by Jenny Colgan
So she tidied up the sitting room, put a load of laundry into the prehistoric twin tub – how on earth had Lilian managed to look so dapper? It must have been agony for her – changed into a floral frock, a denim jacket and the patterned wellies she’d bought four years ago in an attempt to be hip and go to Glastonbury (which had ended very badly indeed); left a note for Lilian and the door on the latch and stepped out into the morning.
1942
When she first saw them, she couldn’t quite believe it. Four weeks’ worth of ration cards, pale pink cardboard, neatly lined up in a row.
‘What’s this?’ she said coolly, convinced he was buying an enormous box of chocolates for another girl.
Henry looked pink. ‘A large bag of caramels please.’
Blinking nervously, Lilian climbed the little stepladder, conscious of his eyes on her. It was a ravishingly beautiful day outside, and the shop was empty so early.
She filled the bag with the sweet, shining, fudgy caramels. No one took her responsibilities more seriously than Lilian. Her father had made it clear that in times of hardship, they absolutely couldn’t be seen to be taking more than their fair share. He had been so grave when he had said it, asking for her promise on the issue, that Lilian hadn’t had a sweet since. Surrounded by them all day, most of the time she didn’t miss it too much. She didn’t usually eat caramel, had always liked to get more for her money, something with a bit of crunch in it.
The pink-striped bag was bulging by the time Henry put down his sixpence.
‘There you are,’ she said. Henry didn’t pick up the bag.
‘They’re for you,’ he said.
Lilian stared at him. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Your friend told me they were your favourites.’
Ida Delia, thought Lilian. Ida Delia would even tell a fib about something as stupid as that.
‘Are they all for me?’
‘They are,’ said Henry, blushing. ‘Unless you’d like to share one.’
Lilian looked at him, half shocked, half giggling, as her father dinged into the shop.
‘Come on, Lils,’ he said. ‘Get a shuffle on.’ He looked up. ‘Hello, Carr.’ He sniffed quickly, then grabbed the bag. ‘These yours, are they?’
By this time Henry was puce and looked at her in horror. Lilian’s father pressed the sweets into his hands.
‘Well, come on, young man, we haven’t got all day. There’s a war on, you know. You do know?’ he said, with the serious air of a man with three sons fighting and who was looking at a perfectly healthy young man with the time to wander around eating sweets.
Lilian looked at Henry, waiting for him to announce that he’d bought the sweets for her. But poor Henry was in a panic. Such an enormous gesture; he might as well ask for her hand. This wasn’t what he’d expected at all.
‘Uhm, well,’ he began. ‘I’d like to …’
Mr Hopkins had already started examining the ledger. Henry glanced at Lilian, who couldn’t help him, but just looked at him like a big-eyed panic-stricken mouse. He couldn’t read it at all. Was she terrified he was going to say something in front of her father? Had he misjudged the situation entirely? She hadn’t even looked happy that it was caramels; were they really her favourites? He felt a horrid dull flush deepen over his face.
‘I’ll come back for these later,’ he said, then turned round and left. Neither of the Hopkinses said goodbye. Lilian’s fingernails were tightly dug into the palm of her hand.
‘What an odd fellow,’ said her father eventually, then wondered why his daughter was pushing past him into the house. He’d never understood her mother either.
First off, Rosie stopped at the little shop next door. The front of it was ancient, and the mullioned windows, which were of thick glass, could do with a proper scrubbing out. The wood frontage was painted a kind of fading burgundy but although the building was pretty, the paint was flaking, and the swinging striped sign outside, Hopkins’ Sweets and Confectionery, was gilded but tired-looking. Inside Rosie could just about make out jars of this and that, in a slightly higgledy-piggledy order, and lots of jelly snakes sitting out in a huge dusty box. It didn’t, she thought, look terribly appealing. In fact, to her horror, she realised that it wasn’t open; that it clearly hadn’t been open for a long, long time. Lilian had been fooling everyone for what looked like years.
Rosie winced. This job of hers was going to be even more of a pain in the arse than she had expected.
She shook off her horrible sense of foreboding and decided to follow the flow and see where she ended up.
The cottage and shop sat at the western end of the main street of Lipton, a collection of thatched cottages, a doctor’s surgery, lawyer’s office, dentist, several feed stores, and a clothing store which featured some extraordinary mother-of-the-bride outfits that Rosie, belying her hunger, spent several moments staring at. What type of person could be in need of a huge jade, silver and violet-striped formal jacket with shoulder pads and large paisley flowers embroidered down the front for two hundred and seventy-nine pounds? The clothing shop next door sold jodhpurs, quilted jackets and waterproof trousers. Rosie wondered where the nearest shopping centre was, then figured out it was probably at the other end of that two-hour bus trip.
She mentally ran through her wardrobe. Since she and Gerard had moved in together, she had just got so comfy. Maybe that was why Lilian still dressed so formally; because she had never found anyone she could relax with. A perfect night for Rosie these days was a takeaway, a bottle of wine and a movie, her head tucked under Gerard’s arm, lying on the sofa they’d bought in Ikea. OK, so Gerard teased her about wearing her old pyjama pants and slippers around the house and asked what had happened to the hot young thing he’d met at the hospital, but this was what contentment looked like. She thought about Lilian’s smart appearance, though, and wondered for an instant if her own approach might just be complacency.
Rosie made a mental note of the right kinds of high-calorie foods to bring back for Lilian. She wondered if she would baulk at eating peanut butter, but it had to be worth a shot. She wandered past a bank, the post office, a large Spar that looked like it stocked just about everything in the world, an electrical store that proudly boasted that it still fixed toasters, a large old-fashioned pub called the Red Lion and, unexpectedly, a chic little restaurant with wooden benches and a chalkboard menu. Streets ran off the main road, all heading upwards out of the valley, with houses dotted more and more sparingly up the hills till you got to the farmland.
There was no doubt about it, Rosie thought, the place was definitely pretty. She popped into the bakery and said a cheery good morning to the woman behind the counter, who smiled back. She looked pink and exhausted. Must have been up early, thought Rosie, wondering if the sweetshop shouldn’t be open early too. There was a queue out the door of children buying doughnuts for the breaktime snack, and men who looked like farm workers and labourers stocking up on pies and sandwiches for lunch. She chose a cheese and onion pasty, bought a cup of tea from the vending machine and took it outside. The tea was horrible. Next to the war memorial was a green wooden bench, and from there she had a good view of the little town coming and going around her.
A dapper young man with a briefcase bounced up the steps of the doctor’s surgery with a large set of keys; a rather chubby vicar emerged from the beautiful square-topped Norman church across the road and looked around, confusedly. A postie wearing shorts and riding an ancient bicycle freewheeled down one of the hill roads. The Land Rovers – they seemed to be the only type of car allowed around here – nudged through the narrow road, followed by a truck containing a large and mutinous-sounding group of sheep. By the pond, on a small patch of green outside the church, two geese honked loudly in response. By the time she saw the two large ladies on horseback, Rosie was half expecting Windy Miller to arrive from somewhere. She phoned Gerard.
‘Hey?’ he said. He sounded groggy.
‘What are you doing?’ said R
osie, in mock annoyance. ‘I’ve been gone five minutes and you’re already having big celebration nights out?’
‘Course not,’ said Gerard easily. ‘Just me and the lads, you know. Friday nights out. Like the old days. Plus I’ve got to eat somewhere.’
‘Hmm,’ said Rosie.
‘So, how’s the old witch?’
‘She’s very run-down, bit weak … and a grumpy old witch.’
Rosie said this to make Gerard laugh, but it felt a bit disloyal.
‘She managed to make two rude remarks about my shoes as soon as I walked in the door.’
‘What, those big Cornish pasties you wear?’
‘Don’t you start.’ She paused. ‘No, she’s all right. Just lonely, I think. Sad.’
‘What’s it like?’
‘Well,’ said Rosie. ‘Well. It’s a bit weird-looking. And there isn’t a Starbucks.’
‘Oh. My. God,’ said Gerard. ‘You won’t last the week. Have you been arrested and charged with witchcraft yet?’
‘No,’ said Rosie. ‘But nobody has met me yet. Do you know, they even have a vicar.’
‘Cor,’ said Gerard. ‘Watch out for him. They’re always the worst pervs, vicars.’
‘That’s your medical opinion, is it?’
‘No,’ said Gerard. ‘Scientific fact.’
‘It’s pretty,’ said Rosie. ‘You’ll like it. You should come visit.’
‘I will, love, I will,’ said Gerard, stifling a yawn. ‘But first, I think I have to get to Starbucks.’
However pretty the scene, and however many people gave her inquisitive looks – which was odd; in London nobody ever looked at you at all; you could have two heads for all anybody cared – before too long her pasty was finished and her tea had been poured on the ground, and Rosie was beginning to feel as if she was in London again, a spectator of other people’s lives – other people’s happy, perfect lives, which always looked so effortless from where she was standing. When she got to the bit where she was working out whether the mothers with children were older or younger than she was, she decided something had to be done.
Although a couple of clouds were gathering in the sky, it was still a bright summer’s day. Larks were circling and, beyond the grey stone buildings opposite, the rich brown loamy fields were being ploughed. A tractor trundled up a little road towards the gentle hills in the distance, and hedgerows marked out the sprawling fields. It was lovely. Rosie decided to explore. She knew she should be getting back, making plans, sitting down with Lilian and figuring everything out, but this idea was not appealing. A quick walk around, just to familiarise herself with her surroundings, that was what she needed. That would be fine.
She passed by the tiny, traditional red-brick primary school with hopscotch drawn out in the playground. After the sign thanking people for driving slowly through Lipton came a long avenue of trees without a pavement. Fortunately there was little traffic, and Rosie marched along the ditch side, remembering as she did so how uncomfortable wellingtons were to wear for any length of time and feeling her feet begin to sweat. Then she turned into a side road that was little more than a muddy path. Here, tracks left by farm machinery had ploughed up the earth, and she found herself sinking into deep trenches. It was harder to see the fields from out here, and as she continued down the long, solitary track, just the quiet cries of birds sounding in the distance, Rosie began to feel her optimistic mood draining away, particularly as the wispy clouds she’d noticed earlier had changed their minds and were massing greyly above her head. Rosie started to wonder where she was going. In all senses. But she trudged on, turning into smaller and smaller tracks, sometimes sheltered by trees, sometimes barely a path before popping out on to what seemed like a road again.
After about half an hour, she reached the crest of a small hill, but turning round realised she could hardly see back down; the clouds were closing in much more quickly than she’d expected. Just at that moment, the first drops started hitting her head, and she realised that, a) she didn’t have an umbrella with her, b) she couldn’t remember which way she had come and now she couldn’t see it either, and c) she was wearing her shaggy H&M shearling, which, while stylish, and relatively forgiving to her lumpy bits, was also made of thin wool and thus if the rain got any heavier would prove totally and completely useless.
The rain got substantially heavier.
‘Bugger!’ shouted Rosie out loud at the sky, hoping this would make her feel better. It did, but not for long. Where was she? Where the hell? She took out her phone. Of course there was no signal. Who would need a signal out here, cows calling for home-delivery grass?
The sky was nearly completely black; you could see so bloody far in the country. She could certainly see far enough not to get her hopes up as to the weather changing in the next five minutes or so.
Rosie had never wished more fervently to see a Starbucks in her entire life.
‘Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks!’
Rivulets of rain had started to infiltrate the collar of her shirt and dribble down her back. There were droplets in her eyelashes. Her wellingtons might be keeping her feet dry, but stray raindrops were still finding their way inside and wetting her socks. Rosie wondered if it might be possible to drown. Didn’t cows drown if they looked at the sky or something?
She turned round. She had to guess a route, and it would have to be downhill. She’d come uphill, hadn’t she? Hopefully, she’d be going down the same hill … and not, for example, the other side of a different one, that led into a crevasse or a ravine.
Rosie realised she was shivering now. She couldn’t believe it had turned so very nasty so quickly.
Suddenly, in the distance, she caught sight of a set of headlights. Her heart leapt. She’d be saved! It must be the farmer! Maybe he’d caught sight of her out alone on the wild moors on a mad day and was coming to rescue her! And he’d take her back to his lovely farmhouse kitchen and his rosy-cheeked wife would have a plate of scones and … She put her hand out to wave down the car as it swept down the muddy lane. Dazzled by the lights, she couldn’t see who was at the wheel. The car, a dirty white Land Rover, failed to slow down, even as Rosie pushed herself further from the shelter of the trees to wave her hands wildly. For her trouble, the car spat out a fan of muddy water all over her jeans and down her wellies, and continued on its way. Rosie had an impression of an angry-looking face at the wheel.
‘You arse!’ she yelled after it. ‘You’ve left me here to die!!!’
At this, the brake lights of the car went on, briefly, and she thought it might be slowing down, that he’d had a rethink. But after a couple of seconds they went off again, and the car continued on its way down the hill, the opposite road to the one Rosie had been about to take.
‘Karma is going to totally bite you,’ she screamed. She was so wet now, it didn’t really matter at all. She marched out into the middle of the road.
‘I hope toads eat through your electrical wiring and a badger gets in your bed. A toe-eating badger. And that your car suddenly explodes for no reason. Without you in it because I am a good person unlike you, you monster. But with all your stuff in it, like your camera and your computer, but when you ring your insurance company they don’t believe you because you are so obviously a nobber. In a Land Rover.’
Rosie was so absorbed in bringing down curses on the head of the vanished driver, she hardly noticed when two lights appeared behind her, and another Land Rover skittered to a sudden, horrified stop.
A late-middle-aged, very tall woman alighted.
‘What the hell are you doing in the middle of my road?’ she shouted.
Rosie wiped the rain out of her eyes, and lowered the fist she suddenly realised had been angrily raised.
‘Uhm … well, I got lost.’
‘Where are your clothes?’ barked the woman, who was wearing a Barbour jacket and an enormous deerstalker hat. Her wellies were dark green and had a rubber tie at the top, Rosie noticed. No flowers at all.
‘Uhm, I got wet.’
‘You’re going to get hypothermia in about a second. Where are you going?’
‘Lipton.’
‘Well, you’re facing completely the wrong way … get out of my road!’
Rosie jumped to one side, completely intimidated.
The woman hurried back to the car, then looked up again. ‘You’re not … you’re not a vet by any chance?’
Rosie shook her head. ‘No.’
‘No, of course not, what was I thinking, look at what you’re wearing …’ The woman shook her head. Rosie finally realised she was extremely distressed.
‘Why, what’s the matter?’
‘Bloody … bloody vet’s an hour away operating on a horse in the next valley. I’ll need to get to the next town over … It’s my dog …’
Rosie peered into the back of the Land Rover, then clapped her hand to her mouth. Staring at her with wide, unblinking, terrified eyes was a large golden retriever. That wasn’t what caught her eye though. Sticking out of his abdomen – grotesquely, spreadeagling his paws away from it – was a huge coil of barbed wire.
‘Christ,’ said Rosie.
‘Quite,’ said the woman. ‘So, if you could get out of my road and out of my way—’
Rosie shook her head. ‘How far is the next town?’
‘Forty miles.’
‘That’ll take too long,’ she said.
‘I know,’ said the woman. ‘That’s why we’re following the doctor. But I don’t know if he can manage on his own.’
‘The doctor?’
‘Do you have any better ideas?’
Rosie shook her head. The idea of a doctor trying to help the poor beast in the back … It was crazy. On the other hand, she definitely, definitely needed a lift back into town.
‘Uhm, I’m a nursing auxiliary,’ she said quickly, not stressing the ‘auxiliary’ part.
‘You’re a nurse?’
