In the Company of Strangers

by Liz Byrski

  In the hours since they first met Ruby has agonised over her dishevelled state at the time, and she has hated herself for caring again, after so long, about what a man might think of the way she looks. Today she is wearing her best jeans and a white linen shirt, but the surprise has made her blush, and she feels her hair slipping around, messy as ever.

  ‘Do you make a habit of this?’ she asks, unsure whether she has struck the right note of amusement.

  ‘Creeping up on women, you mean?’ he asks. ‘Sure do, at every possible opportunity. I thought I might grow out of it when I got past sixty but that was some years ago and nothin’s changed. She’s the real business, this one, don’t you think?’ he asks, indicating the singer.

  ‘She certainly is, what an amazing voice.’ She pauses, trying to get herself together, to stop feeling like a teenager, to behave as a calm and rational woman of her age should behave. ‘Have you settled in all right? Is there anything else you need for your cottage?’

  ‘Not a thing, but Declan said it would be fine to walk on down to the house when I felt like some peace and quiet. And I was feeling kinda nostalgic for my last visit here. Catherine and I had some great conversations. It’s hard to believe she’s gone.’

  There is a roar from the audience as the last notes of the song fade away and the singer responds, bowing first, then waving, before focusing once again on the microphone and her next number.

  ‘Would you like to come across to the house for a coffee?’ Ruby asks. ‘I can close the office for half an hour. It’s quieter than I expected – everyone’s out there enjoying themselves.’

  ‘Well that’d be great,’ Jackson says. ‘I was trying to avoid the café. It’s a real nice place but I nearly got mobbed in there this morning, and it’s kinda hard to escape. The boys, my boys, they’re cool with all that stuff but I’m so over it.’

  ‘Come on then,’ Ruby says. She collects her keys from the desk, closes the door and hangs up the sign that directs callers to the house, and together they walk along the lavender lined pathway to the back door.

  ‘I suppose this is all familiar then?’ she says, leading the way into the kitchen.

  ‘Sure is,’ Jackson says, hesitating briefly in the doorway, looking around. ‘Such a beautiful place, and it looks much the same, just like Catherine had it.’

  ‘We haven’t really had time to think about doing anything to the house,’ Ruby says, hearing the nervousness in her own voice. ‘Declan and I came to this as total amateurs. We were both taken by surprise, not only by Catherine’s death but by finding out we were suddenly joint owners and business partners. Catherine had been very sick for some time and the place was really neglected. We’ve been struggling to get it up and running again and keep our heads above water.’

  Jackson pulls out a chair and leans on the back of it. ‘Well, it looks like you’re doing a fine job. That little café is a winner and getting this show on the road can’t have been easy. You know, I loved this house the first time I saw it. It’s gracious and real homely too, a fine mix. Catherine and I spent several evenings in that lovely old room with the big fireplace. “Come on down to the house when you need some privacy,” she told me, and we sat in there and talked like we’d known each other a long time. That happens sometimes, don’t you think?’

  He looks at her intently, searching her face as if seeking an equally intense response, and Ruby, caught unawares by his intensity, flushes and struggles to respond.

  ‘It does,’ she says finally and, unable to hold his gaze, continues spooning coffee into the plunger. Catherine would have taken you into the lounge,’ she continues, pouring water onto the coffee, and she turns towards him, leaning back against the bench top. ‘It was Catherine’s favourite room and … it’s quite sad, really, but sometime before she died she moved everything, including her bed, in there and packed all her personal things into boxes. It became her den.’ She stops suddenly as grief rises in her throat and she feels her eyes filling with tears. ‘Sorry,’ she says, shaking her head and pressing the tears away with the back of her hand. ‘Sorry, I didn’t expect that.’ She gives him a sheepish smile of embarrassment and notices that he too seems moved.

  ‘Me neither,’ he says, clearing his throat, pausing before he goes on. ‘I can only imagine how you must feel, being her oldest friend. I only knew her over a few days but we got on real well. I don’t mind getting old, Ruby, but I mind losing people. She was a real special lady and I have some fine memories of my short time here.’

  ‘Would you like to go in there?’ Ruby asks. It seems right – what point is there in keeping it locked now? Declan, Alice, Todd – they should all get to use the room. She’ll ask Todd to help her move the boxes when the festival’s over. Catherine’s memory can be equally well served by sharing the place with people who felt connected to her. ‘We’ve been keeping it locked,’ she explains as they head down the passage. ‘Todd and I cleaned it up and I’ve just been going through some of her personal things.’

  ‘Todd’s a fine young man,’ Jackson says. ‘Smart and got a real nice manner with him. He’s gonna be an asset to you here.’

  ‘He certainly is.’ Ruby unlocks the door. ‘Todd and I are the only people who’ve been in here since Catherine died,’ she says. ‘I’ll open the windows for a while. I just can’t get rid of this smell. Each time I come in here I open the windows and spray it with air freshener but it won’t go away. I can’t work out what it is and where it’s coming from. Come on in.’

  Turning back from the windows she watches as Jackson, hesitating still in the doorway, steps inside looking around, sniffs the air and walks slowly through the room, running his hand along the edge of the table, and then crossing to the fireplace, resting his palm flat against the beautiful old stone for a moment before leaning down to look at the pine cones stacked in the grate. He puts a hand out to steady himself and gets down on one knee, tilting his head up towards the chimney, sniffing again. When he straightens up there is a broad grin on his face.

  ‘It’s in the chimney,’ he says, pointing. ‘A nice little stash right up there.’

  Ruby looks at him and then at the fireplace. ‘Really? That’s where it’s coming from? But what is it, d’you think?’

  Jackson throws back his head and laughs out loud. ‘Hey now, Ruby, you’re sure as hell not gonna tell me you don’t know what that smell is. You and I are the same generation, and I don’t know about you but I was smoking weed before I even tried tobacco.’

  Ruby stares at him, ‘No … is it? Oh my God, it is, of course it is. It’s so long ago I’d forgotten what it smells like … it was just familiar but I couldn’t …’ She sticks her hand up the chimney.

  ‘Here, let me do that,’ Jackson says, ‘you don’t want to get dirty.’ And he edges her aside, thrusts his arm up the chimney and pulls out a plastic bag stuffed with marijuana. ‘That’s some stash,’ he says, laughing as he brushes soot from his sleeve. ‘Do you think it was Catherine’s?’

  ‘I suppose it must have been,’ Ruby says, looking in amazement at the bag. ‘It’s not closed properly, that’s why I could smell it. But if it was Catherine’s, where would she have got it and why? She never really took to it when we were young. Neither of us did, but especially Catherine. And she’d banned smoking here, so I don’t see …’

  ‘And no one else was using this room?’

  She shakes her head, turning the bag over in her hands. ‘Well, only Todd, he was coming in here to keep her company and read to her. She wouldn’t even let the cleaner in apparently.’

  ‘So could it have been Todd?’

  ‘No, no. Certainly not with Catherine’s knowledge, anyway. Besides, he told me she’d told him that if she ever caught him smoking dope she’d ban him from Benson’s. Todd adored Catherine, he wouldn’t have taken any risks with her friendship.’

  Jackson slides down off the edge of the hearth to sit beside her on the floor.

  ‘Well then someone else got it for her,’
he says. ‘Medicinal purposes, maybe, that’s my bet. There’s a whole lot of people swear by it. If Catherine was in pain—’

  ‘Of course,’ Ruby cuts in. ‘That’s what it must be. When I cleared up in here I found an ashtray with some cigarette ends, hand rolled. I just assumed she had a visitor who smoked. It did seem odd …’ Her voice trails away at the sound of approaching footsteps.

  ‘I thought it must be you in here,’ Paula says, popping her head around the half-open door. She stops suddenly, clearly taken aback by the sight of Ruby and Jackson sitting side by side on the floor in front of the fireplace, surrounded by traces of soot. ‘Oh, I … er … I didn’t realise you had company.’ She is wearing a t-shirt with Princess Kylie written on it in pink sequins, white jeans and a pink baseball cap with ‘Kylie’ in more pink sequins on the peak.

  ‘Some sort of blockage in the chimney,’ Ruby says, getting to her feet. ‘You’re looking very festive today, Paula.’

  Paula’s eyes dart back and forth around the room as though searching for something and eventually end up on Jackson, who is still sitting crossed legged on the floor. ‘I’m really getting into the festival,’ she says, smiling at him and apparently registering who he is. ‘You aren’t … yes you are, you’re Jackson Crow, aren’t you?’ she says, stepping forward, but Ruby, on her feet now, blocks her path and steers her back to the open door.

  ‘Mr Crow’s looking for some peace and quiet, Paula,’ she says. ‘I’ve just made some coffee. Why don’t you go into the kitchen and pour it for us and one for yourself, if you like. We’ll join you in a minute or two.’

  ‘Right-oh,’ Paula says, craning her neck past Ruby to get another look at Jackson. ‘I’m on my way, coffee coming up. See you shortly,’ and with a flirtatious little wave to Jackson, she turns and heads off to the kitchen.

  Ruby breathes a deep sigh of relief, closes the door and leans back against it as Jackson gets to his feet and picks up the bag which he’d hidden behind him.

  ‘Wow,’ he says, ‘Princess Kylie? Who was that?’

  ‘Paula. Our cleaner,’ Ruby says. ‘Probably the best cleaner in the south west but not the easiest person to have around. Lord knows what she thought you and I were doing sitting on the floor all sooty. But it’s a bit of a worry. If this is Catherine’s and she used it there’s no way she could have got it herself. We need to find out who got it for her and make sure they don’t bring drugs in here again.’

  Jackson bends down to brush some soot back from the edge of the fireplace with his hand. ‘Well I don’t know any of your staff,’ he says, ‘except for Todd, and you’re pretty sure it’s not him. But I reckon Princess Kylie there could be a candidate.’

  ‘My thoughts exactly,’ Ruby says, tucking the stash inside one of Catherine’s boxes. ‘She’s been trying to get in here to have a look around, probably to retrieve it. But don’t say anything about it. We’re going to need to be very careful how we handle this. So could you turn your famous charm on Paula for me while you drink your coffee, so she doesn’t smell a rat?’

  ‘Sure can,’ Jackson says with a smile, opening the door for her. ‘And, Ruby, thanks for bringing me in here. I think we’re partners in crime now, but I also feel like we’re friends already.’ And as Ruby locks the door and turns back to face him, he drapes an arm casually over her shoulders. ‘So let’s go have coffee and charm the sequins off Princess Kylie.’

  Paula is over the moon. She is so chuffed as she heads out of the house kitchen that she simply has to tell someone. Jackson Crow really likes her, she can tell. He kept calling her Princess Kylie, in that sort of knowing way, like he knew there was more to her than just being a cleaner. Actually she thinks he probably fancied her – not that he could do anything about that with Ruby hovering around all the time, but you can always tell when someone fancies you, it’s like electricity, really. And best of all he’d really wanted to hear her sing.

  ‘Love to,’ he’d said. And she’d jumped up from her seat at the table to do ‘Santa Baby’. She’s watched Kylie do it on YouTube so many times that she has all the moves down pat.

  ‘Love to, Princess, but not right now. I have to get back to The Crowbars, something we have to run through, they’ll be waiting for me.’

  ‘Later then?’ she’d said, and she’d done that thing Kylie does, like she tilts her head sideways and backwards with a little toss and lifts her shoulder and looks up from under her eyelids. ‘Much later!’

  ‘Sure thing, kiddo,’ he’d said, and off he went.

  He’d given Ruby a bit of a hug on the way out but Paula could tell he really wanted to stay and watch her ‘Santa Baby’. What Paula thinks now is that she might shoot off home and do a quick run through with Kylie on YouTube, and then she can come back with her red reindeer horns, and the red mini Santa dress so she can do it for him properly. But first she has to tell someone all about it.

  Lesley, she thinks, she might just give Lesley another chance. After that near-miss in the car she probably did feel a bit rough and needed a quiet evening. Paula pulls her phone out of her pocket and dials Lesley’s number, but the phone goes straight to voicemail. She looks around her – who can she tell? Most people seem to be watching the band that’s on now, which, in Paula’s opinion, is rubbish, but there you go, some people have no discrimination. She could go over to the café but it’s not as though there’d be much point telling Alice nor that weird Leonie woman. And then she remembers Kim. Kim will be creaming herself when she hears about Jackson Crow, and Paula tugs the peak of her baseball cap down a little further like Kylie does, at a really cute angle, and heads towards the gift shop. She’s so excited the more she thinks about it that it’s almost doing her head in. She can see herself up there on the stage tonight, singing with Jackson and The Crowbars. She can hear the applause, see that great mass of people in front of the stage, cheering and begging for more. The images swirl in front of Paula’s eyes so she can hardly see where she’s going but as she passes the shop window she spots Lesley in the shop, talking to some woman who’s holding a vase. Brilliant! Kim and Lesley, two people to tell, and she hurries inside.

  There’s no sign of Kim and although Lesley looks up and smiles at her she’s still listening to the old woman with the vase, so Paula slips behind the counter and out through to the stock room. No Kim; odd that. She opens the door that links the shop to the café – no Kim there either. Despite the distraction of her forthcoming appearance on stage tonight, Paula is clear that this is not right. It’s a good thing she’s popped in because Ruby would have something to say about no one looking after the shop. Anyone could just walk in and help themselves – there’s all the jewellery, the pottery, the glassware, cards, books, anything. They could even get their hands in the till. Paula closes the door, slips back into the shop and stations herself behind the counter, just as Lesley and the other woman walk towards it.

  ‘Can I help you?’ Paula says, giving the customer the same dazzling smile she will turn on the audience. But to her amazement Lesley walks round to the back of the counter, moves a big glass paperweight out of the way and sets the vase down onto the stack of tissue paper.

  ‘That’s all right, thank you, Paula,’ she says. ‘I’ll look after this lady.’ And she turns to the customer: ‘That’s thirty-five fifty, please,’ she says, peeling the price tag off the vase. ‘Would you like me to gift wrap it for you?’

  ‘Oh yes please,’ the customer says, handing over her credit card, and as Paula reaches out to take it from her Lesley is there first.

  ‘Which account is it?’

  ‘Savings, please,’ the woman says, and Lesley is keying numbers into the machine as though she owns the place.

  ‘Excuse me!’ Paula says. ‘I don’t know what you think you’re doing but—’

  Lesley turns to her and smiles. ‘Not now, Paula,’ she says, sounding like she’s a school mistress talking to a naughty child. And off she goes chatting away, wrapping up the vase in purple tissue and tying it
with a white bow, as though she does it every day.

  Paula blinks a lot, struggles to get her head back from the stage and into the shop. The images are mixing up now. Lesley on the stage? No, that’s not right. But she’s here in the shop like she’s taking it over.

  ‘So what the fuck do you think you’re doing, Lesley?’ she asks, almost before the customer is out of the door. ‘You can’t just barge in here and start serving people. Good thing I came in when I did. Ruby would have a fit if she knew.’

  ‘Everything’s fine here, Paula,’ Lesley says quietly, straightening things on the counter. ‘Kim is sick and I’m running the shop until she gets back.’

  Paula is appalled. She’s so horrified that she feels giddy. She just has to hang on to herself because she’d really like to punch Lesley in her posh, self-satisfied face.

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since this morning. I was here when they got the news about Kim so I volunteered to fill in.’

  Paula’s head is spinning now and her face is burning.

  ‘There are some boxes in the storeroom that need to be unpacked if you want to give me a hand,’ Lesley continues. ‘And the glass cabinet could do with dusting.’

  A big steel band grips Paula’s head. ‘Liar,’ she yells, ‘this is my job, I’m taking over so if they’d wanted someone in the shop they would’ve got me. You’ve got no chance, and don’t you even fucking dream of getting up on that stage. Just get out of here right now before—’

  ‘Something wrong?’ Alice asks, appearing in the connecting doorway.

  ‘Something wrong?’ Paula says. All she can see now is this red mist before her eyes and a great wave of fury and hurt is welling up inside her. ‘Yes, if you must know, you nosy cow.’ She sees Alice exchange a glance with Lesley, like they’re in some sort of conspiracy.

  ‘Take it easy, Paula,’ Alice says, standing by the big glass cabinet, all sort of soft and calm like she’s talking to a kid, and Paula’s head starts to explode and she wants to smash them both, smash the stupid anxious expressions on their faces, smash everything, and she grabs the big paperweight with the orange bubbles and hurls it at Alice.