by Anna Jacobs
‘Good idea. I’m tired too. I hope you’ll allow me to treat you to dinner at the hotel tonight, as a thank you?’
‘There’s no need.’
‘We both have to eat and I doubt either of us will feel like cooking. Besides, I enjoy your company.’
‘Oh, well, I enjoy yours too.’
‘I can’t thank you enough for helping me, Simone. I’ll look forward to our meal. I’ll book a table before I go to bed. Sleep well!’
What a strange way to make a friend, she thought as she got a quick snack. While she was eating it, she noticed a blinking light on the main phone unit. Someone must have called while she was out.
She was tempted to leave answering it until after her nap, didn’t think her family would have called. Then she suddenly remembered that she’d arranged for her relative to come and visit her this morning. Oh, no! Lance must have turned up and found no one there to greet him. She’d completely forgotten the arrangement.
Feeling guilty she phoned him and he picked up after the second ring. ‘Lance, I’m so sorry to have missed you.’
His voice was stiff. ‘Yes. Bit of a surprise not to find you there, I must admit.’
‘Russ next door had a medical emergency with his sister and needed my help in a hurry. We had to call out the ambulance and the police. I went to hospital with them.’
‘Oh. Friendly with him, are you? That was quick when you’ve only been here a few days.’
She was so surprised by this sour remark she didn’t know how to respond. What business was it of his who she was friends with anyway?
His voice became soft, cajoling. ‘Sorry. It was just that I’d been looking forward to meeting you.’
‘Mmm.’ Why was he making such a fuss? Why was he so eager to meet her?
‘How about I come tomorrow instead?’
She felt guilty but didn’t want to tie herself down. ‘I’m afraid I’ve already got something arranged for tomorrow. Look, I have to go now. I didn’t get any sleep and I’m far too tired to think straight. I’ll phone you and arrange another time to meet once I’ve caught up on my sleep. Bye.’
She ended the call without waiting for him to say anything else.
Why was he being so pushy? His tone of voice had annoyed her. He wasn’t proving any more to her liking than he had the first time they’d chatted. In fact, rather less. How strange! She’d never taken a dislike to anyone by phone before.
She went upstairs and lay down on the bed. Then she wondered whether she might sleep too long and upset Russ by not being ready this evening, so sat up and fiddled around until she’d found out how to set the bedside alarm clock. She smiled and gave it a pat as she finished. Russ was much more likeable than Lance. She definitely didn’t want to miss spending time with him.
After that the world went away until her alarm rang.
As she got into the shower, she realised she was humming, feeling happy at the thought of seeing Russ.
Be careful! she told herself. This is only a temporary holiday break. He and I live at opposite ends of the world the rest of the time – and so do our families.
But every relationship didn’t have to end in marriage, did it? Some you could simply enjoy for a time and then move on. She’d never had the chance to try shorter relationships, having married so young.
She might enjoy a fling with an attractive man. Which Russ definitely was.
Why shouldn’t she? She wasn’t exactly in her dotage.
She enjoyed the evening even more than she’d expected. They had a pleasant meal together, finding shared interests and differences as well as being amused by the same things in this crazy world.
One of his main interests was wildlife, not the big stuff but the smaller species that lived cheek by jowl with human beings, often unnoticed. She hadn’t been particularly interested before, though she’d enjoyed feeding birds in her garden, but he made it sound fascinating and she wanted to find out more.
‘I’ll show you what’s nearby over the next few weeks, if you like.’
‘I’d enjoy that.’
The food was good, but she was still tired and declined a dessert, suddenly desperate for sleep. When the server had left them, Russ yawned in the middle of saying something, unable to stop himself, and that made them both smile.
‘We’re still sleep-deprived,’ he said. ‘Let’s stroll home.’
She didn’t say that this wasn’t her home, didn’t say much of anything, but she enjoyed the star-lit sky above them and it was good that he didn’t try to force a conversation.
When she stumbled, he took her hand. That felt nice too.
It was ages since she’d been out walking after dark, something which, like most women, she didn’t usually risk doing on her own.
Inside her house the light was blinking to show a missed telephone call, but she didn’t check who it had been. Even if it was one of her daughters, all she wanted now, and that quite desperately, was to lie down and sleep. She turned towards the stairs.
The following day, Simone got up late, checked the missed phone call and saw that it had been from Lance. She frowned. Again? He was getting to be a bit of a nuisance. Annoyed, she deleted it without listening, then felt guilty but forgot about him and prepared some breakfast.
As she ate a leisurely meal of a banana followed by scrambled eggs on toast, she wondered how to spend the day. She’d maybe look for another pretty village and go for a stroll round it. Not as much fun on your own, but those she’d seen so far were lovely.
When she checked her emails, she found one from a stranger, so opened it cautiously. To her relief it was from a cousin of her father, the one her parents had gone to see when they visited England. It ended:
Would you like to come over for lunch on Sunday next and meet some of your UK relatives? It’s my wife who is the relative – she’s Fern Pennerton, has kept her own surname – but she’s asked me to contact you because I’m the one who’s into genealogy.
She and I have some old family photos we can share with you. I’ve attached a couple of your parents as teenagers. They both lived near here and our families knew one another.
If you’ve already got something arranged, no worries. We can meet another time.
Joe Harton
She opened the attachments and smiled to see what her father had been like then. He’d always had that wayward tuft of hair at the front, it seemed. It had vanished now, together with the rest of the hair on the top of his head, but she remembered it clearly and his fruitless attempts to persuade it to lie flat. His grin had hardly changed over the years.
Her parents weren’t interested in old photos and were unwilling to discuss their family histories as well. She’d often wondered why. Her father was particularly dismissive of that sort of thing. Had he not got on with his relatives? No, he couldn’t be at odds with them because he’d gone to see this Joe and Fern when they visited England, but hadn’t elaborated on their surnames. And if she remembered correctly, they’d been to see a few of her mother’s relatives too, those living in the same village, anyway.
Well, unlike her parents she was looking forward to finding out more about her ancestry on both sides while she was here and Sunday would provide her with a good opportunity to start doing that.
She replied to the email straight away, saying she’d be delighted to meet some of the family and would be there for lunch as he’d suggested.
Thinking about that, she looked up the village where her parents’ families seemed to have mainly lived. An online trip planner said Pennerton, same name as Fern’s, was about forty minutes’ drive away from the leisure village, and Upper Pennerton, where this cousin Joe lived, was a mere couple of miles beyond that. The distances were so small here compared to those in much of Australia.
She decided on the spur of the moment to go a bit early and check out Pennerton today, maybe take a few photos. Her mother had saved a few old papers and letters from her father’s ruthless clearing out by hiding them in
her sewing box and had given them to her, in case she ever went back.
‘But don’t tell your father. And I don’t want to talk about this again.’
One of the letters had been from an Aunt Henrietta and there were a couple of smudges on it as if tears had fallen. She hadn’t dared ask her mother what that was about.
There was a Christmas card from her mother’s maternal grandparents, too. Rather a posh card it was, with the address printed on it. Her mother had said she’d lived with them for part of her childhood but hadn’t said why.
When she’d looked at them again, Simone had realised this was the same address as the letter from Aunt Henrietta: Pennerton House.
Strangers would be living there now, she supposed – if it was still being lived in at all, that was, and hadn’t been demolished. But if it was still there she’d be able to look at the outside of it, at least, and take a couple of photos to show her mother after she got back.
There was no sign of Russ as she went out to the car. Probably a good thing. She didn’t want to grow too dependent on his company or make him think she was pestering him.
She pulled a face. Who was she kidding? She might not want to be thought a pest, but she’d be very happy to spend more time with him, found him a very pleasant companion. The upset with his half-sister seemed to have brought them together more quickly than usual with a new friend.
Taking her time, she drove through beautiful scenery and picturesque villages to Pennerton. The village centre consisted of two main streets, with a few shops and cafés, and a small church. She parked in the first available space so that she could walk up and down. Quite a few older buildings seemed to have been carefully preserved and were built in beautiful golden stone, but unfortunately the church was locked. She’d have liked to look round it during opening hours. One or two of the buildings had thatched roofs, a style she’d only seen on television or in films before.
She stopped for a coffee and cake, sitting near the window of the café, happy to watch people ambling past, making bets with herself as to which ones were tourists and which were locals.
When she got into the car again she followed the satnav’s instructions and came to Pennerton House. She’d thought it just a fancy name for an ordinary house, using the family surname. But it was in no way ‘ordinary’. Indeed, it surprised her how big the house was, three storeys high, three windows wide and set in a large garden behind high wrought iron railings that looked old too.
She took a few photos but there didn’t seem to be anybody around to ask who lived there now and the gates were closed so she couldn’t even poke her nose into the garden. Her relatives might be able to tell her whose house it was now when she had lunch with them.
As she drove back through the village centre, she noticed that one beautiful old pub was called the Pennerton Arms. Was this called after the village, or had everything been named for the family in the big house? She’d have to research it.
Her mother had always claimed she knew very little about her family history. Now Simone came to think of it, she’d seen her mother look at her father pleadingly the couple of times when she’d pressed for more information about their family. He’d taken over the conversation each time at that point, saying firmly that neither of them cared about that boring old stuff.
Did he really find it boring or perhaps … could there be something to hide? No, what was she thinking of? Her parents were ordinary people who’d worked hard all their lives and were now enjoying their retirement. What could they possibly have to hide?
And yet the house where her mother had spent part of her childhood was the sort to be lived in by the minor gentry, unless she had her understanding of history wrong. So who were her distant ancestors on that side of the family?
On the way back, just before she left the village, she stopped at a garden centre. She loved to visit such places back home in Australia and enjoyed wandering round this one. As she was leaving she saw some flowers for sale, so bought herself a bunch.
On impulse she asked the friendly woman at the till, ‘Do you know anything about that big old house with the same name as the village?’
‘Pennerton House? Been there since way back when, that old place has. My gran used to clean for the Pennertons – family has the same name as the house. There’s only one of them left now, a nice old lady by all accounts. Does a lot for the village. Miss Henrietta, folk call her, last of the direct family as far as I know. She has a great-nephew who works in London and he comes down to see her regular. Buys her a bunch of flowers from us if we’re open. Nice chap. Proper townie. He’s not a Pennerton, though, from the name on his credit card.’
A person standing there coughed, wanting attention.
‘Anyway, I must get on. Have a nice day.’ She pushed the flowers across the counter and turned to serve the next customer.
Simone walked slowly back to the car, wondering if this Henrietta was the same lady who had looked after her mother. It wasn’t a common name.
Just imagine your family living in the same house for centuries. It wasn’t like that in Australia, which was a young country. The west had fewer old houses than the east because it had been much slower to be settled. She’d look up stately homes online and find some to visit while she was here.
She liked old places and antique furniture, would have bought some herself, but Harvey hadn’t liked ‘old rubbish’. She might pick up a few small pieces while she was here, now that she could please herself, things worth the expense of shipping back to Australia.
She felt good as she pulled up outside her house and got the flowers off the back seat. Altogether it had been a very satisfactory outing.
She looked next door as she walked from the car to the house, and saw Russ moving about the room he called his studio, which had a window on the side of his house facing hers.
She wondered if he’d care for a glass of wine, since he apparently had none. Unless he’d done some shopping today.
No, what was she thinking about? She mustn’t bother him.
Russ got up late on the day after their visit to the hospital. He was pleased to find a message from Pierre waiting for him to say that Justine had been safely lodged in a special clinic near Paris and would be carefully looked after, both before and after she had the child.
Good, he thought. That was one problem off his hands.
The best thing about it was that he’d got to know his new neighbour better. What a nice woman she was! And how kind she’d been to him. He didn’t know what he’d have done without her.
As he ate a leisurely brunch, he couldn’t help wondering where she’d gone. Pity he hadn’t caught her before she left. He’d been going to offer to take her to a fresh food market that she’d probably not find on her own, and then to a small, ruined castle you could walk round.
He mustn’t keep pestering her, though. She’d helped him greatly yesterday but she would have things of her own planned, a lot of sightseeing no doubt, relatives to catch up with.
He went out shopping and when he was about to start the car to set off back from the market, his phone rang. He looked at who was calling and smiled. His agent. About time he got back into some work again.
‘Hi, Sally!’
‘Hi, Mr Elusive.’
He chuckled. ‘Not true. I’ve been busy moving into my new house and setting up a proper studio again. I was going to contact you tomorrow.’
‘Did the house turn out as well as you’d hoped?’
‘It’s even nicer – or it will be once I’ve got everything in order.’
‘Can we start thinking about a new series with book links, then? They’ve been putting out feelers about your recovery.’
‘That’s great. I’d love to do another one. I was worried I’d miss out on following up on my success with the last series.’
‘If you make them money, they don’t drop you unless they have to. Have you got any definite ideas?’
‘Possibly. I’d like to stick
to the UK for the time being while I continue to recover. I know we talked about how popular Australia is but I don’t want to go back there yet. It doesn’t have good memories.’
‘How’s the leg going? You were only limping when you got tired last time I saw you.’
‘I’m mostly past even that now, just a bit of stiffness.’ He wasn’t going to tell her about his fall. To his relief his leg seemed to be recovering well. Give it another few days and there’d be no stiffness showing, if he could help it, because those strengthening exercises the physio had given him seemed to help a lot.
‘Go on, then, Russ. What do you mean by “possibly”? What’s the new idea?’
‘I’m living in the beautiful Wiltshire countryside with a lake nearby. I did wonder about a book and series of programmes about what’s in the back gardens and nearby countryside round here.’
‘Like your Lancashire series?’
‘Yes, fairly similar, except that the countryside is very different from the Pennines, lush, you might call it, and picture-book pretty, instead of the breathtaking open spaces of the moors. So in a sense we’ll be focusing on more accessible species.’
‘Sounds good. Can you do me a brief preliminary proposal? Maybe include a few takes of the wildlife in action?’
‘Yes. Give me two or three days to organise my thoughts and do some wandering round the countryside for inspiration.’
‘How about I come down to visit when it’s ready? Next week, maybe?’
‘Don’t push. I’ll try to do it by then, but I’ve got other things to sort out here as well.’
‘Carpe diem, remember! Don’t be too long. Oh, and there’s another bit of good news. It’s still to be confirmed but it looks as if we might sell the series to the States.’
‘Wow, that’d be great.’
As he ended the call, ideas suddenly began bouncing into his mind, which sometimes happened and he knew enough to take notes of them while they were fizzing away in his brain. Not a simple overview of the species and plants this time, but a series of activities designed to introduce townies to their tiny close neighbours, and especially to help parents show their children what was hopping, crawling or flying nearby.
