“It’s OK, Chloe. Take a deep breath.”
I breathe in and out several times and the world rights itself. I haven’t been so absorbed in something for months – unless you count grief of course – and it’s strange to return to reality.
“I’ve been sketching,” I explain, rather pointlessly since Matt’s busy collecting up my work, which is scattered on the floor like autumn leaves.
“So I see. I think we can safely say you can still draw. Come on, let’s get you a hot drink.”
Matt places his hand in the small of my back and gently propels me out of the room and down the steps. Once in the hall he makes me a mug of tea and fetches a couple of biscuits.
“You need the sugar,” he insists when I protest. “Don’t argue. Just eat them while I find a folder for those sketches. I don’t want you passing out on me.”
I do feel lightheaded, but once I’ve had the tea and biscuits the room stops swimming quite as much and I feel more like myself – whoever that is these days. Matt returns with a plastic folder tucked under his arms, which he hands to me with a flourish.
“There! Can’t have works of art getting creased or wet.”
The rain’s started again. Before long the skies are flinging fistfuls of water against the windows and sending spiteful gusts that rattle the glass. As the December evening wraps itself around the house like a scarf, the volunteers are putting on their coats, fishing out umbrellas and making dashes to their cars. I guess I should do the same and drive home, but the idea of returning to the echoey Rectory with its blinded shutters and ravenous wood burner is rather bleak. The place will be in darkness, a shadowy reminder that I’m all alone. Usually the solitude soothes me – it’s why I’m here, after all – but today the thought makes me feel lonely. The wild weather, crackling fire and comfort of having people around have disconcerted me.
Matt’s busy switching off the heaters and turning off lights. He’s settling the house for the night and he’ll need to set the alarms. I’m holding him up by loitering here.
“I’d better get going,” I say, reaching for my coat, which he’s draped over the arm of my chair.
“It’s only just five. Do you need to rush back? I thought we could go to the pub.”
Caught off guard, I stare at him. “What? Why?”
“To have a drink? Isn’t that what’s usually done in pubs? I thought we could celebrate your return to the art world. That’s got to be worth a glass of wine. We could even be really crazy and have some food too. I don’t know what it’s like at your place but I’ve nothing in.”
I think of the huge larder at the Rectory and the big fridge, both of which are totally wasted on me. There’s a loaf of bread, which may or may not be going mouldy, and a tin of beans, but apart from that I’m out of supplies. Maybe I should have heeded my mother’s warnings about the lack of a Tesco Express and the vast distance between here and Waitrose?
“I can’t face another Pot Noodle,” grimaces Matt. “Honestly, you’ll be doing me a favour. I’ll probably get scurvy if I don’t have some vegetables soon.”
I’m disarmed by his humour. “How can I live with myself if that happens? Especially since you’ve saved me several times from hypothermia!”
“That’s true. Give me ten minutes to lock up here and set the alarms and I’ll meet you there. Buy yourself a drink and pop it on my tab. And mine’s a Guinness!”
Leaving Matt to do the final checks, I scurry down the drive, my head bowed against the rain and trying not to feel spooked by the way the tangled rhododendron branches reach for me like skeletal hands. By the time I reach my car I’m dripping all over the seat but my sketches, tightly zipped inside my coat, are dry – which is all that matters. I already know that these have that certain something that will lead to a special painting.
The drive to the Fisherman’s Arms only takes a few minutes, the headlamps cutting a pale swathe of light through the night and the wipers swishing away the rain. I park up and run for the door. Immediately, I’m hit by the fug of warm bodies and woodsmoke.
The pub is a pretty, low-beamed building with a large inglenook fireplace where a merry blaze leaps and dances. Locals playing dice have commandeered the prime spot next to its warmth, while other drinkers lean against the bar and chat. Conversation bubbles away and the dark night is shut out behind thick crimson curtains. Couples sit at tables working their way through plates heaped with golden chips and steak pie, the puff-pastry crusts rising like clouds. After living on toast and soup for weeks, my mouth waters.
I order a Guinness for Matt and a white wine for myself before settling down at a small table set into the far window. It’s a great spot for people-watching, and as I sip my drink I glance about with interest. I recognise some familiar faces from the village shop, whereas others in their Joules and Barbour clothing stand out a mile as second-homers. I wonder how I appear to them? I’m neither a local nor a holidaymaker. As always, I don’t fit anywhere.
“There you are! Sorry if I kept you waiting. I was hoping it might ease off. It’s foul out there.”
Matt unwinds his scarf and shrugs off his coat. Raindrops shimmer in his hair and as he leans across to grab a menu, droplets speckle the tabletop.
“I don’t know why I’m even looking. I always have the pie and chips,” he grins.
“I thought you were supposed to be having vegetables?”
“Chips are vegetables, aren’t they?”
“I suppose so,” I say doubtfully, although I’m not convinced a plate of fries counts as one of your five a day.
“Well, there you go then. Problem solved. What would you like?”
The simple question floors me. I have no idea. Food hasn’t featured much recently. There’s no pleasure in cooking for one and, as I told Sue, my appetite departed around the same time Neil did.
“I’d go with the pie,” Matt suggests, and I nod. Why not? It doesn’t really matter.
He goes to order at the bar and I notice how many people wave at him or want to engage in conversation. It takes a good ten minutes before he returns and, when he does, I notice several pairs of female eyes following his movement. Oh Lord. By meeting him here I’ve instantly made myself a subject of huge interest, if Sue’s to be believed.
“Sorry about that. Jim Pendennys was grilling me about priest holes for his son’s history project. We poor parents do all the homework for our kids!” Matt sits down and picks up his pint. “I need this!”
“Priest holes? As in where Catholics would hide?”
“Yep. I reckon Rosecraddick Manor would have had at least one. The de Mainault family, who owned the place during Elizabeth the First’s reign, were Catholics. Times were volatile and they’d have had to have been on their toes and ready to hide the priest away at a moment’s notice.”
“How fascinating. Where is it?”
“As I just told Jim at the bar, filled in or sealed up is my guess. It’s another of the Manor’s lost secrets, like the daisy. The concealed room in the tower could have been one, perhaps? Not a very good one, though, if you’re counting windows from outside! Anyway, enough of work. To mystery daisies, poetry and paintings!”
I clink my wine glass against his pint and we drink quietly. The noise of the pub washes over me like the tide on the beach and I start to relax. This is normal. This is what most people do after work. They don’t hide in big, empty houses and hold conversations with their dead husbands.
“So are you pleased with the sketches?” Matt asks eventually.
I consider this question for a moment. “Yes, I think so.”
Matt says nothing. He’s waiting for me to elaborate and I find this is OK; I’m happy to tell him more.
“I’m relieved I can still do it. I know that probably sounds crazy, but it’s been so long and I was starting to think I’d never draw and paint again. Now though…” I shake my head in disbelief. “Now I find I don’t want to stop. I’ve got so many ideas for this project that it feels like a
tsunami. You’ll have trouble getting me to do anything useful at the Manor now, I’m afraid.”
His dark grey eyes hold mine. “I’m so pleased for you, Chloe. Draw as much as you like at the Manor. There are plenty of us to do the other bits.”
“So I can skive off? You won’t put me in detention?”
He laughs. “No, but Jill might. She still thinks she’s running a school. Some days I half expect her to give me lines.”
I laugh too.
“You look different,” Matt says softly.
“Do I?”
“Yes. Less haunted? In the sense of not fearing what might happen, I mean. Not ghosts.”
I think about Neil. I know he’s just a hallucination born of longing, but Matt’s right. Something dark has lifted. Perhaps it’s the fear of failure that’s been trailing me, clanking chains and wailing?
I swirl my wine thoughtfully. “I feel ready to paint again. I think I’ll even make a start on clearing the attic at the Rectory and make a bit of a studio up there. The letting agent said I could do what I liked with the place.”
“Haven’t you had enough of sorting out junk? Or is this some weird dust fetish? You don’t really want to be my friend; you’re just using me for my attics?” he teases.
Matt wants to be my friend. Is my friend. I prod this idea a little to see how it feels and the answer is: nice. Matt’s funny and clever and he makes me smile. He’s the kind of person I would have wanted to be friends with before. Neil would have liked him too, I think. They’re opposites in many ways but they’re both honest, funny and easy to talk to.
“You’ve got me. I can’t stay away from cobwebs and grime,” I laugh. “Seriously though, the light up there is fantastic. It’s the perfect spot.”
“Well, feel free to use the Manor as much as you like for inspiration. It could be good publicity for us when the books are launched. It all helps.”
“Brilliant. I’ll sketch like mad and take lots of pictures for later.” I’m already planning my next cover. I know exactly the spot I want to use. Maybe tomorrow I’ll drive into Truro and buy new supplies.
“The builders aren’t arriving until the New Year, so there’s plenty of time to get your sketches done,” Matt’s saying. “Hopefully they won’t find extensive rot or deathwatch beetle or anything awful. I’m sure the conservation experts would be able to deal with it, but I’d hate to be held up by that kind of thing. I’m itching to get on with the exhibition.”
At this point our food arrives and conversation turns from the house to our dinner. The pie’s delicious, just as Matt promised. The gravy’s thick and rich, the pastry cloud melts in the mouth and the steak falls apart on my tongue. The chips are crispy and fluffy inside and perfect for mopping up my plate, which I’m amazed to clear.
Matt’s right. I am different. I’m painting. I’m eating. And I’m having a lovely evening with an attractive man who isn’t my husband.
I’m having a lovely time with a man who isn’t my husband?
Suddenly I’m cold from head to toe and the food in my stomach feels millstone heavy.
Neil’s dead. Dead. What am I thinking? I shouldn’t be out in a pub enjoying myself and enjoying the company of another man. I feel sick with shame.
I have to get away.
“I’ve got to go.”
I jump to my feet and root in my purse for some cash to settle the bill.
Matt looks taken aback. “Now? It’s still early.”
“No. No. I’ve got to go home.”
I throw the money across the table and yank my coat on so fast that I knock my empty wine glass over. I scarcely notice. Nothing matters apart from escaping.
“OK. Well, thanks for dinner. It was fun,” Matt says.
Yes, it was. That’s the problem. I had fun. What sort of woman has fun when her husband, the man she promised to love, is dead? I’m disgusted.
“Please, let me pay,” he says, as I snatch up my bag and scarf. “It’s the least I can do for all your hard work.”
There’s no way I can let him pay. That would feel wrong, as if this were a date or something, and I shake my head frantically.
“No. No. It’s fine. Keep it, please.”
I just want to be out of here and out of my own skin preferably. Guilt crawls all over me.
“Is everything all right? You’re not ill, are you?”
“I’m fine. I just need to go home. Thank you.”
I turn to walk away but Matt catches my arm.
“I’ll see you tomorrow? At the house?”
There’s concern in his voice but I don’t reply. I can’t because I have no answer. The guilt bites into my heart and makes my stomach churn, and all I can do is nod and make a bolt for the door.
Outside the rain’s still falling. As soon as I reach the car park my stomach heaves in revulsion at my unforgiveable ability to forget so easily. With this, the food and wine are purged. Shaking and weak, I walk to my car and lean against it. The food’s gone, but the betrayal of Neil stays with me. I can run away to the Rectory and hide but this knowledge is something I can’t escape.
I was happy. I had fun. I liked spending time with Matt.
I forgot I was grieving for my husband.
What sort of person am I?
Chapter 12
Chloe
It’s the light streaming through the bedroom window that wakes me from restless dreams. The beat of raindrops against glass and the rattle of the sash windows have been the backing track to life at the Rectory for days now, and it’s disorientating to hear instead the cry of gulls and the rasp of waves racing up the beach.
I sit up, bewildered by this brightness after the relentless gloom, and rub eyes that are swollen and sore from hours of crying. When I came home last night I didn’t even pause to lock up, load the range or switch on the lights. I didn’t bother to draw the curtains or get undressed. Instead I burrowed under the duvet, still clad in my jeans and sweater, and cried until I could hardly breathe. I cried for everything that had gone and would never return, for the unfairness of Neil’s death and for the guilt I felt after enjoying my meal with Matt. I wasn’t the first to cry like this and I wouldn’t be the last, but right then I’d felt like the loneliest person in the world.
This morning ice sparkles on the inside of the bedroom window and my breath rises like smoke. I pad to the bathroom to wash but of course the water’s cold, so I make do with a facial wipe and drag a brush through my hair. I daren’t change my clothes until the house warms up.
The next job is lighting the range and the wood burner. I’m getting good at this now; if I can just get to grips with not letting the fires go out, then I might make it through the winter without freezing to death. I fetch two baskets of wood from the shed, then lay and light the fires. Once these are blazing, I brew some coffee. Being busy helps because it stops me from thinking.
And thinking is something I daren’t do. I have to keep moving or else I’ll fall apart.
Keeping moving is the key. While the house warms up and the sun rises higher, I grab my coat and faithful spotty wellies and walk out through the graveyard. My feet leave dark green prints in the wet grass. At the far end of the graveyard is the cliff path – which I usually follow up to the memorial, where I sit and gaze out to sea. It feels like a healing place and when I’m there I think about the unknown Gem Pencarrow, the poetic Kit Rivers with his biting verse and daisy emblem, and all their lost friends who knew this view so well. How they must have longed for these silver ripples of water and this shimmer of the light on the waves when they were far away. Did they dream of this spot when they shivered in the trenches? Was it this place that they thought of at the end? Do they know that they’re still remembered here? So many questions and so much loss. Loss is everywhere, then and now.
I can’t bear to think any further about young lives cut short, so I take the turning just past the church and follow the steep path that plummets to St Nonna’s Cove. It’s not an easy walk, w
hich is why not many people attempt it. Even in the middle of winter the track is overgrown. Rocks and ruts do their very best to trip me up and gorse snatches at my clothes, but I slither and leap my way down until I’m on the shore, where the waves grasp at pebbles and seaweed fingers cling to the rocks. The suck and sigh of the sea slows my heart and I walk along the tide’s edge, skimming stones and watching them bounce across the water before they sink into infinity.
The far end of the beach is guarded by a ridge of snaggle-toothed rocks, revealed now at the ebb but almost invisible when the tide is in. Beyond this point are smaller, secretive coves only accessible at low tide or by boat – the perfect places for picnics and romantic assignations. I’ve tried to spot these from the cliff path but all I could see was foaming water. Being so well hidden, these coves must have been perfect for smugglers. I can’t imagine anyone really makes the effort to visit them. I’m tempted to clamber over and see for myself what’s there, except that I have no idea how fast the water sweeps in. I might not have lived in Cornwall for very long, but I’m wise enough to know that you don’t play games with the sea.
Not unless you really have had enough…
My return climb up to the church is hard work, and by the time I reach the Rectory I’m puffing and red-faced. I’m certainly not cold either. The exercise and fresh air have cleared my head, the sunshine has lifted my spirits and the guilt’s receded to the dark shadowy places where it’s now lurking with all the other things I hide from.
You can’t hide from the fact that I’m dead, Neil says bluntly. He’s at the gate, ahead of me because he always was a fast walker. I’m not coming back, Chloe. You have to accept it.
“I can’t,” I say, but my words are snatched by the wind and they fly away into the scudding clouds, taking Neil with them. I can no more reach him and bring him back than I can wing my way over the cliffs and into the sky.
Neil’s right: he isn’t coming back. All the same, I’m a long way from accepting this. As I return to the house, much warmer now, I know that I overreacted last night and that I owe Matt an apology. He didn’t deserve to bear the brunt of my grief when all he’s done is be a friend. I’ll find him and I’ll explain. I hope he’ll understand.
The Letter Page 12
