by Rachel Hore
‘It’s great!’ said Matt. ‘If you keep moving, that is.’
‘Matt, do you know Patrick?’ Mel asked.
Patrick had wandered off to lean against a rock. Now he came forward and the men looked one another up and down warily.
‘Hello. Patrick Winterton.’
Matt shook the outstretched hand, apologising for his wet one. ‘Matt Price. My mother runs the Valley Hotel. You’re from Merryn, aren’t you? Good to meet you.’ He shouldered his board and said, ‘I’m off to change now. Do you guys fancy hot chocolate at the café in a few minutes?’
Mel glanced at Patrick, who shrugged in a non-committal fashion. She couldn’t gauge what he thought and it irritated her. There was no need to be unfriendly. She said, ‘Good idea, why not?’
They watched Matt stride off across the sand to the car park.
‘How is it you know him?’ asked Patrick, a little frostily, as they set off up the beach towards the café.
‘Just keep bumping into him about the place,’ said Mel. ‘And I’ve been to the hotel to meet his mother.’
‘I see.’ Patrick said hardly anything on the way to the café. Can he be jealous of Matt, she asked herself, or is he just reserved?
‘Is there any water sport you don’t do, Matt?’ Mel said lazily, taking in the way the blue of his long-sleeved shirt perfectly suited his colouring. They were sitting at a table on the veranda of the café, looking out across the bay and drinking frothy hot chocolate.
‘Mmm, aqua-aerobics? Synchronised swimming?’ joked Matt. ‘I’ve tried most things though. But surfing I like best of all. Just me, the board and the sea. The nearest thing to flying, really.’
‘Skiing’s like that,’ said Patrick, nodding agreement. He was still frosty.
‘Not much of that in Cornwall,’ said Matt. He kept glancing from Mel to Patrick as though trying to work something out.
‘’Fraid not,’ said Patrick, stirring his cup. ‘It looks like my main hobby here will have to be gardening.’
‘I gather you’ve a big job on your hands there with Merryn.’
‘You haven’t seen the place?’ Patrick’s tone was sharper than the question warranted and Matt said hesitantly, ‘No – well, only from the road.’
Mel took refuge in her hot chocolate, embarrassed by Patrick’s jealousy. But then he seemed to relax, ‘I’m still deciding whether it’s a gift or a curse,’ he said. ‘But, do you know, Mel, I really want to get on with clearing the garden now.’
‘Fantastic,’ said Mel. ‘When shall we start?’ She had meant it as a joke and was surprised when Patrick took her question seriously.
‘I’ve borrowed an electric saw from a neighbour of Dad’s. I can make a start at least,’ he said. ‘Why not tomorrow? The forecast’s good. Do you mean “we”, Mel? Do you really want to help?’
‘You bet. Just tell me what to do.’
‘I’ll come if you like,’ broke in Matt. ‘It’ll be a change from washing up.’
‘That’s a good offer, but I’m sure we’ll manage.’ Again, that wariness.
‘No, seriously, I mean it,’ Matt said.
‘Well, all right, that’s great.’ Patrick still sounded unsure.
‘What will we do first?’ asked Mel, to move the conversation on.
‘What about the Flower Garden?’ said Patrick. ‘Not so many big trees to deal with there. I’ll need proper machinery for trees. And skips. And trucks for carting skips around. And diggers . . . In fact, professional tree surgeons. What am I starting?’ But there was a light of excitement in his eyes.
‘So this’ll be slashing and burning tomorrow, will it? Fantastic,’ said Matt, rubbing his hands. ‘I love a good bit of destruction.’
‘It’s supposed to be creative,’ Mel teased, then a thought struck her. ‘Patrick, wouldn’t it be best to draw a plan first? I mean, you want to be careful we don’t destroy clues of how the garden used to be, or any plants worth saving.’
‘You and I could do that when we get back,’ said Patrick, glancing at his watch. ‘Anyway, the two things run in tandem, don’t they? I mean, we won’t know what’s there until we start clearing. Though the photocopies from the Records Office will help.’
This reminded her. ‘Matt, there’s something else I must ask your mother. Would her aunt, you know, Jenna the maid’s daughter, be up to visitors, do you know? I would love to meet her and find out what she knows about Jenna’s life at the house.’
‘Aunt Norah? I can ask,’ said Matt, scraping back his chair and pulling his sunglasses out of his pocket. ‘I don’t think she’s ga-ga, but I haven’t seen her for years. Mum will know. Look, I must get back now. What time do you want me round tomorrow?’
‘Ten?’ hazarded Patrick.
Matt nodded, scooped his keys off the table and said goodbye. Was it Mel’s imagination or did his lingering look mean something?
Patrick finished his drink. ‘Brief look at Land’s End?’ he said to Mel. ‘It’s very near.’ He held out his hand.
‘You bet,’ she answered, taking it.
They were driving back in the late afternoon and Mel, whilst trying not to break any confidences, was telling Patrick about Irina’s anxieties for Lana.
‘There must be something we can give her in the way of practical advice,’ she said. ‘She won’t know the education system here.’
‘I can’t say I do either. She did bring me some prospectuses for music colleges a couple of months ago, asking what I thought. But Lana is too young for them at the moment. She’s only, what, eight or nine?’
Mel sighed. ‘Nine, yes, but I can see why Irina is worried. After all, if you have a gifted child then you want to map out a future for them. Make sure you’re pointing them in the right direction at every stage.’
‘She’s having lessons with an excellent teacher, by all accounts, and should listen to her advice. I don’t know, it’s none of our business but I think Irina is getting wound up unnecessarily. She says she is not being a pushy parent, but I wonder.’
‘Your Uncle Val helped them. Do you think that is why she came to you?’
‘Yes, I suppose so. After Val’s death I felt a little responsible for them. I couldn’t afford to go on employing her as housekeeper – I don’t need or want one – and she didn’t want to rent the cottage, so I arranged for her to come and clean regularly and look after the ke of Newlyn and LamornawaQys. It pays her something and it seems to work with her job at the hotel. And it helps me.’
‘She’s very nice, isn’t she? But a bit lost. The sort of person someone would want to look after.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
Mel glanced at Patrick. There was an edge to his voice. Had there been something between him and Irina? His expression was unfathomable.
‘You sound hesitant.’
‘Not really. It’s just you can’t live other people’s lives for them.’
‘Of course not. But someone in a strange country, a single parent, coping on their own with no family support . . .’
‘Mmm. I don’t know, Mel. I am happy to help them up to a point, but I don’t want to get too involved. We don’t know everything – about Lana’s father, for instance. Or even how good Lana really is. We have to leave it up to the professionals to help, the violin teacher and the school. I don’t mind helping to fill in a few forms, but it’s not right to try to give advice.’
‘No,’ said Mel slowly. Then: ‘Oh look, the Merry Maidens!’ as they passed a sign near the brow of a hill. She remembered Matt mentioning them.
Patrick slowed the car. ‘We’ll stop if you like,’ he said. At the next opportunity he turned the car quickly, then drove back to park in the layby near the sign.
They climbed a stile to find themselves in a small field of cropped grass enclosed by hedgerow. In the middle stood a large circle of stones, all waist-high.
‘How many are there, I wonder?’ Mel said as they passed into the circle. When she turned round to start counting, she was d
azzled by the sinking sun.
‘Nineteen,’ Patrick concluded. ‘The story, so old Jim told me, is that they were young women who dared to dance on the Sabbath. This was their punishment, to be turned to stone. And sometimes at midnight, even now, they dance.’
‘They do look a bit like dancing figures, some of them,’ she said, noticing the way the stones around them leaned and twisted, as though dipping and bowing to some unheard tune. ‘But they must have been very small girls.’
Patrick laughed. ‘There a
Chapter 14
The next morning, Mel woke early with a feeling of anticipation. It was how she felt as a child on the day she went on holiday, for example, or on a special birthday. Not the dread of the day of an exam or a difficult interview. Nor was there any trace of the depression of varying intensity that had descended most days over the last eighteen months. She was astonished to conclude that she was happy.
Sliding out of bed, she threw on the oldest clothes she could find – jeans, a fleece jacket and a stained T-shirt she pulled out of the dirty washing pile. How long had she been here now? Two weeks and two days. She was running out of clean clothes. She bundled up the pile and took it downstairs to sort for the washing machine.
It was the thought of starting work properly on the garden that was part of the reason for her happy feeling. Sure, she had worked on her flowerbed, had helped Patrick cut a way through the jungle to discover some of the secrets of the old walled gardens, but none of that had done more than to make the sleeping wilderness turn slightly in its slumbers, before sighing and falling again into unconsciousness. Today they would properly begin the task of reawakening.
The other reason for her happiness was Patrick. She remembered their day out yesterday, and how they had spent the early evening before he had had to go out to meet a friend.
‘You seem almost as fired up by this project as I am,’ he had joked as they worked together on the long dining-room table, poring over a strip of lining paper anchored down by books, drawing as accurate a representation as they could of the gardens of Merryn Hall. This wasn’t easy, but at least the map gave them an idea of the proportions of the garden and they could fill in some of the features that old Jim had described.
‘It’s wonderful, rebuilding a garden. Sort of life-affirming, don’t you think? And then there’s the mystery – what will we find u extraordinary coincidence – 1Emnderneath all the weeds?’
‘Not a grave, I hope,’ said Patrick soberly.
‘No.’ Mel felt troubled.
‘I still need to ask old Jim about that.’
Mel appraised the plan so far. To one side of the central shape of the house was sketched the rough shape of the Flower Garden, gates, sheds, greenhouses and trees all marked. Then the Vegetable Garden, the as-yet unknown boundaries a dotted line. The banks of rhododendron were next, followed by the laurel grove. Mel had sketched in the little seat they’d found and, in a moment of amusement, a giant spider. Patrick had looked at her intensely over the top of his reading glasses and made a stern face. ‘This is serious business, Ms Pentreath, and I won’t have any messing about.’ So then, sitting close to him at the table, alert to the times he brushed against her, she pointed out where he should draw the long pond, the sundial on the now-vanished lawn, the rockery and the ravine.
‘I’m sorry about having to go out this evening,’ Patrick said, unhooking his glasses, his face for a moment seeming naked and vulnerable until she got used to it again. ‘I met an old schoolfriend, Tom, when I was up seeing my parents, and he goes back to Bristol tomorrow. I’d ask you to come, too, but . . .’
‘I know, it’ll be one of those “Do you remember when Old Squiffy let off the stinkbomb?” evenings.’
‘Exactly. Why on earth did I say I’d go?’ he said gloomily.
‘Don’t you enjoy that sort of thing?’
‘Not really. I never seem to have the same memories as other people. I suspect everyone was having more fun than I was. I didn’t really start enjoying myself until I went to university. I’ve loved life most since starting work and can do more of what I please in my own time rather than someone else telling me what to do.’
That was one of the most revealing things Patrick had said, it occurred to Mel now.
At a quarter to ten, she was hanging up the last of the washing on the line at the back of the cottage when she heard the doorbell. She picked up the empty basket and hurried round to the front to find Matt lounging on the doorstep in long-sleeved T-shirt and faded jeans. Under one arm he carried a fusty old jacket that looked as though it had been left for years forgotten in some outhouse.
‘You’re in good time,’ she said. ‘Come in for a moment while I put this away.’
He seemed too full of energy for the little house. When Mel showed him into the living room, he threw himself onto the sofa, then kept standing up to investigate things – the TV remote control, the pictures on the wall, a magazine. Mel went out to the kitchen and he followed her, watching her tidy up, and was instantly drawn to the pile of books and papers she had left out on the table.
‘Laura Knight,’ he remarked, flicking through the pictures. ‘Everyone still goes on about her around here. By the way, I talked to Mum and she’s going to ring Aunty Norah for you.’
‘Thanks, that’s great,’ said Mel. She felt curiously self-conscious with Matt here, who was like a lively dog that wouldn’t leave her alone. She pulled open the back door. ‘C’mon, let’s go up and find Patrick.’
Patrick seemed a little taken aback when he opened his front door to see Mel and Matt together, and Mel felt she had to gabble an explanation of how Matt had called for her on the way.
In the musty dining room, Patrick showed M"; font-weight: bold; plis cesatt the plan of the garden. Mel listened, privately amused, as Patrick and Matt discussed how to treat the greenhouses as though they were planning a military campaign.
‘There’s a strong chance the greenery on this one is all that’s holding it together. We’d better go carefully,’ said Patrick.
‘Leave it till last then?’ put in Matt. ‘We can start clearing the beds today.’
Another sharp pain shot from the top of her arm to her shoulder. Mel straightened and stretched, dropping her machete onto a heap of mown nettles. The smoke floating up from Matt’s bonfire made her eyes water. She squinted at her watch. Just after midday. They’d been clearing the Flower Garden for nearly two hours now, a merciless sun steadily climbing overhead. It was time for a break.
Looking about, she was amazed to see how much inroad they had made into the jungle in such a short time.
For argument’s sake they had started from the dipping pool, she and Patrick swathing away side by side, she with her machete, he with his new Strimmer, and Matt carting away barrowloads of detritus to burn further down the garden. The great fog of smoke, for the vegetation was very damp, had impeded progress until the breeze had dropped. They had worked without talking much, all of them involved in the rhythms of their tasks.
Now Mel watched Patrick swap the Strimmer for the electric saw to fell a sapling. He turned to grin at her.
‘You just love doing that, don’t you?’ Mel observed.
‘Yup. It’s the roots that are boring,’ he grumbled, grabbing a big garden fork and levering away at the base of the narrow stump without much success. She smiled to see his tousled hair, the streak of mud across one cheek.
‘Here,’ she said, grabbing some pruning shears and snapping away at the roots he’d exposed. ‘The rest will come up when we dig over the garden. Look, we’re doing well, aren’t we?’
They both gazed around them, surprised by the fact that they had effectively cleared an area the size of a tennis court.
‘I’m worried that we haven’t noticed anything worth keeping,’ said Patrick, wiping at his face with the back of his sleeve. ‘You don’t suppose we’ve gone at it too hard?’
‘A lot of the flowers would have been annuals,’ said Mel. ‘
And many of the perennials wouldn’t have survived the weeds. It really is going to be a matter of clearing it all and starting again, I’m afraid.’
‘What’ll we plant?’ he asked, leaning on his fork. ‘What would work here?’
‘Mmm, well, Mum used to grow lupins, cornflowers, clarkia and nigella, sweet william and delphinium.’
‘Sounds a good start.’ He smiled, watching her. ‘You’ll have to tell me when and how to do it all, though.’
‘Of course,’ she said lightly. ‘While I’m here. Only another couple of weeks now,’ she added heartlessly, and watched him press his lips together in a rueful manner.
‘How was last night, by the way?’ she asked.
‘Oh, with Tom? All right, actually.’ Patrick grinned. ‘In fact, I might go skiing with him and his wife at Christmas.’ He returned to levering his stump.
Christmas. What will I be doing at Christmas? Suddenly, Mel felt shut out. Patrick would go skiing with his friends and she might not even know him any more by then. All the energy s"; font-weight: bold; chairGohe had felt this morning drained away. Picking up her machete from the nettles, she dropped it safely amongst the other tools, then walked off towards the cottage. ‘I’ll bring us all drinks,’ she shouted back in explanation.
When she returned, Patrick and Matt were resting, deep in a conversation about cricket, which had apparently provided them with some bonding at last. Mel was glad. She sat down on part of a fallen brick wall and sipped at her squash. Her shoulder was still bothering her and she had a deep scratch down one arm from a rose briar, but she was pleased that her good mood had returned.
‘I feel properly alive in the garden,’ her mother used to say, when people teased her about the large amount of time she spent on her knees in the earth. Mel now knew exactly what she meant. She gazed up at the tall trees bordering the garden – presumably at some point a deliberately grown shelter belt. She understood how trees could be sources of comfort, a protection against the world. Listen to them sigh and creak, as though whispering secrets as deep and eternal as the sough of the waves on the beach.
