by Georgia Hill
Peter nodded. ‘It was partly his death which made me join up. There was so much sacrifice. I couldn’t bear the guilt. Everywhere I looked, from dratted Miss Fletcher’s white feathers to my parents’ bewilderment at my lack of willingness to enlist.’ At Hetty’s shock he nodded. ‘Oh, yes, it was our delightful colleague who was so generous with her hat feathers! She went to be a nurse, did you know?’
‘Those poor soldiers,’ Hetty said, with feeling.
They laughed.
‘You went so abruptly.’
Peter sighed. ‘I couldn’t say good bye, Hetty, knowing I might not come back to you.’ He smiled bitterly. ‘And I so wanted to come back to you.’ He rubbed a hand over his face. ‘Once a coward, always a coward, eh? I’m so sorry.’
Hetty shook her head. ‘You were never a coward!’ she said, stoutly. ‘And there is nothing, nothing to apologise for.’ She shrugged. ‘It was the war. We were all so terribly affected, at sixes and sevens.’
‘At least you had Edward for a little while?’
‘He was a good man, but we were never really suited.’ She caught Peter’s look. ‘Have I shocked you? I think I did him, rather. I was too wild, too unfulfilled for him. I don’t think he really knew what to do with me either.’
‘And you were too young.’
‘Too unworldly. But it was what was expected of me. And I so very nearly had the chance to see some of the world with him. As an army wife,’ she added. ‘But it was cut short, like so many other marriages. Blighted lives.’
Peter frowned. ‘Has it always been blighted?’
‘Oh no,’ Hetty said, too briskly. She poured more tea. ‘Far from it. I went to London. Flora Parker, of all people, helped find me a nannying position.’
‘A nanny? I can’t imagine you as a nanny!’
Hetty stiffened. ‘I was rather good at it, don’t you know! And I finally got to see some of those places I dreamed about. The ones I thought were only for others to see.’
‘The pyramids?’ Peter asked impishly.
‘You remembered!’
‘Of course I remembered. You talked about little else.’
Hetty swirled tea around her cup. ‘No, she admitted, regret staining her voice, ‘I never got to visit Egypt. The family with whom I travelled the most enjoyed the Riviera and the States. But I enjoyed it, nonetheless. I still hear from the children.’ She smiled warmly at him. She might be unused to having guests in her little cottage, but she was enjoying the company of this one so very much.
‘You were always good with children, as I recall.’ Peter grinned.
‘As were you. Did you go back to it? Teaching?’
Peter nodded. ‘I did. I came back to the school after the war. Ended up as head teacher. Married eventually. Had a life.’ He took Hetty’s hand again. ‘I asked about you, but no one seemed to know anything about you or what had happened to the family.’
‘The Parkers bought the house after the aunts died, but it needed too much work. They didn’t keep it very long, their hearts weren’t in it. I don’t think they ever really got over the death of their son. And then…well, there was very little to keep me here, so I went to London.’
‘But you came back.’
‘I did. I’ve been living here for ten years. I love it. I enjoy my garden, I love the birds that visit, the squirrels and the view too, of course. And it’s not too far from the places where I was happiest. Delamere. The school. I finally have a place to call my own after all these years. What could be better after travelling the world than to come home and put my own slippers in front of my own fire.’ She looked at him, the young girl emerging from its mask of age. ‘Did you never think to look me up, if you were still in the area?’
‘Hetty, are you flirting with me?’
She laughed. ‘Maybe.’ She removed her hand from his and sat back in reproof. ‘I haven’t decided whether to forgive you for not writing, never letting me know you’d survived. I wondered, you know.’
Peter was silent. ‘I regret that deeply, Hetty,’ he said, eventually. ‘You have no idea how much.’ He took a breath. ‘I wasn’t well…afterwards. Maybe I wasn’t well throughout the war. How could I explain the horror of it?’ He shook his head. ‘I had no words. I still don’t.’
‘Was it your leg wound?’ Hetty asked, knowing it was so much more than that.
He nodded. ‘And…other things.’ He looked up at her. ‘Another life blighted, eh?’
‘Oh, my dear. I’m so sorry.’ This time it was Hetty who reached across the table. ‘But you recovered? You married?’
‘I did. To a wonderful woman called Naomi.’ Peter gave Hetty an embarrassed look. ‘She was my nurse in the field hospital.’ He shrugged at the cliché.
‘Oh, Peter!’
They laughed again.
‘She helped me through some very black times. She was a saint. I owe her my sanity.’ He sobered abruptly. ‘She died some years ago.’
This time Hetty’s ‘Oh Peter’ had a very different tone.
‘Don’t be sorry. She had a long illness. In a way it was a release when she went.’
‘And children?’ Hetty couldn’t quite keep the envy from her voice. How she would have loved having Peter’s children.
‘No. We were never blessed.’ A sigh. ‘But I dedicated my life to the children of others. It was nearly as fulfilling.’
‘Of course.’ Hetty understood that only too well. ‘And where are you living now?’
‘Worcester. I have a house with a view of the river.’
Hetty leaned back, making her chair creak. ‘So here we are. Two people at the end of two busy lives.’
‘The end? Rubbish, woman, you’ve got years to go yet.’
Hetty giggled, young again. ‘I’m seventy-one next year.’
‘As I said,’ he drained his teacup and put it back on its saucer, with a decisive chink, ‘a mere youngster. We’ve got lots of time to catch up with one another.’
Hetty looked at him. Her beloved, long-lost Peter. ‘Friends again, then?’ She took hold of his hands. She remembered them well. Thin-fingered but warm and capable.
Peter returned her gaze. ‘Oh, I think it’s time for more than friendship, don’t you? I think we’ve both waited long enough.’
‘I do, Peter, my darling,’ she said, on a sigh full of longing. ‘But I’m not sure I deserve it. I have something to say first. It’s something I’ve spent a long time feeling guilty about. I’m worried you may not feel quite the same about me when I’ve told you.’
‘You can talk to me about anything, Hetty, you know that.’ Peter smiled. ‘Just take your time and tell me.’
So she did.
Chapter 33
They ended up going to the pub.
Again.
They always ended up going to the pub. It wasn’t that Rachel really minded, it was just she would have liked to have gone somewhere different occasionally. Gabe didn’t see it that way. The last thing he wanted to do, he reasoned, was get all dolled up and drive miles after a long day at work. And Rachel had to concede he had a point. He was working harder than ever and trying to get as much outside work done while the weather held.
So Rachel stifled her resentment, shrugged on a thin jacket and took his hand.
A dry, gusty wind blew as they strolled down the track. It blew the orange clay dust into their hair and eyes and irritated Rachel further. It seemed even the wind hadn’t the energy to get going properly, as if it too had had enough of the endless hot weather.
The summer heat was continuing into September and the papers were hysterical with the promise of an Indian summer reaching well into October. Tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, Rachel longed for a cool breeze and some crisp air. As if to echo her thoughts, a sparrow cheeped dejectedly from the hedge, no energy to do any more. Rachel wondered if it was a descendant of Indignant, now absent from her windowsill.
‘You alright?’ Gabe looked down at her.
‘Fine. Why?’
<
br /> ‘You’re a bit quiet.’
‘No, I’m fine.’
‘It wasn’t the mess I left in the kitchen, then?’
Gabe had made himself fish-finger sandwiches when getting in late the night before. He’d left crumbs and tomato ketchup all over the table. He hadn’t told her where he had been, either. She was pretty sure it hadn’t been work. Charles had been like this, when he’d begun seeing Lorna.
‘No,’ Rachel lied. ‘It didn’t bother me.’
Now Gabe knew there was something wrong. Rachel always blew up at him about such things. And his liking for tea at all times of day and night. And his preference for white bread. And cold lager instead of red wine. Rachel ate wholemeal brown, red wine and sought out organic vegetables. Such differences didn’t bother Gabe, but they seemed to increasingly irritate Rachel. Then there was the paper he chose to read and the television programmes he liked to watch. It was just as well they were so good in bed, Gabe grinned to himself, because they were dangerously incompatible out of it.
‘Why are you smiling?’
‘I was just thinking, that’s a good old table, that one you’ve got in the kitchen. Solid oak. I could maybe have a look at it, rub it down, re-stain it. I reckon it’d come up a treat.’
Well, anything would look better than tomato ketchup stains.’
‘Aw, Rach, I’m really sorry. I meant to tidy up, I really did. It’s just that I didn’t get in ’til gone eleven and I didn’t want to wake you with all my clattering around.’
That his lack of cleaning up stemmed from consideration for her further irritated Rachel. She bit her lip. What was it with her lately? Every move he made, everything he said or did made her nerves stand on end. She really liked him, she did. She loved the things they did in bed. She had let him into her life, into her heart. Was he going to trample all over it as Charles had?
It’s just that you’re too used to doing things your own way; that’s all it is, she admonished herself silently. Compromise, that’s what’s needed in a relationship. But she was no good at compromise. And Gabe was wonderful. Kind helpful, considerate. Mostly. It shouldn’t matter that he was untidy and uncultured; that he didn’t know best Colombian from milky Nescafé, that he ate chocolate digestives in bed, that he sometimes forgot to take off his muddy boots before coming into the house.
That he often disappeared without explanation.
He was loving, gentle, fiercely passionate in bed – at this, Rachel felt the familiar sexual tug pull at her. The sex was amazing. Mind-blowing. Exhilarating. Even now, simply walking alongside him, the image of his lean, brown, eager body came to her. She wanted to leap on him, push him into the nearest hedge and take him there and then. She yearned for him. Craved him. But could you base a whole relationship on sex? Tim, when she’d discussed it with him, had said an adamant yes and what was she whining about? And that had been said in between the accusations that she didn’t recognise a good thing when she saw it. His vocabulary had been slightly more Anglo-Saxon, but that had been the general gist.
Rachel stole a glance at Gabe. At his well-defined cheekbones and strong nose. At the lips which could drive her crazy with desire and had done things to her which made her blush.
But she needed to trust him too.
‘Sorry,’ she said and lifted his hand to kiss it. ‘In a foul mood. Work didn’t go well today.’ A little white lie.
Gabe kissed her temple. ‘You’re too hard on yourself. Ease up a bit. Another day tomorrow.’
‘I suppose, although I’m behind with the fairy tales illustrations. Gabe?’
‘Yes, Rach?’
‘The idea about the table, it sounds great. If you have time to do it, that is.’
‘For you? Anything.’ He held the pub door open for her. ‘Here we are, then. What are you having?’
‘Wine, what else?’
‘What else, indeed?’ He grinned at her and kissed her full on the lips. The kiss deepened. Intensified. The dance of love, of desire, practised well but one that was never tired of.
For a moment, they stood in a heated embrace and then Kev’s wolf whistle, as he barged past them, broke them apart.
Two weeks later, the scene was set. Candles on the kitchen table, spaghetti bolognaise wafting garlic and herb scents, garlic bread warming in the oven and a bottle of Chianti open and ready.
Rachel went outside to cool down a little. It had got hot in the kitchen while she cooked. She leaned against the front door and enjoyed the evening. The nights were drawing in and there was a bite of autumn in the air. Her garden seemed strangely still and quiet, blanketed around her. Looking up she realised the chestnut tree, where the swallows had gathered, was empty. Hetty had gone too. Although Rachel had a strong sense Hetty approved of Gabe, she wondered if she didn’t like them living together?
‘I’m not sure he’s actually moved in, Hetty,’ she said to the emptiness. ‘Not properly. He comes and goes when he wants. You wouldn’t approve of that at all, would you?’ With a sigh, she added, ‘I just hope you both agree with what I’ve got planned for this evening.’ Shivering, she retraced her steps.
Back in the kitchen, Rachel adjusted a fork to an infinite degree and smiled. She wanted this night to be perfect. She’d pulled in all her contacts in the art world and it had worked – she’d got Gabe a stand at the prestigious arts and crafts fayre in Olympia in November. She couldn’t wait to see his reaction.
This might be the push in the right direction that Gabe needed. He had far more talent than his current occupation merited. With his skills and the feel he had for wood, he could go places. And the fayre was the ideal stepping stone. She braced herself as she heard his footsteps in the hall.
‘Rach? You around? There’s that French film you wanted to see. It’s on at the Courtyard.’ Gabe stopped abruptly. ‘Woo hoo,’ he said in appreciation. ‘What’s going on here?’ He sniffed. ‘Spag bog? My all-time favourite.’ He came to her and threw his arms around her waist, half lifting her to his lips. ‘And don’t tell me you’ve done that garlicky bread stuff again?’
Rachel nodded against his kiss.
‘Died and gone to heaven.’ He began to sit down, saw Rachel’s frown and retreated into the hall to take off his work boots. ‘Don’t worry,’ he called back, ‘I’m not too muddy. Bit dusty, but no mud.’ He poked his head around the kitchen door. ‘Can I come in now, miss?’
Rachel laughed. ‘Sit down, I’ll get it served.’
Gabe loped across the kitchen and tore off great strips of kitchen towel. Rachel squashed her irritation, but he caught her look. ‘Aw lovely, you know how messy I can get with spag bog.’
‘There are napkins,’ Rachel said primly, she couldn’t help herself. She put the bowl of sauce on the pot stand.
‘Wouldn’t want to ruin your white napkins,’ Gabe said. ‘This’ll do fine.’ And with that, he shoved a corner of the square of kitchen roll down his t-shirt.
Rachel tried not to wince and passed over Gabe’s bowl of pasta. ‘Help yourself to sauce, but be careful, the casserole dish is hot.’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ Gabe said cheerfully and began to eat with gusto.
‘Wine?’
‘Rather have a can of Stella, but don’t worry, I’ll start with wine.’
She watched him as he took a great gulp. He looked exhausted. ‘Hard day?’
Gabe put his glass down and nodded wearily. ‘The Hallidays are quibbling about the bill and still haven’t paid and Mrs Sutherland-Harvey doesn’t like the layout for the conservatory.’
‘I can’t believe you’re still doing work for that woman.’
Gabe gave a short laugh and crunched his strong white teeth into the garlic bread. ‘She’s never happy with anything, which means she wants to change everything all the time, which means more work for us. But at least she pays her bills on time. Never had any problem getting money out of Mrs S-H.’ Gabe waved the piece of bread in defence of his argument and scattered crumbs over the table.
&
nbsp; Rachel pushed aside her bowl of pasta. ‘Wouldn’t you like to do something else?’
Gabe stiffened. They’d had this conversation many times over. He knew Rachel wanted him to pursue a more artistic career. What she didn’t seem to realise was he needed to eat as well. And there was no market for his fancy bits and pieces of wood around here. What folk wanted was craftsmen-built kitchen units or oak staircases. And he couldn’t leave the family firm. Not now.
‘Some day,’ he said, guardedly.
Rachel fished a letter out of her handbag. ‘I’ve got something for you.’ She unfolded it, smoothed it out with nervous fingers and slid it across the table.
Gabe frowned. ‘What’s this?’ He scanned the contents and the frown deepened.
‘I’ve pulled all the strings I have. Tim helped; his partner has a few contacts and I’ve got you a stand at the British Exhibition of Arts and Crafts at Olympia. London,’ she added, as Gabe looked blank.
‘I know where Olympia is. Funnily enough.’ He looked at her. ‘What have you done, Rachel?’
‘I thought you’d be pleased.’
‘And what am I supposed to put on this stand. In Olympia. In London?’
‘Well, that oak piece you’ve been working on…and…’ Rachel faltered. She was beginning to realise she might have made a mistake.
‘That’s right, what else?’
‘But you’re always working on something. Other smaller things.’
‘Oh yes, odds and sods, nothing I’d want to show anyone. Nothing I’d care to exhibit in Olympia. In ruddy London.’
‘Don’t shout, Gabe.’
‘Well, how the fuck did you think I’d react? Didn’t you once think to discuss this with me first? Didn’t it occur to you that I might not have anything to show?’
‘No, I…but there’s time.’ Rachel stabbed a finger at the letter. ‘The show isn’t until November.’
Gabe jumped up, making his chair screech across the quarry tiles. ‘Christ, Rachel, I can’t just drop everything and…and…create things. I’ve got a living to earn.’ He shook his wrist at her, pointing to his watch and making her flinch. ‘It’s gone nine now and I’ve only just come back from the Sutherland-Harvey job. When the hell do you think I’ve got time to fit in anything else?’
