Parliament of Rooks

by Karen Perkins

  ‘You’ve got a red nose, like a clown, Auntie Verity,’ Hannah informed me.

  Lara laughed, which somewhat negated the impact of her, ‘Don’t be rude, Hans.’

  She recovered herself and touched my arm. ‘It’s just the frozen peas, Verity.’

  I smiled. I knew well what I must look like, and doubted Hannah was far wrong. I pulled a face at her, immediately regretting the nose scrunch, but the laughter was worth it.

  ‘I think I’ll just go and change,’ I said, tugging my top to show off the blood drips, but was stopped by Grasper’s frenzied barking.

  ‘Aunt Jayne’s back,’ Hannah announced from the window. ‘She’s got the vicar with her, he’s still wearing his dress.’

  ‘Cassock,’ Lara corrected as she joined her daughter at the window and peered below. ‘Looks like you were right – she is up to something.’

  ***

  ‘Well, that was a waste of time,’ Lara said as we found a free table.

  ‘Couldn’t hurt to try,’ Jayne said. ‘Do you both want wine, shall I get a bottle?’

  ‘Coke, please, Aunt Jayne.’

  ‘Apple juice or water for you, miss,’ Lara corrected.

  ‘Apple juice.’ Hannah pouted then added, ‘Please,’ at her mother’s raised eyebrow.

  We sorted menus while Jayne went to the bar.

  ‘It was a good idea, Jayne,’ I said when she returned. ‘Thanks. Though I’m surprised you persuaded the vicar to come straight over after the service.’

  ‘He said it’s not the first time someone’s had a spontaneous nosebleed in his church,’ Jayne said. ‘He said if you were that stressed, the least he could do was come round as soon as the congregation had left.’

  ‘He probably wanted a look-see at what you’re doing to the place,’ Lara said. ‘You know what these villages are like, everyone wants to know everybody else’s business.’

  ‘Probably,’ I said with a laugh. ‘Either that or he was looking for the Grey Lady.’

  ‘Behave,’ Jayne said. ‘It was good of him to give up his time to bless the house – it’s his busy day, you know.’

  We all laughed then, the tension broken. Truth be told, I had found the blessing comforting – and very similar to Lara’s cleansings. I couldn’t quite understand why she was being so sarcastic and resistant. I shrugged; maybe she just wanted to be the one to solve the issue.

  ‘What’s up?’ Jayne asked.

  ‘Nothing, just trying to make sense of the last few days,’ I said.

  ‘Are the dreams back?’ Lara asked.

  ‘No.’ I blushed. ‘I couldn’t sleep last night – not a wink.’

  ‘Ah, thinking about William,’ Jayne teased.

  My blush deepened.

  ‘You’re one to talk, Jayne, did you dream about Vikram, or did he keep you up all night too?’

  ‘What?’ I stared at Jayne, whose blush was in competition with mine. She was the scarlet of a hunting jacket.

  ‘Yes, Vikram and our Jayne at midnight,’ Lara said. ‘Giving you and William a run for your money – I had to cover Hannah’s eyes.’

  ‘No, I saw them.’

  ‘Oh, thank goodness,’ Jayne said as Tess approached with our wine. ‘I need a bloody drink.’

  ‘Roast beef and Yorkshire puddings all round, please,’ Lara said to Tess. Then, to us, ‘What?’

  ‘We might have wanted something else!’

  ‘Tough – it’s a Yorkshire roast for you while you both fill me in on your men. And be aware of young ears!’

  15.

  Deep breath. You can do this, I thought, then reached out and pushed my way through the inner door to the Black Bull.

  I paused, self-conscious, my eyes scanning the interior, trying to check each nook and cranny without appearing too obvious.

  Then I saw him. Hand raised. Smiling. At the bar. Waiting for me. William Sutcliffe.

  The worry that he wouldn’t be here, and the fear that he would be, coalesced, but now the churning in my stomach was infused with warmth. He was here, and I was here. Everything else – caution, memories, Antony, my dreams – hadn’t been powerful enough to keep me away. Whatever the evening would bring, I was here; he was here.

  I realised I was still standing near the entrance, blushed, smiled, and walked towards him.

  ‘Hi, I was worried you were going to stand me up again.’

  My heart leapt into my mouth, and I realised I’d made a mistake. ‘You weren’t expecting me to turn up? You didn’t mean it?’

  ‘Oh,’ he held the flat of his hand out to me, ‘no, that’s not what I meant. I was just trying to make a joke.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said, ‘I see.’ I was lost. Was this a date or wasn’t it?

  ‘Shall we start again?’ He grinned, and my heart leapt again, this time more pleasantly, at the lopsided smile and resultant dimple in his right cheek. I nodded.

  ‘Hello Verity, it’s good to see you.’ The dimple deepened. ‘Would you like a drink?’

  ‘Yes please, a large one.’ I found myself wishing for dimples in my own cheeks to match his.

  ‘That bad is it?’

  ‘Getting better.’

  Deeper still. A pause, then a quirk of his eyebrow.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘What would you like to drink?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Umm, dry white wine please.’

  He ordered it, plus another pint of Black Sheep for himself. ‘Haven’t done this for a while.’

  ‘No, I’m a bit out of practice.’

  ‘I meant me.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Shall we sit down?’

  ‘I think we’d better.’

  We found a seat in the corner by one of the lopsided leaded windows, and looked at each other in silence for a few moments.

  ‘Shall we start again?’

  ‘Okay.’

  We laughed then, the awkwardness dissipating in the absurdity of the situation. A couple of nights ago, we’d been in each other’s arms at the birth of a new year, a couple of nights before that we’d hardly been able to stem the words; now we seemed incapable of conversation.

  ‘It’s good to see you,’ William said.

  ‘You too. Cheers.’ I held my glass up to clink, then we drank, our eyes locked on each other.

  I realised he was younger than I’d originally thought – probably mid-thirties rather than early forties. His face was tanned, but what I’d taken for wrinkles, I now saw were pale lines – crease lines, I realised. He must spend a lot of time outdoors, squinting into the sun.

  ‘You’ve shaved,’ I said, out loud, then gasped and clamped my hand over my mouth.

  ‘Well, I am on a date,’ he said dryly, his eyebrows raised. ‘Though it’s a damn strange one so far.’

  ‘Sorry, I’m out of practice,’ I reaffirmed.

  ‘Good.’

  I took another drink, cursing myself for injecting discomfort back into the evening.

  ‘It looks good.’

  ‘What does?’

  For answer, I stroked my chin, though in truth it wasn’t a good look on him, the skin of his jaw was two shades paler than the rest of his face.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Have you ever grown a beard?’

  He shrugged. ‘Once or twice, but it comes in grey and is a bugger to trim. Easier to shave it off.’

  I nodded and sipped my drink again. Why on earth am I quizzing him about his shaving habits? How would I like it if he asked me about mine?

  ‘Should get rid of these really, too,’ he continued, running his fingers through his sideburns. I realised he was just as nervous as I was, and glad to have something – anything – to talk about. ‘Rebekah won’t let me though, insists they make me look distinguished.’ He wobbled his head in mockery with the last word.

  ‘Rebekah?’

  ‘My sister.’

  Relieved, I said, ‘She’s right, they su
it you – give you a certain ... gravitas.’

  ‘Gravitas?’

  I shrugged. ‘When the word fits.’

  ‘I’ll tell Rebekah that next time she comes to cut my hair.’ The dimple reappeared.

  ‘Is she a hairdresser?’

  ‘No, a historian.’

  I laughed. ‘And the sideburns now make perfect sense!’

  We clinked glasses again.

  ***

  ‘So how is The Rookery coming on?’

  ‘On schedule so far – thanks to Vikram,’ I replied and surreptitiously tapped the wooden table three times. I noticed William watch my fingers, but he didn’t remark on the habit. He definitely had better manners than I did.

  ‘Aye, he’s a good man is our Vikram. He’s very taken with your mate, you know.’

  ‘Jayne? Yes, I heard they got close New Year’s Eve.

  Silence fell again as our eyes met, both embarrassed as we remembered how we’d ‘got close’ at the same time, and I wondered if he felt the same tingle of excitement I did.

  ‘So, Sutcliffe,’ I said, ‘no relation to Peter?’

  He groaned. ‘Why do women always ask me that? No, I’m no relation to the Yorkshire Ripper. Another wine?’ He got up without waiting for a response and went to the bar.

  When he returned, I thanked him for the drink and apologised.

  ‘No, it’s fine, it’s a fair question. The man terrorised the area – I can remember my sister being banned from going out alone, most lasses were – thank God he’s rotting in Broadmoor or wherever they moved him to. I just hate that we share a surname, does me no good on dates.’

  I smiled at the sight of his dimple.

  ‘Tell me about your family,’ he said. ‘Why did you choose Haworth?’

  ‘Well, I got divorced about a year ago – the details have only just been finalised.’

  ‘So you’re starting over?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Why here?’

  ‘My dad was from Keighley, we used to come here at weekends when I was a child – this place holds my happiest memories – in fact, my dad’s family may have originated here, they definitely worked in the local mills.’

  ‘Have you never looked into it, ancestry.com and all that?’

  ‘Have you tried sticking “Earnshaw” and “Yorkshire” into any search engine? There are millions of hits thanks to Wuthering Heights.’

  ‘Yes, I can see that would be a problem.’ He smiled. ‘Maybe Emily based Catherine on one of your ancestors.’

  ‘God, I hope not!’

  16.

  ‘Your turn,’ I said when I rejoined him, fresh drinks in hand. ‘Have you always lived in Haworth?’

  ‘Born and bred,’ he said, his pride evident in the smug cast of his smile – no dimple. ‘Apart from three years at art school. This is my home – I hated being away, and I can’t imagine living anywhere else. We can trace the family back here over three hundred years. I love the moors, the people, the way of life here, both past and present. I just have to paint it, all of it.’

  ‘Wow, so you’re not an adventurous breed then?’

  I cringed, wondering if I’d been inappropriate again, but he continued without a flinch.

  ‘My grandda and his before him, and his before him, were stonemasons – carved most of the stones in the churchyard they did, and built most of the houses of their time.’

  I felt cold and faint headed, but if I’d paled as well, he didn’t notice.

  ‘The business struggled when they stopped burying people in the churchyard.’

  ‘Why did they stop?’

  ‘Overcrowding, and the stones were laid flat, so the gases and rot from decomposition were trapped in the ground. Some of those graves are twelve corpses deep, and there’s no spaces between them. Supposed to stop in the 1850s they were, after the Babbage Report pretty much condemned the village. But nobody took much notice – folk want to be with their folk, it takes a lot to come between family in these parts.’

  I nodded. ‘Who was Babbage?’

  ‘An inspector in the 1850s from the General Board of Health – Patrick Brontë had him come out, actually, the sisters’ father. Anyways, the living conditions here were atrocious: life expectancy early-twenties; at least one funeral every day; over two thousand people sharing four wells and twenty five privies. Not good.’ He shuddered, and I joined him.

  ‘One of the wells was out back here by the graveyard, and another next to the morgue, where the Tourist Information is now. Can you imagine? Even the cows wouldn’t drink from it, folk had no chance. Anyroad, things started improving after he came, and eventually they stopped digging graves.’

  ‘Not before time, by the sounds of it.’

  ‘But it meant no one needed new headstones. I think it was a blessing really when the museum people bought the parsonage – they knocked down the old mason’s workshop to make room for the car park.’

  ‘That must have been difficult for your family,’ I said. ‘The stonemason’s workshop must have been a big part of Haworth’s history, especially with it having been so close to the parsonage.’

  ‘Aye, just not the sort of history that brings in the tourists,’ William said with a smile – dimple evident this time – and took a long drink.

  ‘Anyway, they didn’t do too badly from the sale of the land, enough to set the family up in other businesses. My father had the shop on Main Street – shoemakers it was in his day, then when he retired, I took it over and reopened as an art gallery.’

  ‘What did he think to that?’

  ‘Not a lot,’ William admitted, ‘but he’s starting to come round now.’

  ‘How long have you been open?’

  ‘About ten years.’

  I laughed. ‘And he’s just starting to come round to the idea?’

  William shrugged. ‘Yorkshire folk don’t like change. Things are best done the way they’ve always been done.’

  I raised my eyebrows and pouted. I had plenty of memories of my dad saying exactly the same thing.

  ‘I didn’t have it as bad as Rebekah, though. You should have heard my dad when she told him she was going to university to read history. Well, most of the village did hear him!’ He laughed, but with no mirth, and took another drink.

  ‘Still complains to this day, though we’re both making good livings. Not sure he means it now, though, just does it to keep up his curmudgeonly reputation.’

  I giggled. ‘He sounds like quite a character.’

  ‘Oh aye, that he is, right enough. Just beware when you meet him, he’ll have all sorts to say about you opening yet another guesthouse.’

  ‘When I meet him?’

  ‘Aye, well.’ He coloured. ‘Bound to before long, living here.’

  The bell behind the bar rang, and William jerked his head round to stare at the barman.

  ‘Bloody hell, last orders already? Can’t be.’

  I checked the time on my watch. ‘Eleven,’ I said. ‘Funny, living in Leeds, I haven’t heard a last orders’ bell in years. Everywhere just stays open.’

  ‘Aye, well, you’re in the country now. Things are done the way they always were,’ William said. ‘And we forgot to eat! Everywhere will be closed now too, dammit.’

  ‘Not to worry, let’s get a last round in, then we can go back to mine – I should be able to rustle up an omelette or something.’

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m only offering food, mind, it is only a second date.’

  We smiled at each other, eyes locked together, then William pulled away at the shout of ‘Last orders, please!’ from the bar.

  ***

  ‘Blimey, what’s going on?’ William ducked as a couple of birds swooped at us.

  ‘Oh yes, they seem to like roosting here – it turns out calling it The Rookery is very apt!’

  William looked up at the gable and windows of The Rookery. ‘They never used
to roost here before.’

  ‘Really? They’ve been bothering me since I moved in. I’m sure there are more of them every day.’ I gave a nervous laugh and found the keyhole with my still unfamiliar key.

  ‘I’ve only ever known them roost in the churchyard,’ William said. 'My sister used to tell me they were the souls of all the babies buried there. Scared the life out of me, she did – I couldn’t go near the place for years.’

  ‘She sounds lovely!’ I laughed.

  ‘Aye, but she’s also a big sister – had to have her fun with me.’

  I switched the lights on and led the way to the stairs. ‘The only working kitchen at the moment is the one upstairs, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Vikram’s still got a lot to do, hasn’t he?’

  ‘Yes, but there’s time. They’re doing well, actually, on schedule so far, despite the holiday season.’

  ‘That doesn’t sound like him – mind you, I guess he’s only just started.’ William laughed, then realised what he’d said when I turned to him.

  ‘What do you mean? Should I be worried?’

  ‘No, no, not at all. Sorry, me and my big mouth. He’s one of the good ones is Vikram, we were at school together. When he does a job, he does it proper – even if it takes him a bit longer. He’ll see you right, don’t worry about it.’

  I nodded, mollified, and led the way up the narrow staircases.

  ‘So why didn’t you come to the Black Bull on Saturday – the real reason?’

  I didn’t turn. I couldn’t look at him. ‘I-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have stood you up like that. I’ve taken so much on with The Rookery, and especially after all the stuff with the divorce, it just seemed too much. And Hannah was with us, too, of course.’ I paused. ‘I’m glad you and Vikram came to the White Lion, though.’

  ‘Yes, me too. I wasn’t sure if you’d turn up tonight.’

  I giggled. ‘I couldn’t do that to you again. Anyway, I enjoyed New Year’s Eve.’ Now I did turn, smiled, and led the way to my apartment.

  ***

  I opened the fridge. ‘Wine or lager?’

  ‘No bitter?’

  ‘None I’m afraid.’

  ‘Guess I’ll have to make do with lager then.’