by Georgia Hill
Captain Trenchard-Lewis is cheery but cannot use his right arm due to his injury. He sends his regards to all at home.
Dorothy Turnbull VAD
24 Etaples
Rachel could hardly bring herself to open the third letter in the pathetic little bundle. It was shorter still and she knew its content before even reading it. It was a telegram:
Regret to inform you Captain Trenchard-Lewis died of wounds 25th March, 1915
Rachel let the papers sit in her lap while she stared unseeing into the fireplace. She couldn’t believe that the Edward she had begun to know, through Hetty, was already snuffed out. That was ridiculous, of course, he’d died more than eighty years ago but, to her, he had only just begun his life. Had married Hetty, was just beginning his adult life. Rachel shivered again. She felt a wave of desolation wash around the room. Poor Hetty and poor, poor Edward.
She sorted through the papers in the biscuit tin, rifling through Hetty’s diary accounts of Richard’s childhood misdemeanours, some not inconsiderable bitching about Flora and a description of another party – she’d come back to them later. Then she found it. Just a short few paragraphs dated April 18th, 1915.
Diary: a parcel arrived today. It contains Edward’s things from Etaples. Why they felt it necessary for us to have them I cannot imagine. There were only a few sad items: some of our letters to him, our wedding photograph, his pipe and tobacco wallet. There was also a case of cigarettes, one of which was half-smoked. With trembling fingers, I put it to my lips. Perhaps this had been the last thing that touched his? With it all was a letter from a VAD. She claimed Edward had had a ‘peaceful death’ and she was with him at the end. I can only hope so.
But then I unwrapped his tunic. It was stiff with blood and stinking. The horror of it all lay in my hands. The mud and blood and stench of death. This unholy mess. The mess that has ended my short marriage, my hopes and Edward’s brave life.
I could not bear for the aunts to see it, so I burned it. I took it to the brazier in the stable yard and burned the whole sorry lot. It was as if I had burned Edward himself.
Afterwards I washed and washed my hands. I even scrubbed them with carbolic in the scullery. But I could not rid myself of that stench. I can smell it even now.
We are a sad household, indeed. Cold supper tonight. Cook is too upset to do more.
Rachel read through tears, then shoved the papers back into their tin and closed the lid. It was too much. Too much sadness. A sigh, the softest echo of long-past unhappiness shivered through the room and then the phone rang and tried to steal her back to the twenty- first century.
‘Rachel?’
Rachel cleared her throat to answer. ‘Mum?’ The last person she needed to talk to, at the moment, was her mother. The ghosts of Hetty and Edward still lingered in her head – and in the room.
‘Hello, darling, how are you? Just thought I’d ring to see how you’re getting on.’
‘Okay. Fine…erm, I’m fine.’ Rachel hoped her bafflement wouldn’t communicate through the receiver, her mother hardly ever rang.
‘Are you sure? You don’t sound terribly fine. Is it living in the country?’
‘No, I’m enjoying living here. It’s very peaceful. I’m getting lots of work done,’
‘Good.’
Rachel raised her eyes to the ceiling and then wished she hadn’t; there was a spot in the corner she’d missed in her hurry to paint it. Dragging her brain into the conversation, she said, ‘Yes, I’ve got a big commission to draw a series of flower paintings. I’m really pleased, I –’
‘Rachel,’ her mother interrupted, ‘I didn’t ring to talk about your job. I wanted to see if you were coming to see Daddy and me before we go.’
Of course, her mother hadn’t rung to ask about her work. Rachel had never had a discussion with either parent about work since her decision to swap to an art course halfway through university.
‘Go?’ asked Rachel stupidly, half her brain was in 1915 with Hetty and Edward. Go where?’
‘Rachel!’ her mother reproved, in familiar fashion. ‘To Portugal, of course.’
‘We thought it might be rather wonderful to get a few people from the golf club together before we leave. Tristan and his family will be there.’
Rachel winced. Tristan Wallingford worked at something in the city. Their fathers were golfing partners and both families had been, to the eternal embarrassment of their offspring, trying to get them together since they were teenagers.
‘That’s nice.’
‘Rachel, is that all you can say! Tris is doing so well at the bank, he’s been promoted again, you know. Such a lovely boy.’
‘Yes.’
‘Rachel, are you sure you’re alright? You sound very distant.’
Rachel was, very much, not alright. This seemed too jarring a conversation to have, immediately after discovering Edward’s death. How had Hetty ever found the courage to deal with that awful package? She was in awe of the girl’s unblinking attitude to life – and to tragedy. There was a shifting in the sitting room behind her. She could feel Hetty willing her on.
‘Mum,’ she began, ‘have you ever been proud of what I’ve achieved?’
‘Darling, whatever do you mean?’
‘I know you never wanted me to swap courses at uni.’
There was a silence. Rachel could hear her mother thinking through what to say.
‘Whatever’s brought this on, Rachel? I only rang to invite you to the party.’
‘Have you ever loved me?’
‘Rachel, what a thing to ask! Of course your father and I love you.’
‘You’ve never told me.’
‘Well one doesn’t think one has to.’
Rachel laughed bitterly. ‘I might have needed to hear it, especially when you gave me so much grief over changing to a graphics degree.’
Another silence, longer this time. ‘I’m not sure this is the conversation to have over the phone, but of course we love you. Daddy and I were worried, of course. It wasn’t what we had envisaged for you. I can never see how people make a living from art, but you, well you seem to be doing quite well.’
‘Not a hobby any more?’
Paula had the grace to give an embarrassed laugh. ‘It doesn’t seem so. I think you’ve proved to us that it’s no longer that.’ Her voice became stilted. ‘And we are proud of you, you know. I was only pointing out that lovely feature you did for the National Trust magazine to Tris’s mother the other day. It was quite beautiful.’
Rachel’s throat constricted. She couldn’t speak.
‘Are you still there, Rachel?’
‘Yes.’
‘Perhaps we don’t say these things often enough?’
Not nearly enough.
‘You will come to Portugal to see us, won’t you, darling? Lovely wild flowers to sketch.’
Was this Paula’s way of reaching out, of apologising?
Rachel heard a sigh come down the line. ‘And you always were such a sensitive child. Never had enough confidence. I never had much of an idea how to talk to you, if I’m honest. I’m sure half these wrongs are only in your head. Now,’ Paula added briskly, as if all was dealt with, ‘about the party –’
Rachel smiled. It looked as if that was all she was getting. But it was enough. For the moment. A step forward, maybe. She felt a weight just begin to lift from her shoulders and gave up a little prayer to Hetty.
Her mother continued to chat about the move, about the amount of packing required, the struggle to get things just so for the party and her worry that it was all going to be too much.
It occurred to Rachel for the first time that maybe her mother lacked confidence too. Was that what was behind the iron control?
‘Are you there, Rachel? Has the line gone?’
‘Yes, Mum,’ Rachel answered, wincing as her mother banged the receiver. ‘I’m here, I told you. Must be a bad line. When is the party?’
‘Two weeks on Saturday. Can you come, da
rling? It would be so good to get the family together before we go off.’
Maybe it would.
‘Rachel?’ Her mother’s voice was sharp, she was losing patience and had things to do. To organise. To follow a cleaner around.
Rachel took a deep breath. ‘Yes, I’ll be glad to come.’ But she’d need support. They’d only taken a tiny step forward, after all. ‘Can I … erm … bring someone?’
‘Is there something you’d like to tell us, Rachel? Her mother’s voice had taken on a knowing quality.
‘No,’ she answered, deliberately vague. ‘Just be nice to have company on the drive, that’s all.’ Rachel cursed under her breath. Why had she said that? She just hoped Tim was free. He would, at least, make the party fun.
‘Of course you can, darling. Must go now. Bye Rachel, see you soon. And, and well, love you!’
Tears stinging, Rachel took a breath and then replied. ‘Bye Mum, love you too.’
She put the phone down and stared at the receiver. A boarding-school childhood with nannies and au pairs had left her wanting nothing. But she would have swapped it all in an instant for that phone call. She knew she could be over-sensitive, that her lack of confidence made her think she was unlovable. Maybe she too had a part to play in the rocky relationship with her parents? She tried to see it from their point of view. All they’d ever wanted for her was material success, with a career and a husband providing that. Instead, they’d produced a daughter who wanted to paint. Even she had to admit making a living from art was a precarious business. ‘We simply don’t understand each other, do we? Or our life choices. Perhaps it’s time to begin.’
‘Hetty,’ she said to the wall, ‘I may have crossed a threshold here. Thank you. And I’m so, so sorry about Edward.’
A wave of something, gratitude and sadness maybe, washed through the room. Then the ghosts of the past slipped away.
Chapter 18
Rachel woke with a start.
Boom!
She lay rigid and confused, wondering what the noise was. After a few minutes it came again and then, immediately again. There was no rhythm to it. For a delirious second, she thought she’d been transported to the trenches and could hear gunfire.
Boom! Boom!
Giving up on getting any more sleep, she got up and opened the curtains. It was a peerless day, only spoiled by the mysterious noise in distance, and it was later than she’d thought. Stifling a yawn, Rachel stretched and looked down on the sight of Stan weeding her front garden. She smiled. Since he’d begun to work there, he’d transformed the place. Along the sunniest side he’d cleared the alarming five-foot-high nettles and had created his vegetable patch. It was part of the deal; he escaped Sharon, his well-meaning but overly fussy daughter-in-law, in order to work on Rachel’s garden, but had this space to grow his fruit and vegetables.
He’d already made three raised beds and filled them with enticing-looking topsoil, so different to the fertile but sticky red clay surrounding them. You could make pots out of the stuff Stan had dug out. He’d planted some leeks in one bed, some tomatoes and lettuce plants against the sunny wall of the cottage and had said to Rachel that he’d really get going in the autumn, in readiness for next spring.
Rachel didn’t really mind what he did; anything was better than the depressingly overgrown front garden she had inherited. She was looking forward to home-grown strawberries and salads made with Little Gems. She didn’t mind waiting. The thought of the permanence of being at the cottage thrilled her.
Boom!
There came that sound again. That, and the rattle of Rachel opening her bedroom window, had Stan looking up. He waved, the ever-present cigarette stuck stubbornly to one corner of his mouth.
‘Bloomin’ bird scarers.’ He nodded over to the rolling fields. ‘The Garths always get one goin’ this time o’ year. Can only hear it when wind’s in this direction.’
That explained the noise, then. Rachel nodded, not really much the wiser.
‘Looking good ain’t she?’ Stan went on.
‘She’ was presumably the garden.
‘Hope you don’t mind, like, but I got an early start. Going to be hot ’un.’
Rachel laughed and shook her head. ‘You carry on, Stan. I overslept. Was working late last night,’ she added as explanation. Even though she didn’t really need to justify herself to him, somehow she felt she had to. She always felt so guilty sleeping in on these glorious mornings. The myth was true. Country people really did seem to get up earlier than their urban counterparts. ‘I’ll put the coffee on, shall I?’
Stan’s answer was another cheery wave.
Rachel took his instant coffee, milky with three sugars, out to him, along with her usual strong, perked stuff. With it, she carried two fat Danishes, bought from Mervyn’s bakery the day before.
They took their breakfast in silence, enjoying the morning. Rachel had picked up a couple of canvas deckchairs from the charity shop in Fordham and she always found Stan’s company undemanding. Swifts screamed overhead, making Rachel jump as usual. She looked up and watched house martins swoop to and from the eaves of the cottage and felt supremely content. Thanks to the combined efforts of Gabe and Stan, she was gradually learning to identify the birds that visited. She gave a happy sigh and leaned back in the chair, gazing up at the sky. It had been the right decision to move here. So much of her life seemed to be settling into place – and, despite the interruptions, she was working in a way she’d never done before. Somehow she knew Hetty had been happy living at the cottage too.
‘You know,’ she began, half to herself, ‘I thought it a bit strange having the main bit of the garden at the front. But now I wouldn’t have it any other way.’ She thought of the back of the cottage, with its small lawn leading up to the steep hill beyond. There was a gate leading out of it to the path, which eventually took you to the gastro pub Neil had taken her to. That night Neil had gallantly paid the bill, but Rachel knew it must have been an expensive meal. She couldn’t see herself returning unless for a very special occasion. But it might come in handy if Tim brought Justin to stay and if Jyoti ever visited.
‘You want to get yersen a little old shed to go round the back. Come in handy, like.’
Stan’s voice startled Rachel out of her reverie. She jumped again as the swifts swooped.
Stan laughed. ‘Little beggars,’ he said, fondly. ‘The birds have allus liked it up here. Old Hetty used to feed ’em. Used to have birdhouses and what-not up here. Used to feed the squirrels as well. Bloody rats with bushy tails, though, them things. You don’t want to encourage them varmints to visit.’
Rachel smiled at him. She loved it when he mentioned something about Hetty. The snippets she gleaned from people who knew her all helped to create a picture of Hetty as an older woman. So far, she’d discovered she was fierce, wore black, rode a bicycle and fed the birds. They were more pieces of the jigsaw. Rachel wondered how Hetty had got to be like that when older. What had happened to her in the long years in between beginning her life in the big house and ending up in the cottage? The death of Edward must have affected her terribly.
‘I’m sure Hetty would have known what all the wildlife was. Unlike me,’ she said to Stan. ‘Thanks to you, though, I’m beginning to learn. I can spot a swift and I’m almost certain of the difference between the house martins and the swallows.’
‘You want to look at the chests, Rachel. That’s how you tell ‘em apart. Swallows got those brick-red chests. Bigger an’ all.’ Stan emptied his mug and wiped coffee from his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘What you going to do with rest of the garden, then?’
Rachel screwed up her eyes against the light and scanned the garden. Stan had already made a huge difference, but it was a big space and there was still a lot to be done. ‘I’m not really sure.’ She bit her lip.
To the left of them, the vegetable beds took up most of the room and Stan had cleared the long grass and weeds to reveal what must have been cottage-garden-style
beds at one point. To the right of them, however, it remained a wilderness. There was a part of Rachel that rather liked the towering grass, with a few hardy surviving bluebells poking through the cow parsley, but it hardly looked neat. She sighed. ‘I don’t know, Stan, any suggestions?’
‘Well, you could have a few small beds, mixed in with a bit o’ gravel. Don’t want anything too difficult to look after, do you? You ain’t got the time.’
‘True.’
‘And what about ‘ere? You sit out ‘ere a lot, don’t you? What about a bit more gravel and some slabs. You could have a proper place to sit out. A bit of owl frisky living, like.’
Rachel looked at him blankly and then understood, but was in too mellow a mood to correct him. And she wouldn’t dream of laughing at him. Since the quiz she’d become very fond of Stan, even if he did have a habit of stripping down to his string vest on warmer days.
It was her favourite place to sit. The back garden was more private but, as hardly anyone ventured up to the cottage, it didn’t really matter. A place for a bit of alfresco living sounded just the ticket. Stretching out her legs in contentment, she agreed, ‘That sounds like a marvellous idea, Stan.’
‘You needs a clematis as well,’ he responded, obviously on a roll now. ‘Hetty was proud o’ the one she had growing up round the front door. And mebbe a honeysuckle. The scent is good on a summer evening.’
Rachel thought about the day ahead. She ought to get down to some work. The deadline for the flower illustrations was looming and she was behind with a commission for some Christmas cards. But, try as she might, she couldn’t block out this glorious June morning and really didn’t feel in a mood to conjure up wintry scenes. And, after all, you couldn’t call a cottage after a plant it didn’t have. Making a snap decision, she turned to her companion, who was now sucking on a roll-up. ‘The garden centre’s having a sale. Fancy a trip out?’
