must have forgotten the other call. But I’ve been really busy since then anyway, and I had to go out again this evening. In fact, I’ve only just got back in.’

  ‘I don’t see what could be more important than talking to your fiancé,’ he said. ‘I’ve been waiting for you to give me some kind of explanation for your behaviour – even an apology.’

  I stared at the phone as if I’d discovered a gremlin hiding inside it. ‘Explain about which behaviour? What are you talking about?’

  ‘The way you disappeared back up north after the accident, leaving my father at the police station. You didn’t even ring my mother and let her know what had happened.’

  ‘But you of all people should have understood what a shock being in another car accident was. All I wanted to do was get away. Anyway, on TV the police always allow people they’ve arrested to phone someone, don’t they?’

  ‘This wasn’t some trashy crime series, but real life. I’d have expected my fiancée to stand by my family.’

  ‘Look, Kieran,’ I said, with more patience than I felt, ‘the last I heard from you was a text blaming me for refusing to take the rap for your father’s drink-driving! Is it any wonder I haven’t rung you?’

  ‘He was not drunk,’ Kieran said coldly. ‘Perhaps he was slightly over the limit, but the crash was all the fault of the other driver.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be silly,’ I snapped. ‘He overtook just before a blind bend – and he’d been driving recklessly before that. The car coming the other way tried to avoid him, that’s how the poor woman ended in the ditch. And thank God she and the children were all right,’ I added devoutly.

  ‘That’s not how my father described what happened, and if you’d only backed up his story, things wouldn’t now be looking so grim.’

  ‘Well, I’m very sorry if he’s in deep doggy doo-doo, but he dug himself into it and there was no way I was lying to get him off. I don’t know how you could even suggest I should have taken the blame, knowing as you do what happened when I was sixteen.’

  ‘But that was entirely different,’ he said. ‘Anyway, this hasn’t exactly endeared you to my parents, I can tell you, though for my sake they’re prepared to forgive and forget.’

  ‘That’s very big of them. But actually, Kieran, the way they were trying to take over our lives and my wedding didn’t exactly endear them to me, either! And what’s more, even before the accident I’d had some doubts about our future, once it became clear you’d been making big assumptions about things.’

  Kieran made the sort of gobbling noises that could get you into big trouble around Christmas, but I carried on regardless.

  ‘I’d made up my mind that I didn’t want to live in Oxford, but instead needed to come home and put some space between us.’

  ‘And you were going to tell me this when, exactly?’

  ‘When you arrived in Oxford. It seemed fairer to do it face to face, and then I could travel back to Halfhidden right afterwards.’

  ‘How kind of you to want to tell me in person,’ he said sarcastically. ‘I don’t know what’s got into you, when you always knew I intended going into practice with my parents.’

  ‘But I didn’t. You only told me that last year, when we visited them for the first time. And I always talked of coming back here, to Halfhidden.’

  ‘I thought you just meant to visit, not to live, because after we got engaged you must have known you’d have to change your plans. I thought you’d be grateful there was a family practice for me to go into and that my parents were willing to put in some money for a house deposit.’

  ‘Yes, to add to the legacy I got from my father! I was surprised to find you were all counting on that since I always intended to use most of it to set up my clothing business. I mean, I even delayed returning to the UK till I’d visited the workshops where my designs were going to be made and seen how the first orders were coming along, so what did you think I was using for money?’

  ‘I presumed you had some savings and weren’t touching your capital.’

  ‘No: I was never paid enough to save anything and I knew I didn’t have to because the money would be there when I needed it. And now I’m using what’s left to bail Debo and the kennels out of a financial hole and get them back on an even keel.’

  There was a pause, during which I could hear him breathing deeply and, possibly, grinding his teeth. Laid-back, good-natured, affectionate Kieran would appear to have permanently left the building.

  ‘Your aunt will just squander it, like all the other money that’s run through her fingers. But it’s yours, so I suppose you can do what you like with it,’ he conceded, with gritted-teeth magnanimity.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said drily. ‘Just as I can do what I like with my own life.’

  ‘Look, Izzy,’ he said in a softer voice, though with an irritating overtone of one talking to a halfwit, ‘I don’t know how we came to fall out like this in the first place, but I’m sure we can work things out. Why don’t you come down here for Easter weekend? I miss you,’ he added, coaxingly.

  That tone had once weakened my knees and blinded me to his true nature … but now the effect was only momentary.

  ‘I haven’t got time to come down, even if I wanted to. As well as starting the ball rolling with my own company and sorting out the kennels’ affairs, I’ve decided to interview everyone involved in the accident I had as a teenager.’

  ‘Why on earth would you want to rake all that up again? It would be much better to let it drop and live somewhere else far away from it all, and I’m sure once you’ve seen a bit more of Oxford you’ll love it.’

  ‘Oxford is a beautiful place, only I don’t want to live there. So I think we’ve reached an impasse, haven’t we?’

  ‘If you really loved me, you wouldn’t say that!’

  ‘If you’d really loved me, you wouldn’t have expected me to cover up for your father’s actions – or taken it for granted that I’d let your parents run my life.’

  I didn’t see how there could be any going back now, for the foundations of our love had taken so many knocks that they were crumbling, and the whole airy edifice was now as shaky as a stage backdrop.

  ‘They were only being kind,’ he said stuffily.

  ‘Perhaps they were, in their way – but it isn’t my way. I love Debo and Judy and Halfhidden, and I believe in what they’re doing with the dog refuge. They need me.’

  ‘I need you more,’ he said flatly.

  ‘I don’t think you do, or you’d have considered working up here. I mean, you’re a doctor with years of experience; it can’t be that hard to find another practice, can it?’

  ‘I grew up in Oxford and my family and friends are all there,’ he said. ‘Besides, my parents are counting on me to go in with them.’

  ‘Well, you can see why I thought our engagement had run its course, can’t you?’ I said. ‘Impasse!’

  ‘Oh, come on, Izzy,’ he said more persuasively. ‘I’m sure if we could get together you’d see sense.’

  ‘I am seeing sense,’ I said firmly and then quick
ly switched the phone off before we could go round in any more unproductive circles.

  I did shed a few tears once I was in my narrow bed up under the eaves, but they were more for the love I’d thought we’d had than the kind it had really proved to be, for by a process of reverse alchemy, my solid gold had turned to lead.

  Chapter 13: Disengaged

  ‘No, I really mean it, I can’t come – you know what Judy’s like. If I’m not home by ten, she’ll be really mad and start looking for me.’

  I didn’t tell him I also wanted to rush back to be with my little dog, in case I sounded soppy.

  ‘But it’s like I said, we need you, Izzy … and we can give Judy the slip,’ he said persuasively, catching me in the traction beam of his smile, like a rabbit in the headlights.

  ‘Need me? You said that before, but why on earth would you need me, Harry?’ I asked, puzzled.

  I sat bolt upright, my heart racing, for that snatch of conversation had taken me onwards, into uncharted territory. Was it a memory surfacing? Or just my vivid imagination embroidering what I had since learned?

  It was impossible to know.

  The back door slammed as Judy and Debo went out to the kennels and I lay back on the pillows, calmer now and listening to the birds sweetly singing in the trees.

  I thought about the conversation with Kieran last night and how, although the sound of his voice had stirred up echoes of the love I’d once had for him, the substance appeared to have entirely vanished.

  Would I feel the same if I came face to face with him again? I thought I probably would, since I seemed to have fallen as headlong out of love as I’d fallen into it. But then, I’d thought I’d known what kind of man he was, only to discover that he was scheduled to morph into a clone of his father at the drop of a stethoscope.

  I sent him a text message, saying that I didn’t think we had any future together as a couple, but hoped we would stay friends and I wished him all the best.

  After that I felt in need of a purge, so, despite it being overcast and with a distinct crack-of-dawn chill still in the air, I decided on a quick dip in the pool and a good long drink from the spring in the cave. I didn’t know what was in the water, but something tasting that peculiar had to be good for me.

  So off I trotted down the path, keeping a wary eye open for Dan, though due to his late boozy nights at the Screaming Skull he wasn’t generally noted for early rising. At one point something did go crashing away in the undergrowth, but it was more likely to be a teenage badger heading back to the sett after a night on the tiles than a hung-over pseudo-gamekeeper.

  There was no sign of anyone at the Lady Spring either, but a hazy, translucent blue plume of smoke rose from the cottage chimney, so Tom was probably cooking up a hearty breakfast.

  Cameron had said he was going to leave really early to fetch the shop counter he’d bought on eBay, so he was probably already halfway down the M6 by now, stoking up with trans fats at a motorway services.

  I let myself through the metal turnstile, which gave its usual well-oiled clunk, and drank two whole pointy paper cups of water from the spring in the little cavern, after which I started to feel revitalised, if slightly nauseated. There’s nothing like a good purge, of one kind or another.

  It was still so chilly that I was reluctant to take my clothes off and it was certainly no day for floating about dreaming – of naked Roman soldiers or anything else. I had the quickest dip ever, and though as usual the water felt a little warmer than the air, it was not enough to make me linger. Before I worked abroad I used to do this from early spring to very late autumn, so I have clearly turned into a lily-livered wuss.

  As I came out of the enclosure, half-woman, half-Popsicle, I spotted Tom walking away from me towards the back garden, but either he hadn’t noticed I was there, or he didn’t want to talk to me this morning. The latter was quite possible, given that my questions last night must have stirred up many sad memories … and maybe a touch of guilt.

  He and Judy seemed to have reverted to being just good friends after his wife died, though, so it had probably been one of those brief affairs that fizzle out.

  I returned to the Lodge for breakfast with a huge appetite … where I discovered Babybelle in the kitchen, feeling much the same after her walk. After we’d both eaten, she insisted on staying and keeping me company in the office, while I carried on with the paperwork. She occupied the whole of the middle of the floor, spread out like a huge black bear rug, so I was constantly falling over her.

  It was amazing how a large filing cabinet could so easily and hungrily eat up a ton of paper and make it possible to lay your hands on whatever you wanted without a five-hour search.

  I’d just about finished popping things into freshly labelled hanging files when Judy called to tell me lunch was ready. It didn’t seem five minutes since breakfast, but that certainly got Belle up on her huge, hairy feet – or maybe it was the enticing smell of food that wafted through the door when Judy opened it.

  Over delicious chicken soup, accompanied by slices from a leaden and sulky sourdough loaf, Debo said that Tom and Jonas had been round to look at the dogs, and Tom had not only fallen for the greyhound, but he’d already taken her away with him!

  ‘And Jonas is going to have Snowy when he’s cured of barking at the TV,’ she added. ‘Chris is picking him up later and taking him back to his place for some intensive therapy. He reckons he can cure him of the barking in about a week.’

  ‘So that will be two dogs rehomed. When several of the others have gone to Debo’s friend Lucy’s kennels, there’ll be much more space,’ Judy said. ‘Four are going this afternoon and the next batch tomorrow.’

  ‘I’ll miss the poor darlings,’ Debo said sadly.

  ‘As long as we get down to a more manageable number soon, that’ll be fine,’ I said encouragingly. ‘You’re doing really well.’

  ‘Until the next phone call about a dog on death row,’ agreed Judy. ‘And the one after that, and the one after that …’

  ‘We can’t turn the desperate cases down; that’s what we’re about,’ Debo said. ‘But I do promise to send the others straight off to Lucy.’

  ‘Great – and the paperwork’s almost sorted, too. I’ve paid the most outstanding bills online and ordered some oil for the heating.’

  ‘And I was promised some good donations when I rang around a few friends,’ Debo said. ‘Once they come in, we should be fine, shouldn’t we?’

  ‘For the moment,’ I agreed. ‘As soon as the dogs have gone to Lucy’s, we can clear away the kennels and runs nearest to the drive and replace them with a small purpose-made block and runs further away, where the old greenhouse used to back onto the garden wall. I’ve been looking at them online.’

  ‘Can we order that nice fence to hide them from the drive, to keep Rufus happy?’ Judy asked.

  ‘Yes, and you’re in charge of planting the roses along it.’

  ‘Of course, I’ve already been looking at the catalogues. I’d like to make a long rose bed in front of the fence, as well as planting the climbers,’ Judy said enthusiastically.

  ‘Nothing too pricey,’ I warned.

  ‘Perhaps Rufus will pay for the roses?’ Debo suggested brightly, with her brilliant, gamine smile. I could see she’d soared off into one of her moods of unfounded optimism again.

  When he’d come to tea, he hadn’t been as awful as I’d expected after our first encounter at the Spring; but on the other hand, he hadn’t been that nice, either.

  After lunch I looked up the phone number for Grimside and tried calling Cara Ferris – or Lady Cripchet, as she was now, I supposed. But it rang for ages and then switched to an answering service, so I just left a message saying I needed to speak to her and asking her to call me. I didn’t really think she would, though.

  After that, Judy drove me to Ormskirk so I could buy four extending clothes rails on castors, and a shelf unit, ready for when my first consignment of stock arrived. I thought I’d keep
one rail in my studio and the others and the shelf unit in the end of Cam’s large storage room. I also, in an inspired moment, bought a folding pasting table with a carrying handle, because I thought I could set it up whenever I had orders to pack.

  Back home I assembled one of the rails and then pressed and hung all my clothes samples on it – floaty scarves, dresses and quilted jackets in Indian printed cotton, several based on vintage originals from my by-now extensive collection. Some were embellished with bits of mirror and embroidery, tassels or little bells.

  I’d had two sari-inspired dresses and one Grecian tunic made up in silk, and they looked quite beautiful, if I said so myself … as did my wedding dress, which was ivory with lace overlays and a lot of tiny silver mirror work and embroidery on the bodice and hem. I zipped it firmly away in a plastic cover and hung it in the back of my bedroom wardrobe.

  Shades of Miss Havisham.

  Debo, popping into the studio to admire my creations, said they took her right back to her early modelling days and she only needed a good dab of patchouli oil on her wrists to be completely transported.

  Now I could see all the samples together, I was pleased with my basic stock. I would add extra styles over time. Currently I was working on a design for a maxi skirt that would have fullness in the hem and an elasticated waist, but wouldn’t be so bunchy it made the wearer look like Widow Twankey. And it would be lined in thin cotton too, so you didn’t get the see-through Lady Diana experience. I had the drawing pinned on a board on the easel and it was now veering from Indian Classic towards Flamenco, but in a good way.

  Later, I rang Cameron to see if he was back and asked him if I could take the other rails and the shelving over.

  ‘Of course, and you should come and see my counter anyway because it’s amazing: antique and made of mahogany.’

  ‘Will that fit in with all the white walls and oak floor?’

  ‘Yes, because it’s beautiful in its own right, and anyway, the floor’s stained quite dark. The van I hired is still out the front, so I’ll come over and pick you up, if you like.’