Deception in the Cotswolds

by Rebecca Tope

  For lunch she made herself a lavish salad full of all her favourite tastes – olives, beetroot, rocket, prawns and cherry tomatoes. It might not be orthodox, but she enjoyed it, along with a glass of cold white wine. It left the contents of the fridge rather depleted, which meant she would have to go off to find a shop the next morning. Painswick would be nearest, she supposed – a town she hardly knew at all, other than as the home of Phil Hollis’s sister, Linda. They had met two or three times; enough to recognise each other easily in the street. ‘I really hope I don’t bump into her,’ Thea muttered aloud. ‘That could be a bit awkward.’

  She had disappointed Phil in a number of ways, one of which being her failure to befriend the lonely Linda and shake her out of her reclusive ways. ‘That’s too big a task,’ she had protested. ‘Besides, she seems to like things as they are.’

  Where many of the small Cotswold villages were tucked away in folds of the landscape, a scattering of sturdy yellow houses arranged around the home farm or the Manor or the church or the green, the towns were of a different appeal. Often on a river, like Naunton or Bourton, they were all entirely distinct from each other. Northleach, for example, was on rising ground, with the huge church standing guard over the main square as if it had been there since the world began. Naunton snaked cheerfully along the banks of the river, the beautiful buildings basking complacently in the knowledge that they had achieved a perfection that could never be surpassed. Stow had an air of importance, standing at a point where several roads intersected, offering bounteous quantities of free parking for visitors and little old shops from a bygone age. Broadway, which Thea had only glimpsed once, some years before, had its own claims on the tourist trade, which on that single visit she had failed to comprehend. She ought to give it another chance, she decided, but strongly suspected she would not like it any more a second time. Blockley, on the other hand, was full of fascinating contradictions and historical mysteries. And Painswick was different again, with a busy road running through its heart and yet another large church asserting its presence.

  The sheer miracle by which a rich density of occupation combined with a sense of unchanging rural life was one of the main charms of the area. There were literally hundreds of settlements, ranging from the tiny hamlet of Hampnett to the major town of Cirencester, and yet there was always a feeling of sparse human presence. The tourists tended to converge on a few centres, leaving the undiscovered glories of the little Duntisbournes or this unheard-of Cranham in almost perfect peace.

  The weather was teasingly uncertain throughout the day. A breeze was blowing from the east, far from cold, but enough to lower the temperature from Thea’s optimum 25 degrees or so. White clouds with pale-grey centres were milling about overhead, pretty enough, but unwelcome just the same.

  In the cellar the geckoes and their eggs were boringly inert. She sprayed a fine mist of ionised water onto the eggs as instructed, and left them to their slow incubation.

  Chapter Four

  Donny arrived early. It was just short of two-thirty when she heard his shuffling feet on the threshold of the open front door. ‘Hello?’ he called breathlessly. ‘Can I come in?’

  Hepzie trotted ahead to welcome him, but did not jump up at his unsteady legs. He nudged her gently with his walking stick and she backed away, long tail slowly wagging.

  Thea smiled and extended an arm to usher him into the kitchen. She felt awkward and dumbstruck after their previous exchange and all she had learnt about him subsequently. He seemed to be feeling something similar, his smile uncertain and his eyes querulous. Foolishly, she was reminded of the morning after a one-night stand, where the sudden night-time intimacies are revealed as excessive and inappropriate in the cold light of day. Not that she had had many such experiences, she thought ruefully.

  ‘I met your daughter this morning,’ she said.

  ‘So I gather. She seems to be rather cross with us both.’

  ‘Mmm.’ With difficulty she kept back the words that would have placed her firmly on his side – where he obviously wanted her to be.

  He was quick to see how things stood. ‘She’s a very good girl,’ he said. ‘We’ve always got along pretty well, me and Mimm. Did well at school, married a decent man. Fine, healthy kids.’ He sighed. ‘Counts for very little now, though. All she does these days is fight me.’

  ‘I like your children’s names,’ Thea offered, in the hope of keeping things light. ‘I heard them all this morning.’

  ‘Do you? Jemima was her mother’s idea. Named her for some old maiden aunt I never even met. And Silas – that was nearly as bad. I made sure I got my choice for the last one. I always liked the name Cecilia. It sounds musical to me.’

  ‘I like Silas,’ said Thea. ‘It’s unusual.’

  ‘It doesn’t suit him.’

  ‘My daughter’s Jessica. Nice and safe. Not too ordinary and not too unusual. She seems quite happy with it.’

  He nodded absently, tired of the small talk. He rubbed a hand absently across his abdomen, pressing hard at one spot. ‘Have you got a pain?’ she asked him.

  ‘Blockage,’ he said curtly. ‘Not a subject for polite company.’

  Where was the boldness of the day before? All courage had deserted her in the ineluctable fact of a disintegrating body. Her medical knowledge was scanty, especially where it concerned old people. ‘Oh dear,’ she said.

  ‘Have you ever had an enema?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Ghastly business. And nobody wants to do it.’

  ‘It has to be a nurse, I assume?’

  He scowled, sitting in his usual place at the kitchen table, thin legs tucked out of sight, but their constant movement intrigued the spaniel, which watched intently. ‘I won’t have a nurse,’ he muttered.

  Well, I’m not going to volunteer, thought Thea, suppressing a shudder. ‘Have you any choice?’ she asked, aware that the same question had arisen on the previous day.

  Donny too noticed the repetition. ‘That’s a favourite word with you, isn’t it?’ he accused. ‘One of those jargon words the politicians like to use. Of course I’ve got a choice. Take it or leave it. Hold out or give in. I make the same choice every day.’

  ‘You’ve tried prunes and stewed apple, and all that, I suppose?’

  ‘Syrup of figs and liquorice sticks,’ he added. ‘All hopeless.’

  ‘I can see your problem,’ she said, thinking she would have entirely the same reaction. One reason she stopped after one child had been her profound resistance to the indignity of the birth process, the sense of helpless victimhood in the hands of uncomprehending medical people. Donny’s situation was so much worse, with no happy outcome to look forward to, no consoling new baby to salve the wounds to his self-esteem.

  Perhaps it was the necessity for dignity that made her resolve not to exclude him from what had been said by Jemima – Mimm – that morning. She would not be party to conversations behind his back, and the feeling of betrayal that came with them. ‘Your daughter doesn’t like the idea of you talking about your own funeral,’ she said.

  ‘You’re right there. She’s furious about it. I told you.’

  ‘Did she tell you I’d already contacted my friend Drew?’

  ‘Not exactly. She said you’d been overenthusiastic. Something like that.’ He ducked his head, glancing at her from beneath his straggling grey eyebrows. ‘It’s a battle,’ he summarised.

  ‘He did say he could come and talk to you tomorrow, while he’s in the area. He lives in Somerset, you see.’

  ‘No harm in talking,’ he remarked carelessly.

  ‘No – we couldn’t.’ She was scandalised at the ease of the idea. Say nothing to Mimm and let Drew call in on a casual footing, as much to see her as to offer Donny his services.

  ‘Just how friendly are you with this chap?’ His eyes twinkled teasingly, and Thea felt herself flush.

  ‘Only vaguely. I met him in March, and we had a bit of an adventure. But he’s married to a very nice
person. He’s quite young for an undertaker, but very experienced.’

  ‘Expensive, I shouldn’t wonder. They all are, these people. Captive market, of course. Who’s going to argue?’

  ‘I’ve no idea about the money, but I would guess he keeps it all as low as he can.’

  Donny said nothing, keeping his gaze on the coffee in his hands, but managing to kink an encouraging eyebrow to keep things going.

  ‘So, if I were to ask him to call in for a cup of tea, about three tomorrow afternoon, it wouldn’t be an official consultation, would it? Just a chance encounter,’ she suggested. Again there was no reply, so Thea carried on, ‘Except that your daughter already knows I’ve talked to him about you. She wouldn’t be deceived for a second.’

  Finally he spoke. ‘Not if somebody told her about it, no. But she’s never here of an afternoon. She’s busy with the strawberries just now. Has to watch out for the Pick Your Own people helping themselves.’ He chuckled chestily. ‘Should have been a sergeant major, that girl. I’ve said so to her face.’

  ‘I liked her,’ said Thea, uncomfortably. ‘She has your best interests at heart.’

  ‘She loves me too much,’ he said flatly. ‘And what’s it to her what sort of funeral I want?’

  Therein lay a whole new argument, which Thea had engaged in more than once in her life: was a funeral for the person who had died, or the people left to mourn? The obvious glib answer always came back, that it was the latter. She had never been quite so sure. It was something she looked forward to discussing with Drew one day.

  There was some other matter nagging at the edge of her mind, going back to Harriet’s quick summation of Donny. ‘And what about your lady friend – Edwina? What’s she going to think?’

  His palsied head shook in a sideways motion. ‘She’s no lady,’ he asserted. ‘She’s a force of nature.’

  Unlike his wife, then, if Jemima’s description could be believed, but not dissimilar to his daughter. ‘So where is she?’

  ‘Away. She goes off at half-term to stay with her daughter and the grandchildren. Five of them there are, all school age. She makes them do treasure hunts and read books about boarding schools and steam trains.’

  ‘Like me with my sister’s kids,’ said Thea. ‘They think I’m a bit mad, because I organise amateur dramatics and stuff they can’t do on a computer.’

  ‘Mischief, that’s all it is. Weena’s family must dread her coming, but it’s traditional by this time, and they can’t get out of it while she’s alive. Twice a year, Whitsun and Christmas, she takes over. Don’t know how she does it, with her hip the way it is, but she says it rejuvenates her.’

  Thea was thinking. If Edwina and Harriet were both away at the same time, then no wonder a house-sitter had been enlisted as backup. It might even have been a deliberate plan hatched up between all the women together – Jemima included.

  ‘A force of nature and a sergeant major is quite a combination,’ she smiled. ‘You’re being very well looked after, compared to some.’

  ‘And Harriet wouldn’t let me go wanting, either,’ he agreed. ‘I tell them they’re all just wasting their time. There’s nothing in the bank for me to leave them.’

  It gave her a jolt. Even if he was joking – and surely he was – it was a nasty thing to say. She eyed him consideringly. ‘You don’t really think that’s their reason for looking after you, do you?’

  He avoided her scrutiny. ‘Why do people do what they do?’ he shrugged. ‘Habit, mainly. And some sort of moral duty that comes from what the neighbours think.’

  Blimey, thought Thea, with a flash of anticipation. Now we’re onto moral philosophy. ‘Social pressure, you mean? Hasn’t that all died out these days? What neighbour is going to even notice, let alone judge you?’

  ‘Them, not me. Nobody judges me. I’m excused all that, at my age. But Mimm likes to keep in with people, do the right thing. Weena’s pretty impervious, I grant you – but she’s got a bad dose of noblesse oblige. Her father was an “Honourable” and she can’t ever forget it.’

  ‘And Harriet?’

  ‘Harriet’s American,’ he said. ‘She doesn’t understand.’

  ‘They say Americans are good at being neighbourly.’

  ‘And it must be true. She bakes pies for me, and phones Mimm if she thinks there’s cause for concern.’

  ‘And still you don’t count yourself lucky?’

  His tremor increased and his thin lips tightened. ‘I find such ideas are far too relative to be taken seriously,’ he piped. Pomposity sat oddly on the quavering frame, but it was unmistakably present, for all that.

  ‘Come off it,’ she protested. ‘Count your blessings, why don’t you.’

  His look intensified, causing her to flush. ‘Sorry. I’m being crass,’ she retracted.

  Donny chuckled happily. ‘And I’m wallowing in self-pity. I do it a lot.’

  ‘It must be tempting to blame somebody,’ she sympathised. ‘When it’s really just the way things are.’

  ‘You got it exactly,’ he applauded. ‘Except I don’t see why we all put up with it so spinelessly. We’re not even allowed to mention it in polite company. Getting old is a taboo. Look at all the accolades you get if you can manage to look ten years less than your real age. It’s just society’s way of rewarding you for not being embarrassing.’

  ‘People I know in their sixties say all that’s going to change when they’re old. They’re not going to put up with it.’

  ‘Good luck to them,’ he grumbled. ‘Not going to do me much good, is it?’

  ‘More coffee?’ she interrupted, unable to come up with any more attempts at reassurance. Friendship was in the air – a sense of mutual acceptance, comradeship, wanting things to go well for each other. Despite his stubble and tremor and slight air of grubbiness, she would have liked to hug him. But she did no such thing. Plenty of time for that, she thought, anticipating many more amicable afternoons.

  He put up a quivering hand to decline the offer of coffee. ‘What about your friend, then?’ he asked.

  She screwed up her face as she tried to assess the risks. ‘Well, it would be nice to see him. If he’s free, I’ll invite him over for this time tomorrow. The rest is up to you.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, graciously.

  Another walk in the woods seemed in order when Donny had gone. Thea had belatedly discovered that the Cranham Woods were rather more famous and special than she had realised, when she consulted the Internet for local places of interest. Pictures of them abounded, as well as reports by cyclists as to their condition. They stretched almost to the neighbouring village of Sheepscombe, and were plainly much valued.

  As if to endorse her researches, three bicycles sped past her before she had walked two hundred yards. All men, with heads down and legs well muscled, it was as well that Hepzie had not got entangled with them. What possible pleasure they could be gaining from such intent pedalling, with no attempt to admire the scenery or converse together, she could not fathom. A century ago, the bodies of the riders would be vertical, the pace sedate. There would be a picnic in the panniers and a sense of awestruck freedom to enhance the jaunt. Now cycling had changed out of all recognition, with its overtones of moral superiority combined with protective headgear and Lycra garments that made the Edwardian plus fours seem quite ordinary and sensible. It could hardly even be said to comprise an environmentally benign, low-cost means of transport, when the price of the machine itself could amount to as much as a second-hand car, and the hazard presented to walkers and their animals was so considerable.

  The weather remained ambivalent, hazy cloud overhead and a cool breeze blowing. More spring than summer, with nothing approaching a firm promise of warm sunny days ahead. Thea wore a long-sleeved shirt and cotton trousers, reluctant to expose skin in the shady evening woodlands. No other walkers had come into view, the dog had gone sniffing off ahead of her, and thoughts of death never quite went away.

  She was forty-four – her
own death surely need not worry her for a long time yet. It was Donny’s demise that preoccupied her, but by extension that of other people also intruded into her head. Her mother was in her late seventies, for example, her father gone for less than a year. People of her acquaintance had died suddenly, sometimes violently, leaving her to wrestle with the mystery of the whole business, time and again. She had seen dead bodies five or six times, both lying in their coffins and in the first hours after losing their lives, still untidy and undignified. There had generally been somebody very much to blame for the premature curtailment of a young life – in at least two instances far too young.

  But it was June, and the final few bluebells were still visible in one or two places. The whole place throbbed with life, birds breeding rampantly overhead and new plants emerging on all sides. This was one of the most lovely parts of the country, timeless in its own special way. The very buildings were rooted like great immortal trees and the undulating land swept serenely in every direction. It was not a scene for morbid thoughts, despite her instinctive tendencies that way. She would see Drew again the next day, and enjoy the mild deception of introducing him to Donny against his daughter’s wishes. The idea of mischief gave her a lift, despite some worry as to how Jemima might react. She could be irresponsible and get away with it, never needing to come to Cranham again if she made an enemy in the process. But she could not persuade herself that she was being especially feckless, given Donny’s frame of mind. In any case, Drew would know what to do. He would understand the different motives and thread a careful path through the minefield of sensibilities, as he must have done many times before.

  The woods were increasingly shadowy as she carried on along the well-marked path, pounded by all the cycling and walking and even some horse riding. Her stomach suggested that it was close to seven o’clock and time for some food. ‘Come on, then, Heps,’ she chirped. ‘Let’s go home.’

  The absence of any response did not at first alarm her. Although she had lost the dog once or twice in the past, she had always been found again. This time, a passing squirrel or rabbit must have distracted her. If she had got herself caught in a bramble or wire, she would have called out. When did I last see her? Thea asked herself. Only a few minutes ago, came the reply. The dog had come back to her from further along the track, nosing briefly at her legs before running off again. The ordinariness of it had been reassuring in itself, the usual routine on a country walk. There had been no more people since the cyclists – despite it being a dry summer evening, when locals might be expected to take the air.